Our world was one of color and music, popular company and exquisite parties that wound around the hands of time be it day or night, sun or rain, depression or at the height of jubilation. Everyone knew us and we them and we were happy in knowing that no one was a stranger, not one of us didn't know what to expect and we liked it that way.
Years back we danced, mated and carried on with wild abandon that would put to shame even our ancestors who brought us forth and gave us what we are. If they were watching surely they wished with all of their might up in the vast lands of milk and cream that they had been us, that they had lived as we lived, in a time when cats ruled and at their forefront, the Della Vinci family who were at the forefront of our society, the tom cat Foreigner and our Queen Eve.
On our street things were beautiful and serene, enjoyable and alive until our world was turned upside down and things changed.........
There was someone who came who turned our world on itself and destroyed what we all held dear. They attacked us not directly but in subtle secretive ways that unraveled all that we had built. In some cases they turned us on each other.
The life we once had faded from existence, changed and altered in the blink of an eye and the family....all of them were lost....
Light coruscating over my closed eyelids, filling my head with a constant shade of orangey yellow that invaded my mind. My head throbbed with pain that had no reason, no provocation that I could attribute it to. What had happened to cause it? And what could possibly bring such agony as I felt pounding through every corner of my body?
I felt like I was on fire, one that didn't burn me but that pulsated and ran through my bloodstream with every beat of my heart.
Where was I? What was I? What chain of events had happened before this pain, before me laying on the cold wooden surface?
Dimly I was aware of the lapping steady crash of water somewhere just below where I lay, it's docile movement creating a complex myriad of sounds that attacked the inner fur of my ears and at the same time soothed me more then any warmth that I could have been afforded at that time. My thoughts drifted back through a foggy haze and I mewled pitifully, trying to remember something, anything that would jog recognition.
There were flashes, scents that rolled vividly through my thoughts and teased me, sights that were familiar but strange at the same time. Did they belong to me? Did I belong to them? Had I once had a name that I could readily have handy to tell others and to give myself a sense of identity? Why couldn't I remember it now when I needed it? It didn't make sense and it tore me apart to feel so lonely, so disconnected from anything that I was the stranger the one who didn't belong. It would've been scary enough to be a piece of the puzzle with the puzzle changing and shifting around me, even if it did constantly because I'd have a base core, something to hold onto. The fact that the playing field was invisible and I didn't know what I was or what I was intended to do now that I had woken to being in the world was terrifying.
Whoever I had been before I could tell that I was self reliant and that I was used to standing up for myself and figuring things out or at least working things out to some conclusive point. I was a thinker. The realization gave me comfort. A small shred of confidence flickered within my chest, blooming into a strength and then I groaned as it turned into a physical pain.
Liquid rocketed up from my lungs and I shivered my belly clenching as I coughed up salt water, the acrid tang of it not leaving my mouth, only hanging there. How I wished I could rid myself of it.
My sides shook with the ragged breaths I took in and let out as I sputtered and gasped for what felt like the second time in however long I had been here.
The furthest memory within my grasp was bobbing in the waves, drowning, my limbs tiring, the energy in them being replaced by weakness and the cold darkness that made my fear spike to a peak although it did welcome me and bear down on me with a cruel invitation. Bubbles danced upward in front of my vision, leaving my muzzle. Each one was precious signifying less air, less chance that I would resurface and survive and be able to work things out. Now that I had I needed to remember!
My eyes slid part way open as I lay on the wooden planks sunbathing and beating myself up inside. I couldn't for the life in me figure it out and each time I tried my skull felt like it was about to explode, bursts of violet obscuring my vision.
This had to be the most painful relaxation I'd ever taken part in, as if I had been given a choice...
I was sure without a doubt that it had been some series of events or a single event that had brought me to where I was now. It had to be. I was determined to find out how and why.
Once again I allowed myself to drift into sleeps welcoming arms, lulled by the sunlight and the few sounds of life that hummed steadily in my ears. All of it aided me in my quest for further rest and then it all faded and became a yard bathed in the moonlight of a dream. The evenly cut grass at my paws moved even though there was no wind. Nearby I could make out another cat sitting near the base of a hemlock flicking it's tail to and fro as if contemplating and measuring how long it took to make the movement. My mind couldn't see his or her face and yet a voice called me forward.
"Denali. Come back Denali. Come back home to us where you belong...."
I padded forward sniffing at the cat and trying to make out whether the voice was coming from it or from somewhere else.
"Who's Denali? And who are you" I mewled?
"Denali is you silly. Now come home to us. Come home Denali."
