Page 16 of We’ll Prescribe You Another Cat

When Reona arrived home from school, she noticed it right away: her mother, standing in the kitchen, was looking unusually cheerful.

Oh no. Reona looked over her messages to her brother. They were marked as “read,”

but it seemed he hadn’t contacted their mother.

“Mom?”

she called out hesitantly.

Her mother was in the middle of coating shelled shrimp with batter.

“Oh, you’re back. Tomoya will be back in a while, too, so let’s wait a bit for dinner. I want to serve it nice and hot,”

she replied, her tone noticeably different.

The area next to the stove was crowded not just with shrimp but with a mountain of ingredients—vegetables and other seafood—ready to be fried. The fridge, too, was undoubtedly stocked with her brother’s favorites.

Reona was irritated by her mother’s overly cheerful mood, but she reluctantly broke the news.

“Tomoya’s not coming tonight.”

Her mother came rushing out from the kitchen. “Why?”

“Apparently, something came up at work.”

“I’ve heard nothing about this.”

Her mother’s eyes narrowed in anger. But her ire was directed not at Reona’s brother, who had broken his promise, but at Reona.

“Why didn’t you tell me sooner? I already prepared dinner.”

“Tomoya said he was going to get in touch with you.”

“I haven’t heard from him. If you knew, you could have just called me, Reona.”

She had asked her brother to tell their mother himself because she knew how disappointed she would be. But now, it felt like she was being accused of keeping it from her.

If you’re going to be mad, be mad with Tomoya. If Reona had said that aloud, she would only be adding fuel to the fire.

Her mother turned back toward the kitchen looking forlorn.

“What are we going to do with all this food?”

“We could just eat it,”

Reona suggested quietly.

Tomoya had begun living on his own in Kyoto a few years ago. New Year’s was the only day you could count on him to come home. Otherwise, he visited once every six months at their mother’s insistent urging. He was supposed to come by for dinner tonight, but something had come up at work.

“Please let Mom know yourself,”

Reona had messaged, but he’d probably been too busy and had forgotten. Her brother was kind, but he was hopelessly careless.

Reona was twenty; her brother was twenty-nine. Due to their age difference, she had always perceived him as grown-up and mature. But now that she was older and they lived apart, she began to notice his unreliability, occasional thoughtlessness, and insensitivity. Sometimes, like he had done today, he would involve Reona in his communications with their parents. She suspected it had to do with the pressure he was feeling from their mother to visit home more frequently.

She was going to ask him to call their mother later, even if it was a bit of a hassle. Just hearing his voice would cheer her.

The soft tinkle of a bell. Hajime, the cat, was rubbing her head against the top of Reona’s foot.

“All right, all right.”

Reona stood still, patiently waiting for Hajime to finish nuzzling.

The bell on her collar jingled softly.

Hajime didn’t enjoy being petted; she expressed affection by pressing her head against people’s feet.

Her entire body was covered in amber-colored stripes—even her eyes were a greenish amber.

Fourteen years had passed since her brother had brought Hajime home as a kitten from his middle-school classmate’s house.

She used to have a glossier amber coat, but age had faded her fur to a yellowish shade reminiscent of a sun-bleached tatami mat, and her eyes had dulled to the color of its faded trim.

Hajime pressed her nose against Reona’s palm. It was damp and cold.

“Hajime, you’re just like our tatami mats.”

Reona recalled visiting a pet shop recently with her friend Moé. There were no mixed-breed cats like Hajime there. Each one was cute as a plush toy, tumbling around in the display windows. They were all stylish kittens that would look out of place in an old house with only tatami rooms.

Hajime was nothing like them. Hajime was Hajime, and she was like no other cat. As soon as she was done nuzzling, she promptly headed off to the back room.

Reona’s phone sounded. It was a message from her friend Shousuke.

“Mom, I’m going to eat later.”

“What are you saying? You, too? Dinner’s already ready.”

“Sorry, you should eat without me. I’m going over to Shousuke’s.”

Ignoring her mother’s protests, Reona left the house.

After walking for about ten minutes, she arrived at Shousuke Kunieda’s house. She strode in without ringing the doorbell.

When she called out “Hello! It’s Reona,”

Shousuke’s mother emerged from the living room.

“Hi, Reona. He just got back from cram school a moment ago.”

“Got it!”

Without knocking, Reona went into his room upstairs. Shousuke sat cross-legged on the floor, his back to her.

“What’s the emergency? Did you snag a rare character toy at the arcade?”

Shousuke ignored her. Reona rummaged through his bookshelf, searching for a manga she hadn’t read yet.

“You don’t have any new releases. What’s up? I gave up fried shrimp to be here. Not that the shrimp was meant for me.”

At least half of Shousuke’s bookshelf was filled with college entrance exam prep books, all worn-out from heavy use.

Shousuke, Reona’s childhood friend and the same age, was in his third year of trying for Kyoto University.

He had taken the exam the first year with no expectations, believing the second year would be his serious attempt.

But that had ended in failure, too, and this winter, he was preparing to face the exam for a third time.

He kept his back to her.

In the past, when he turned away from her like this, he’d be facing his desk.

He hadn’t ever brushed Reona off when she dropped by, but he would continue to study as they talked.

But recently, he’d been spending more time gaming and reading comics.

Sometimes, she’d find him just lounging around.

He still attended cram school, but there was a visible decline in his pace.

But he was probably most aware of that himself. Reona continued making mundane small talk, careful not to put any undue pressure on her friend.

“Honestly, my mom is way too obsessed with my brother. When he can’t come home, she flips out on me. I guess it can’t be helped. At least cats don’t care about human schedules or relationships.”

“Cats?”

Shousuke responded, still turned away from her.

“Yeah. You know my brother works for that cat rescue center in Minami Ward. He’s super busy with the intake and placement of cats. Even though he’s the center’s deputy director, he says he’s basically just an errand boy.”

“He’s probably lying.”

Shousuke’s voice carried a mix of laughter, disbelief, and a hint of mockery.

His comment instantly riled her. Her brother was not the type to lie and avoid coming home. If anything, she wished he would lie and come up with a better cover for once. Shousuke, who was an old friend, should know that much.

“What do you mean? If it wasn’t work, why—”

Reona started to retort but stopped short when she noticed something: a slender strand resembling a piece of fluffy twine swaying in Shousuke’s lap.

“Wait a second!”

She leaped around him. Nestled between his crossed legs was a bundle of fine, grayish-brown fur.

“No way! What is it?”

“It’s a cat.”

“Yes, I get that. I mean…”

Reona gasped. A tiny cat was facing her. Its eyes were almost perfect circles and were a dusty shade of baby blue. If she remembered correctly, that distinctive eye color was known as “kitten blue”—a nervous shade of blue. The cat was trying clumsily to crawl out of Shousuke’s lap. It extended its short legs earnestly but kept missing.

“So adorable.”

Overwhelmed by the sheer cuteness, Reona’s eyes crinkled and her voice melted.

“Is that a Munchkin?”

“Looks like it,”

Shousuke replied, handing her a piece of paper. She took it and read aloud.

“Name: Shasha. Female. Two months old. Munchkin. Feed moderate amounts of cat food in the morning and at night. Water bowl must always be full. Clean kitty litter as needed. This is a crucial time for her development. She will grow by cultivating curiosity and trying new things. She may engage in reckless play, so please watch out for risky behavior, such as jumping from high places, swallowing objects, and other accidents. Please keep her indoors. That’s all. What is this about?”

“It’s an instruction manual for the cat. They gave it to me along with a bunch of other things,”

Shousuke said, glancing at the bowls, bag of cat food, and other essentials for raising a cat.

They were all things never seen before in this room she had been frequenting since childhood.

Shousuke had always enjoyed studying, and his grades had been stellar. They were both twenty now, yet remained very close. Whenever they faced problems, they talked to each other, and they maintained their bond through his entrance exam failures and his disappointment over having to take a gap year.

And now, this Shousuke had brought home a cat. The Munchkin, with its short legs and petite stature, was a popular breed. If you were to pick a cat by its cuteness, this one would rank high. But had he considered things thoroughly?

Cats were not all the same. Care, characteristics, and lifespan varied from breed to breed. If he’d consulted her beforehand, what advice would she have given him? But she didn’t want to find fault with the kitten that was already there.

“This is most definitely an emergency,”

Reona said in a deliberately casual tone.

“I’m sure it’s not the case, but you didn’t just impulsively pick up the cat, did you?”

“Not at all,”

he said.

“It was prescribed to me at a clinic.”

He looked down at the cat with a worried smile. To prevent her from escaping his crossed legs, he raised his knees and tried to block her with his thighs.

It took a moment for Reona, who had been distracted by the cat’s cute gestures, to register Shousuke’s words.

“Wait, what did you just say?”

“It was prescribed.”

“What was?”

“The cat.”

“By whom?”

“Tomoya. Man, something’s up with your brother. He was there, in this old building in a back alley in Nakagyō. It was pretty…intense.”

Something’s up with my brother?

As Reona watched the cat clambering up Shousuke’s legs, she recalled how her friend Moé had also recently mentioned wandering into an alley in Nakagyō.