Jo Jo and Brooks

by Jem Big Sky III

Part Three
Dave and Jo Jo waited outside the bakery for nearly 10 minutes while the firefighters arrived. Jo Jo grabbed one of them by the sleeve and said "My cat is inside!" "Where? What! A cat?" said the firefighter. "He follows me to work and when the alarm...he is in an air vent!" Jo Jo said quickly. "Alright" the firefighter replied and then ran towards the bakery.
Several minutes went by and it appeared the fire was nothing more than smoke. The firefighters were starting to come out of the bakery one at a time and it seemed some of them weren't even dirty. None of them had Brooks in their arms and they were starting to take off their masks. Jo Jo asked each of them if they had seen a cat and one of them, a rather large man, replied, "A cat? No we didn't see no cat." Jo Jo started to make his way back inside the bakery when he was stopped by what looked like the oldest firefighter and was told that he couldn't go back inside yet. "Are you the guy who lost his cat inside?", asked the older firefighter. "Yes" said Jo Jo as he tried to explain how it had happened. The man, who turned out to be the firefighter captain, told Jo Jo that they would be checking all parts of the building to assess the damage and that they would look out for Brooks. The firefighter then wanted to know who was working in the oven room when the fire started and Jo Jo just shrugged and was clearly distracted by what the other firefighters were doing inside the bakery. "I am sorry, but I was on a break when the alarm went off", said Jo Jo finally.
Jo Jo joined Dave on the curb outside and while Jo Jo continued to worry, up walked another co-worker, named Harry, who started talking about the fire and how it started and that it was no one's fault and so forth. Dave and Harry kept talking while Jo Jo was looking at the smoldering building. He wondered about a lot of things, about his previous pet, a dog named Simon, who was killed by a car. He wondered if maybe he wasn't a very good pet owner and shouldn't be in charge of another living thing, which ironically is what his father told him after all his goldfish died one summer day. After that, his father wouldn't allow any more pets because of Jo Jo's knack for losing or killing them on accident. Jo Jo would find stray pets and bring them in the house to hide from his father, but usually they would soon stray again. Sometimes, Jo Jo would find frogs, but would forget to put the lid on the jar and they would jump out. One ended up in his father's cereal by accident and Jo Jo was instantly blamed for the incident.
Jo Jo's mind was wandering some more when Harry asked him "Did you leave any valuables in the bakery?" Just as Jo Jo was about to tell Harry, the bakery's biggest gossip, about Brooks, Jo Jo looked in the tree on the side of the parking lot and saw what he thought was a squirrel and continued telling Harry about how his cat followed him to work and ended up running into a vent. "Your cat?" asked Harry, in almost a mocking tone. "Yes" said Jo Jo, when suddenly there seemed to be a commotion in the same tree and a couple of birds took flight when all of a sudden a cat jumped out of the tree in a leap towards the flying birds, but ended up landing on the grass empty handed. "Its Brooks!" shouted Dave.


Painting by Eileen Mosca