Bosco Kitty's Arc

Chapter 9 of 9

Bosco is still curled on the rug when the door opens. He freezes. Heavy footsteps cross the floor, slower than hers ever were. He slides beneath the bed skirt before the man can see him. From the dark, he watches a pair of worn shoes stop beside the rocking chair. The man sits down hard. Bosco knows the scent now — soap and coffee and the salt of held-back tears. It is Max. Her husband. The one whose lap Bosco once kneaded while she laughed from the doorway. Max sets a leather album on his knees and opens it with shaking hands. A framed picture slips from between the pages. Bosco sees it land on the rug — a wedding day, two young faces pressed close. Max picks it up and presses it to his chest. Then the sound comes. A low, broken sob. He pulls a tissue from a box on the nightstand, then another, then another. Crumpled white shapes fall around his feet like snow. Bosco's whole body aches to go to him. To climb the lap that needs him most. But he stays hidden. This grief is not his to interrupt. He presses his cheek to the floor and listens until the weeping softens, keeping his silent watch from the dark beneath her bed.