I thought I understood how grief would look in this house.
I knew I would look toward the living room and expect to see Blitz there. I knew I would wake up listening for her. I knew the silence would feel wrong. I knew the cats might wander around for a while, looking in the places where she used to be.
What I forgot was Jasper.
My scruffy, beautiful Jasper.
Cats have come and gone through our lives over the years, but Jasper remains the longest-running feline member of this wonderfully chaotic household. Ten years young, and very much the strong, silent type.
And by strong and silent, I mean he mostly stares at you like he’s judging you for every decision you’ve made since birth.
He’s tolerated a lot.
He’s survived dogs. Humans. Household chaos. Having his face ripped halfway off acting a fool outside and healed in less than 2 weeks. And, perhaps most impressively, the arrival of the Orange Terrors, who came crashing into his previously respectable existence with all the subtlety of three drunk frat boys kicking down the door.
Jasper took it all in stride.
But there is something about him that I don’t think many people knew.
Blitz was his best friend.
I have pictures to prove it, although I don’t really need them. I have years of memories of the two of them together. Jasper rubbing his face against hers. Sitting beside her. Existing quietly in that strange, beautiful way animals do when they have decided that another creature belongs to them.
No explanation necessary.
No species distinction.
No complicated human bullshit.
Just: You’re mine. I’m yours. We live here together.
And today, while I was drowning so completely in my own grief that I could barely see beyond it, I realized Jasper was grieving too.
The other cats looked for Blitz.
They wandered around. They investigated. Eventually, being cats, they apparently decided there were important cat matters requiring their attention elsewhere.
But Jasper didn’t.
Jasper went to her bed.
He climbed onto the blanket Blitz was lying on when she died.
And he stayed.
All day.
That picture of him lying there absolutely destroyed me because suddenly I realized something I somehow hadn’t allowed myself to think about:
He doesn’t know where his best friend went.
He doesn’t understand cremation. He doesn’t understand death. He doesn’t know about the beautiful urn that will come home or the shadow box I made or the candle I burned for her all night.
He only knows that Monday morning, Blitz was here.
And today she isn’t.
And her blanket still smells like her.
God.
As if my heart had any pieces left to break.
I keep wondering how I’m supposed to help an animal through grief when I can’t control my own emotions for five consecutive minutes.
But maybe that’s another one of those things animals understand better than we do.
Maybe Jasper doesn’t need me to explain it.
Maybe he doesn’t need me to make it better.
Maybe he just needs someone willing to sit in the place where she used to be and miss her with him.
So after my bath tonight, that’s what I’m going to do.
I’m going to crawl onto Blitz’s enormous bed beside my scruffy old cat. I’m going to leave her blanket exactly where it is. I’m going to stroke that beautiful gray fur for as long as he’ll let me. If he wants to stay there all night, then I suppose that’s where we’ll be.
Two creatures who loved the same girl.
Neither one of us understanding how the hell the world is supposed to keep going without her.
And maybe, for tonight, we don’t have to.
Maybe Jasper and I can just lie there together in the place where she belonged.
Maybe he can grieve his way.
I can grieve mine.
And we can remind each other that we’re still here.
Because I almost forgot something important today.
I didn’t lose Blitz alone.
Jasper lost her too.
And tonight, my sweet boy isn’t going to have to miss his best friend by himself.
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