TRASH CAT LIT

Kathryn Kulpa

Listen to Kathryn read her story

I build a garden in my mind. A place no shadows fall. 

I shield my garden with high stone walls. A door no fox can dig through. 

I lock my garden with a silver key. A key no witch can charm. 

I hide in my garden like a bumblebee in a rose. Little Bee is the name Papa calls me. I am the youngest daughter. I sit on a stone bench in my garden and wait for my rabbit to come. Nose down, careful, ears turning to catch every sound. I’m silent as a ghost. Still as a statue. I long to reach out my hand, stroke the milkweed softness of his fur, but I know if I do, he’ll puff away like dandelion threads. I take out my sketchbook and start to draw. 

When I was five years old I had a pet white rabbit. He was allowed to sleep in my room until he chewed a hole in the wall. Then Papa moved him to the hutch in the barn with the others. 

There were three rabbits. Then the biggest one ran away. Went to live on Rabbit Hill, Mama said. 

Papa never looked up from his bowl of stew. 

Rabbits disappeared, I knew. Like chickens. Like our pig, Delilah, Mr. Fletcher took away in his wagon. I held my hands over my ears when my brothers pointed at the bacon on the breakfast table, made oinking sounds, whispered Delilah is delicious! 

When my brothers smile their teeth gleam white and sharp like knives. But when they laughed about rabbit stew I lifted my bowl and turned it over the eldest’s head, then kicked all three when they tried to grab me and pull my hair. 

Girls don’t fight, Papa said, and I was sent to bed without supper. Later Mama brought chamomile tea and honey. You must think before you act, she said. 

That night I lay in bed, listening to thunder rumbling, long rolls and sudden sharp cracks, yet no rain. It felt wrong, a storm so fierce and dry. Flashes of light flared like matches. At last the thunder dimmed, and I heard the spatter of rain on leaves. The house was quiet. 

I sneaked outside, into the dark barn. Unlatched the door to the hutch. Told the rabbits to run away, run to Rabbit Hill. 

The next morning, the barn door was open. The hutch was empty. Nothing left but scattered straw, torn clouds of fur soaked in blood. 

The fox. 

The fox I let in when I left the door unlocked. 

And now, each night in bed, I build my garden wall, stone by stone. I lock the door. I wear the key around my neck, heavy as sorrow. 

I draw pictures of rabbits drinking tea. Their mother tucks them into soft beds, folds their little blue coats over chairs. Sometimes, as I sketch, I think I catch a glimpse of something white, wisping through tall grass, watching. 

Kathryn’s prompts were: during extreme weather, a ghost, a fight

Kathryn Kulpa’s first ambition in life was to be a witch, and then a writer. It’s possible she is at least one of these things. Her work has been chosen for Best Microfiction, Best Small Fictions, and the Wigleaf longlist. Find her at kathrynkulpa.com, on her Substack, and in Boudin, Claudine, Flash Frog, HAD, matchbook, and trampset.

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