Flash Fiction Friday: Peeping Tomcat

(Source image: "Monday" by Darren Hopes)

He purred contentedly as she stood naked in front of her closet, deciding what to wear on her date.  Maggie selected a cute sundress and placed it on her bed.  Sitting in a chair, she put on the striped tights Frank liked so much, then a pair of red shoes.  She caught the cat staring at her, and lowered her hand to him.  He rubbed his face against her fingers.

When Andy died, the adjustment was difficult.  Maggie was terribly lonely, and often frightened of strange noises late at night.  Resigned to solitude, she adopted a stray cat that had been prowling outside the house the week after the funeral.  She fancied him a protector of sorts, looking out for her and keeping her company.  She named the cat Andy. (130)

-Jack

I tweeted on Thursday afternoon that I wasn't feeling this week's prompt.  When I first saw it on Wednesday, I wasn't sure what to do with it.  I don't do well with prompts that aren't photographs; during last week's self-assigned FFF, I bypassed several non-photo prompts in favor of the one I ultimately chose.

With minimal thought, however, the premise came to me pretty easily.  In the prompt picture, I saw a woman getting dressed while sitting in a chair.  The cat beside her appeared to have a halo over its head.  It occurred to me that the cat might have been the embodiment of a dead husband or lover.  Though it might not be conclusive from the two paragraphs I wrote, I decided that the cat was in fact the reincarnation of the woman’s husband, and that he is perhaps watching wistfully as she gets dressed to go out on a date.

As usual, my main problem with this week’s Flash Fiction Friday was managing to tell a coherent story while remaining within the word limit.  This week’s range was 86-136 words.  The first casualty was a passage describing Maggie’s shoes:  “She fancied them ruby slippers, much like in The Wizard of Oz.”  As my first thought upon seeing the shoes in the picture was “ruby slippers”, I felt that I had to address this, though it took up far too much valuable space and was quickly cut.

Additionally, I altered the opening of the story, which originally was told from the cat’s point-of-view:  “He observed silently as Maggie stepped out of the shower, drying her body with a white towel.  He purred contentedly as she stood naked in front of her closet, deciding what to wear on her date.”  This opening was dropped partially due to space restrictions, but also for the sake of keeping Maggie the story’s focus.  I regretted not having a bit more space, as the excised opening is the only thing remotely erotic about this story.

The fact that the cat and Maggie’s husband share the same name was initially revealed early in the story, but I felt that it made a decent twist for the very end.  I didn’t want to beat the reader over the head with the possibility that Andy the cat is Andy the dead husband, but I also didn’t want to make the revelation too subtle, leaving the reader to say, “So she named the cat after her husband.  So what?”

Placement of the key phrase ("resigned") proved troublesome at first, as I wrote a decent rough draft but forgot to include it.  However, upon revising and editing I was able to work it into the story in a manner that, in my opinion, doesn't seem too forced.

If you'd like to take part in the fun, or see who else participated this week, check out Erotic Flash Fiction Friday.