Who Painted The Cat?

A short story about marriage and spills

Photo by Adrian Swancar on Unsplash

“Marriage has no guarantees. If that’s what you’re looking for, go live with a car battery.” Erma Bombeck

We were invited to a Christmas party at Angie’s boss’s place. I’d met Marjorie a few times, but these other people going, I’d only seen them on TV. They were news anchors, on-air personalities, commentators. Marjorie and Angie were producers. What was I supposed to say to these people? Angie was too busy wrapping Marjorie’s present to answer. She told me to sign the card.

This party was an annual shindig. I didn’t want to go. Even Angie’s daughter, who went the year before, said it was a drag. “It’s just people sucking up to each other,” she said, shaking her head like only a seventeen-year-old can. I didn’t mind Angie sucking up to Marjorie. Marjorie was okay. Whenever I came to Angie’s office, Marjorie would stop by and say, “When are you going to make an honest woman out of her?” and I’d say back, “You’ll be the first to get an invitation.” She’d laugh at that.

“Mom’s crazy,” Sophie said. I don’t think she meant crazy as in crazy. Angie just said and did odd things.

We’d only been together a year, Angie and me. Marriage wasn’t out of the question, but even Sophie — Angie’s daughter — was a bit skeptical. Angie had already been married three times. “Mom’s crazy,” Sophie said. I don’t think she meant crazy as in crazy. Angie just said and did odd things. The first month we were together, we went to a foreign film rental place. I wanted to introduce her to the works of Claude Lelouch. She asked the guy at the counter if he had anything without words at the bottom.

“Do you mean English films?” he asked. “Have you tried Blockbuster?”

Anyway, I tried my best to get out of this Christmas party. Earlier, I kept saying to Angie, “Wouldn’t it be better if you went on your own?” She was tying a bow, making a mess of it. “Marjorie told me to bring you,” she said, “and that’s exactly what I’m going to do. We don’t have to stay too late.”

Out in the car, she gave me directions, keeping Marjorie’s present on her lap. “Take the exit at Kingsway,” she said. “She’s the second street east of Windemere.” We drove along without saying much. We finally came to this red brick Georgian with white pillars and flagstone steps. People were arriving, presents in hand, knocking and opening the door. Marjorie was there, wearing a kaftan, hair in a scarf, drink in hand. When she saw us, she said, “Here’s the young lovers.” Angie handed her the present.

“You shouldn’t have,” Marjorie said.

“It’s just wine glasses,” Angie said.

The party was pretty much what I expected. All the news people were there, the well-knowns, the support staff. They stood in small groups, usually surrounding an anchor or on-air personality. One guy — a morning man — was rocking back and forth on the balls of his feet. He kept smiling, but there was nothing behind it. There was nothing to any of their smiles.

Marjorie appeared, saying to me, “Where’s Angie? Did she go away and leave you all alone? I’ll have to have a word with that girl.”

Angie disappeared into the crowd, leaving me in a corner. I went to the kitchen and poured a glass of wine. People kept coming in and out. Marjorie appeared, saying to me, “Where’s Angie? Did she go away and leave you all alone? I’ll have to have a word with that girl.”

I went back to living room. Angie was coming towards me with some woman in tow. “There you are,” she said to me. “This is Louise, Cliff’s wife.” I didn’t know any Cliff. “She’s in advertising, too. Marketing, actually.”

Louise looked bored.

“She’s client side,” Angie continued. “Denton Pharmaceuticals. I told her you did a lot of pharmaceutical work. Have you done anything for them?”

“No,” I said.

“Well, tell her what accounts you have worked on,” she said, not even waiting for me to say anything. She left me and Louise standing there.

“Have you been with Denton long?” I asked, hoping she might at least smile.

She kept looking off.

“Four years,” she said.

I was about to say, “You don’t have to stand here talking to me,” but then someone brushed by me, bumping my arm. It seemed harmless at first, but in moving aside, my glass caught on my belt buckle. The next thing I knew, red wine was spreading across Marjorie’s white broadloom.

Everyone instinctively moved away, leaving me standing there in the middle of the room. I recognized one foreign correspondent, a guy who’d covered Bosnia and Afghanistan. He was backing away, pulling his wife with him into the dining room. Louise had disappeared.

Through the crowd, Marjorie appeared, face flushed. “You naughty boy,” she said. “What are we going to do with you?” At least she was smiling, which was more than I could say for the rest of the crowd. Whether you’re dying literally, or just from embarrassment like me, it’s all the same to them. They look at you with this detached sense of superiority.

“What did you do?” she asked, and Marjorie laughed and said, “Your betrothed made a boo boo.”

Thankfully, some of Marjorie’s co-workers came out of the kitchen with salt and soda. I offered to do the actual cleaning. “We’ve got it,” they said, getting down on their knees, scrubbing away. And where was Angie? She showed up eventually, seeing me standing there. “What did you do?” she asked, and Marjorie laughed and said, “Your betrothed made a boo boo.”

That’s when she noticed there was red wine on my shirt.

“Look at you,” she said. “There’s a Tide Stick in the washroom upstairs, Angie. Take him up there before that wine stains. Top drawer, left side, I think. Rummage around, you’ll find it.”

Upstairs in the washroom, Angie was looking around for the Tide Stick, saying, “My God, red wine. And on her new broadloom, too. I’ll probably be hearing about this for weeks.”

“Someone bumped into me,” I said.

She couldn’t find the Tide Stick. She wet a washcloth and started wiping the stain like crazy. My shirt now had a big wet blotch. “Go put your coat on,” she said. “Are we leaving?” I asked. “No,’ she said, “I don’t want everyone staring at your shirt.” She started checking under the sink for a hair dryer. “Why couldn’t you have worn a suit jacket like I asked?” she said.

Fortunately, there was a hair dryer, and that helped. At least I didn’t have to walk around the party in my coat. “I have to go talk to some people,” Angie said, and I was back standing in the corner again. A young couple was next to me. They were pretty much being left on their own, too. The woman had on these big black-rimmed glasses. She leaned over to me.

“Are you Angie’s husband?” she asked.

“Not yet,” I answered.

“Chris works for her,” she said, meaning her husband or boyfriend.

Disasters everywhere, in other words. A president lying to Congress, a bus going off a cliff in Pakistan, killing forty people.

They were nice enough, explaining that he was a journalist and she was, too. Her beat was international affairs. “It’s been a crazy week,” she said. Disasters everywhere, in other words. A president lying to Congress, a bus going off a cliff in Pakistan, killing forty people.

“And you?” she asked.

“Oh, I just spill wine,” I said.

“It happens.”

“You two married?”

“Going on two years,” she said. “Fingers crossed.”

Eventually, the party started winding down. Angie came out of the kitchen, motioning that we should get our coats. “I guess we’re going,” I said to the couple. They said they were on their way, too. We all ended up in the bedroom, finding our coats in the big pile. Marjorie was saying goodbye at the front door. “Goodbye, slippery fingers?” she said to me.

We hugged, then she hugged Angie.

“Give his shirt another scrub when you get home,” Marjorie said. “Use lemon juice.”

As I drove, Angie sat looking out the window. She didn’t say anything.

“I met a nice couple,” I said. “The guy works for you. Chris something.”

“Chris Smuthers,” she said. “I have to let him go.”

“Why?”

“He doesn’t take direction,” she said.

“How exactly does he not take direction?”

“He doesn’t understand what I’m saying.”

“Neither do I sometimes.”

“That’s different.”

“How’s that different?”

“You don’t work for me, he does.”

She was supposed to stay over, but when we got to my place, she decided to go home. Nothing else was said about the party or the spilt wine.

Weeks went by, then months. The subject of marriage kept coming up. “People keep asking,” she’d say. Marjorie kept telling her men needed a nudge. Her husband was some sort of big wheel financial advisor. They’d been married thirty years. If she hadn’t nudged him, they’d probably still be dating. I told Angie I wasn’t crazy about being nudged, but I didn’t mind moving the relationship forward.

She didn’t know what Sophie would think of that. I knew Sophie didn’t think anything of it. She still thought her mother was a bit nuts.

“Living together, you mean?” she asked. She didn’t know what Sophie would think of that. I knew Sophie didn’t think anything of it. She still thought her mother was a bit nuts.

“Why don’t you ask her what she wants?” I said.

“She wants me to be happy.”

“Which means?”

“We should get married,” she said.

She’d been out with friends the week before, a girl’s night, and they’d all told her the same thing. “Don’t let him drag this out, Angie,” they said. “Sophie will be in university in a few years, then she’ll be off on her own. What are you going to do then?” Angie always attached a name to who said it, like, “Carrie told me that, or Linda, etc.”

After a couple months, I guess I was getting worn down. Here I was, forty-five, never married. When April came around, I finally said, “I guess we’d better do it.”

We set a date, that summer, in fact. A friend of Angie’s — another producer — offered us her backyard. Invitations went out, everything was set.

On the day of the wedding, Angie called from the friend’s place, telling me she’d be busy all morning with the decorations, the food, the music. “I want you to pick up Sophie and her friend,” she said. “Make sure you’re here by two o’clock.”

Sophie showed me paint footprints through the living room and dining room. They went up the stairs.

So, at one-thirty, I was there at her house, picking up Sophie. Only her friend wasn’t there yet. We stood there waiting. I looked around and noticed white footprints on the floor. Angie had been painting the living room the previous week. Like everything she did, there had to be a calamity of some sort. In this instance, she’d dropped a can of paint all over the kitchen floor. The majority was cleaned up, but Sophie showed me footprints going through the living room and up the stairs.

As she was showing me that, the cat came out from under the couch. Sugar was tabby, a timid thing until she got to know you. Somehow we’d developed a friendship. She was rubbing up against my leg. I looked down and saw this dribble of paint along the cat’s back. It ran from Sugar’s head almost to her tail. The paint was dry, of course, but Angie hadn’t bothered to clean it up. “Didn’t she see this?” I asked Sophie. Sophie just shrugged.

“You know Mom,” she said.

I got down next to Sugar, trying to pull the dried paint loose. It was really stuck on there. “Does your mother have any paint thinner?” I asked.

“What’s paint thinner?” Sophie asked.

Just then, Sophie’s friend came through the door. She was carrying a wedding present. She saw us looking at the cat.

“Why’s there paint on Sugar?” she asked.

“Mom,” Sophie said.

“Maybe try soap and water,” Sophie’s friend said.

We got a washcloth, wet it, and put some dish soap on it. That didn’t work. So we thought maybe we could comb it through with Sugar’s brush. It caught on Sugar’s fur and she ran off. She went under the couch again.

“We’d better get going,” Sophie said. “It’s almost two.”

“My dad might have some paint thinner,” Sophie’s friend said. “I’ll call and ask. You can pick it up when you drop me off later.”

“Didn’t you notice you got paint on the cat?” I asked Angie.

That never happened, of course. Our wedding gift turned out to be a night at a hotel, the bridal suite. The next day, we came back to the friend’s house, got my car, and went straight up north on our honeymoon. By the time we got back, we found Sophie at home, flopped on the sofa, watching television. Sugar was on the rug, the paint dribble still there.

“Didn’t you notice you got paint on the cat?” I asked Angie.

“It’ll come off,” she said.

“We tried,” I said. “It’ll take paint thinner or something.”

“We’ve just driven three hours,” she said. “Can we catch our breath? The cat’s not going anywhere.”

She took her bags up to the bedroom. I sat down on the couch next to Sophie. Sugar jumped up between us, then climbed on my lap, facing away. I rubbed her head. I ran my finger down the dried paint dribble. I imagined years from now, being infirm, being in a body cast or something, and Angie painting the ceiling above me. What if paint dripped down on my head? Would she just leave it?

“How was the honeymoon?” Sophie asked.

“Fine,” I said. “We had good weather.”

“That’s nice.”

I kept looking at the paint on Sugar’s back. I couldn’t stand it. I figured I’d find a hardware store or a Home Depot. Somebody had to have paint thinner. “I’m gonna find some paint thinner,” I told Sophie.

“Should I tell Mom?”

“Don’t bother,” I said.

Along the way, I saw a pet store. Maybe they’d know how to get paint off a cat. A tall woman was behind the counter. “Can I help you?” she asked. She was wearing earrings that looked like coiled up dog leashes.

“Yeah,” I said. “We dropped a can of paint and some of it got on the cat’s back. I was wondering what you’d use to get it off.”

“Please don’t use that,” she said. “Cats are always cleaning themselves. That could poison the poor thing. I’ll ask our groomer.”

“I’m not sure,” she said. “I’ve never had anyone ask before.”

“I was thinking paint thinner.”

“Please don’t use that,” she said. “Cats are always cleaning themselves. That could poison the poor thing. I’ll ask our groomer.”

She got on the phone. When she came back, she said, “Don’t do anything. It’ll fall off on its own. Give it a week or so. It’s not hurting the cat any.”

“Okay,” I said.

I left the store and got in my car. Maybe I was over-reacting. I went back to the house and found Angie and Sophie watching TV. I told them I checked with a groomer. The paint on Sugar’s back would come off eventually.

“That’s what I thought,” Angie said.

“Sure you did, Mom,” Sophie laughed.

“I did.”

We sat and watched some celebrity show, the three of us on the couch. That’s what married people did, or so I thought, anyway.

Spills were spills, much like marriage. Some you clean up, some you just ignore.

In the three years that followed, we’d get a bigger house, spill more things, including India ink on the new rug in the TV room. When we finally called it quits, the stain was still there. Angie put a big potted plant over it. Right in the middle of the room. I said to her, “That’s not helping,” but she didn’t care. Spills were spills, much like marriage. Some things you just can’t save. So I left the plant in the middle of the room. Then I left for good.