A Hug for Harry

By Maryanne Hamilton

There are few things in life more heartwarming than to be welcomed by a cat.

~Tay Hohoff

"Mrs. Hamilton, I'm Harry. The rental office sent me over to put up your ceiling fan," announced the man through the screen door of my apartment.

Oreo and Cookie, my feline roommates, scattered to find hiding places from the suspicious looking person in khaki work clothes. Riding across the country caged in a car was unnerving. Having every room filled with boxes, and strange looking birds and trees in the yard was frightening. And now there was a stranger invading their new home in Florida.

"That's great. If you need to get into the attic crawl space, there is a pull-down staircase in the closet," I explained, as I led him to the back bedroom where the fan was to be installed. The curious cats followed at a safe distance, peeking in from the living room to see who this man was and what he was doing.

Harry took off his hat and scratched his bald head as he surveyed the job and my cluttered bedroom. "I'll get the fan and a ladder from the truck while you finish up in here."

"Nice looking cats," Harry remarked, returning to the living room. Oreo dove behind the sofa and Cookie scrambled to the top of a mountain of boxes.

Oreo and Cookie were littermates whose mother belonged to a coworker in Tennessee, from where I had just moved. Rumor was that their daddy was a roadie with a famous country music star.

They were a day old when we saw them for the first time, curled up in the back of a closet where they were born. My daughter picked Oreo's name because of his sleek black-and-white fur. After we got them home, Cookie seemed an obvious name for his sister. Cookie was matte-gray with a stub tail, while Oreo had what seemed like an extra long tail. They were easygoing, but each had a unique personality.

"Harry, if you have a key, I'm going to head out to work. But I need to warn you about the cats," I said, searching through a box for my shoes. "The gray cat, Cookie, is a climber. If you go into the attic, please be sure to pull the stairs up behind you so she can't follow you up there. She loves to explore, and who knows how long it would take us to get her back down."

"No problem." Harry chuckled.

"The black-and-white cat is Oreo," I continued, anticipating the usual reaction. "This may sound strange, but he may try to jump from the floor to your chest to give you a hug. He doesn't have front claws, so he won't hurt you."

Without saying a word, Harry stopped in his tracks and looked at me doubtfully. Shaking his head, he continued walking out the front door.

A few minutes later Harry came back in.

"Huh!" I heard him say from the living room.

I looked in and saw an amazed Harry. Oreo had jumped on him and was clinging to him now, with his paws wrapped around Harry's neck and his head tucked under Harry's chin. It was a giant hospitable hug, letting our returning visitor know that he was welcome.

"He really does do that!" Harry grinned, petting the purring Oreo.

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