Juno heard it first with her left ear.
A tiny rustling — not a mouse-rustle, not a pipe-creak — something sneakier, something with small, scrambling paws. Juno was on the sofa, one eye already open. Her right ear swivelled. Her whiskers went very still. Something was happening in the kitchen.
She dropped to the floor without a sound.
The hallway was dark and smelled of nothing unusual. But halfway along it, the smell changed. Turkey. Definitely turkey. The leftover roast from dinner, sitting on the counter, going absolutely nowhere. Juno's nose twitched once. She pushed the kitchen door open with one deliberate paw.
She stopped. She stared.
The turkey was still on the counter, gleaming faintly in the dark. But dangling from the shopping bag hanging off the cupboard handle was a small grey kitten, swinging gently, going nowhere fast. Wrapped completely in a fallen tea towel was a second kitten, bumbling in slow circles on the floor. And sitting on top of the refrigerator, looking extremely pleased about absolutely nothing, was a third — the smallest, the smuggest — with one white paw dangling over the edge.
They had come through the cat flap. All three of them. From next door.
Juno sat down and gave them a look. It was not a welcoming look. It was the look of someone with very strong opinions about who was and was not allowed in her kitchen. The dangling kitten stopped swinging. The tea-towel kitten bumped into a chair leg. The smug one on the refrigerator yawned, which was frankly outrageous.
Sniff, sniff, sniff. That was the grey one, nose aimed straight at the turkey. Sniff, sniff, sniff. The tea-towel one had worked its head free and was doing it too. Even the smug one leaned down from the refrigerator, nostrils going like tiny bellows.
Juno herded the grey one first.
She walked it firmly toward the cat flap with her shoulder, the way you move a slow cloud across a sky. The kitten went, eventually, with a small indignant squeak as it squeezed back through. The tea-towel kitten was easier — it tripped on the towel's edge and Juno simply nudged it in the right direction and out it went, trailing fabric behind it.
That left the smug one on the refrigerator.
Juno looked up at it. It looked down at her. The refrigerator hummed between them. Juno flicked her tail once. The kitten did not move. She flicked it twice. Nothing. The kitten tilted its head, very slowly, toward the turkey. Then back at Juno. It was making a point.
Juno took one step toward the counter. She lifted her nose. She gave the turkey one single, long, dignified sniff.
The smell was extraordinary. Herb and fat and golden crackling skin. She would not be admitting that to anyone.
The smug kitten climbed down from the refrigerator, trotted past Juno with its tail in the air, and disappeared through the cat flap with a soft thwap.
Juno stood alone in the kitchen.
She looked at the turkey. She looked at the cat flap. She looked at the turkey once more — just to confirm her findings — then she turned and padded back down the dark hallway, into the sitting room, and up onto the sofa.
Three circles. Then she settled.
Her nose tucked under her tail. Her ears folded just slightly. The kitchen was quiet, the house was still, the turkey was exactly where it belonged, and Juno's eyes closed to two thin, satisfied lines.
