A stray calico on my lap…

The Tail….errrr….Tale of Prima Donna de Hearn

Chilly temperatures had kept me indoors for more than a week. So when the sun broke that Sunday afternoon in February 2020, I stepped outside with my pruning shears. For a few minutes, I surveyed the work ahead. Dead branches of mistflowers, bent over and tipped with fuzzy seed heads. Papery brown blades of inland sea oats that begged for a trim. Brittle stems of autumn salvias that would require cutting back.
 
Then my gaze fell on a fresh pile of dirt clods. Abe….
 
Just ten days before, we’d said goodbye to the last of our three cats. I missed them all. Mandy had shown up first in 2002 as a skittish feral. She had long gray fur and golden owl eyes. A year later, we’d adopted Abe and Gabe, a pair of Siamese mix kittens with bright blue eyes. Mandy tolerated the brothers at best. But sometimes Abe and Gabe didn’t get along either. No matter their moods, one usually followed me when I worked in our gardens. More often than not, Abe would plunk down right where I was digging or pruning. Oh, I might fuss in irritation and slide him out of the way. But deep down, I loved having my little furry shadows tag along while I worked.
 
Gabe died first in 2017. Digestive problems stole his health. Two years later, Mandy at 17 lost her strength fast. Again we let another cat go. In the meantime, a large tumor on Abe’s ear signaled that his time was drawing near, too. Three months later, we made our last heart-wrenching decision. At the vet clinic, my husband and I had cried as we wrapped our hands around Abe and waited for his heart to stop. Seconds before he died, I closed his blue eyes. We brought his body home, and James buried him in the side yard next to Mandy and Gabe.
 
Silently, I stared at the new grave and thought of my last fluffy yard assistant. Oh, Abe, I miss you….. Inside the house, a glass vase of daisies and lilies still graced our dining room table. They’d been a gift from friends who knew we’d grieved the loss of Abe. But now that we were pet-less and freed of that extra responsibility, James and I had both agreed to stay that way. No. More. Cats. 
 
“Hey, Sheryl! How’s it going?” The greeting from across the street broke my reverie in the back yard. I turned to see Terry waving at me.
 
“Fine,” I yelled back. “Just about to get to work.” I held up my shears and laughed.
 
At that precise moment, a cat emerged from behind our metal shed and beelined across the grass toward me.
 
“Look, there’s Sister!” I shouted, assuming his gray-and-white cat was heading my way. Sister, a small but fierce feline, ruled Terry’s side of the street.
 
“Nope, she’s right here,” he yelled back. I glanced his way and spotted Sister, stretched out on Terry’s sidewalk. “Looks like you’ve got a new friend, Sheryl!”
 
My eyes turned back to the cat that now rubbed against the chain-link fence separating us. She was a striking calico, splotched with creamy white, sherbet orange, and dark and milk chocolate. Her bright turquoise eyes startled me. I’d never seen a calico with blue eyes. 
 
“Oh, no,” I groaned, shaking my head as I backed away. “No, no, no. Not another cat.”
 
Behind me, James stepped outside from the garage. First he looked at me. Then he saw the cat.
 
“No,” he said, shaking his head. “No more cats.”
 
“I know, I know!” I wrung my hands together as I repeated the words. “I know.”
 
“Remember,” James reiterated in a firmer voice, “we agreed. NO MORE CATS.”
 
“She just appeared from nowhere,” I said, throwing up my hands. “I’m sure she’ll go home. I’ll post photos on ‘Lost and Found Pets’ on Facebook, okay?”
 
James gave me a skeptical look. “Okay,” he agreed. “You know where to find me.” Then he left to cut timber on our rural land. 
 
Willing myself to forget about the pretty calico, I headed to the other side of our back yard to trim salvias. Squatting down, I pruned a few branches, then glanced back at the fence. The cat had wandered out of sight. Good, she’s gone, I sighed. I don’t have to worry about that any more.
 
Just in case, I knew I should stay in the back yard where the calico wouldn’t see me. But deep down, I wanted to work in the front yard.
 
Because deep down, I hoped the cat would see me.
 
Because deep down, I wanted another cat to follow me around the yard.
 
No more cats, Sheryl.
 
Standing up, I tossed aside my tangled thoughts and headed for the front yard with my shears. As I strode toward a rock-encircled flower bed, I snuck a look behind me. But the calico had disappeared. Disappointed, I bent down over a mistflower and snipped off a long branch.
 
“Meowr, meowr!”
 
I turned to see the calico, hurrying across the yard toward me. At my feet, she stopped and cast her blue eyes upward at me. I smiled and sat down on a rock. Right away, she leaped onto my lap and began to purr. As promised, I snapped photos of her with my phone and posted them online (see FOUND! photo). I called a few people, too, asking if they’d lost a calico. But no one knew anything about her. 
 
“Oh, dear, oh, dear,” I fretted as I rubbed her head. “I’m in so much trouble.” Then I returned to pruning. While I worked, the calico stuck close but not in my way. She seemed content to be near me.

My heart melted.
 
After more than an hour, I plunked down on our front porch steps. Within seconds, the calico was back in my lap. Soon James would be home. Then what? Minutes later, my husband pulled into the driveway and shook his head when he saw us on the porch.
 
“Sheryl–”
 
“I posted her online, and I’ll call some more people,” I interjected. “Isn’t she sweet?”
 
James reached out a hand and patted her head. “Yes,” he relented. “But we agreed–“
 
“I KNOW,” I said. “I’m trying to find her owner.”
 
For two weeks, I did try. We also took her to a local vet, who estimated her to be around five years old and spayed, too. Someone else told us that the calico could be a “snowshoe,” a Siamese breed that has four white paws and striking markings. I’d never heard of snowshoes, but that would explain the cat’s blue eyes and her coat’s unusual colors.

Days went by, and still no one claimed the calico. In the meantime, she followed me around the yard like she belonged there. She shadowed James, too. He even welcomed her on his lap, where she soaked up head rubs and chin scratches.
 
“Prima Donna,” he announced one afternoon as he massaged her head. “That’s what we should name her.”
 
“Perfect,” I said, trying to sound ho-hum.
 
Inside, though, I was turning cartwheels. Because deep down, I’d come to love that calico cat with blue eyes more than I dared to admit. I still do. Prima wasn’t supposed to show up ten days after we buried our last elderly cat. But our lives are richer because she did. On that we can both agree.

* * *
The rest of Prima's story

A pair of sherbet-orange angel wings graces the top of Prima’s shoulders. Since she had just magically appeared in our yard, I liked to say that she’d dropped straight down from heaven to James and me. Sometimes I actually believed that.

More than a year later, we learned what really happened.

In November 2021, Bev Behrends, a Blanco friend who rescues dogs, messaged me. “I was looking through Facebook posts and saw a photo of your cat,” she wrote. “Would you like to know the story behind her?”

My heart pounded. “YES!” I replied right away.

This tale goes like this:

Some years back, perhaps in 2015, a caring woman found a mama cat and two tail-less kittens at some apartments in San Antonio. She called her friend Ana, who rescues dogs in the Alamo City. Ana called her fellow rescuer, Bev Behrends, and told her about the homeless cats. Bev suggested that she catch them and take them to her husband’s vet clinic in Blanco.

Ana did just that.

At the clinic, the trio were neutered. The kittens found homes; the calico went to the Behrends’ farm on the east side of Blanco, where she became a barn cat. Soon the friendly calico began to follow Connie, Bev’s sister, as she watered within the fenced yard that encircles the Behrends’ home. “We called her ‘Connie’s Cat,” Bev said.

A few years passed. Several dogs also shared the fenced yard. “We were afraid the dogs would get Connie’s Cat,” Bev continued. “So I sent her home with a lady who works for us. I told her to keep the cat inside the house, but she got out.”

The lady lived outside of Blanco a little more than one mile directly north of our home. Apparently, the calico had been on her way back to Bev’s house when she found us February 16, 2020.

“We looked for her (the calico) out there every day for a long time,” Bev recalled. “We were so worried that a wild animal might have gotten her. I was hoping someone had found her. We were so happy to see that she had found YOU!”

Connie had even shared about their lost cat on Facebook, but I never saw the post, which included a photo of the calico (left photo above).

Naturally, I called Bev as soon as I could after she’d first messaged me. At one point, I gulped. “So….” My voice shook and it took all I had to ask. “…do you want her back?”
 
“Oh, NO,” Bev replied. “She’s YOURS. We’re just so happy and relieved that she has a good home.”

I smiled. So were we! Prima Donna de Hearn is one very special cat.

And now you know the rest of her story. 😊

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Follow Prima Donna de Hearn on Instagram at
@prima.donna.calico



Prima's been published!
Angels magazine, March/April 2021