Welcome Home, Kitty: Little Kitten

Johnny remembered the day she came to Maple Hills like he remembered the heatwave. Dry air and slow sweat. It had crawled in slow and mean at the middle of July and never let go. By August, even the nights didn’t cool.

That was the air the Chevy rolled into

A two-tone, pale blue and ivory that was polished just enough to catch the sun without looking gaudy. Not the kind of car you drove to run errands. The kind you parked where people could see it. The kind of car you parked like you meant something. Johnny’s dad used to drive a ’49 Plymouth. Dull green and built like a brick. It wasn’t much to look at, but it had run smooth and quiet. Then Loraine came along and before spring was out, the Plymouth was gone.

She’d called it “dreary” the second week she moved in, like the damn thing had insulted her. Said it made her feel “common” pulling up to church. She wanted something prettier, something people would notice when it rolled through town. So his father traded it for the Bel Air, like a dog fetching whatever she pointed at.

Within a few months of marrying in, Loraine had changed the house like she was erasing someone else’s fingerprints. She’d swapped the curtains and had the kitchen painted. Even the cabinets got new knobs. Porcelain white, delicate, like they might break if handled wrong. She turned the front room into a parlor “for entertaining”. She swapped out every photo frame. She rearranged the bookshelf by color and added a ceramic ashtray that nobody could use.

She didn’t yell, she judged. With perfect posture, quiet sighs, polished statements and sentences that sounded like compliments layered in a smile that looked like she’d practiced it in the mirror until it stopped meaning anything.

She wore lipstick to breakfast and set her hair every night in perfect rolls.

Johnny hated it.

Not the rolls. Not the lipstick.

Her.

The way she took his father’s house and made it hers with soft hands and smiles. Like she was doing them all a favor. Like she was the upgrade. The improvement.

And now she was pulling up with a daughter. Her shadow.

Johnny was already on the porch chewing a toothpick and pretending he hadn’t been watching for the past five minutes. His forearms were still smudged from the garage, shirt sleeves rolled and damp at the edges.

Loraine stepped out first, not a hair out of place beneath her pillbox hat, like a mannequin in a department store window. She looked up at the porch with that familiar tight-lipped expression. The one that said the place still wasn’t quite up to standard.

Johnny leaned against the porch post. His arms were crossed, boot heel dug into the bottom step, the light catching just enough of his face to throw the rest into shadow. His jaw worked slow around the toothpick, not chewing exactly, just keeping rhythm, like he had nowhere better to be and all the time in the world to wait her out.

Then the passenger door finally creaked open. Kitty stepped out of the car. Her shoes crunched into the gravel.

Johnny’s eyes slid over her slowly, taking in the neat curls at her nape to the skirt hem just below her knees, the white socks folded clean, polished saddle shoes shining like they’d never touched dirt.

Johnny felt something settle low in his chest as he watched her.

He’d seen pictures, heard her name plenty, but seeing her there, breathing his air, that was different. Somehow worse in person.

Prettier.

That hit first. Not the outfit, not the manners. The face. The shape of her. That quick gut-jolt you get when something’s better looking than it has any right to be. And he hated that it hit him at all.

He didn’t realize he’d stopped chewing the toothpick until it sat still between his teeth. He let out a low laugh.

She looked too smooth. Too finished. Not a wrinkle in her dress. A little doll, fresh from the box. Built neat and soft, meant to sit in a quiet room and reflect good taste. She walked like she’d been told to walk nicely. She dressed like someone had picked the outfit for her.

She was Loraine’s work, head to heel.

“Well, look at this.” Johnny didn’t glance at Loraine. His gaze stayed fixed on the girl by the car door.

“Pop didn’t say you was bringin’ a movie star.”

Loraine gave a laugh, too high, too polished. The kind that didn’t quite fit the heat or the gravel underfoot.

“Oh, Johnny. This is Kitty. Katherine.”

He smiled at that. Not wide, not warm. Just a curve at the corner of his mouth, shallow and practiced, like something he’d borrowed from someone more polite.

Then he came down the steps. Boots thudding.

One. Two. Three.

Stopped a foot in front of her. The smile didn’t reach his eyes.

“Welcome home.”

Kitty tried to smile back, clutching her suitcase handle. “Thank you” she said.

“Go on, help her with her bags” Loraine urged, fanning herself with one hand.

Johnny nodded, his smirk deepened. “Course. Happy to help.” He reached for Kitty’s suitcase, lifting it with ease. “I’ll show her her room. You get settled.”

“Thank you, sweetheart” Loraine said, relief flooding her voice as she continued to fan her face.

Johnny led Kitty inside, his grip on the suitcase casual but strong. They passed the small lounge, dim and warm and the kitchen where sunlight filtered through thin lace curtains. Everything looked like it had once belonged to someone else. A house paused mid-change. Soft touches over rough things.

He walked the stairs without a word. Didn’t check if she was behind him, didn’t offer conversation. Just climbed with the same lazy confidence she’d seen on the porch, like he wasn’t leading her anywhere important at all. Kitty still followed, her own footsteps light and quick.

At the landing, he veered to the right, opened a door and stepped half into the frame, but didn’t move aside. He dropped her suitcase just inside the threshold with a dull thump. Then he leaned his shoulder against the doorframe, arms folded.

She tried to step forward into the room, but he didn’t move. Just stood there, forcing her to pause. She looked at him fully now, blinking once. The smile on his face came slow, almost lazy.

“So. Kitty,” he said, rolling the name over like it was candy gone too sweet. “That what folks really call you?”

She blinked, surprised by the shift in tone. “Yes” she said. “Sometimes. I mean… everyone back home does.”

Johnny’s grin widened a touch. “Yeah… that suits you. Little thing like you oughta have a name with a purr in it.” His chuckle was low, almost private.

She offered a tight smile, unsure if it was meant to be a compliment.

“But kitten’s better.” His voice curled around the words like cigarette smoke.

Kitty’s shoulders tensed. She tried to keep her expression flat, polite, unreadable. The way her mother had taught her to in rooms full of sharp-tongued women and critical eyes.

“A little house pet” he went on. “Tidy little housecat, come to perch on the windowsill.” His tone lost its sweetness, turning sharp at the edges. “You don’t like it?” he asked, too casually, like he wasn’t watching her flinch.

Kitty blinked. Her mouth opened slightly, unsure what to say. The shift in him was small but sudden. The way his voice had turned, the heat behind his gaze. “It’s not my name” she responded, voice tight.

“Didn’t say it was.” He was already turning away. “Just said it fits.” Finally, he stepped back, giving her space, but only barely. He gestured toward the open door with a lazy flick of his fingers. “Room’s yours.”

She walked past him quickly, not daring to look up. The bedspread was pale pink, floral. The curtains were lace. The whole room looked like a page from a catalog her mother would’ve circled in ink.

Behind her, Johnny’s voice followed like a thread through the silence. “Settle in, Kitten.” She stood still for a moment and stared at his back as he walked away, slow and easy, like the conversation had never happened.

His voice still echoed faintly in her mind. The way he’d said Kitten like he was testing it. Like he thought it was funny. But maybe that was just… his way.

It was just his tone that stuck. The kind of voice that tested boundaries, whether or not he knew he was doing it. She didn’t want to start this new chapter with judgment. Not even quiet ones. Some men were like that. Sharp around the edges. Her uncle in Ohio had been like that. Always calling everyone by nicknames, like that excused the way he talked over people.

Some men just didn’t have much use for politeness. He hadn’t raised his voice. He hadn’t mocked her in front of her mother. And when he carried her suitcase, he hadn’t jostled it. He could’ve been worse.

She should be polite, be gracious, give him the benefit of the doubt. She let out a slow breath, turned back to the suitcase sitting where Johnny had dropped it.

Unpacking had always felt like claiming something. At Aunt Iris’s house, she’d kept everything tidy, folded, and respectful. That space was not ever really hers, but this was different. This was supposed to be home.

She knelt beside the suitcase and flipped the latches open with two gentle clicks. Inside: her dresses, some sewn from patterns. Soft cottons in pastels and ginghams. Rows of piping. Button plackets she’d stitched herself.

A navy one with a sailor collar. One yellow dress with a crisp white collar her mother had insisted on buying from Sears Roebuck.

A pale pink shirtdress with a scalloped collar and pearl buttons. She’d added tiny embroidered rosebuds by hand to the cuffs, just to make it feel like hers.

A buttercream eyelet dress, cinched at the waist with a narrow belt. Her mother had made a fuss about it in the dressing room, calling it “respectable, but not dowdy.”

A blue-and-white gingham day dress with cap sleeves and pintucks down the bodice. McCall’s Pattern 9353. Kitty had stitched it herself over two weekends, pulling out crooked seams and re-pressing darts until they lay flat.

She lifted them carefully and hung it in the narrow closet, smoothing the collar before letting it go. The fabric whispered as it swung on the hangers. Familiar sounds.

Beneath the dresses, wrapped in tissue and tucked between a folded slip and a blouse, were her sewing patterns. Butterick, Simplicity, McCall’s. Below those was her sewing kit. A small wooden box with her name scratched lightly into the inside edge of the lid. Inside: thread spools, a tomato pin cushion, tiny silver scissors, a thimble she always forgot to wear.

Her sewing machine had already been set out on the desk near the window. The old Singer model with the black enamel body and gold scrollwork. The treadle sat quiet beneath the desk, its iron pedal dusted faintly from disuse. A spool of white thread still sat on the spindle, like it expected her to sit down and pick up where she left off.. She smiled faintly.

In the top flap of the suitcase, tucked between tissue paper, were her treasures. The paper that made a space feel like hers.

One by one, she laid them on the bed.

A glossy clipping of Jane Powell, her blue eyes sparkling. Debbie Reynolds caught mid-laugh in a pink dress, hands clasped under her chin. June Allyson perched on the edge of a desk, typing something on a typewriter with a bright, wholesome smile, like she could solve every problem with a good attitude and a sensible blouse. And Rock Hudson, of course. Tall and dark, his strong arms crossed and half-smiling like he knew exactly what every girl in America was thinking.

Kitty smoothed the edges of each clipping before she pinned them above the bed with care, angling them just so. A constellation of safety and softness. Not perfect, but familiar.

Then came the Pan Am and TWA ads. Full-color spreads from Ladies’ Home Journal. Jetliners sailing through watercolor skies and graceful stewardesses gliding down airplane steps in kitten heels, arms raised in a welcoming wave. Slogans in bold italics: “See the World with Pan Am!” “You Can Fly TWA - The Airline of the Stars.”

She’d cut out those pages so carefully, but some still had jagged edges from being torn in a hurry, when her mother almost caught her cutting up her magazines.

Next came the postcard from her best friend Barbara, mailed just a few weeks earlier from Honolulu. Palm trees swayed under a blazing orange sky. A couple in matching leis smiled from a postcard stand. A paradise in technicolor.

“Wish you were here. The boys are a dream. Tall and tanned. I got a pineapple drink with a straw. I felt like a movie star. Even the air smells fancy. Miss you! Write me!! Love, Barbara.”

Kitty pinned that beside her mirror too. Not to show off. Just to remember.

Last she reached for the small velvet case tucked deep in the side pocket of her suitcase. She sat down on the edge of the bed, laid the case across her knees, and opened it.

Inside, cushioned in dark satin, were three medals:

The Purple Heart, deep violet and gold, shaped like a heart with the soft silhouette of George Washington in the center. She had learned what it meant when she was nine. “Awarded to those wounded or killed in combat”. The word killed had felt far away then. It didn’t anymore.

Then the Distinguished Flying Cross, bronze and beautiful, given for heroism or extraordinary achievement while in flight. Her mother rarely spoke of it.

And the Asiatic–Pacific Campaign Medal, striped in red, blue, and yellow. A ribbon, really. She used to think it looked cheerful, like something for a birthday.

She walked to the vanity, eyes moving over the small constellation of pictures she’d already pinned above it. Pan Am, TWA, the stewardesses with perfect posture and gloved hands, promising the world with a smile. She reached up and pinned it just beneath the line of flight ads. Not directly under the stewardesses. Under the plane.

She stepped back and looked at the room. It wasn’t perfect. But it was hers.

~

Kitty smoothed the last napkin flat. Those that were real linens, not paper, the floral ones kept boxed in tissue. The good china was out for company or impressions. The silver was polished to a high shine. Even the butter curls looked rehearsed.

Loraine moved between the table and stove, posture straight, hips gliding beneath her pencil skirt. She wore a cream blouse tucked tight and a cinched waist belt and the pearls Kitty would learn she always wore when Ernest came home.

Silk gloves still clung to her hands, delicate and unnecessary. She stopped to glance over Kitty’s work. “Be a doll and straighten your collar.” she said without looking up. “First impressions count.”

Kitty adjusted the fold beneath her cardigan and smoothed the pleats in her skirt

“He’ll only be here three nights” Loraine had said earlier. “So let’s not treat him like a stranger.”

Ernest was Regional manager for United Auto Supply, which Kitty understood meant he traveled most weeks. Up and down the highways, from Roanoke to Knoxville, stopping at gas stations and garages, selling parts and making sure the books lined up with the boxes.

She heard the car doors slam, then the entry door open, then a man’s voice call, muffled by the walls. The front door shut. Heavy footsteps crossed the entryway floor, followed by a voice, deep and warm.

“Smells like roast. That your work, Loraine?”

“Mine and the oven’s” Loraine called back, already beaming. “Go wash your hands and come sit.”

Ernest stepped into the doorway a moment later. Ttall, dark-haired, mustached and slightly winded like he’d come in fast. His collar was open, his tie loosened, and his eyes landed on Kitty before anything else.

“Well, there she is,” he said. “So you’re Katherine.”

She nodded. “Kitty, sir.”

He smiled and crossed the kitchen floor with purpose. “No need for ‘sir.’ Just Ernest.” He extended a hand, firm but not overbearing. “Your mama’s told me about you.”

Kitty took it, trying not to squeeze too hard. “It’s nice to meet you.”

“You too. Long drive?”

“Yes, sir. A little over four hours.”

“Well” he said, glancing at the table, “I’m glad we got you here before dark. Lo’s been fixing this place up like the Queen of England was coming to stay.”

Loraine gave a tight smile and adjusted a vase on the sideboard. “Someone had to bring some standards.”

Another pair of footsteps entered the room. Johnny.

His hair was combed back, sleeves rolled neat to the elbow, a fresh button-down tucked in at the waist. No grease on his hands this time. No boots tracking in dust.

Ernest gestured toward him. “You’ve met Johnny already, I reckon?”

Kitty nodded faintly. “Yes, earlier.”

Johnny gave a nod in return, low, barely there. Then he pulled out a chair across from her and sat. He didn’t look at her.

Ernest clapped his hands lightly. “Well, let’s sit. Let the roast get cold and I’ll never hear the end of it.”

Kitty began passing plates. The roast smelled like cloves and thyme. Something she recognized from holidays back home. Her mother served Ernest first, then Johnny, then finally Kitty, carefully laying out each slice like it was a performance.

Ernest carved into the roast with pleasure. “Johnny’s been holding down the fort while I’m on the road” he said. “I’ve got half a dozen shops in the region to check in on, but I never worry about this one. He’s got a head for numbers and a feel for the work.” Ernest went on, pride growing louder. “Took over the floor last winter. Keeps the boys in line, orders parts before they’re needed, can eyeball a carburetor and tell you if it’ll hold another week or blow by Tuesday.” He laughed.

Johnny didn’t react. Just cut his meat quietly, eating in silence.

“He’s modest” Ernest said. “But that garage wouldn’t stand without him.”

She nodded, offered a quiet, “That’s nice. You must like it.”

“I like knowin’ what I’m doing” he said simply. “And fixing something right the first time.”

His voice wasn’t cold, but without excess. Like he was giving her the answer and nothing else.

Kitty nodded, a little unsure whether to respond. “That makes sense.”

The meal continued. Loraine chimed in with controlled little comments. The rest of the meal passed with the clink of silverware and Ernest’s low, steady talk about a parts manager in Chattanooga, a busted axle in Asheville, a mechanic in Roanoke who thought he could fix everything with baling wire and gumption.

Kitty answered when spoken to, smiled when expected and kept her hands in her lap when she didn’t know what to do with them. Through it all, Johnny stayed silent, but Kitty felt it. His glances, short and rare but sharp.

When dinner ended, Ernest stood and stretched. “Well, that was something. I say we’ve officially welcomed you.”

Loraine started clearing plates, stacking them with a clink on the counter, her smile still painted on from dinner. “Kitty. Be a doll and help with the dishes.”

Kitty unfolded her napkin from her lap and stood. The tap hissed as Kitty turned the handle, steam curling up like breath on glass. Johnny stood as Loraine left the dining room, moving toward the sink. He didn’t speak. He didn’t smile. He was watching her, though. She could feel it.

Kitty scrubbed at a fork, unsure whether to speak, fingers already pink from the heat. She offered a polite smile. The kind girls were taught to give when they didn’t know what else to do.

He reached into his shirt pocket and drew out a cigarette. Lit it with one smooth flick. The match flared, then died between his fingers. He took one long drag. Exhaled through his nose.

Then his voice came low, offhand, like he was just making conversation. “You settle in quick.”

Kitty looked over again.

“Barely got your suitcase upstairs and already got your hands in the sink. You always play house this fast?”

She blinked. “I’m just-”

He cut her off “Just what?” he asked. “Being helpful? Obedient? Good?”

She turned to him now, cheeks warm. “Why are you being like this?”

He exhaled a quiet laugh. “Like what? Honest?” He took another drag. The cigarette glowed orange for a second in the dim kitchen light. “You act like someone wound you up and set you on the shelf.” His voice dropped to something smoother, the smoke spilling into the air between them. “Pretty little doll. Pretty dress and empty head.”

Kitty’s throat tightened. “That’s not fair.”

He leaned in a hair too close.

“Sure it is. But I’ve seen dogs trained better.” Then, with the same slow ease, he plucked the cigarette from his lips and flicked it into the dishwater. She froze, hands stiff on the towel.

It hissed as it sank, curling the water black around the stub. He didn’t watch it. He turned, rolled down his sleeves without a word and walked out.

Kitty stood at the sink, frozen, hands still curled around a damp plate, the smoke rising faintly between her fingers. In the dining room, Loraine laughed lightly at something Ernest said.