The Cat in My Sunroof
It had been a wonderful camping trip in Kings Canyon, only to end in a COVID disaster. I had just flown back from New York after being a bridesmaid in my friend’s wedding and spending nearly a month with my family so I could attend her bachelorette party and wedding. I flew back to LA, ate one breakfast sandwich with my roommate, and then headed up to Sheep Creek Campground in Kings Canyon National Park to enjoy the complete opposite of New York City.
In the twelve hours I had spent with my roommate, a total COVID catastrophe had ensued. It turns out she was just barely infectious with COVID when we split an egg sandwich. Unfortunately for us, we had both touched the same container and breathed the same air, which certainly meant that I was a disease vector who might have infected everyone I camped with.
I found out about my possible contagion when my phone came back into service, and I had to make the embarrassing confession to all of the passengers who were part of my car ride home. My friend’s partner was on the verge of landing a career-making acting gig, and any type of COVID misstep would mean she would miss an audition and basically be out of the running. And so, as you did in 2021 when any COVID infection could mean weeks of quarantine, we all searched for the cheapest Airbnb possible to isolate from friends and family. We decided I would quarantine alone, away from the others, and if I did not test positive in a week, we were all free to go home.
I got an Airbnb in Westminster, California, because it was the absolute cheapest thing I could find. The family had a beautiful garden and did karaoke in the backyard every night. After about a week or so, I tested negative with no symptoms and we were all freed. My roommate, however, was still sneezing and testing positive. Determined to spend no more money on rogue Airbnbs, I decided to park my car in the alleyway next to our house and sleep in it.
The plan was perfect. I could sneak into the house with a mask on just to shower and use the bathroom. I would take my morning meetings from the backyard and then drive to a co-working space to finish the day and charge my devices. I packed my skates into my car so I could go get some fresh air after work. Once it got dark, I would drive home and read with a flashlight in my car. I put a magnetic window net over my sunroof to allow some air circulation. I laid the back seats flat and put down my camping mat and sleeping bag to sleep.
The first night was smooth sailing.
In the middle of the second night, I was awoken by the sound of scratching. I squinted my eyes open to see two yellow eyes staring back at me from the front of the car. A blood-curdling scream escaped me. “WHAT IS THAT??????” My screeching launched the creature into action; it started scratching at my dashboard and running back and forth across the two front seats. Shaking, I scrambled for my car keys in the dark for the longest ten seconds of my life.
As I came to my senses, I realized the tiny creature was not a monster but a small black cat who was now running laps around the car, trying desperately to find a way out. I don’t know who was more scared, me or the tiny feline. When I finally found my keys and opened the passenger door a crack, the cat zipped out of there. In an instant, it was all over, as quickly as it had started.
It turns out there was a wall between our house and the neighbor’s, and it was the perfect height for a cat to prowl along before jumping onto my sunroof. Only this night, the sunroof was not glass; it was a mesh net that collapsed directly into a car with a shrieking human girl. My scream was so loud that it woke up the neighbors, who texted us all to make sure we were okay. For months after that, I would see the tiny black cat around the neighborhood and try to coax it so I could pet it. It was so terrified of me that the picture above was the closest I ever got.
The Ring camera captured the sound bite of this ordeal. Sadly, my car is not in view since it was in the alleyway and not parked in front of the house, but at the very end of the video, you can see my headlights light up the front gate when I opened the passenger door to let the cat out.