Swati Sengupta

On Thursday, I woke up to find my roommate metamorphosed into a dog. When I opened the door for the milk and paper, she ran out and stood panting on the road. Which was a good thing, for it meant she wouldn’t (couldn’t) borrow my clothes for days on end any more.  

I bathed early and started for office. It was quite early. As I stepped out onto the pavement, the children’s school bus came gunning by, and nearly ran me over. I almost died of shock. 

There was a big crowd in front of the office. It looked like my roommate was not alone in her metamorphosis. Many other people had also been turned into animals. I recognized at least three of my colleagues walk into the building- a duck, a camel like animal that could have been a  llama (I’ve never seen a llama), and a long green snake. They were completely unaware of how they were looking. Did they even realize that they were animals now? I was enjoying my little secret so much, I almost choked on laughter and died. Just as I entered the elevator, a lizard jumped from the ceiling and landed on my right shoulder. I was worried. Was it a lizard, or was it my manager? Could I flick it off, or should I wrap it in my handkerchief and put it in my purse? What if I did something disrespectful; and she axed me later? I could feel my heart thumping. I almost died of fright. I peeped into my manager’s cubicle. She wasn’t there. By now I was certain that the lizard was my manager. I unfurled my handkerchief and gently placed the lizard on the desk. As soon as I did so, the desk shook for a second or two, and the lizard changed back into my manager and she jumped down onto her chair. From there she eyed me disgustedly. “Aren’t you ashamed of yourself, stealing sugar sachets from the office? Your purse is full of them!” It was true. I had the habit of picking up a little something from the office every day. I got very red in the face and nearly died of shame. Because of all the animals, and their special needs, no one was paying any attention to the usual work at the office. For example, we had a penguin, but we also had an African elephant. There was a tiger who had sensibly come in his own cage, but now he was becoming restless, and his roars were shaking the whole office. HR was running around trying to order dry ice and raw goat meat all at the same time. I felt so jealous that I nearly wanted to die. That would get me some attention, I thought bitterly. Anyways, the novelty of the animals soon wore off. There was no one to gossip with. Some of my colleagues came by my desk, but I just could not understand what they were neighing or bleating or screeching out to me. I played Scrabble all day. I couldn’t find anything else to do. Around 2 pm, I had had enough. I was nearly dying of boredom. I started back for home. I reached home quickly. There was no traffic jam, since all the people who had transformed to birds were flying to their destinations. As I started crossing the road, the school bus came round to deposit the children. This time it was too fast, and I was too late. It ran me over and squished me into the curb. As I felt my life trickle out, I heard the guard say, “Terrible! Just terrible! So what if it was only a cat.” Only then did I realize that I was now a cat, and that I had almost died, of various causes, six times today. It also dawned on me that I was finally dying, completely and for the seventh time, now. I had not even had a chance to live the nine lives I was entitled to. I realized that even in my brief life as a cat, I was a complete loser.

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