Cataloupe
Cataloupe
Lilith Acadia
Zhen and Ann met at Berkeley Bowl market, reaching for the same cantaloupe. Their fingers touched. Then their eyes met. Then they let their fingers intertwine over the melon’s ropey surface.
Or that’s what they told people. Actually, they had been reaching for the same $1 bag of over-ripe avocados in the sale section. Knowing she couldn’t really finish all of them before they turned brown and sour, Ann invited the stranger over to share a big bowl of guacamole. Ann had wanted to impress Zhen with summer rolls of sprouts and baked tofu in the brittle rice wrappers you can only get shipped direct from Vietnam. But she forgot to buy peanut butter for a dipping sauce. So they gorged themselves on chips, then went out to glean figs from a neighbor’s tree for dessert.
Zhen, taller and buffer, lifted Ann’s slight frame into the branches and tried to focus on spotting Ann rather than staring at her calves. Not objectifying the other woman’s body, Zhen told herself, just trying to see through the superficiality to the true being underneath the skin. As Ann reached higher, the shaking branches disgorged a plump fig smack onto Zhen’s forehead, eliciting an oath Ann didn’t understand. Ann had already suspected from Zhen’s stereotypically Californian accent and prepositional slips of an immigrant who’d been forced through accent-reduction classes that Zhen might have come to California as a child, but this was the perfect opportunity to ask about Zhen’s mother tongue. Zhen climbed into the branches after Ann, and taught her another how to pronounce “Zhen,” even drawing the character ‘貞’ in the air with a lithe pointer finger, as though that would help. But there was no high and level tone in Vietnamese, so before Ann could quite get it right, their giggles melted into kisses.
Three days into their first date, Zhen grudgingly bicycled back up Shattuck Avenue to change her underwear and grab her laptop before class. After that, they agreed to force themselves to take at least a day apart between dates. After both counting down hours, they’d meet at Berkeley Rose Garden, Jupiter’s back patio, amongst the headstones at Chapel of the Chimes, or in the New Parkway Theater’s top row. Invariably, they would end up at Ann’s house. As dawn light came in through her un-curtained windows, they would be gazing at one another, at the other’s distinctive, yet somehow immediately familiar features. Zhen’s fingertips tickled along Ann’s square jaw and the tall bridge of her nose, while Ann smoothed Zhen’s black caterpillar eyebrows and asymmetrical shoulder-length hair that had been bleached then dyed blue. Ann sang snippets of love-song lyrics and Zhen would try to think of synonyms for beautiful, resorting to Mandarin when she ran out of suitably appreciative English words.
They both knew they were in love on their twenty-fifth day. In a drowsy, giddy fog, they agreed that if they fell asleep, they would never wake up in time for class and work. So instead, they bicycled through Temescal in the early morning to see what might be open. Turning onto Telegraph, they took advantage of the empty street to ride side-by-side, reaching out to hold hands. Zhen’s breath caught in her throat, they locked eyes for a second too long: she didn’t see the pothole and her front wheel careened out. Zhen pushed hard on the left handlebar to avoid crashing into Ann’s bike as her tire popped and her knee picked up a gash full of gravel.
As they told their friends, Ann knew first, when Zhen instinctively sacrificed her knee for Ann’s safety. Zhen knew a few minutes later, when Ann confidently wheeled both bikes back to her stoop, to clean Zhen’s knee then replace the burst bicycle inner tube with equal skill.
They marked their six-month anniversary of meeting over the melon at Berkeley Bowl by moving in together, into the illegally-built auxiliary dwelling unit in the back yard of a pseudo-lefty couple who realized they could capitalize on the housing crunch, so released their three chickens in Joaquin Miller park, poured a cement floor, raised and shingled the roof, and listed their coop as a “#TinyHome” on Craigslist. The first 4.2 earthquake knocked the frame out of alignment, so the brand-new double-paned windows never really closed, letting particles from the highway overpass above settle onto every surface. But Zhen and Ann were in love.
They celebrated their one-year anniversary at the Berkeley Humane Society, adopting Cataloupe. As they walked along the rows of cats in cages, a small orange striped cat with Scottish fold ears and a tiny voice to match had stuck a wee paw through the bars. Ann reached out to touch his paw; Zhen looked into his eyes, and they didn’t even have to speak to know this would be their cat. Cataloupe seemed so mellow and harmless at the Humane Society, but in the rideshare home, he had the stinkiest diarrhea that dripped out of the crate, running up a cleaning charge higher than his adoption fee. That only made Zhen and Ann more invested.
Oh, how much they loved Cataloupe! Both of their Instagams quickly filled with photographs of Cataloupe: whiskers in the slanting dusk light, toe beans (adzuki beans, they agreed) photographed from below as he lounged on one of their laps, caught mid-yawn as though roaring, baring his belly or begging for breakfast, or simply stretched out on their bed staring into the middle distance. He had toys under every piece of furniture, and a cat tree replaced the reading chair. They planted cat-nip in the garden from which they’d snip little offerings. Ann borrowed a sewing machine from the tools- lending library to quilt together a stuffed lining for her bike basket so she could bring Cataloupe on rides along the Bay or around Lake Merritt, to Sunday brunch at the Thai temple, or once even to campus to surprise Zhen [pe7] [n8] after class. On their first trial ride around the neighborhood with Cataloupe nestled in the newly-lined bike basket, they spotted a lost cat poster. They stopped to contemplate how they’d feel if Cataloupe disappeared (devastated), and what they’d do if that happened (wander the streets of Oakland night after night, shaking a bag of cat treats and calling her name like a Buddhist chant). They leaned in from either side of the bike basket to kiss Cataloupe’s little ears.
Zhen and Ann agreed, they had a perfect relationship. They shared tastes in food, clothes, and movies. They enjoyed the same activities and avoided the same vices. Both were similarly active and equally frugal, then together, they addressed conflict through nonviolent communication. Cataloupe complemented their balance; he served as the fulcrum around which their relationship spun.
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For their two-year anniversary, they got a joint tattoo. They agreed that rainbows were too much, but since Zhen always held Ann’s left hand in her right, Ann got concentric red-orange-yellow brushstrokes on her inner left forearm, and Zhen got green-blue-purple ones on her right outer forearm so that when they held hands, as they usually did, their arms pressed together composed a rainbow. They told their friends they chose the spot because it was where Cataloupe first scratched Ann. Really it was just above their wrists, where Zhen thought she could cover it with bracelets on trips home. While Ann’s mother readily welcomed Zhen, unconditionally loving the woman who loved her only child, Zhen feared her own conservative Taiwanese family would not be so understanding—, of their relationship or a tattoo.
For their fourth-year anniversary, they spent the day in San Francisco, picking out one volume each at City Lights, lounging in Dolores Park sharing pastries from Tartine, and wandering the Mission reading Michelle Tea’s Valencia aloud to one another until The Lexington opened. Usually, they would’ve brought Cataloupe along in his cat backpack with a perforated plexiglass porthole he could look out of while they walked around the city, but this bar on a Friday night seemed too rowdy, even for their chill cat.
Of course, that was the night Cataloupe ran away. Later, Ann would say she just knew he was gone, as soon as she saw the crooked window wedged open too far. Zhen and Ann were distraught, awake right through the night, not contemplating one another’s beauty or bicycling to the earliest morning café, but walking up and down calling for Cataloupe, shaking bags of his favorite cat treats. Ann insisted all would be well: it was the year of the cat, so Cataloupe was probably just making a statement. Zhen insisted it was the year of the rabbit, and the Vietnamese had just misinterpreted the Chinese word for bunny, so they were doomed. It was their worst anniversary ever, but they cuddled close after finally falling into bed.
Ann’s mother took some sick days and the first bus up from Santa Ana to help them look for Cataloupe. Ann went around to ask all the neighbors whether they’d seen a small orange cat with tiny ears. Zhen took charge of printing out and putting up flyers around the neighborhood. Unfortunately, the flyers only elicited disappointment, prank calls of meows, and offers to return the cat in exchange for undoable things. There were the creepy calls from men, like the one with a faux French accent detailing how he was torturing the cat. And there were uselessly distracting ones like the Law law school student who had found a box full of orange kittens and wanted to know whether they’d like a replacement. He probably though he was being helpful and judicious.
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Cataloupe had been missing about a week when Zhen called her grandmother to wish her happy birthday. Hearing the sadness, her grandmother asked what was wrong. Studies were going well, she was eating and sleeping enough, she didn’t want a boyfriend, and there hadn’t been any big earthquakes in a while. Zhen admitted that she was worried about her missing cat. That was an issue her grandmother could solve, even from six thousand miles away! She instructed Zhen to get a pencil and take careful notes on Taiwanese tricks for calling a cat back. First, that very night Zhen should take treats around to the neighborhood cats and talk to them, explaining how much she missed Cataloupe, so that the other cats would spread the word that he should come home.
Ann loved the mystical imagery when Zhen placed open scissors on top of a bowl of water next to the stove, splayed blades pointing towards the door. She was not so enthusiastic about leaving out Cataloupe’s favorite meal of sardines and sprinkling undiluted urine around their tiny house each day until Cataloupe returned. They weren’t sure where to find a Land God temple, so went to the Thai temple on Russell street Street to pray.
They were walking under what they’d come to think of as ‘their’ fig tree when they heard mewing. Zhen lifted Ann into the branches, and she pulled out a black kitten. Ann cried that she’d rather have found a bunny! A friend with a car took Zhen and Ann to deliver the kitten to the Humane Society, then on a hike in Joaquin Miller to get their minds off Cataloupe. The friend was jovial and exuberant, jumping off of whatever he could find, and prancing along a fallen tree as though voguing in a Harlem ballroom. Their somber mood was on the verge of dissipating into smiles when they saw a chicken, with full lush feathers so silky they looked like Ann’s long black hair. They followed the chicken a few yards and Zhen began to moan. What sort of sign was it: did the gods misunderstand what they were praying to have returned? Were the black kitten and chicken divine replacements? Or a sign that they were not being bold enough, and should take some of the calls seriously? Or, Zhen shook with fear, was the chicken a sign that a bird took Cataloupe? A paranoid image splashed before her eyes and out of her mouth: an eagle might have carried Cataloupe a distance, then dropped him, talon gouges spilling blood.[pe9] [n10]
A friend from Scripps recommended a pet psychic to Ann, and Ann grasped at the new hope. Zhen totally rejected the idea, arguing that psychics are were[n11] bullshit, particularly when claiming to communicate with a non-human who wasn’t even there. Ann countered that a pet psychic was no more woo-woo than the sequence of Taiwanese superstitions they’d exhausted, and if Ann had been willing to surround herself with scissors, pee, and joss sticks for praying to unknown gods, then they could try this new approach.
The pet psychic just happened to have a cancellation allowing them to see him the very next day, and generously agreed to give them a rate at the bottom of his sliding scale ($108–600/session). A white boomer hippy hippie wearing Rajneeshee red and purple clothing greeted them in the cramped waiting room suffused with spa music and scent diffuser mist. Zhen realized this awkward man was the pet psychic when he led them with a cringe flourish-bow into a cushiony chamber with photographs of various animals lining the walls, some with faint watermarks still visible as though he’d downloaded them off a stock photo website without paying. Zhen chose the least-comfortable looking chair, hoping it would be the least used, but had to switch seats when crystals on the windowsill reflected irritatingly into her eyes. Ann glared, unsure whether Zhen was anxious or just incredulous, and the pet psychic blinked rapidly over his reading glasses as Zhen removed some throw pillows from a different chair.
The pet psychic clacked his bracelet beads and jiggled his knee while Ann laid out the requested four color photographs of Cataloupe printed on 8.5 x 11” paper: Cataloupe draped like a fox stole over Ann’s shoulders, walking across Zhen’s keyboard while she tried to type, dressed in a bowtie for Tết with Ann’s mother, and a studio portrait of the cat peeking out of a basket of oversized silk flowers. The pet psychic led them through ridiculously basic “insights” into Cataloupe, a striped cat with four paws who liked to nap and cuddle. Popping saliva bubbles against the roof of his mouth, the pet psychic mused that Cataloupe is was pampered, but could take more love. The cat, he suggested, had been so very sad before they adopted him, and was so very happy to live with them. The pet psychic closed his eyes, turned towards the window so that prisms cast small rainbows over his brow. He hummed, rested his hands in mudras on his knees, then breathed out heavily and announced that Cataloupe was very sorry for running away, especially sorry to Ann. But, he announced with a dramatic sigh, Cataloupe just couldn’t stomach being near Zhen’s boyfriend.
There was a moment of shock. Now Zhen was definitely incredulous. And annoyed. She insisted there was no fucking way, but the pet psychic doubled down. Readjusting to sit in half lotus on the fringed pillow, and trying a different set of mudras, the man insisted that was the message Cataloupe was sending through him. Ann forced herself to breathe while tears pooled in her lower lids. They all looked from one to the other: Ann devastated, Zhen irate, and the pet psychic suddenly very uncomfortable. He struggled up from the floor, mumbling about giving them some privacy, though really he just needed to poop.
Ann accused Zhen of not wanting to come to the pet psychic because her affair would be revealed. Zhen insisted she didn’t want to come because the psychic was full of shit. Plus, the idea that she, a gold-star lesbian (except for that boy she kissed at the music festival, Ann interjectsed) would have a secret boyfriend was outrageous. Anyway, how would an affair be logistically possible for a pair of U-Haul lesbians who spent all their time together? Ann should have seen it was bullshit. Ann shot back that what she should’ve seen was that the boy at the music festival wouldn’t be the only one. [pe12] [n13]
Adrenaline-pumped speed-walking back up Telegraph Ave to their tiny house, Ann accused Zhen of betraying Annher, betraying their love, and betraying Cataloupe. When Ann asked Zhen to move out, Zhen argued that they had an ideal relationship. All of their friends would agree: they were the most perfect couple. Obviously not, Ann cried. After hours that seemed like mere minutes, Zhen relented; maybe their relationship was not as perfect as she thought, since Ann believed some white boomer hippy hippie over her love.
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On what would’ve been Ann and Zhen’s fifth anniversary, Ann took what she’d never admit was a nostalgic trip to Berkeley Bowl. Ann was hurrying through the cheese section towards the chips when a man thrust an arm out to stop her. The pet psychic appeared to be wearing the same red-purple outfit, so Ann recognized him with a rush of blood to her ears as he asked her through an uncomfortably broad smile and too many blinks how she was doing. Then, almost proudly, he asked about her cat. Tears were starting to well as Ann relived the loss of Cataloupe, when the pet psychic asked, “and And how’s your sister?”
Ann gaped at him: “I don’t have a sister!”
The pet psychic looked puzzled, placed the round of camembert Camembert in his empty basket in slow motion, and asked who it was who came along with her to their appointment. Ann started to whisper, “my My girlfriend,” but all the tears of nearly a year without Cataloupe or Zhen spluttered out with, “my My ex-girlfriend!” The pet psychic excused himself to go to the bathroom, though really it was to give himself privacy.
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Thanks to Tallulah for actually understanding how cats think; to Ya-Chen, Chang-Min, and Rilla for teaching me about Taiwanese cat traditions; and to unnamed colleagues who shared their experiences consulting pet psychics.
