Bag comes out of hiding

7Aug17

Yesterday a normal feeding, except no Bag. This morning, I went down the stairs and saw Loudmouth and Fluffy sleeping far apart in the back yard. Still no Bag. Patch makes an appearance, as if I would forget to feed him. There’s a Patch but no little Mask. I call for Mask, no Mask.

 I notice the water bowls are empty and since the outside hose is turned off, trudge up the stairs to refill their water. Then I remember, there is a special treat for the cats in the fridge. My husband sometimes buys smoked salmon, but some brands taste off to him. There was a package of an “off” brand in the fridge he wasn’t going to eat. That’s like dessert to indoor cats and for feral cats must be like dying and going to heaven.

I went back down with the water and salmon. I put down the water and the cats must not have smelled the salmon yet because they went for the water. Went around the corner and found Patch, together we went up and down the sidewalk while I called for Mask. No Mask. Gave Patch a little piece of salmon. I held it in my hand hoping he would come get it. Oh, he was interested, very interested, but was not going to grab food from my hand. I relented and put the salmon in his dish to find Loudmouth demanding his share. Fluffy wanted some too, I was trying to convince her to follow me to her dish, but she was hankering for what Loudmouth had. I gave up and threw her a piece on the sidewalk.

Bag must have smelt something good. He emerged from the side of the apartment. I gave him the last and biggest piece. He seemed particularly paranoid of me and wouldn’t even smell the salmon until I was far away.

Later

I was coming home walking down the path between apartment buildings, I saw Mask sitting in front of another apartment. “Mask!” I said. The cat who had been half asleep immediately recognized my voice and perked up. She communicated with me in typical house cat fashion and showed me her empty bowl.

“All right, I’ll have to go get you some.”

I rounded the corner and debated whether or not I wanted to go upstairs, get the cat food, come back down, feed the cat – who won’t even let me touch it – and go back up. At my apartment, I drank something and got into something more comfortable then went down to feed the cat. She was waiting for me at the foot of the stairs and let me straight to her bowl. She happily waited for me to fill the dish, and naturally, Patch appeared wanting food too. There are three bowls out there for cat food. I filled the bowl situated directly across the sidewalk from Mask who was chomping away. 

Patch meowed at me and wouldn’t eat the food.  Apparently, I put Patch’s food in the wrong bowl, and what’s more it was too close to Mask, and Patch wouldn’t touch it. So I poured the food into the other bowl, and Patch ate just fine.