Part III-Sir Fopling Flutter

New Year’s Eve, December 31, 2007

While much of this drama was being played out in the second half of 2006, I had already begun contemplating a move to the East coast. For one thing, I had always wanted to return. Secondly, my university was offering health care for those who lived in New York, New Jersey or Connecticut. I now had the perfect excuse to move back.

By June of 2007, I had found the house I wanted – and by September, I had moved in. My parents decided to accompany me since they were elderly: what if something happened to any of us?

To this day, I still wonder if I made the right choice then. In mid-October, Flutter began to decline, eating less and less. I was especially worried since the vet had already removed his feeding tube in May, believing that he was thriving. Was another mass growing in his jaws? Whenever his appetite returned, we felt relieved. But there were fewer such days. As Thanksgiving rolled around, we decided to bring him to the vet’s yet one more time. Fortunately, he started eating again for a few weeks, albeit not as heartily as before.

By mid-December, I convinced myself that he needed a feeding tube again. I know he’s not that badly off, I told myself; he still wants to sit and sleep with me.

And so we brought him to yet another vet as I was losing hope with the other one. If I were superstitious, I should have taken the hint from the slip in a fortune cookie saying “sometimes it’s best to accept things as they are.” And I should have felt morbid when a mass of black birds suddenly descended on the houses around us – like a scene out of Hitchcock’s Birds. But I was determined that none of this meant anything. I was not superstitious.

As he looked progressively weaker even after the feeding tube was reinserted, I told myself…he just has to get used to the tube like he did before. Didn’t he become much livelier after appearing to lose so much of his vitality the previous summer? Never mind that he was now suffering a fever for the first time in his life. That he was losing control of his bladder and bowels. Never mind that he sat for hours in the adjoining bedroom, barely stirring. His sudden spurt of activity on Friday, December 28th convinced me, however, that he was recovering – even though he was less energetic over the weekend. He did eat on his own, which seemed somewhat promising. Maybe he was just more tired on Saturday and Sunday because they were cloudy days – and he always seemed livelier when the sun was shining brightly. These were all fervent hopes and dreams that he would regain a new life. After all, he gained a new life last year and cats have nine lives…right?

Little did I know that Monday, New Year’s Eve, would be his last day. I still recall that overcast morning and afternoon as I sat at my computer grading essays. When I went to see him in his room, he could barely muster the strength to jump on the sofa. He sat next to me, resting his chin on my lap. What a loving boy: what would I do if I lost him? As I tried to offer food, he jumped off, walking away. A few hours later, noticing that he hadn’t touched anything at all, I decided to give him a tube feeding.

That is when tragedy struck. Ten minutes after the feeding, he threw up and my mother noticed he had gone limp. Was it a stroke? Heart attack? Was he alive at all?

We drove to the emergency vet. At 11:30 pm, he was pronounced dead.

© Frances A. Chiu

Next – Part IV, Mourning Flutter