Fiction

How to Make Friends at the End of the World

The Quarantine Diaries, Part Two

This is part of a series of short stories. To read them all, head here.

When the virus put the city into lockdown, my cat started talking to me.

“You’re so lazy,” she said.

“What?”

“All you do is sit there and watch TV.”

“Nobody’s allowed outside,” I said. “What do you expect me to do?”

“For starters, you could learn to play that song you’re always humming in the morning. But for now, how about lunch?”

I got off the sofa and poured some cat food into Maguro’s bowl. She gave a quiet nod and began nibbling at it. I glanced at the guitar in the corner and the thin layer of dust that coated it.

“Yeah, I’m probably too lazy for that,” I said.

Maguro had always been kind of talkative in her own way. She cried if I slept past seven in the morning. If I forgot to fill her auto-feeder. If I forgot her afternoon snack. If she wanted to play. If she wanted to sit in my lap but I was using my laptop. If she woke up from her afternoon nap and she didn’t know where I was even though I was just on the sofa. If she was sleepy but I wasn’t in bed yet. If she just…