A kitten found all cut and bruised up on the side of the road. Not really an ideal way to get a new pet, right? When you’re told you’re getting a new pet, you think you’re getting it from a shelter or a farm or something generally sweet. My story isn’t like that. How I got my cat, Sunshine, wasn’t anywhere near that nice. But I wouldn’t change it for the world.
I was only five. Doing what five year olds do, I was playing with my toys. The phone rang and my grandma answered it. I heard a series of “yep’s”, “really?”, and finally I heard, “we’ll be over.” I looked at her with curiosity. My grandma told my mom and me that we were going over to my aunt’s house because she had a cat that my great grandpa needed to fix up. So we locked up the house and headed out.
We pulled in and I got out of the car, anxious to see this cat. I saw my aunt and cousins huddled around what appeared to be a crate of some sort. As I got closer I saw that it was a cat carrier. Not a big fancy one. It looked like it used to be white but now it was faded to a yellowish cream color. I looked through the holes of the red door to see a tiny terrified kitten, no older than five months old. The cat, as scrawny as can be, looked like it had long, soft, black and white fur. Its back and tail were all black with only a stripe of white up each of its hind quarters. The head and ears were black, with the black moving around to envelop the entire left eye and only half of the right. And then the rest was white. But what really caught my eye was the blood caked into its fur. It had gashes all along its tiny frame. And its green eyes held absolute terror as it tried its best to sink itself into the back corner of the carrier. The sight in front of me pulled on my heart strings. Despite all the ugly gashes and blood caked in its fur, I fell in love with the kitten.
Talking brought me back to reality. My aunt was explaining how they found the poor soul. They were outside when they saw a van speed by and throw something out the window. In shock, they watched. Once the car was gone, they walked up to the road and saw a little bundle of fur lying on the road. In complete shock, they picked up the kitten and put it in the cat carrier. Then, the called my grandma.
The cat never ended up going to my great grandpa’s. I insisted I wanted it. So Instead my grandma nurtured it and she’s been with me ever since. She’s been through everything with me. From the time my grandpa passed away up till I got hit by the car last year in 2013. She’s my rock and it’s her way of thanking me for taking her in when she needed someone the most.