Cat in a hot pink Pursuit

me all screwed up. You want to be my mother and father in thirty-some years? Afraid to face each other because they can’t admit that what they had was lost? That it was really something?”
    “You want to marry a bottle blonde?”
    “I want to marry you, whatever shade you’re wearing.”
    “Then this is a proposal.”
    He thought for a moment. “No, this is a free trial offer. A proposal would be much better than this.”
    “Can’t believe it could be,” she said, curling her fingers into the lapels of his jacket.
    That ended discussions for a while.
    Temple’s heart was beating like the Rod Stewart-advertised drum but her mind was racing too, from the moon to the dizzying scent on her wrist that blended with the champagne and the music into an altered state.
    To a low-profile emerald ring on her hand and a wrench of regret in her heart.
    To a certain knowledge that there was no going back from here, no slipping away into separate Edens.
    To a growing realization that she didn’t want to go back from here. She wanted to go forward.
    She so much wanted to go forward that it would have taken one finger pushing on the delicate necklace so near the pulse in her throat and she’d have been lying back on the Crossfire hood.
    Maybe he knew that. Maybe that was what he meant by going slow (although it might be what she considered going crazy).
    His parents had followed the moment and the magic and couldn’t bear to face each other, and perhaps him, now.
    Not for them.
    They necked for another extremely overheated ten minutes, then packed up their salt-cedar picnic.
    And left.



The World His Oyster

    I am waiting up for my Miss Temple, my tail thumping with impatience. It is not right for a roommate to announce a midnight return from a social engagement and then to be three hours late!
    Normally, I am content to let others come and go at their pleasure and their leisure, since i do not want anyone dictating hours to me.
    However, time and again I have proved to be my Miss Temple’s muscle. Although I know Mr. Matt Devine to be such a straight arrow that he could aim his fancy new car at the town of Reno hundreds of miles to the north and hit it dead on, I have to wonder what he could be doing to keep my roomie up so late?
    Could it be a breakdown of the Crossfire? Flat tire? Gas tank leak? An attempted hijacking? Kidnapping? Encounter with terrorists? UFOs?
    Perhaps I have become a teensy bit too attached to my Miss Temple.
    I should have hitchhiked a ride in the Crossfire. Then I would not be worrying now. I pace like a Big Cat. Hey! I am a Big Cat.
    1 chew my nails. I will certainly raise a ruckus when the truants come home safe and sound at—I eye the clock on the VCR. Three-thirty! What are they thinking of? Certainly not me!
    But... now I hear voices. In the short hallway leading to our domicile.
    Very low voices. Nice of them to worry about not keeping anyone up when I have been wearing out my pads with pacing!
    A key in the door. I go to sit by it, assuming a stern, accusing posture. She could have left a note.
    The door swings open a hair but no further.
    I still hear murmurs.
    I insert my head silently into the opening, assuming a put-upon look. I have not had a treat spooned over my Free-to-be-Feline since we left for the Teen Queen Castle. I am hungry!
    My Miss Temple is leaning against the door frame with her hands braced behind her like she has all the time in the world. She looks half asleep. Correction: she looks like she is half dreaming.
    Mr. Matt has leaned a hand on the doorjamb above her head. At least he is not neglecting her.
    Miss Temple jams the toe of her purple silk sandal into the wooden hall floor, looking down. He is looking down on her shockingly blonde head.
    “You could come in,” she says, a strange slow, reluctant, warm, inviting tone in her voice, like she means it and is afraid she does mean it.
    No! I am waiting impatiently for a long-delayed spread of oysters and shrimp over my Free-to-be-Feline! Enough palaver!
    Apparently, Mr. Matt agrees, for he drops his hand from the door frame and catches her hands tight behind her back and... well, his other hand lifts up her face and he does something totally unfeline and quite unfit for the youthful eyes of my species.
    It is a good thing I have been around humans during mating season, for I shut my eyes in time to avoid witnessing something we would all prefer that I did not.
    And then my Miss Temple is in the room at last,