The Third Set of Paws

It’s been nine years since I last saw Jasper. My father, in one of his drunken hazes, left the back door open and the little black cat slipped out into the night. I remember searching the alleys, calling his name until my throat went raw, but he was gone. My mother and I moved out of that rundown apartment not long after, and I tried to put it behind me. But even in our new place, in a different part of the city, I’d feel a phantom weight on the foot of my bed, or a fleeting brush of something against my calf. I’d blame the neighbor’s cat, but my mother would just shake her head, her face tight with a worry she never put into words.

Now I’m back. Not by choice. The old apartment complex, a five-story brick relic with a courtyard that always smelled of damp concrete, was the only place I could afford after my mother’s passing. I brought with me a new black cat, Sable, a scrawny stray I’d found in a dumpster. She was skittish, but she had the same amber eyes as Jasper.

The first week was quiet. I unpacked boxes, repainted the walls a sterile white, tried to scrub the memories out of the floorboards. But at night, lying in bed, I’d feel the familiar dip in the mattress, just behind my knees, a soft pressure as if something were settling there. I’d reach down, but my hand would brush only the empty sheet. Sable would be curled on the dresser, watching me with those unblinking eyes.

It escalated slowly. A shadow at the edge of my vision, darting behind the sofa. A soft thud from the hallway when I was alone. I’d turn, expect Sable, but she’d be asleep in the armchair, or perched on the fridge in the kitchen, a habit she’d picked up. I chalked it up to grief, to the house settling, to my own frayed nerves. But then one evening, my boyfriend, Paul, and I were making pasta. The kitchen was warm with steam, and Sable was doing her usual sentry duty on top of the refrigerator, her tail flicking lazily.

I was stirring the sauce when a black form blurred in my peripheral vision—low, fast, skittering across the tile floor, heading straight for the table leg. I froze, my heart lurching. ‘Did you see that?’ I asked Paul. He looked up from chopping basil. ‘See what?’ I pointed, but the space under the table was empty. I looked at the fridge. Sable was still there, her head tilted, her eyes fixed on something beneath me. But there was no cat. No shadow. Only the faint, musty smell of the old apartment, and a cold draft that crept up my ankles.

That’s when I noticed the dust on the floor. Freshly swept that morning, now marred by a set of paw prints—small, distinctly shaped, leading from the door to the table and then vanishing, as if whatever made them had simply evaporated. Paul saw them too. He knelt, touched one with his fingertip. ‘Maybe the window was open?’ But the windows were sealed. Sable let out a low, guttural growl, a sound I’d never heard from her.

I started to remember then. Jasper had a habit of rubbing against my feet under that same table. And he had an odd quirk—a small white patch on his front left paw, shaped like a crescent. I lifted Sable’s front paws, but she had no such marking. I looked at the dust again, where the paw print was. There, barely visible in the embossed dust, was a tiny crescent indentation.

That night, I couldn’t sleep. Paul was beside me, his breath even. I lay staring at the ceiling, when I felt the familiar pressure on the mattress, and then a weight pressing down on my shin, just above the ankle. I held my breath. The weight shifted, as if turning in a circle, and then settled. I felt the faint warmth of a body, the faint vibration of a purr. I didn’t move. I didn’t breathe. I felt something brush against my hand—a whisker, silky and fine.

I finally dared to look down. There was nothing there. But the sheets were indented, a perfect cat-shaped impression, as if something unseen was curled against me. Sable, from her spot on the dresser, was watching me, her eyes glowing in the dark, and she was hissing—not at me, but at the empty space beside me.

And then, in the silence, I heard it. A soft, plaintive meow. It came from the air beside my ear. A sound I knew better than my own heartbeat. Jasper’s meow, the one he’d used when he wanted to be let in from the cold. I sat up, flipped the light on, and the imprint was gone. But the meow echoed, faint, as if from very far away.

Paul stirred, ‘What’s wrong?’ I couldn’t tell him. I could only whisper, ‘He’s here.’ I looked at the empty room, at the dust motes dancing in the light, at the old wardrobe in the corner, its door slightly ajar. It had been Jasper’s favorite hiding spot. And in that moment, I knew—I hadn’t lost Jasper all those years ago. He hadn’t wandered off. Something in this apartment had kept him. And now, it was keeping him here still, unseen and unmoored, trapped between the world of the living and wherever lost things go.

I haven’t left the apartment since. I can’t. Because every time I try, I feel a small, insistent pressure against my ankles, as if something is blocking the door. And in the corner of my eye, I see a black shape, less solid than shadow, waiting for me to acknowledge it. But when I turn, there’s nothing there. Only Sable, watching, and the faint impression of paws in the dust, leading nowhere.