the Cat Who Judged Everyone
The first time I met my tutor’s black cat, I genuinely thought the apartment might be haunted.
Not in a scary way. When my tutor opened the door, she casually said:
“Oh, that’s Dante. Don’t worry, he judges everyone.”
The cat slowly looked at my bag, then at me again, as if silently deciding whether I was intelligent enough to enter the apartment. Which somehow made it worse.
During lessons, Dante would walk around the room like an academic supervisor. If I made a mistake, he appeared beside me. If I answered correctly, he disappeared. At one point I became convinced the cat understood grammar better than I did. After a few weeks, I stopped thinking of him as a pet. He felt more like the guardian of the apartment.
A small furry manager of energy and atmosphere.
Honestly, I’m still not entirely convinced my tutor isn’t secretly a witch. And I’m almost certain the cat was the one truly running the classes.