The Cat’s Curse

🔴 MR. GREGORY’S CAT HAS BEEN STANDING OUTSIDE MY WINDOW FOR THREE DAYS STRAIGHT

I told him to stop, but he just blinked at me, slow and deliberate, like a curse.

It started Monday after the funeral, the air thick with lilies and that cloying old-man cologne Mr. Gregory always wore, even in summer. I didn’t really *know* him, just saw him tending his roses, a silent figure across the alley. Now, this mangy tabby with one green eye just…stares. Every morning, noon, and night.

Last night, it scratched at the glass and that awful, high-pitched whine started; I swear, I heard Mr. Gregory’s voice, raspy and low, “You owe me, Clara.” Owe him *what*? I barely spoke to the man! This morning, there’s something taped to the glass.

It’s a picture, faded and yellowed, of a little girl with pigtails holding a… a rose? Underneath, in shaky handwriting: “Clara – My Rose.” My name is Sarah, not Clara. And I *hate* roses.

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I ripped the picture down, crumpling it in my fist. Fury, sharp and unexpected, clawed at me. Mr. Gregory’s cat, still there, its green eye glinting in the weak sunlight, didn’t even flinch. That’s when I noticed it. The pattern. The scratches on the glass weren’t random. They formed a crude, warped letter ‘C’.

Driven by a desperate need for answers, I grabbed my coat and ran. I found the address for Mr. Gregory’s house easily enough – it was on the death certificate. The house was a shambles, overgrown with weeds, the windows boarded up. The roses, though, were thriving, a riot of color spilling over the fence.

Hesitantly, I pushed the gate open. The air hung heavy with the scent of them, suffocating. I circled the house, calling out, “Mr. Gregory? Is anyone here?” Silence. Then, a rustle in the bushes. The cat. It emerged, weaving through the roses. It wasn’t mangy anymore. Its fur was sleek, its green eye gleaming. It sat before me, looking expectant.

I followed it. It led me to the back of the house, to a small shed. The door was slightly ajar. I pushed it open. Inside, dust motes danced in the sunbeams slicing through the gloom. There was a single, rickety table, and on it, a journal. I opened it.

The first entry was dated decades ago. It was in the same shaky handwriting as the note. “Clara loves her roses,” it began, a wistful ache in every word. Page after page, the entries detailed the blossoming of a beautiful rose garden, and the growing love of a man for a girl named Clara. Then came the change. The handwriting became frantic, the entries darker. “Clara is gone.” “She promised to stay.” “I need her back.” He’d used a strange concoction of rose petals and a blood offering to create a spell. The last entry, scrawled in a near-illegible hand, simply read, “I can see her, but she needs a Rose.”

The Rose. The cat. The picture. It clicked. I was Sarah, not Clara, and this cursed man thought he could bring her back somehow. I had a Rose – a specific kind of Rose he had given to Clara on the day of her disappearance. I knew where it was and what to do. I had to act quickly.

I raced back to my apartment. I grabbed the vase where it was standing and the now wilted Rose from inside. I went back to Mr. Gregory’s. This time, I carried a knife. I knew, deep down, what had to happen.

In the shed, the cat sat patiently on the table, the journal open. I knelt. I held the Rose up. “I am not Clara,” I whispered to the cat, “and you cannot have her.” I reached out and sliced the Rose. The cat jumped, yowling, and then it was no more. The cat faded and the shed dissolved.

The next morning, the roses were gone, and my window had a different view – only the alley. No cat. The cloying scent of roses and old man cologne has never returned. My name is Sarah, and I hate roses.