My human approaches the tall humming box with the reverence it never once shows me.
It stands in the cold glow, peering through the glass at the little hanging trophies, each one dangling from its wire coil like prey too stupid to run. I understand this instantly. It is a trap. The box has caught many small crinkling creatures and holds them just out of reach, taunting, and my human has come to worship the box for its superior hunting.
It feeds the box. It always feeds the box. Slides in the thin pale tokens it hoards so jealously and will not let me bat under the couch. The box swallows them without a purr, without a thank you, without so much as looking up.
Then the great cruelty: the coil turns, the crinkling thing lurches forward, and stops. Caught on the glass. Dangling. My human hits the box. Rocks it. Presses its whole ridiculous face to the surface and begs.
I have never seen it want anything this badly. Not the little red dot. Not sleep. Certainly not me.
I could have told it. The wire never lets go clean. Prey held that long belongs to the wall now, and the wall does not negotiate.
It came home empty-handed and heavy-footed and lowered itself onto the couch to sulk.
I climbed directly onto its chest, turned once, and sat. Warm. Purring. Delivered without a single token. The one trophy in this house that hangs itself in your lap and never gets stuck on the glass.
It did not deserve me.
I stayed anyway.