When Byron crossed the rain­bow bridge, we knew the fastest way to fill the holes in our hearts was to adopt a new kit­ten, anoth­er crea­ture into which we could pour our love. It was­n’t long before we start­ed apply­ing to res­cues, but with the pan­dem­ic in full swing, peo­ple had been snatch­ing up all the pets from both shel­ters and breed­ers alike. Heather even­tu­al­ly found a res­cue orga­ni­za­tion in Smith’s Falls with a goofy look­ing cat avail­able for adop­tion, so we made an appoint­ment to meet him as soon as pos­si­ble.

Unfortunately, he remained a per­pet­u­al loaf in a dark cor­ner dur­ing all the hours we stayed. Without being able to inter­act and phys­i­cal­ly check his con­di­tion, we decid­ed not to take the chance. A few oth­er kit­tens were also wan­der­ing around this mod­est coun­try house-cum-cat-gym, includ­ing one with dilute cal­i­co colours that remind­ed me so much of Dolly. She rolled onto one side to present her bel­ly as soon as I start­ed pet­ting her, and I knew she was the one right then.

The day we met her, with­out any idea of what to call her. She was­n’t list­ed on the shel­ter’s web­site because she was­n’t yet old enough for the surg­eries required for adop­tion.

And her name­sake, Countess Liliana Vess. Even though she’s a mas­ter necro­mancer and heal­er, her use of mana strict­ly remains in the black domain, which seemed quite fit­ting for Lili’s mys­te­ri­ous nature.

The inspi­ra­tion I get for pet names usu­al­ly comes from cre­ative influ­ences or per­son­al heroes, but this time we went with a char­ac­ter from the Magic: The Gathering uni­verse. It’s a hob­by Heather and I have shared for so long (and into which we’ve poured an embar­rass­ing amount of mon­ey) that it felt appro­pri­ate to have a name relat­ed to some­thing we both enjoyed. And since we tend to think of our cats as roy­al­ty in some way — espe­cial­ly since they treat us like fur­ni­ture — it also made sense to name her after a per­son of nobil­i­ty.

There’s no way any­one could mis­take her for Dolly though. She’s the small­est cat I’ve ever owned, like­ly because she’s not moti­vat­ed by food in any way. With Dolly and Byron, it would be a con­stant bat­tle to keep them off the coun­ters¹. Cooking any kind of meat would have them beg­ging at my feet, scream­ing to get my atten­tion. Dolly would even knock uten­sils out of my hand if I was­n’t pay­ing atten­tion. She’d eat flies, spi­ders, bee­tles, while Byron would some­how con­sume foam balls, rub­ber bands, objects that were both inan­i­mate and ined­i­ble. Lily, on the oth­er hand, is only inter­est­ed in her reg­u­lar meals and the occa­sion­al dry treat. Not bacon, sushi, but­ter, or any oth­er form of kit­ty kryp­tonite.

Our after-din­ner rit­u­al (the start of which is sig­nalled by the sound of dish­es being put away), when she climbs on me for some ear rubs or time with the de-shed­ding brush. She prefers it when I stiff­en an arm to make a guardrail for her lap-bed; oth­er­wise, she’ll keep walk­ing loops and refuse to get set­tled.

I like to think that the warm purring against my bel­ly aids in diges­tion, so it works out for us both.

Her per­son­al­i­ty could­n’t be more dif­fer­ent either, as she’s quite aloof and inde­pen­dent com­pared to how clingy Dolly was. Her favourite place to sleep has always been under the bed, so we usu­al­ly don’t see her for most of the day. She’s so shy that she’ll hide there the entire time guests are over, which is why Heather and I are the only ones who tru­ly know her and how affec­tion­ate she can be…when she’s in the mood. And unlike all my oth­er cats, who are accus­tomed to being picked up and cra­dled like a baby sev­er­al times a day, the only way she accepts being held is if I’m sit­ting with my knees up, with her lying back against my thighs so she can get both her chest and bel­ly rubbed.

When she wants atten­tion, she’ll walk into the room and demand it from me with pierc­ing meows, or flop onto her side with an exag­ger­at­ed stretch (what I call “giv­ing me a sweet roll”). It’s a rit­u­al she’ll repeat a few times, with a huff thrown in every now and then to let me know her dis­plea­sure, if I’m not giv­ing the atten­tion fast enough.

It comes as no sur­prise that she gets along with Percy, since he has a habit of groom­ing every­one — regard­less of size or species — as if they’re a lit­tle sib­ling. Still, a dom­i­nant streak will run through him every now and then, usu­al­ly man­i­fest­ing as an attempt to clamp onto her scruff and mount­ing her like he’s in heat. We don’t mind his attempts to chase her since he’s get­ting rather tub­by, while we sus­pect she’ll always remain the size of a kit­ten.

Admittedly, I’m still get­ting used to her reclu­sive­ness, espe­cial­ly com­pared to my pre­vi­ous cats, who all spent the major­i­ty of their time in my pres­ence. I always appre­ci­ate hav­ing a feline with­in arms-length so I can touch them when­ev­er I need a quick hit of dopamine, which means mak­ing sure there are always com­fort­able nests for them near­by. With Lili though, she’s always the one to ini­ti­ate, and inter­ac­tions are decid­ed­ly on her terms. As soon as she’s had enough of me, she’ll quick­ly leave and dis­ap­pear until she’s crav­ing atten­tion again. Combined with my aban­don­ment issues, it means I nev­er have the heart to get up or move once she’s decid­ed to sleep on me. Fortunately, Heather does­n’t mind being the bad guy, and will pick her up so I can remain the favourite par­ent.

1. Leonard died too young before I could tell what kind of per­son­al­i­ty he had, while Percy is some­what in between. [↩]