MicroHorror

I died 350 years ago.

I had been a Witch Finder, and even found a few I think. But I burned even more, because deep down I found a perverse enjoyment in it. The sight of flames licking higher, burning away clothes to reveal skin that turns first red, then brown, followed by hair bursting into flame–all so very exciting. But it was the screams I liked the best; even the brave ones eventually succumbed.

I caught one witch too many though, and she cursed me, said when I died, I would return and live forever in the body of a black cat.

So most nights I spend cold and wet, looking for food, avoiding stray dogs and living on my wits. I’ve tried to use up my lives on roads and in rivers, but I’ve many more than nine, and nothing I do brings this curse to an end.

I’m shunned; no household wants me as a pet. I think at some unconscious level, some primitive part of the psyche senses the death in me. Other cats avoid me too, possibly for the very same reason–they know I am not of them. There are others like me, not many, but every few years I see one, and when I do, I know to run like the wind.

But what the Witch that inflicted this on me forgot was that man’s nature never changes. I am the same as I was back then, have the same needs. So many nights I will steal into someone’s home, hiding in dark corners. Sitting behind a chair or basket I will watch transfixed as a lady undresses, having the same unholy thoughts I have always had. And if perchance she leaves her underwear on the floor, when the light is out, I will nestle amongst it for the night, dreaming of what I can’t have.

But it is the screams of women that I relish above everything else, and there is only one way I know to achieve my desires.

I’m sure it can’t be true, the old wives’ tale about cat’s sitting on babies faces, killing them, for surely the baby would wriggle, shake off the cat. That is certainly my experience, unless of course I dig my claws into its face first. It only takes a minute to be sure.

And then I wait, hidden by the blackness of night, for the screams to begin.