No, it’s Viv. Do you have time for one more meet up? We just realized our selfies with Juliet mostly featured Jess’s blurry finger. We’d really love a new pic with her before we go.
I agree. Why not? Meeting Piglet and Pink had been a high point of CatFest. Other than meeting Joe, which simultaneously turned out to be a low point.
Because I’ll be bringing Juliet, I tell the couple to meet me on the outside deck by the hot tub. I change clothes, pack a little, and then scoop Juliet up from James’s bed. She’d been kneading his covers for five minutes and had barely settled down. She glares at me.
“I know, sweet girl. One more fan session, and then we’ll go home.”
In the elevator again, a woman with a shock of white hair and fake eyelashes, leopard skin pants, and black four-inch heels coos at Juliet. “What a gorgeous cat. Is she a Persian?”
“She is. Her name is Juliet.”
The woman clasps a hand to her chest, closes her eyes, and intones, “O sweet Juliet, Thy beauty hath made me effeminate, And in my temper softened valor’s steel!” Her eyes open. “But, wherefore art Romeo?”
Juliet makes a strange choking sound, as if she knows the handsome black Persian cat’s name already. My shoulders sag. “I don’t really know.”
The woman studies me with an intuitive expression. “Ahh, I see. My only love sprung from my only hate, Too early seen unknown, and known too late!”
I nod sadly as the doors open at the hot tub and lounge floor. “You have no idea how right you are.”
“Come, gentle night.” She holds the door for Juliet and me to exit. “Come, loving black-browed night, Give me my Romeo, and when I shall die, Take him and cut him out in little stars.”
I have to laugh. She hasn’t broken character once, quoting the lines from Romeo and Juliet with perfect accuracy. “Are you an actress?”
“In my day,” she says. “In my day.” She raises a fist slowly and looks up, as if to the heavens. “I defy you, stars!”
She pauses, letting the words float down the hallway. From the entryway of the lounge behind her, curious faces turn our way. The woman smiles brightly at me.
“Well, nice to meet you both.” She turns and sashays toward the bar, while I head mournfully outside to the deck. What did Joe say? Shakespeare belongs to everyone. I don’t know about that, but everyone seems to claim him.
I take a seat, and a few minutes later, Viv and Jess arrive.
“Kathleen! Thank you so much for meeting us again. We have to get going to the airport in a minute, but we didn’t want to go without a good picture of Juliet.”
“Let’s take care of that right now,” I say.
I hand her to the women. Jess gives me her phone and they sit close together in deck chairs and lean in, so their faces are right above Juliet’s. The slight cloud cover over the afternoon sun provides the perfect light. Juliet poses like a queen. Or at least like a lovesick teen queen. I take about ten shots.
“Could you send one or two of those and a few from the meet and greet to me?” I ask as we exchange cat for phone again. “I didn’t really take any pictures.” I did get a few selfies of me, Joe, and Junior while in line for the Twister, but I refuse to think about that now.
“Sure! I’ll send some now through DM.” Jess taps on her phone a few times, and I hear the ding of a notification.
“So, was the conference worth it, despite the great award ceremony rip-off?” Viv asks.
I sigh. “It was fun to meet so many cat lovers like you two.” I smile at them.
“We loved meeting you and Juliet, too,” Viv says.
“And Joe and Romeo,” Jess says. The women exchange glances. “We talked to Joe for a few minutes after today’s meet and greet. You didn’t know he was Romeo’s owner, did you?”
I shake my head.
“We were pretty surprised to see him up there with Romeo after meeting him with you. What happened?” Viv says.
I close my eyes. “I don’t really want to talk about it.”
Viv nods. “Private stuff. Got it. Well, we thought he was much cooler in person than he seemed online.”
I have to agree with that.
“Have you seen the comments on the Gram since last night?” Viv asks.
I shake my head. “I haven’t had time to read them.”
“The tone has kind of shifted.”
“How?” I ask.
“There’s a new hashtag, for one thing,” Jess says. “#Nomorehousedivided.”
“Really?” I ask. “Who’s using it?”
“People from both sides. Meowtagues and Catulets,” she answers.
Wow. “What do you think changed?”
Viv squints and tugs on her overalls. “It might have been the pictures we all posted from last night. The food fight and then the making up over drinks in the lounge.”
“Both Juliet and Romeo’s accounts are blowing up.” Jess pokes at her phone a few times and hands it to me again.
My eyes go wide. Juliet has gained almost fifty-thousand followers since Thursday. Some could be due to publicity from CatFest and the award nomination, but it wouldn’t explain the high number. She’s had bumps before, but nothing like this. I check Romeo’s account. Same for him.
“Holy cats,” I say.
“Right?” Jess takes her phone back. “So . . . we were wondering . . .”
“What?” I ask.
“Earlier, you seemed open to working with Romeo’s owner. Would you consider working with Joe?”
I groan. “No! And don’t ask me why.”
“Okay, okay, got it. Reasons. That’s what Joe said you’d say. We just thought we’d ask,” Jess says.
“It would be really cute to see Juliet and Romeo doing some posts together or working off each other to recreate scenes from the play together,” Viv says speculatively.
“Or even to try a modern interpretation,” Jess says, “like the Leonardo DiCaprio and Clare Danes version of the movie.”
“But,” Viv looks deliberately glum now, “Joe told us he’s deactivating Romeo’s account when he gets home.”
I sit upright. “What? He’s lying.” There’s no way he’d do that after all the work he put in to build the account. And now he has the Purina sponsorship, too.
Jess shrugs. “Maybe. But he sounded sincere.”
“His account’s still live,” I say.
Jess’s eyebrow quirks. “We talked to him like half an hour ago. He’s probably packing.”
“I wonder . . .” Viv says to Jess. “Maybe if Kathleen asked Joe to work with her, he might keep his account going.”
I narrow my eyes. What did Joe tell them? “Why would you think that?”
“Because when we asked why he wanted to shut it down, he said because then Purina would have no choice but to give you the sponsorship. He also said something like, ‘Romeo without his Juliet is a moody kid with a bunch of swaggering buddies and no girlfriend.’”
“What does that mean?” I say.
Viv tilts her head. “I think he meant it’s time for Romeo and Juliet to be together online, or for Romeo not to be online at all.”