“Demands?”
“Yeah…They would let us have Arizona, Nevada, and Utah—that was a big deal, Daniel getting us Utah—but if they found us anywhere else, they’d shoot us. And if we were found plotting against them, they’d shoot us. And we can’t use any air vehicles. Or they’ll shoot us. And also no cats.”
“I heard about the cat rule in New Mexico,” I said. “It’s so…random.”
“I know. But the Gorg said they wanted all the cats, that they loved to keep them as pets and also to shoot them, and that they would kill any human who still had a cat after last July 31st.”
“What was July 31st?”
Mom’s face fell. “The Gorg sent around these awful robots with cages in back. People everywhere turned over their cats. It…was awful. I saw the cages flying by, filled with them, piled on top of each other…”
She trailed off and hugged Pig to her chest. Pig let out a yowl.
“Shhh! Shh shh. No, baby,” Mom whispered. “No noise. Poor Pigbaby, you can never make noise again.”
Getting to bed that night was awkward. I realized Mom had set up the second mattress for me, but that didn’t leave any place for J.Lo. When Mom had heard that someone named JayJay was coming with me, she’d assumed he was an adult who’d given me a ride to Arizona, an adult who would have his own family or friends to stay with. I’d been sharing close quarters with J.Lo for so long, I didn’t think anything of sharing the new mattress with him. But Mom quickly said, “Here, Turtlebear, why don’t you sleep with me,” and J.Lo got it all to himself. She even made kissing noises at Pig, and I think she went to bed disappointed that Pig curled up in J.Lo’s legs anyway.
“He’s okay,” I whispered when it was dark. “Kind of a pain sometimes, but he has a good heart. Or whatever it is they have—”
“He can’t stay,” Mom whispered back. “It’s bad enough we have a cat. We’re putting the whole casino in danger.”
“So…what, are we going to just…We can’t turn him over to the aliens. He’s not a pet.”
“We can talk about it tomorrow.”
“But—”
“Tomorrow, Turtlebear.”
But tomorrow came, and Mom left at noon. “Jury duty,” she said. Two families were arguing over who got to live in an ice-cream truck, and Mom was one of the people deciding the outcome.
“Stay here,” she said. “I won’t be long. When I come home I’ll knock the secret knock.”
We’d always had a secret knock. It was “I’m a Little Teapot.”
“Don’t let anyone in,” she added. “And don’t go anywhere.”
“We will not,” said J.Lo. Mom glanced at him quickly, then left.
We stared at each other.
“Your mom is nice,” said J.Lo. “Very tall.”
“She’ll get used to you,” I said. “She just needs some time.”
“We all need this time. Our home is very new.”
I took his point. It was strange, living in the casino. It didn’t have any windows, so the ceiling and walls were full of little holes where people had drilled to let in the sunlight. But that let in bugs, too, so the holes were covered in cloth or wire mesh. All these tiny shafts of sunlight gave only a dim haze to the building. What little electricity the casino got went to keeping the fans running. And it was still hot.
A knock at the door made us both jump. It wasn’t the secret knock.
“Um…yeah?” I answered, waving J.Lo behind the refrigerator.
“It’s Katherine Hoegaarden, honey,” said a voice. “We met last night? Is your mom around?”
I’d met a lot of people the night before. I had no idea who this woman was.
“She had to go help with some ice cream–truck thing,” I said, giving Pig to J.Lo to hold. “She’ll be back later.”
“Well, I’m bringing her some books she asked for. Then I thought I could show you two around.”
“Uhhh, yeah? Except she said not to let anyone in. Or go anywhere. While she’s gone.”
“She won’t mind me, hon. Your mom and I are good friends.”
I could feel her pushing gently on the door.
J.Lo whispered, “What do we do?”
“Umm…we can run Pig out to Slushious real quick. And we can cover Slushious with a bedsheet so no one can see in.”
“Oh, this is your answers for everything,” said J.Lo. “Throw a sheet over it.”
Pig meowed suddenly. We froze.
“Honey?” said Mrs. Hoegaarden. “Was that a cat?”
“Okay,” I said to J.Lo. “Get your costume on and follow me.”
With one swift motion, we slipped through the door and blocked it. I took the books and tossed them inside, startling Pig enough to ensure she wouldn’t go near the door again for at least the rest of the day.
“Oh. Hello, there,” said Mrs. Hoegaarden.
“Hi,” I answered. “We’re ready to go.”
“I thought I heard a cat.”
“No. You heard JayJay. He meows.”
Mrs. Hoegaarden gave J.Lo a look. J.Lo sighed a tiny Boov sigh and meowed quietly.
“Well, I’ll be. He sounds just like a real cat.”
He did. So that was lucky.
“Yeah,” I said, “he’s been doing it ever since he heard about the cat massacre. In solidarity with our fallen cat cousins. He’ll probably do it again, any second. Just listen.”
J.Lo turned his ghost face and glared at me a moment. Then he meowed as we followed Katherine Hoegaarden through the casino.
“I’m not surprised your mom is off doing something or other,” said Mrs. Hoegaarden. “She always is.”
“Some men I met talked about her like…she was some kind of local hero,” I said, wondering if that was the right word.
“Oh, my! Well, I suppose. Why not? She’s just been such a big help to everybody, you know. I’ll bet she’s met everyone in the Airport District. That’s where we live, honey, the Airport District.”
“Yeah.”
When we walked outside, the morning sun was like fire in your eyes. We blinked and squinted into it for a few moments before moving on. In the daylight I could see that the pink building was surrounded by small tents and shacks and pickup trucks. It was like a tailgate party that never ended.