Twisted

He:

  Go!

  My spirit crushed and humble

  No feeling left, no lust

  Abandoned here

  To crumble…

  Not strong enough to blow

  These fading marks

  Of footfalls,

  Your footfalls, off my dust

  She:

  I will not let you blur

  These traces in my mind

  Of the way we were

  Our limbs entwined

  I miss you, still resist you,

  Forgive me, for I must

  Gather you so gently

  From the dust.

  The Art of Dust I

  The Art of Dust II

  The One Who Never Leaves

  She sits at the edge of the crooked old couch, knees pressed tightly together, and I can sense a little tremor traveling up her spine. I try to calm her down, which is to say, I clear my throat, after which I proceed to explain to her—in my softest, most polite tone—that contrary to popular belief, feline creatures do not have nine lives.

  She stares at me, terrified.

  As well she should be. Yes, both of us know, all too well: she is the stranger around here. She would be gone before the day is over. I am the one who never leaves.

  “Really,” I insist, over her silence. “There’s no such thing as nine lives.”

  She leans back, sinking deeper and deeper into the frayed cushion, not doing much of anything except breathing heavily. Naturally, it annoys me. Hell, it sucks the air out of my lungs. The danger of oxygen deprivation does not occur to me at first. But if there is one thing I have come to hate more than her breathing heavily, it is me, having to hold my breath.

  So many months have passed since I smelled fresh air. Come to think of it, it must have been years since I crossed the threshold, since I stepped outside, into the sunlight, which—as I remember—is so warm, so gloriously magnificent. Yes, it must have been decades since I sunk my paws into the moist ground outside, or lifted my eyes to the blue sky, or chased birds. I remember how, having caught them, I would ruffle their feathers, and lick their throats ever so playfully.

  Being locked here I have managed to squash these memories. I have grown quite resigned, somehow, to the stale perfume rising here, from these blankets, which she now gathers around her.

  Trust me, I don’t miss the fresh air anymore. Out of boredom I have lost the urge to prowl around this place, from one room to another. All I do is groom my tail, which is a sorry sight, because the limp thing has lost most of its hair by now. There is only one small clump of fuzz, clinging by a thread to its very end. I brush around it ever so gently, then lick my fangs, which have become somewhat dull lately. I find the hairline cracks in them, polish them with my tongue, ponder the perils of old age, and try to stay calm, keeping my eye on her.

  True, her scent is overwhelming, her heartbeat palpable, her presence inescapable. In spite of my best intentions, she makes me hate her. Yet, she draws me in. I am focused on her as if she were my prey, and she knows it.

  I ignore the chirping of birds, drifting in through the windows—yet the taste of their flesh fills my mouth. They flap, flap, flap their wings out there... So darn free, so delectably fluffy! And here I am. I try to pay no attention to that immensely heavy key, hanging way out of reach up there on a rusty nail, by the main door. Why should I.

  I never show weakness. And most certainly, I never meow.

  “You know cats,” I say. “Just one short, miserable life, that’s what they have. Interrupted, every so often, by having to beg strangers... Can you imagine? Really, I have to beg them for the most basic needs.”

  I find it difficult to guess if she believes me.

  “My life, if you can call it that, may soon be over. I’m hungry. I could die. Really,” I stress to her.

  She just sits there, and the window behind her shows her reflection; and her reflection is paralyzed, too. I can see a green flash of anger in the glass, and by hook and by crook I know, without thinking twice, what she sees in my eyes.

  “I’m dying here!” I growl, “Food! Something to eat!”

  And for added emphasis I arch my back. She may take that as a threat, but I assure you, for me it is nothing more than a sudden urge to stretch.

  Somehow the sight of my sharp claws brings her to her senses, and so she removes the blankets in a big hurry. She has—or rather, used to have—a pretty figure, I conclude, now that I see it. The fabric is swishing softly as she ties the belt around her waist, showing off that which was once slender, but now is merely fragile.

  I trot behind her to the kitchen, and watch in amazement as she fumbles about, opening and closing cabinet doors in utter confusion. By now, I am deeply in despair. Something fizzles in my throat, but I do my best to hold back, to subdue it from becoming a full-throated hiss.

  “What’s the fuss?” I ask. “Did I ask you to catch mice? Look here, for crying out loud, look inside already!”

  And with that, I thread my long, flexible tail directly into the handle of the pantry door. It gives way, it opens with the usual creak, and there, on the lowest shelf, is that thing I learned to crave: A can with a lovely whiskered face on it.

  She picks it up. I wait. I do not meow.

  Now she embarks on shuffling stuff in the drawer. The hunger grows in me as the clink and the clank rise higher and higher, as spiky and prickly as rage. Finally she digs out a shiny tool and then, snap! She sticks it into the thing, right there between those whiskers.

  And with that one blow, the aroma! Ah, tinged with blood, it spreads instantly, all over the place. Is she a killer, I ask myself. Is she is a killer, too?

  Full of awe, I watch her closely as she labors to cut the thing open. I study her from one side, then from the other, only to catch her shooting a little glint at me from the corner of her eye. I can see that she is calculating, with a little smile, the twisting of her knife.

  Alas, in this place, my hunger puts me at her mercy. So she is using this particular moment, I figure, to play a cruel game with me, a game of measure for measure: a measure of her skill with the knife against the measure of the pain in my stomach. Her power against my need.

  Her lips curl up, as if to say, Let me hear you purr, will you? No?

  Her skin hangs under her chin and around her neck like a delicate necklace, wrinkle upon wrinkle, and her face is fallen. I can, without too much effort, use my bad eye to erase—if only for a squint—the marks of time on her. For that brief second I find in her the playful, if not innocent, face of a kitten.

  “What happened? You swallowed your tongue?” she asks teasingly. “You’re as quiet as a mouse!”

  My stomach growls, so I just crouch there, staring helplessly at her knife.

  “This place,” she casts a look around her. “Oh my, it gave me the creeps at first. I mean, no one told me it came not only with furniture, but with a pet, too.”

  In place of an answer I claw her leg, because hell, I am more than some useless old nicknack. Beware. I am dangerous.

  So to sooth me, she goes, “Oh my, such an adorable tail! I love it, I do!”

  And I go, “No you don’t. You hate me, but not half as much as I hate you... Food! Quick, miss,” I hiss. “I’m dying here!”

  Perhaps she gets what I say, because now she heaps the food on a plate and then, at long last, sets it before me. I tear into it. I lick the plate clean. I pass my tongue over my paws. I wipe my whiskers clean.

  But I never meow.

  I hop onto the counter. She has left the knife here, so I inch closer, just to sniff it—but then, the sight of whiskers from the metallic surface makes me cautious.

  Wait, where is she now? Oh, there! Beating a full retreat, she is making her way back to the couch. I come closer, rubbing myself against her feet, as happy and bushy-tailed as I allow myself to be. I feel stronger now. Bushy-tailed or not, the clump of fuzz is about to fall off my rear end—but in spite of thi
s I feel invincible.

  With the single exception of the main door, which is locked, there is no door here I cannot push open. She knows it. She knows there is no point in hiding from me.

  I glance at the window. Between the smudges and through the layers of dust, fragments of murky sky are getting darker. I curl up beside her, rub against her skin for warmth and, with my eyes nearly closed, I rock my head to and fro with a long, sweeping motion. These days, there is nothing I like better than licking myself.

  She shrinks away, while at the same time making pronounced efforts to ignore me.

  With every instinct in me I know one thing for sure: despite her silence, which is an insult to my pride; despite her looking away in every possible direction, at this corner then the other; and despite the failing light, she can still see me—or at least my eye, the good one, shining at her from the darkness.

  So at the end of an unbearably drawn out, tense second, here it is: she gives a jerk—a sharp one, mind you! And with a click, she brings in a host of shadows by turning on the twisted lamp by her side.

  What do I care? I am busy, trying to imagine sun. Curling around myself, eyes half-open, I pass my tongue around my fangs. Here, it is coming to me: a radiant, blood-red sun. Sky—ground—birds—flap, flap, leap!—throats—

  I feel her looking at me, trying, perhaps, to decipher the sudden flash in my slit pupils. I flick her with my tail. The shadows—small and large, sharp and fuzzy—all flick their tails at her.

  I am the master of this place! I am the one who never leaves. She will be gone before this day is over.

  Then I will be cold. I will be alone once more. Locked. Helpless. Choked to tears by something quite inexplicable. Perhaps that stale perfume. Or else, the fading of that stale perfume. And I know: in vain will I resist staring at that immensely heavy key, hanging way out of reach, up there on that rusty nail, by the main door.

  But never will I meow.

  About This Book

  In this unique collection, Uvi Poznansky brings together diverse tales, laden with shades of mystery. There are four of them: I Am What I Am; I, Woman; The Hollow; and The One Who Never Leaves. Here, you will come into a dark, strange world, a hyper-reality where nearly everything is firmly rooted in the familiar—except for some quirky detail that twists the yarn, and takes it for a spin in an unexpected direction.

  This is the reality you will see through the eyes of a ghost of a woman, trying to reclaim her name by appealing to the devil; the eyes of a clay figure of a woman, about to be fired in the kiln, longing for her Creator; the eyes of a woman in the midst of a free fall, about to become a ghost; and the eyes of a feline creature with cracked fangs, trying in vain to resign herself, by hook and by crook, to being locked. These characters explore their identity, and challenge their fate.

  Inspired by her art, by quotes from literature and the bible, and by the author’s professional career, these tales come from different times and places. Yet all of them share one thing in common: an unusual mind, one that is twisted. So prepare yourself: keep the lights on.