In a quest for sex, Alicia encounters two intense kitties

 

 

I thought I was someone who loved cats. As a lifelong animal lover, I had a cat growing up — Penny was her name. Swiping around on Tinder just hours after landing at LaGuardia from LAX that summer, I noticed a pattern: Many of the gay ladies who popped up in my feed had at least one photo of them holding or hanging out with a feline. My empathic teenage girl self remembered Penny the cat, and how much I loved letting her sleep on my head at night, cuddling her always. I felt like I could trust anyone with a cat in their photo.

 

It wasn’t long before I matched with a woman named Natalya, who told me that she was from the Soviet Block. I laughed to myself because clearly the Soviet Union had been dismantled in 1989, but I went along with it. Natalya was charming. We were chatting and I was horny. I explained to her that I would be in New York for the summer. She seemed fine with that.

 

Things became intimate very fast. Only 20 minutes into the conversation, I felt like I knew everything about her roommates, her job, where she went to school, and where she lived. This seemed like a lot of information upfront but I thought that seemed alright because, well, aren’t we all posting possibly too much information about ourselves to the internet on a regular basis? I was enjoying getting to know her via text.

 

Then she abruptly cut into our conversation, telling me that she was only 25. I told her that I knew this — clearly I had swiped right to her, had I not? She wanted to make sure that was okay, was I okay with that? What more consent does one need about age than a swipe right? I told her I was 31. Ok, great, she said, and so we continued talking.

 

It was getting late. I decided that it was too late to invite her over. This conversation also had an intense vibe to it. Then she told me that she only dated Jewish cats. I said I was Jewish, but I wasn’t sure if I was a cat. I remembered Penny my teenage dream kitty, but was I actually a cat today, as an adult? Before I could finish that thought, she texted me a selfie of herself dressed as a cat, followed by a few photos of the cat she owned.

 

I told her I suddenly felt tired.

 

“Alicia, let’s go to sleep then,” she texted, as if I were lying next to her.

 

“Yeah girl, you go to sleep too!!!” I replied, my guard suddenly up after this texting that became intimate too quickly.

 

I also wanted to make clear that we had never met and were not lying in the same bed.

 

“We haven’t even met yet!”

 

She ignored that, continuing to text as if she were tucking me in after a good fuck, whispering sweet nothings into my ear until I drifted off.

 

Despite this intense vibe, we made plans to hang out the following night; she said she would feed me tacos. I wanted to get my own tacos, thanks, but I was down to eat together. Mostly, I wanted to meet her after this textual build up.

 

I drifted off to sleep, but then 45 minutes later an eighteen-and-a-half pound cat named Zoe who lived in the place I was subletting crawled onto the bed and started ramming her head into mine. After 10 minutes of this, I realized that I would be trapped in this small Crown Heights studio apartment with her for the entirety of my stay.

 

Zoe wanted love. I couldn’t give it to her — at least, not this late. I wrapped the bed with tin foil and threw her off of it, determined to get at least one hour of uninterrupted sleep. My goal was to have sex with Natalya the next evening, and if I didn’t sleep that would be pretty difficult.

 

Zoe didn’t care. She had needs.

 

After hours of aggressive cuddling attempts, I finally gave into Zoe, letting her ram her head against my face, purring loudly, sometimes opening her mouth to reveal foul breath.

 

At some point I drifted off. In the morning I awakened to a text from Natalya asking me how I slept. Zoe was cuddled next to me; I peered into her eyes as if she were Natalya, and then glanced again at the text. It felt both sweet but also off-putting since I didn’t feel that much of a connection with her. Nevermind that we hadn’t met in-person; fundamentally, something didn’t feel right about this.

 

I was unsure of what to do with these mixed feelings I was having, so I waited until 4pm to text her back. I told her that Zoe had kept me up all night, which was mostly true; I used that as an excuse to why I wasn’t able to meet up. She was sweet about my cancelation, and told me that she hoped I slept better the following evening. She told me that her cat had also kept her up all night. I felt sick to my stomach, terrified at the possibility of already feeling close to someone who I had never met. Natalya didn’t feel safe.

 

The next morning I received a text from Natalya telling me that she hoped my cat let me sleep. My doubts about her increased, so I chose to never reply rather than to let her know that I wasn’t interested. I doubted that she would ever contact me again.

 

A week later on Tinder, where we were still matched, she messaged me: “Hello.”

 

I stared at the message, still unsure of what to say. Mostly, I was confused that she kept trying to hit me up. Two hours passed, and then she unmatched me. Why did it have to end this way? I wondered.

 

Two weeks later, I realized that I had to leave the cat sublet. Zoe was keeping me up all night every night, always ready to cuddle. I tin-foiled the bed, but that didn’t help. I wore earplugs to block the sound of her constant needy meows, but then she rebelled by peeing once on the floor. I made a homemade cat repellent of eucalyptus oil and lemon juice, spraying it around the bed to keep her off of it. She expressed her anger again by adamantly pissing all over the kitchen floor. The third time she peed it was because I didn’t feed her when she asked. I found a subletter for the sublet and a new place sublet nearby; Zoe would be someone else’s problem, or maybe someone else’s beloved kitty.

 

It wasn’t clear if the subletter could stay the whole time, however, and so I would probably need a cat sitter for the last five days of the sublet. I couldn’t think of anyone who would do it except for my cat-loving friend, Natalya. Even though she had unmatched me on Tinder, I still had her number. I texted her to see if she would stay over and cat sit, and she replied quickly with “Sure.”

 

I was excited at the prospect of finally meeting her, even though she seemed intense and I felt my body light up with fear. But this same fear seemed like it could make for hot, semi-anonymous sex. I felt that we had sexual chemistry.

 

We made a plan for Wednesday at 6PM. She would come by. I was ready. I had a secret fantasy that she would come over right after the sublet guy came by to check out the place, fuck me on the bed where Zoe had been keeping me up all night, and then we’d both leave and never speak again. No adoring texts or cat innuendos — the perfect ending to this epic cat texting. I called a friend back in LA and told her about this fantasy, and she told me I was playing with fire. I told her that I didn’t care. This could be a hot end to the sublet from hell.

 

Then I hit a snag in the plan. The subletter dude decided to take the place for the entire period of time, meaning I wouldn’t need a cat sitter for Zoe after all. At 5:55PM, he handed me a check and I gave him the keys to the apartment, meaning I would no longer have access to the bed. Then I texted Natalya, who was supposed to come over at 6PM, to let her know I had found a cat sitter, but would she still like to come by? I would still love to meet her.

 

“K” she replied, and then a simple “No thanks.” My heart dropped a little. Even though I already didn’t trust her because of these bad emotional boundaries that we both participated in via Tinder, I was more disappointed that I wouldn’t be able to satiate my curiosity about who she really was. I was left with an idea of this person, a character in my head, someone who was longing for romance. Mostly relieved that my fantasy was over, I delightfully deleted the text thread. I had been a real dick.

 

Alicia Eler is a writer, art critic and comedian based in LA. Her writing can be found in The New Inquiry, Guardian, Art21, Hyperallergic, Artsy, Daily Dot LOL, KCET Artbound LA, and CRAVE LA. She recently edited the FAMILY and HAPPINESS issues of Art21 Magazine. When she's not freelancing, find her tweeting jokes or working on a book about selfie culture.