Congratulations on Seeing Cats!

You’ve been homeless in New York for almost ten years now, and you know the streets pretty well. You spend most of your time Brooklyn nowadays, living off the growing crowd of affluent artists and industrious immigrants while taking advantage of the still-lax law enforcement and sleazy bodegas that will still sell discount 40s to veterans.

But as the hipsters move deeper and deeper into your turf these places have become fewer and farther between. They’ve been replaced by a combination of cheap Korean grocery stores (more trustworthy than Mexicans, so the hipsters say), “organic markets” that mark up supermarket goods and sell them at a huge profit and pretentious coffee shops with witty names.

So you’ve been forced to wander afar when you want to get drunk enough to shape your madness into a beautiful love for all of mankind. You’ve gone through all of the five boroughs, wandering about looking for a corner to call your own, a place where you can mutter and scream and occasionally take a handful of change and make into a single, beautiful night of happiness.

You’ve been from Manhattan coast to Manhattan coast, and still haven’t come across a single corner store suited to your needs. You’ve run afoul of the police, the artists, the soccer moms and, of course, the CHUDs. But it hasn’t been all bad. You’ve made some friends along the way.

One of those friends was Sven, a young gay actor who saw a lot of his crazy, disapproving father in you. He let you stay in his place for a night and, in exchange for his kindness, you waited until you’d left his apartment to take a shit on the floor.

It’s been a few weeks since you saw Sven, and you’ve been having a rough time of it lately. You’ve been sober for fifteen accursed days now, fifteen days with a clear head ringing with voices, and it’s been driving you bat shit. But when you see Sven and recall his kindness you’ll immediately feel better.

“Hey! Faggot!” you’ll exclaim.

He’ll be walking with his boyfriend, Charles, who will look aghast at your outburst. Sven will know to take it all in stride, though. He’ll smile at you and trot over to your side, excited.

“Hey Jack,” he’ll say, tussling your hair. You’ll bat his hand away, but it’s an old routine.

“Fuck off!” you’ll shout, but he’ll see right through it. He’ll just smile and drop down on his haunches to your level while Charles awkwardly stands nearby, looking everywhere but towards you, and hand you his change. You’ll grin up at him.

“How’s things?” he’ll say, looking deep into your eyes. He’ll see a glimmer of the vulnerability that made his dad so mean and his mom so scared when he was growing up, a glint of the past he never wanted, and it’ll make him want to cry.

You’ll look right back into his and say, “Can’t complain,” scratching your beard and licking your lips.

His eyes will get wide and his smile will vanish. He’s had enough homeless friends to know what that means. He’ll reach into his pocket and pull out something else, something that isn’t money. Looking back at Charles for a moment, he’ll bite his lip before he hands it to you.

When you open your hand you’ll see he's given you a pair of tickets. You’d read the lettering on it, but the madness has kept you from being able to understand writing for years now. So you’ll just smile up at him even wider than his big pretty gay eyes.

“Thanks kid,” you’ll say, before you make a really loud throat clearing sound.

“No problem,” he’ll say, wiping away the trace of a tear from his eye. “Enjoy the show,” he’ll say, biting his lip as he stands. “And take care of yourself.”

Then he’ll collect his boyfriend and walk away into the night.

It’ll be about twenty minutes before you find another hobo who can read, but once you do it won’t be more than a few minutes before the two of you show up at the theater a few minutes before curtain.

The doorman will give you a really strange look, but he’ll let you in all the same. You and your filthy companion will settle into some folding chairs and sit, staring at the stage, entirely unsure of what will unfold.

When the curtain rises it will be as if the madness that assails you has been made manifest. Beasts that look and move like men will screech horribly at the moon, loving and dying and hating and forgiving just as people do. Your mind will be reeling, but something about it will make you happy.

Congratulations on seeing Cats!