“I refuse to accept this,” I said drunkenly. I’d lost count of how many glasses of wine I had. But the three-quarters empty bottle of wine had some idea. “Shadow, how can Bhargavi just walk out on me? I thought we were friends!”

Meow.

She sounded bored this time. Like, she was done with me going on and on about the same things, over and over again. A new idea took hold of me and I grinned broadly. I knew immediately what I wanted to do.

“How hard can it be to summon her?” I said, loudly, “She will have to answer me then, and I will finally get my answers.”

Meow.

This time, it sounded like Shadow was egging me on. What she stood to gain from me summoning a deity, I did not know. But after the day I had, I would happily take encouragement even from my recently adopted black cat.

“Wait a minute though,” I said, slowly, turning to stare right into Shadow’s glinting eyes, “How do you summon a deity? Is there a spell for that? Or a ritual? What exactly would I have to do? And would have all the necessary ingredients right away?”

A paw rested on my knee and Shadow maintained eye contact. I knew immediately she was telling me to pull myself together. That if I wanted to go through with this, there was no turning back. You don’t invoke a deity and then give them the silent treatment. No matter how justified it would be. Once they turn up, you either have to ask them for help or ask them for a boon. I wondered if I could ask her for a curse. Not for myself of course. But for the latest I-am-not-looking-for-anything-serious-but-I-can-fucking-get-engaged-in-a-heartbeat dude. I couldn’t even remember his name at the moment.

I stared back into Shadow’s orb-like eyes and said, “Or should I just scream into the void, hoping Bhargavi hears me this time?”

Meow.

“You’re right, I am being silly,” I muttered.

I went to my bedroom and skimmed through the stacks of old books that now lay gathering dust on my bookshelf. The office job had left me completely drained – mentally and physically. All their promises that the work day ends the minute the clock strikes 6.30 pm was nothing but a lie. As good corporate places often do to you. I had forgotten about the book I’d purchased from a second-hand bookshop, a couple of years ago. It was on spellcraft, and I was convinced that there would be one inside of it that told me how to summon a deity.

I found one that was titled ‘How to Invoke a Deity’, and hoping that this was the answer I was looking for, I thumbed through the ingredients list.

“Candles…cinnamon powder….salt,” I muttered, “Coloured chalk…interesting choice…rose quartz…”

I had most of the ingredients lying around the house, and whatever I couldn’t find, I substituted after doing a quick web search to find whatever could be closest to them. All the while, Shadow watched me from her perch on the sofa.

I placed all the ingredients in their designated places and lit the candles. Then, I began chanting the incantation written in the book. At most, Bhargavi would turn up in the middle of my living room, annoyed out of her mind. Or the spell would fail. I liked my options.

Meow!

Suddenly, Shadow jumped into the middle of the spell circle, sending the spell ingredients flying everywhere. I yelled loudly, stopping my chanting.

“Shadow, no, what are you doing?” I scolded the mischievous cat.

She gave me a witheringly obvious look. I blinked. It was as though Shadow was telling me that she knew what had transpired, and I did not understand what I was currently playing with.

The candles were burning despite Shadow’s interruption. The wind started howling right outside of my window, making me jump out of my skin. My spell book flew out of my hands and landed next to Shadow. I blinked again.

How much did I drink tonight? I asked myself, trying to make sense of what I just witnessed.

“What did you do, Shadow?” I groaned, sinking onto the sofa, “This was the very last attempt I had to contact Bhargavi. Why would you blow it like this for me?”

Meow.

“Clearly, I don’t know what I am talking about,” I muttered, defeated. I sighed again. “Look at me, getting drunk on my own. Trying to summon a deity. Blaming a cat of all things. It’s official – I’ve become completely unhinged after working myself to the bone. God, this isn’t worth it. None of this is worth it.”

I lay down on the sofa. Putting my hand over my eyes and said loudly, “Shadow, I am going to clean up that mess in the morning. I do not know what possessed me to think this was actually a good idea. Bhargavi isn’t going to answer my prayers. Don’t know why I even bothered with this in the first place. If she really cared, she would have turned up a long time ago. Let’s face it – she abandoned me.”

Meow, meow, meow, meow.

“What is it, Shadow?” I asked, miserably. Even though I could hear the urgency in the meows, I was too tired to actually open my eyes and look around.

Then, I heard it. The slow rattling of the ingredients all scattered on the floor. I turned my head to see that the spell had started working again, with Shadow in the middle of it. The candle flames burned brighter! The rope that was binding them all together caught fire.

“No!” I yelled, trying desperately to get to Shadow.

I hadn’t meant for her to be standing in the middle of a fire circle! However, Shadow stood there, just watching the world with a bored expression on her face. As though she had seen this before, and she wasn’t impressed.

“Oh, dear God,” I whispered, “what have I done?”

Shadow just stared dead ahead as if she knew what was going to happen next, and she couldn’t care less about it.