They noticed each other from across the room and locked in. I watched it happen, I saw the spark…I wished I’d had my camera ready to capture it. It’s just as well I didn’t, I would have violated the intimacy I was basking in, even if I wasn’t invited.

The murmuring of voices in their own hushed conversations didn’t distract the two of them once they’d engaged, and I continued to try not to look as moved gingerly closer to one another locked in hard and yet aloof. Four feet, three feet, two feet….

HISSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS

Amber actually snorted when taking her next breath before she unleashed another of her hate spewing hisses. She revved up and went again, and again. She introduced a growl and another guttural noise I didn’t know cats were capable of - impressing me and making me like her more than I ever had. I should have pissed her off sooner.

There were several additional introduction attempts over the weekend, the final of which resulted in a bit of bootie sniffing/yin-yang around The Mc’s ankles late yesterday afternoon. Not a Chuck Woolery moment, but not any worse than if I bumped into - say - Rory Sabbatini in a bar. That would be ugly.

So for now, we sit back and we draw parallels. We build imaginary lines between “the kids” and folks in the office we don’t like but learn to tolerate, to relatives and friends we wish we could break up with and to finding the good in everything. The way I figure it, Amber just got a live-in fitness partner and someone to blame for little land mines of vomit on the kitchen floor.