Knit · Princess · Speaks

So, The Roommate and I returned home on Saturday afternoon from a day of parties and errands to discover a random cat sitting in front of our door.  This was unusual, but not unprecedented, since cats are known to escape from apartments from time to time.  We thought nothing of it.

Sunday morning, however, the cat was still there and had progressed to howling outside our door.  This was no good.  Roommate made signs to hang around the complex, while I entertained the cat.  We brought food and water out to the landing, but the cat was purring...  Yeah, there was No Way that was going to last.

Since the cat had now been abandoned for more than 12 hours, we brought him inside.  Our cats?  Not amused.  There was growling, hissing, chasing, the usual.  Mostly on our cats' end, honestly.  The abandoned cat, who was nearly immediately named Arthur (after Weasley, not King of the Britains), made himself right at home.  We started calling around for no-kill shelters, but most of them were full.

We did finally find a place that could take him, but not until 6 that night.  Attempting to confine him to the bathroom was an unmitigated failure, so we kept our cats isolated in bedrooms and let Arthur have the run of the rest of the house, figuring that Amy and Arista sleep in bedrooms for most of the day anyway.  We also started calling friends who are in Reduced Cat Circumstances, but no go.

At 5:30, while we were waiting for the go ahead from the shelter to bring him in, we get a knock on the door.  It's Arthur's momma!  She was very relieved to see him and we were glad to find his home instead of bringing him to a shelter.

Someday, perhaps, our cats will forgive us.  Not today, though.

ETA: Arthur's momma had been out of town since Saturday morning.  Her husband was supposed to be watching the cat, but I think, and I don't think I'm wrong here, he didn't do a very good job.  Turns out the cat was an earlier rescue and his momma just calls him Kitty.  But he'll always be Arthur to me.