When Ayn saw Whiskers it was as if she was looking at a reflection of her own spirit.
The cats were in cages, at the back of the store, below a dimly lit neon sign. The sign said cats. As you walked into the feline area the strange feeling of defeat crept over you. Cats were curled into the corners of the cages. They hid from the light and hid from the children as they screamed and hurled themselves around the store.
All the cats were meager, shabby, and distracted. All except one.
Whiskers sat at the front of his cage. Staring into Ayn’s eyes. It sat upright, proud. Whiskers did not meow, purr, or put on some gimmick for attention. He confidently looked out from his cage at the people in the area outside. It gave you the feeling that it was not Whiskers that was in the cage, looking out at the world, but instead that he was looking through the cold grey bars into the cage in which you were kept.
Whiskers was pure white. Not cute, not fluffy, but brilliantly white like a star incinerating gas and burning hot enough to destroy anything that came within a thousand miles.
Amongst the other mangy cats, Whiskers was perfectly groomed. So white that it made it impossible to imagine that dirt could ever taint his perfection.
A small blonde girl caught sight of Whiskers and was enchanted. She called out to her mother, “This is the one!” The girl’s mother, the housewife of a long time bureaucrat, made eye contact with whiskers and shivered. She replied, “God no, not that one.” Whiskers reminded her of her youth, of dreams, possibilities, of life as it ought to be lived. It made her terribly uncomfortable.
From the moment Ayn saw Whiskers she knew she would possess him. It gave her great pleasure, the thought of owning such a perfect animal.
Ayn found the store manager and paid the forty-six dollar and twenty-six cent price for Whiskers. The store manager opened the cage and reached in to pick Whiskers up. Whiskers turned sharply, violently, and hissed at the manager with his teeth bared. The manager hesitated, stepped back and turned his dim glance towards Ayn.
Ayn stepped forward, not hesitating for a moment. She stopped directly in front of Whiskers. Then she picked him up. Whiskers did not fight but did not submit. He sat in Ayn’s arms upright, proud and independent.
Ayn looked down at her new cat, and at that moment Whiskers stared up into her eyes, defiant. The look was a message, it said, “you may own my body, by you will never own my spirit.” Ayn laughed rapturously.
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