My eyes see through your skin, down to your very soul.

Familiar – noun, “An attendant spirit, often taking animal form.”

Squeaky, the larger of Mom’s two black cats (and the one with the tiny tuft of white on his chest), has become her shadow. He watches over her from the rafters while she does her barn chores. When she takes the horses out to the arena for a ride or exercise, Squeaky perches on one of the fence posts, his eyes following them around the arena.

The other day, Mom and I were talking on the phone, and the beagle started howling frantically in the background. She said to me, “Hang on, the dog is trying to eat my cat. Oh it’s Squeaky, he just heard my voice on the deck and wanted to get to his Mom.” Squeaky had gone on a sojourn around the house, into the yard and past the dog to find her. He was sitting calmly on the deck railing, watching her talk on the phone and completely ignoring the beagle howling at him from the ground. Mom firmly insists that Squeaky is a barn cat, so she picked him up and carried him back to the barn.

I give it two months before he’s in the house full time. 🙂 Wagers, anyone?