Little Guy Goes To Heaven

I came home today to find a little mouse – all wet except his head which made it seem un-proportionately large – dying in my kitchen sink. Little Guy was slumped against the side of the drain, heaving at times and then falling still, his slick fur vaguely pinkish, as if blood had been washed off.

I tried to get Little Guy to crawl into a container so I could bring him down the stairs and feed him to the many cats that patrol Quincy St. but he was too weak to climb out of the drain. Ever helpful, I was going to assist but thought perhaps Little Guy had been poisoned by one of the many powders inconspicuously lining the edges of every cabinet and corner of our kitchen. This could kill the cats! I thought. Unlikely, I know, but still, Not me! My cat-lady friends would disown me and the remainder of my days would be haunted by the sassy felines of youtube. My second best plan was to nurse Little Guy back to life. I stood for a solid five minutes leaning over the sink and asking him what he thought of the idea. Little Guy’s breathing was becoming less and less perceptible and finally I had to admit that he probably wasn’t going to pull through. Still, what to do?

It seemed incomparably cruel to flush Little Guy down the toilet or put him in the trash (remember people, disposal methods in Brooklyn are a bit limited) as he lay suffering, so I finally decided I would let him breath his last in peace and then I would do the disposing, with Little Guy blissfully unaware of his inglorious end. I picked him up by his tail, put him in a box on the windowsill, turned on some music and started cooking. The whole time I’m feeling kind of uneasy with the slow yet impending doom of Little Guy on the sill and the apartment is eerily quiet and cold and still. At some point Little Guy II emerges out of the stove and goes exploring while I’m standing there going, “Hey buddy, what’s the deal, aren’t you scared of me?!” I finally make a move to get at him and he runs around my pot of boiling water, singes his fur, and makes a getaway. It smells, undoubtedly, of an impending mouse revolt in apt. 285.

Soon after, my roommate comes home and I laboriously relay the entire tale to her. She picks up the box with Little Guy, goes straight for the bathroom, and flushes him. “I think he said, ‘Thank you.’” she says.