“A cat, that’s all. A cat.” “Put the box in the back of the truck.” “Shoo, cat! Scat!” Then for a long time, there were no human voices. The box they were in was picked up and put down many times. Shoebag had crawled out of the microwave and joined his family in the bottom of the box. It was a noisy, bumpy ride, full of stops and starts, lasting many days, during which they fed on the glue of the Super-Stik tape. At last they arrived at their new home, a huge store in a shopping center just outside Boston. When they landed there, it was evening, almost closing time. They sneaked out into a section of the store called Appliances, where they stayed up under a new refrigerator while Under The Toaster scouted for a permanent place. All the television sets across the aisle were on. “This doesn’t look good to me,” said Drainboard. “What will we eat here?” “I saw some books in the next aisle,” said Shoebag. “We can always eat the bindings.” “Ugh!” Drainboard’s wings shuddered with distaste.
