The Cat Burglars

Portfolio Piece #3

Title: The Cat Burglars

Cameron Dingle

1612902

Mrs. Morris

Date Submitted: 3/9/15

I met my friend, Puss, during the worst time of my life. My father had just died, I didn't have any family that would take me in, and I was a penniless orphan who was constantly being moved through different homes and foster homes. When I met, or really found Puss, he was just like me, alone and suffering. I was running away from another foster home, which had become my new hobby, and needed a place to hide when I found a dark alley. I ran in it, hoping to escape the hell my life currently was, when I heard a quiet meow.
When I turned around to see what had made the sound, a sopping-wet, orange cat jumped on my face. He didn't scratch me or anything, he jumped climbed on top of my head and curled up like my head was a pillow and went to sleep. I realized he was a stray, but if I got my way and got away from that foster house, I might end up joining him, so I let him sleep on my head and slowly walked into a small walkway at the back of the alleyway and sat down.
I waited there, sitting with an orange cat on my head for what seemed like hours, until I was completely sure that the people chasing me in an effort to bring me back to the foster house had moved on. Once I was sure, I took the cat off my head as gently as I could so I didn't wake him up, but apparently I hadn't taken him off my head gently enough as I heard a meow the moment I took him off my head. Since the cat was awake now, I dropped him on the floor and stood up to find some restaurant to beg for food at and walked away, leaving the cat on the ground where I dropped him. I didn't even make it out of the alleyway before I heard another meow and felt something jump on my back and start climbing.
"What the... Oh come on, why are you on my head again," I yelled at the cat as if it could respond to me.
"Cus' its comfy and really warm," I heard a voice above me and started freaking out trying to figure out who said it. I started looking around, whipping my head back and forth, looking for someone who had responded to my question, when I heard the same voice say something else.
"Stop swinging your head to fast. I might fall off if you don't." I looked up, finally realizing where the voice I'd heard was coming from.
"Th-that was you," I said looking up at the orange fluff of fur that was doing its best to stay on my head.
"Of course it was me, who else could it be?"
There was a talking cat on my head that, apparently, really liked sleeping on it. I thought, "I must be hallucinating. No, dreaming. This can't really be real, can it?" I got my answer when I felt the shooting pain of claws digging into my head. "Okay, so this is real. There is really a real cat, that is talking, on my head!"
I started panicking and running around, when suddenly I heard a growl and looked down at my stomach. As shocked as I was about a talking cat being on my head, it was no where near how hungry I was.
"Oh, you must be hungry. I can help you get some food if you want, but if I help you, you have to leave some for me, too. Okay?" I just nodded and stood still, staring at the cat which had just jumped off my head and started walking. "Well, what are you waiting for," the cat looked back at me. "Aren't you hungry? Lets go."


I followed the cat as it strolled down the street towards a small McDonalds. After a few minutes, the cat and I reached the McDonalds and it led me to the dumpsters behind it. "Are you serious, you're going to make me dumpster dive for our food," I said, disappointed.
"Of course not, I'm waiting for someone to take the trash out. Then I'm going to act cute and stuff while you go in and take as much food as you can hold. Then, we're going to run... as fast as we can."

"And how do you know that I'm not going to get caught by someone else in the store?"

"I know because this isn't the first time that I've done something like this. They're about to close up for the night and are cleaning up. Once someone takes out the trash, theres nothing else to do for the night and everyone can leave, but everyone leaves early except for the manager, who loves cats, so she'll be the only one here."

"Fine, but if I get caught and we don't get anything to eat, I'm blaming it on you."

"Thats fine, but I'm planning on you getting caught."

"Wait... WHAT?! YOU'RE PLANNING ON ME GETTING CAUGHT! WHY?!"

"Once you get caught I can get away. That's why I told you to run as fast as you can once we get the food. I need her to chase after you so I can get away. Once you outrun her, we'll meet back at the alley and eat our dinner, thats the plan."
After thinking about it for awhile, I realized it wasn't that bad of a plan and agreed to it. A few minutes later, the manager came out to throw away the trash and saw the cute, orange cat and kneeled down to pet it. She then said something about how cute it was and the cat started glaring at me, which was the signal that I get into the McDonalds and start stealing food.
I got up and ran to the door, and slipped inside when it was about to close. Once inside, I grabbed as many happy meal bags I could and started piling food into each one. I didn't care what I was grabbing and in my situation, I couldn't afford to, after all, beggars can't be choosers. After grabbing as much food as the bags could possibly hold, I ran back to the door and threw it open as loud as I could to catch the manager's attention. She stopped petting the cat for a second to turn around and see me with my arms full of happy meal bags filled to the brim with food, so she did what any good store manager would do when someone was stealing from them, she started chasing me.
I was expecting to only have to run a block or two since it was the manager of a McDonalds chasing after me and she was wearing heels, so I didn't expect her to be very fast, but I ended up having to run for almost half-an-hour before the store manager finally gave up and stopped. By that time, I was lost and had no idea where the alleyway was or for that matter, where I was. I started walking around and eventually found my way back to the McDonalds and from there, I found my way back to the alley.
The cat was waiting for me there and was pretty annoyed by how long it took me to get back. My response was simply I didn't expect her to be able to run to far and so fast on heels and sat down to eat. I handed a burger, a chicken sandwich, and some fries to the cat and gorged myself on the rest. The cat and I talked while we ate and I learned that its name was Puss and after awhile, we agreed to become partners with each other. Thus, Puss and I began our "business" and after 10 years of hard work, became rich, and we never had to go back to living in an alley ever again.