Hi there, it’s Mom. The very three years have passed since we four- Zoe, Hugo, Dad and Mom became a family. Both Zoe and Hugo were just cute and looked like babies three years ago, they are still cute, though. The fact that we can never go back to the past makes me feel eternal love toward them.
In this article I am going to talk how Zoe and Hugo met and got along with each other through twists and turns. I hope this article would be informative for the people who are considering to have another cat or to be annoyed by the conflicts among the cats.
When Hugo came home, me and Dad prepared a room where he lived until he got used to the environment. Once he got in the room Zoe found the sign with her keen nose. She wondered “Who in the world is beyond the door?” She stayed in front of the door and tried to catch more signs. She kept silence, refrained from scratching the door, and just kept looking at the room through the crack, all day and every day! I wondered and worried about her, “Is she not bored to keep just staying there all day long? She should take a little rest.”
Zoe likes to please people. She used to comb my hair with her tiny tongue at nights. She is such a motherly cat. So I thought it would result in success to have Hugo with Zoe. It is said that cats sometimes take time to get familiar to each other, so it would be a good idea to leave the items which were bought for a new cat and let the former one to get accustomed to them before the encounter. I did the same so that Hugo can be accepted by Zoe without a problem.
However, the thing did not go well as I expected. One day I heard a growl when Hugo meowed beyond the door. I thought it was a trick of my hearing, but I saw Zoe growling. After a few weeks when Zoe seemed to be used to the environment, we tried to have her meet with Hugo. We put him in the carry case and brought the case to her. Hugo was trying to attract her attention, but she growled at him, jumping to the carry case. Oh, brother, poor Hugo, it is called a one-sided love. But there is no shortcut other than taking time.
After several tries of meeting through the carry case, we then started using a cage, which is larger than the carry case. Zoe stepped on the top of the cage and looked down Hugo. Since the cage was made of soft materials, the cage was squashed by her weight, resulting in scaring him. Me and Dad felt sorry for him.
When we were thinking about having another cat, our vet said, “The current home is the only and absolute world for Zoe, so think about Zoe above all else.” I had a sense of guilt because we could see that Zoe did not want this situation, which seems that we did not think about Zoe first. Also, Hugo ended up with being scared. Nothings went well for either of them.
Hugo had loose bowel when he came to our home, so me and Dad slept with him alternately to take care of him at nights. In the daytime Zoe looked through the crack and we thought there was still a chance for them to be friends. We decided to utilize the time that they play with the toys: we exchanged the toys so that they get familiar with each other’s smell. We also let the one look when the other played with us. We tried all the other ideas that was found from the articles on the websites written by the cat owners.
In doing so Zoe started trying to open the door by putting her cute round hand in the crack, and her growl became fainter. We started to have them stay in the same room. But some other times she was not able to accept him and we clearly saw her emotional conflict undergoing. By this time Hugo might have been huffed by Zoe’s growl to know that she never accepted him, he started jumping on her menacingly. Me and Dad were not able to come up with what more we could do for them even though we knew their sufferings. All of us had a hard time.
I kept playing with Zoe and Hugo using the toys. Playing will eventually shorten the distance between the two, I believed. Since it is a matter of their feeling, all I could do was to wait for “the time.” Around this period I felt that the emotional distance between Zoe and I was enlarged. She might have thought I started to love Hugo more than Zoe… Oh Zoe, I love you so much! But I did not how I could melt her frozen feeling, and that made me feel lonely.
“The time” came suddenly. About a month of the hardships, Granma came to spend a few days. Zoe and Hugo respectively came up to welcome her by sniffing the luggage and asking her to play with. At the night before Granma leaves, I occasionally found that Zoe and Hugo were laying closely and touched their paws together. I have never seen that. You see? Being friends is such pleasant, kids. I could not stop grinning or taking photos because I was so happy.
Me and Dad were so relieved and thought that they would become friends from now on. However, the disturbance of their relationship continues… When would they get closer? When would all of us be able to slip out of such a suffering? When would we be able to be a family…?
<To be continued to the Second Part>
