Nine Lives
Short story: first published in EAT anthology, November 2012
‘Nine Lives’ was my first ever story published. I had submitted it to a competition in 2012 and it won me a place in the anthology titled Eat. While the book is no longer in print, you can still see the Amazon listing here for information. Warning: it is a horror anthology and the cover is quite gory. Below is a sketch I made to accompany the story when I re-published the story in A Suspicious Collection two years later.
Nine Lives
My cat, Chaney, was the only one who knew or cared that I was dead. Even I didn’t care in the beginning. I just lay on my bed thinking that the naysayers were right after all, that the world had come to an end. Imagine my surprise when I got up and out of bed – probably on the third day, though I can’t ever be sure, what with my brains already decomposing – to discover that I was physically dead.
Yes, I have since discovered that the dead have emotions. It’s a bummer, but we don’t really stop being who we are after we die. I don’t know about those who pass over to the other side, or if there is another side, or heaven or hell. All I know is that I died and I am still here and I do not see other dead people around.
I was always a recluse, and Chaney was and still is my best friend. I found her in a ditch when she was barely a week old, all wet and with her eyes still closed. I heard her soft mewing while I was walking home from work one day and I knew that she was calling to me. Her first two nights were spent at the vet’s on a drip, and it saved her life and cost me three hundred dollars. Well, that’s not important anymore as Chaney proved to be much more than a pet for me. She is my one true companion, and now, my saviour. Funny how the roles have reversed.
Anyway, the night I died was a cool summer night. I had left all the windows opened, thinking that the breeze felt like silk, wrapping around my body. I came home from work at around six, as usual, fed Chaney while I ate my own dinner, and I watched some TV before bed. I don’t know what happened and I guess I’ll never find out, but I just didn’t wake up the next morning. I remember either thinking or dreaming that the world had ended, with little remorse or sadness.