Chaos Critter Tails: Dante's Bath Tangle
Dante and Crokell visit Bath, where Dante becomes entangled with a female. Also, Black Cat Tales anthology rocks the charts!
The summer is flying by, and Houston, at least, is starting to heat up. My roses are blooming and changing. We are also getting ready for dog obedience competitions in July. In that effort, the dogs are getting trained up, but they are also going to get cleaned up. I think the need for extra baths and my listening to Georgette Heyer inspired… or haunted Tod to writing the story below.
Dante's Bath Tangle
Dante ran into the big monkey's office at his normal speed, that being 20% faster than his feet would actually move him on the wood floor. Feet scrabbling, nails click, he careened around the corner and stampeded up to his biggest brother, who was already curled up on the dog bed below Aki. His brother smelled clean, fluffy, and just slightly damp.
Dante settled down and poked his big brother with his nose until the Newfie woke up. Crokell raised his furry head, his big Newfie jowls sagging and drooling, and looked at Dante with half shut eyes. The Newfie's big, huge body dwarfed the little Mini American. Dante noticed that the black fluffy backdrop of Crokell, brought out his own coloring of white and tan. He preened a bit but look up at his brother expectantly.
The Newfie grunted at the peering puppy. "What are you doing, Dante?"
Dante bounced up and down in excitement. "Can I tell Aki my story now?"
The big Newfie looked at the calico laying on the sofa. "She's still asleep."
"Are you sure?" Dante butt scooted closer to Aki and poked her with his nose. She raised a sleep-blurred face to stare at him.
"What is it, canine brain?"
Dante turned to Crokell. "No. She's not asleep."
Crokell just sighed and settled his head back down, while Dante turned his attention to his big sister.
"Aki, Aki, I got a story for you. It's a horror romance from Bath. I'm calling it Bath Tangle."
At this point, Beleth walked into the room. Dante watched him hop up on the sofa just out of Aki's reach so she couldn't push him back down.
Beleth asked him, "Isn't that a Georgette Heyer book?"
Dante cocked his head to one side. "Maybe? I'm not sure. I don't remember. Bath. Anyway, Crokell and I went to Bath."
Aki slow blinked. Beleth understood the question. "He and Crokell went to have a bath. They did not fly to England to visit the town of Bath."
Dante continued with his story. "When we were there, we got washed. Bath is really cool. First, they showered us down. They sprayed us with warm water. It took forever to get it into Crokell's fur. Then they sprayed me down. Then they soaped us up. They're pretty smart. They don't put in soap that covers up our natural smells. It's just nice, clean soap."
He sniffed his big brother appreciatively. "While they were soaping me, I noticed they brought in another puppy. They put her into the shower sink next to me. She'd already been hosed down. I guess she was having a conditioner soak or something. But they soaped her up some more, and then they started spraying her off. I had plenty of time to talk to her because Crokell was being rinsed, and that takes forever."
Crokell raised his head. His big brown eyes considered his three little siblings. "This is true. It always takes forever to rinse me and forever and a day to dry me, but I like being in the water."
Aki asked, "But you don't like walking on wet grass? I've seen you refuse to walk on wet grass through the window."
Crokell shrugged without actually moving. "I just don't like the wet grass between my toes. It tickles and is cool where I like it warm. You'd think the fur would keep it off, but it doesn't."
Beleth chimed in, "But you don't mind it during a rain storm?"
Dante interrupted with a wiggle. "I'm telling a story."
His three siblings turned their eyes back to him.
"So, while they were rinsing us, I was talking with the girl next to me. She was a brown puppy. She had a long tail. It was so cool. She lives out on a ranch, and they've got sheep, just like at the place up north where the big monkey and the little monkey take us. Except her monkeys let her run and chase the sheep. I'm not allowed to chase the sheep. Oh. And they have horses too. Crokell, were you ever allowed to chase the sheep before I came along?"
Crokell shook his head, jowls flailing, spraying Dante and Beleth with drool. He was very careful not to shake it on Aki. His other two siblings ignored the drool; they were used to it. But Aki would put him in his place if he got so much as got a fleck on her. Then the answer came.
"No. They don't even like it if I bark at a horse."
Dante stopped moving suddenly. "That's right. What's a horse?"
Aki and Beleth laughed at Dante, while Crokell actually answered him.
"Remember the police officer that rode by the car, and he was taller than the car because he was on an animal?"
"Oh, yeah. I remember that. That's a horse. The officer?"
"No. The animal the officer was riding is a horse."
"Oh, okay. Anyway, the girl next to me was really fun to talk to. She said she had a special license."
Aki blinked down at the little Mini. "What, pray tell, is a special license? A cat license? A dog license? Dog licenses aren't very special."
"Well, before she told me about the license, we were attacked by a hurricane. It was so scary. First, there were just drifts of wind. Soon, the noise started. It was so loud. My ears tried to bury themselves up against my head, and then they turned the full force of the wind on my friend. I tried to leap over to get between her and the wind, but the attendants at Bath prevented me from doing so. I was so sad. I couldn't even wave my tail at them because I just have a stub."
Dante bounced over to lick Crokell's nose. "I guess my efforts were worth it because soon after, they turned the hurricane on me, and I bravely faced the elements face on. Once they were done with me, they turned it on Crokell and kept it on him for a very long time. I'm not sure he noticed. So the girl and I had even more time to talk."
This time he darted over to Aki, who mildly swatted him to move back. "I told her about how I was a Mini American, and we just became a breed a few years ago. She said she's a Scotch Collie, her name is Miss Scarlett, and they're a special breed. Maybe that's why she has a special license. You know how Crokell is bred to pull people out of the water, and his European half is bred to retrieve big ducks and geese? She was bred to chase sheep. It sounds like so much fun. I wanna be bred to chase sheep."
Aki sneezed.
Beleth laughed at him. "Little brother, you are bred to chase sheep, but you're also bred to be little. They didn't quite succeed with you. Maybe a few more years will help."
Dante cocked his head. "Really? Anyway, she had a special license. She asked if I wanted to run away with her - we could do that because of the special license, I guess."
Again, Aki looked at Beleth without words.
The Maine Coon rolled onto his back. "Don't you listen to the little monkey's audio books?"
Aki answered with a monosyllabic, "No."
Crokell unexpectedly provided the explanation. "A special license lets you get married anywhere, anytime, without posting the bans and all the other nonsense."
Dante bounced up and down. "Hello! Story! It sounds like fun playing with horses and chasing sheep all day. Miss Scarlett and I had it all planned out. When they came to pick her up, I would wiggle over and hide behind Crokell. And then, when everybody started looking for me, I'd sneak out with her."
The other three exchanged glances.
Dante decided that didn't need an answer, especially since he couldn't decide what it meant.
"She said Crokell could come see me. He's kind of big, but they could deal with him. But then I asked if my other brother and my sister could visit. She asked about you two, Aki and Beleth. She said cats weren't allowed. She didn't seem to like cats. I told her Beleth thinks he's a dog, and she didn't seem to think that really mattered. It really didn't make any sense to me. Maybe she didn't like that cats get furniture privileges."
He scratched under his chin with a rear paw, getting a last bit of dampness out. "Also, I need to take care of the little monkey. Crokell reminded me at that point that the monkeys can't make it home without canine assistance. They just keep walking past the house and around in circles. It's really weird, but they need me and Crokell in order to make sure they make it back."
He sat up straight and still a moment. "And I would really miss my play buddies. I mean, who else, other than my two brothers, can I pounce on whenever I want to?
Putting action to words, Dante jumped onto Crokell and grabbed an ear.
Aki blinked at Beleth. "That was a horror story and a romance?"
The big, gray tabby cat-shrugged. "Well, it had a hurricane and a boy and girl in it. I think Dante learned to tell stories from the big monkey."
In the chart rocking Black Cat Tales, we tell the story of A Press of the Button.
Black Cat Publishing (http://www.black-cat-publishing.com/) announced:
We are so excited to share that Black Cat Tales hit #1 on Barnes & Noble and IngramSpark's bestsellers lists for horror anthologies & collections! This is HUGE news for our little book about black cats! And we hit #51 for Amazon's New Short Stories Anthologies - that's across ANY genre - not just horror-specific! Wahoo!!
https://www.amazon.com/Black-Cat-Tales-Anthology-Cats-ebook/dp/B0DXMXX5JP/
Black Cat Publishing says:
A black cat approaches, do you let it cross your path, or run in the opposite direction? From the superstitious to the unlucky, from a witch's familiar to a soul stealing grave robber, black cats have captured our imagination and remain solidly in the realm of the dark.
Join authors from around the world for never before published horror, dark fantasy and mystery short stories and poems featuring the beloved, feared and mystical black cat. Black Cat Tales showcases a diverse group of authors ranging in age from 17 to 80, some with multiple award winning publications under their belts, for others, this will be the first time seeing their work in print.
On top of this was our first interview as authors!
Chaos Tip of the Week
If you are invited have fulfill a special license make sure you know what part you are expected to play. You don’t want to ended up married to a bull frog while your prince hops away.
Chaos Question of the Week
What is the best way to get your dog interested in baths? Or are they like mine and mostly look sad about it but love them in their heart of hearts?
We've tried bringing his antler into the bath, but Thor is too smart to hop into a slippery bathtub. 🤷♂️