My human has discovered the second cat.
It lives in the great cold wall at the metal room, the one my human visits every morning after abandoning me. I know this because my human returns smelling of the second cat's territory: sweat, rubber, the strange dead air of a place with no soft surfaces to claim.
Here is what I have pieced together. My human stands before this wall, lifts the glowing rectangle, and freezes. Chin tilted. Shoulders squared. One leg forward, as though it has spotted prey and cannot decide whether to pounce. It holds this pose. It holds it far too long.
It is stalking its own reflection.
The second cat in the wall does exactly what my human does, which my human finds thrilling rather than suspicious. A true rival would break the stare. A true rival would flee. This one only mimics, endlessly, cowardly, and my human mistakes cowardice for competition and puffs itself larger to win.
Then the rectangle flashes, and my human keeps the moment forever, the way I keep the memory of a bird I did not catch: as proof of a hunt that produced nothing.
It comes home taller in its own mind. It wants me to see. It holds the rectangle to my face, expecting the slow blink, the low purr, the acknowledgment.
I look at the glowing square. I look at my human, still flushed, still waiting.
I turn my head to the window, where a real bird is doing something real, and I let the silence do the work no mirror ever could.