She held her sweater tight against her and kept the kitchen door closed as much as possible against the night air.

"Damn that cat," she thought. She closed the door and,  before the latch even clicked, opened it slightly and called again. "Ophelia! Here kitty!"

Peering out into the darkness of her front stoop, she waited for some movement that wasn't the wind. All she wanted to do was make a cup of tea, curl up with her book and get some sleep. But she knew from past experience that she wouldn't sleep anyway if she didn't know the cat was in.  

"Ophelia!" she tried again. She considered closing the door and trying again after she made her tea, but, as though by some secret sense, the cat suddenly emerged silently from the darkness and sauntered up the front steps and through the open door.

She closed the door, locked it, and tried to rub the cold away from her shoulders.

"Silly cat," she said, bending down to stroke her grey fur. "What do you do all night out there?"

As if in answer, the cat mewed softly and rubbed slightly against her leg.

Maggie put the kettle on and filled the cat bowl, thinking how her life had changed so dramatically in such a short time.

Four weeks ago she'd been married, excited about the prospect of her first baby. Her life had been filled with baby name books and doctor visits. Tentative research on natural childbirth and organic baby food.

Now she stood, widowed at 28, and worried about the road ahead. She hadn't thought of baby names at all, hardly mused, in fact, about boy verses girl. She'd missed her OB appointment today and hadn't returned the message the office left on her machine.

The whistle of the tea kettle startled her from her thoughts. Little things made her jump these days. And little things made her mad.

She turned the water off and never even bothered making the tea. Against her own admonishment, she opened a drawer and took a cigarette from a half-empty pack in the back. She lit it from the stove, inhaled deeply, and stared at the cat eating contentedly in the corner of the room.

Why, she wondered for the umpteenth time, was this cat still alive and well and Randy dead? Where was the sense?

The truck that had hit the car, sending it careening into the guard rail that rainy afternoon, had been carrying, of all things, baby furniture. She couldn't shake the irony, despite her hatred of it.

Randy had taken the cat to the vet. She'd planned to do it herself, but she'd been so tired, and he'd insisted she get a nap. She fell asleep feeling so well cared-for. Thoughts of what a good father he'd make. It was the last decent sleep she'd had.