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House and Home- A Short Story About Garfield The Cat
Jon sat down at the table with his plate of scrambled eggs that he just made.
“I can’t wait to eat these scrambled eggs that I just made,” he said. He paused before putting his fork into those fluffy golden eggs, though. Maybe… maybe he could be spontaneous and put salsa on them. He knew lots of people did that, but he’d never tried it. Maybe today would be that day.
He scooted out of his chair and strode confidently over to the fridge. He thrust open the door and saw the salsa, sitting right there in front of him with its tantalizing red aura.
He picked it up and looked at the label. “Mild,” it said. Jon smirked, probably thinking he looked cool, but in reality it looked more like he was having a stroke.
He walked over to the table and unscrewed the lid, promptly dumping way too much salsa on his eggs. He screwed the lid back on and slammed the jar on the table.
Jon then realized that he probably definitely shouldn’t have done that and checked both the table and the jar for cracks or scratches. When he didn’t find any, he sat down and shoveled a big bite of eggs into his overeager face hole.
He closed his eyes and chewed like an idiot who didn’t realize how much salsa they just put on their eggs, probably because he was an idiot who didn’t realize how much salsa he put on his eggs.
As is bound to happen with salsa mishaps, it ended in disaster and tears.
The last of the eggs landed in the garbage disposal as Jon scraped them off his plate and into the sink, his eyes still red. Next time he’d just put some light salt on them. Or maybe nothing. He did like the taste of water, after all. Compared to that, eggs were a one way ticket on the train to Flavortown.
He was just finishing up as his cat, Garfield, came in and meowed loudly at him. It was more like a whine, really. Something akin to the sound a spoiled toddler might make when they saw a candy display at the toy store and they didn’t use their words to ask for some because kids are kinda just like that honestly and maybe some people shouldn’t have them if they aren’t prepared to deal with it so they just hit them instead. Don’t hit your kids. You wouldn’t hit an adult. And if you would, don’t.
“Oh, Garfield, you silly cat. I bet you want breakfast, huh?” Jon reached down to pet the fat orange fluffmonster as it wound around his legs. He stood back up and turned around to face the cupboards, reaching up for a can of wet cat food.
Garfield immediately left Jon’s legs and ran as fast as his stubby legs could carry him to his food and water bowls. He stared at Jon the whole time, as if making sure he wouldn’t eat it himself (although many that knew Jon wouldn’t put it past him to try it, at least once) until he scooped it into his bowl, at which point he redirected his focus entirely onto scarfing his food down as if he was one of the starving kids in Africa everyone’s mom tells them about when they don’t want to eat their asparagus.
Jon shook his head and put his hands on his hips. “Oh Garfield,” he sighed. “Whatever are we going to do with you?”
Garfield did not respond, as he was a cat and cats are not exactly known for their conversation skills.
Since Jon didn’t get to eat his own breakfast, he grabbed a granola bar (plain granola flavored obviously) from the pantry and crumpled up the wrapper to toss in the trash. He missed. He was less than ten feet away.
After putting the wrapper gently in the trash he went to the bathroom to brush his teeth. Turning on the light he was greeted by another person.
“Why, hello handsome,” he said to his own face in the mirror, winking awkwardly.
It actually looked more like something in between Mark Zuckerburg and the first stock photo to come up if you searched “white guy.”
While he was brushing his teeth with toothpaste milder than non carbonated and non flavored soda, he felt something twist around his legs again and heard the familiar cries of his greedy feline.
“Garfield, what is it? I already got you food. Didn’t you finish it?” Jon looked down at Garfield, who still did not speak back to him, since Jon either didn’t understand that cats can’t talk, or he didn’t expect him to answer. The former being just as likely as the latter.
After a moment of the two staring at each other like two lovers in a rom-com who notice each other from across the room for the first time, Jon sighed and went back to Garfield’s food bowl.
He was met with his other pet, Odie the dog, wagging his tail happily as he ate his own food, which was already in its bowl since it was dry food. He raised his head and barked at Jon before bounding over to him to give him a series of happy licks.
The orange cat’s impatient meow brought Jon back to the situation at hand, which was Garfield’s poor starving tummy after only one can of delicious wet food that Jon often spent more on than his own food.
“Okay Garfield, is something the matter with your food?” He asked as he bent over to look in his cat’s bowl. Which was not only empty, but had been licked clean.
He looked over at Garfield and aimed an exasperated sigh at him.
“You fat kitty cat. I can’t feed you twice in a row, silly.” Jon reached down to pet Garfield, who had plans to be fed twice in a row.
Jon decided to get to work, and sat down to his desk with a cup of coffee that had enough milk and cream in it to instill the fear of god into anyone who was lactose intolerant.
He got to work on sketching something from his backlog after scribbling the morning’s events down onto a sticky note in bullet points. Might make for a decent comic. He could probably fit it into three panels.
While he was drawing, Garfield wailed from the kitchen as if he had just been stabbed 27 times instead of just being hungry, and every time he did it made Jon flinch. Every time he thought he was done, he just started back up again, louder than before. He was sure his neighbors thought he had a crying baby and not a spoiled cat.
He scooted his chair back and stood up, walking defeatedly to the kitchen. Bested by a cat, he could do nothing but sigh as he reached for another can of food.
Garfield ate his second helping just as ravenously, and Jon just went back to his desk. “It’s like you have a black hole for a stomach, Garfield,” he muttered dejectedly. “You’re eating us out of house and home…”
He slumped back into his chair and took a sip of his slightly coffee flavored milk-and-cream liquid substance. At least he had that, he supposed.
After a few hours he got to the inking phase, at which point he noticed that his thicker pen was missing. He leaned over to see if it had rolled off the desk and onto the floor, and found it under his chair. When he came back up, he was greeted with the sight of a stripy orange puffball that had its face in his mug.
“Hey!” Jon shouted, though no one except perhaps an infant or an old person on life support would be intimidated.
“Get outta my coffee, you,” he said as he tried to push Garfield off the table, but Jon was too wimpy and Garfield too fat for him to be able to achieve anything more than a slight nudge.
Garfield finished Jon’s coffee without Jon being able to do anything, and hopped off the desk, strolling casually away as if it was his house and not Jon’s.
“I don’t even think cats are supposed to drink coffee…” Jon just put his coffee mug in the sink and decided to do the dishes.
After he finished he looked at the clock. It was around noonish, so he decided to pull out a frozen lasagna and put it in the microwave. When it was done, he took it out without anything between it and his hands so he burned himself. He left it on the counter to cool, and went to the bathroom to run his hands over cold water and wash them before he ate.
When he came back, the lasagna was gone. The foam container it was in was still hot, and he’d only been gone a minute or so, so Jon knew there was no way it had cooled down. He also knew there was only one culprit.
“Garfield!!!” Jon shouted into the air, angry but also disappointed that he hadn’t seen this coming. Though he supposed he’d assumed Garfield wouldn’t have been able to, since it was basically scalding.
He threw the trash away and put another one in the microwave. While he was waiting for it to heat up, he noticed something spilling out from under the door of the pantry. He went to investigate and found a bag of chips and its contents lying across the floor.
The bag got closed up, the floor was swept, and Jon was tired. He noticed something on the shelf, too. Or rather, something not on the shelf.
“Where did all the Hamburger Helper go?” He muttered. Oh well. It was a mystery to be solved later, when he wasn’t feeling like his cat was the one who owned him.
He returned to a strange sight, to say the least. The microwave had been smashed, the lasagna nowhere to be found. All that remained were a few chewed up bits of the foam container. There were a few pieces of glass on the counter and floor, so Jon walked over carefully as he wondered what the heck happened.
Something heavy could’ve fallen out of the cabinet, although the door was closed and he didn’t keep anything heavy in there and there was nothing else that looked like it could’ve fallen and that didn’t explain why the lasagna was gone but hey, you never know, right?
Jon heard a thud coming from the fridge and snapped his head over to look. The door was ajar, the light spilling onto the floor and softly illuminating the kitchen, as not much light was coming through the windows on an overcast day like today, though this morning had been quite sunny. It seemed even the weather was against Jon.
He crept towards the door, unease in his belly as opposed to the warm lasagna in Garfield’s. Cold dread gripped Jon’s heart as it began to pound, the sound of it filling Jon’s ears.
The three cheese pizzas were gone. The taco shells were gone. Those were the first things he noticed, since their containers had spilled onto the floor. What was left of them, anyway. There was nothing else on the shelves or in the drawers but a few empty containers and some stains that had clearly been licked, perhaps multiple times.
The chilly air seemed to pierce him as he opened the freezer. It told the same story, one of greed and wildness and perhaps something unworldly. It scared Jon. It scared him more than any other story he knew, and that was saying something.
His hands shook and he took a step back, not closing the fridge or the freezer. He unintentionally took a deep, shaky breath in, the cold air reaching into his lungs as if to escape inside them and hide, stabbing them like a million tiny shards of glass. It did not know that Jon was no more safe than it was.
A crash echoed through the otherwise silent house, startling Jon and causing him to turn his body to face the sound. It had come from the living room.
Jon wasn’t sure what he would be greeted with when he ran in, but it wasn’t this. Dear god, he never would’ve seen this in his darkest nightmares. And here it was, in the waking world, asking him if this was what his decisions led him to, or if he was a horrible slave to fate.
A bowl of fruit that was usually perched on the coffee table was laying in pieces on the floor, half eaten fruit among the glass. The sight of Garfield, now grown ten times his already large size, was almost alien like in nature. He seemed to swipe his paw at the fruit almost like he couldn’t be bothered, like he was bored.
“Garfield, What are you doing!?!!” Jon’s voice shook with terror and disbelief as the orange monstrosity turned its large head to face him. Its glazed over eyes seemed to barely register him, until it turned back to the fruit, bending down to close his large mouth around an entire orange.
Despite his control being obviously ripped from him like a child might rip petals from a flower for no reason other than boredom, Jon tried to assume the position of a pet owner.
“You’re su-such a bad kitty. That’s it, I’ve ha-had it with you! That does it! I’m done. That’s the la-that’s the last straw, Garfie-” Jon was cut off by Garfield climbing off the table and lumbering toward him. Jon’s plan (or lack thereof) had failed, and there was only one thing that could ever hope to save him.
Run.
He stumbled a bit before dashing to the side, yelling for Odie. He couldn’t leave him here. There was no way he would ever survive. He stopped at the bottom of the stairs. If he ran up there and got cornered… He just had to save Odie.
He called his dog’s name and whistled as he dashed up the steps two, then three at a time, then finally leaping the last few before bolting through the hallway, checking doors as he went.
He got to the room at the end of the hall, his own room. Odie wasn’t here either. He could hear the thing that could once be called a cat slowly but surely thumping up the stairs after him, until Jon turned around.
He saw his shadowy figure standing at the end of the hall, looking more like an ominous silhouette of a large blob. It didn’t move.
Then it did.
It moved, and faster than Jon thought it would. The fat spilling from every bit of surface on his body flapped heavily as he approached. He almost seemed not to put one foot in front of the other, but to slide over the floor like a large grotesque snail. His eyes were half closed and his lower jaw was parted a little, with drool coming out in buckets as it decorated his large yellow teeth and the carpet beneath him.
Jon could feel and smell his hot breath before he even reached the door. It reeked of cheese, meats, and a million other things. But there was one smell he could pick out among the others.
“Garfield,” Jon whispered, tears of fear and disbelief beginning to form in his eyes, “Where… where is Odie?”
Garfield once again did not speak, though he knew the answer, and lowered his eyes in response. His pupils pierced through Jon’s.
“Garfield…” His voice cracked as a sob forced its way out of his lungs, turning his body into jelly.
The hungry being gave Jon a glimmer of mercy, sparing him a moment to grieve the loss of his dog. Or perhaps he just wanted Jon to know. Know that he didn’t regret it, didn’t feel anything when it happened, and would do it again if given the chance.
And that he was still hungry.
The moment he moved Jon knew what he had to do. He turned on his heel and leapt out the open window, landing on the unforgiving grass below.
With the wind knocked out of him, there was nothing he could do for a moment except lay there, let the itchy grass poke at him and the rain pelt him. He got his breath back as quickly as he could and went around to the garage, lifting the door.
His car would surely be faster than Garfield. Surely.
He hadn’t even gotten out of his neighborhood before he saw a blurry shape looming in front of his car about thirty feet tall. He stopped.
The figure seemed to slowly move, and two large eyes revealed themselves, staring straight at him.
Jon didn’t move. He couldn’t move.
The beast’s luminescent gaze seemed to go right through Jon, even through the pouring rain. He could hear it against his car as it slid down his windshield. The light shone through the drops, like any streetlamp or passing headlights would. But these lights were not man made. Unless you counted Jon’s foolishness.
The engine of the car rumbled like the huge eternally unsatisfied stomach of the creature in front of Jon. He wondered vaguely if he should turn his headlights off. Could he see him? Did he remember what Jon’s car looked like?
Whatever the case, he didn’t seem to think it was worth it. He leaned his huge shadowy body over something, bringing it to his open mouth. Jon recognized it as a headless body of a person.
Liz. He had to find Liz. If she wasn’t at the vet’s office, anyone else there might know. He had to get there before he did.
When Garfield was distracted with what was sure to be his two dozenth meal of the day, Jon floored it in the direction of the vet’s. He turned on the radio in the hopes of a news report that would bring him some hope.
But no matter what station he turned to, he only got varying degrees of static, any words almost impossible to make out amongst the dirty sound. It was almost like an extension of the rain.
As he pulled into the parking lot, he spotted at least a few cars in parking spaces. There was a good chance one of his only friends was here.
He left the car running as he slammed the door shut to make his way up to the front, going right over a puddle and splashing water all over his pants. Which wasn’t to say the rest of him was dry, his hair was practically glued to his face, and his pants were dripping all over the tile as he burst in through the double doors.
The receptionist looked up from the computer they were typing at and widened their eyes at the sight of the sopping wet and out of breath Jon, who slammed his hands down and asked where Liz was.
“She’s-she’s uh, with a patient,” the receptionist said hesitantly, pointing behind them. Jon sped off without so much as a word, his shoes squeaking and leaving tiny puddles.
“Liz!? Liz, we have to go, now-” Jon threw open the door and startled Liz, who turned from the dog on the table and almost dropped the small bottle of ear drops she was holding.
“Jon, what in the world has gotten into you? Didn’t you know I’m in the middle of-”
“That’s not important anymore. We really have to leave, right n-”
“Stop, stop, stop. What are you talking about? Is there an emergency or something? You can’t just interrupt m-”
She was interrupted by Jon grabbing her wrist and practically dragging her away, though she didn’t really resist physically.
They passed the receptionist, who only shrugged awkwardly when Liz shouted for them to help. Then Jon stopped with his hand on the door and looked solemnly back at the receptionist.
“If you don’t want to die, I suggest you get out of town as fast as you can.”
He rushed out the door with Liz before anyone said anything else.
“Jon, what’s the emergency? Hey, slow down! I’m in heels,” Liz protested, her legs struggling to keep up with Jon’s pace, who was spurred on by fear. He didn’t say anything until they were both in the car.
“It’s Garfield,” he said, finally.
“What? Is something wrong with him?”
Jon didn’t take his eyes off the road.
“You could say that.”
When Liz pressed further, Jon didn’t reply, just kept driving, his grip on the steering wheel leaving him white-knuckled. Eventually she too fell silent, fidgeting anxiously with her hands in her lap. She noticed that they weren’t headed in the direction of Jon’s house, and she became evermore confused and scared.
She wondered if there was something physically wrong with him. She’d never known him to do drugs, and he was the last person in the world to be anywhere near them (he read the entire bottle of cough sirup twice every time he had to take any) but she for some reason she couldn’t rule that out as a reason for his out-of-character behavior.
He was sweaty and shaky, his face pale, his eyes wide. He hadn’t bothered to brush the wet strands of hair out of his eyes the whole time they were in the car.
He punched his radio, and Liz jumped a bit. He tried to turn to any station that wasn’t just static, but couldn’t get anything. Growing increasingly frustrated, he did something anyone who’d ever known him had heard him do. He swore.
“Damn… radio,” he muttered angrily, his voice edged with fear. He somehow managed to find a station that was more words than static, and turned the volume up almost as far as it would go, leaning in close to listen.
“...Forces…Unable to stop th…Consumed the…Ms it is headed downtown, though the mo…Unknown. Evacuation of the…” The static then overcame the voice, and Jon banged on his radio, to no avail. He punched the button and the static died immediately.
It was another moment before he spoke.
“Downtown… What’s downtown? Has he already moved on? God, it’s like he gets faster and faster…”
Liz’s lap vibrated, and she looked down to see that she had received a text. It was from the automatic system that sent out messages, like amber alerts.
Jon got the text too, judging by the vibrating in his jean pocket. He didn’t bother to check it. Instead he just shook his head.
“It’s likely to be an evacuation alert for the town.”
Liz checked. He was right.
She read and reread the message, wondering what the heck was going on, but not saying anything. She knew by now Jon wouldn’t answer her questions. He just kept his focus on driving as fast as possible in the opposite direction of his house.
The rain pattered the windows and flew off the glass thanks to their high speeds, filling the otherwise silent car. It was fairly dark inside, with the streetlamps casting an eerie yellowish glow that made it look like the rain streaks were inside the car.
Liz’s tense muscles refused to loosen until she tried to focus on her breathing, finally beginning to relax just a l-
“OH MY GOD,” Shouted Jon, slamming his foot on the brake.
Liz screamed, grabbing her seatbelt.until she forced herself to take slow deep breaths, and they finally began to relax a lit-
"OH MY GOD," Jon shouted, slamming his foot on the brake.
Liz screamed, clutching her seatbelt.
"I know what's downtown! I know what's downtown, Liz!"
He grabbed her by the shoulders and shook her, while she continued to make confused and startled noises in a loud voice like a spooked animal.
She grabbed his wrists and stopped him, meeting his eyes with her own.
"Jon, wait, wait, wait. What are you saying? What's downtown?"
He looked into her eyes for a moment before speaking.
She blinked.
He parted his lips slightly, and spoke in the softest whisper barely audible above the rain pelting the car.
"The lasagna factory."
Neither of them spoke for a minute or two, Jon's breathing shaky and his palms sweaty. Liz furrowed her brow and tilted her head a little.
"Jon…" She muttered.
"You can't be serious. This prank, or whatever it is, has gone far enough. I don't know what could've possessed you to possibly-"
"Liz, please, wait-"
She was removing his hands from her shoulders and shaking her head.
"I'm serious. More than I've ever been in my life. Why would I lie about-"
"Jon, I can't do this anymore. I don't know if you skipped your meds today or something, but-"
She unbuckled her seatbelt and was turning to get out of the car, still shaking her head.
"Liz, you've gotta stay. Please, please, come with me and get outta town. I just-"
"I don't wanna hear it, Jon."
She had stepped out the door and was standing in the pouring rain, with Jon leaning across the seats, looking up at her. She couldn't meet his eyes, instead looking down at the sidewalk.
"I hope you get help. You really need it."
She was sopping wet now, shivering.
"Liz…"
"G'bye, Jon."
She shut the door.
He was left there, spread across the seats, looking up at where she'd just been. He saw her blurry silhouette on the other side of the window, but when he unbuckled his seatbelt and rushed around to the other side, she was nowhere to be seen.
Jon’s throat tightened, feeling like it was being squeezed by barbed wire. He felt the beginnings of a sob, and his shoulders shook as his face was wet by the cold rain and his own salty tears.
The rumbling of the car's engine was dwarfed by the loud looming sounds behind him. Jon turned, his eyes wide, and saw a shadow that was bigger than any building in town and in the vague shape of a cat.
Its huge eyes glowed brightly, an ominous gaze flowing over the horizon.
Jon knew there was nothing else he could do. He'd likely consumed most of if not everyone in town, and he wasn't stopping any time soon.
Those horrible twin lights slowed as they approached Jon’s direction, and somehow, even though he knew he was miniscule to him, he'd been spotted.
Cosmic dread washed over the simple man, who just this morning was exited about breakfast. This was literally and metaphorically bigger than anything he'd ever faced, and he gave up immediately.
Jon watched as the massive creature who'd once been his cat slowly approached him.
He didn't run.
He closed his eyes and waited.