A Thanksgiving tail from Willowcroft

If the humans had asked me, I could have stopped the whole stuffing incident before the turkey even hit the oven.

But no—no one consults the cat.

Instead, I was busy being shooed off countertops, denied turkey scraps, and forbidden from “quality control testing” anything on the dining table. Tammy said it was “for my own good.” Mrs. Temperance called it “manners.” I call it injustice.

The house smelled like poultry, burnt sugar, and pride. That last one came from Beatrice, who had brought her “secret stuffing recipe” to the community dinner and was now treating the parlor like a crime scene.

“It’s ruined,” she declared, holding the casserole dish aloft as if it were a fallen soldier. “Sabotaged.”

Tammy, sitting with her foot propped on a cushion, leaned forward. “Sabotaged? How?”

“Cayenne,” Beatrice hissed. “Not sage. I tasted it. I nearly burst into flames.”

The room gasped. Della Mae fanned herself with a napkin. Mrs. Temperance clutched her pearls. Betty took a bite anyway.

“I like it,” Betty said brightly. “Clears the sinuses.”

Beatrice did not appreciate this. “Someone switched my spices. And I think I know who.”

All eyes turned to Marjorie, who sat with arms crossed and lips pursed tighter than a knot in yarn. Her stuffing had come second in last year’s contest, a defeat she still brought up every time the knitting circle met.

“I didn’t touch your pantry,” she grumbled. “Besides, I brought apple cobbler this year.”

“That’s even more suspicious,” Della Mae whispered loudly.

Tammy glanced at me. “Lockie, what do you think?”

Finally.

I leapt from the windowsill to the floor, sauntered past the humans, and headed straight to the kitchen. I didn’t need words. I had my nose.

The first clue was obvious: the spice rack. Three jars sat slightly askew. One had been shoved back into place with more force than finesse. Cayenne.

I sniffed.

Yes. Definitely handled recently—and by someone with traces of cinnamon, lavender lotion, and… peanut brittle?

I turned toward the living room and scanned the guests. Then I jumped onto the sideboard and stared directly at the culprit.

“Betty?” Mrs. Temperance blinked.

Betty looked up, cheeks full of stuffing. “What?”

I narrowed my eyes. The smell of cayenne clung to her like regret.

Beatrice’s voice cracked like a whip. “It was you?”

Betty paused mid-chew. “All right, fine,” she sighed. “But it wasn’t sabotage. It was senility! I grabbed the wrong jar. My glasses were fogged from the sweet potatoes. I thought it said ‘sage’—I swear!”

The room fell silent.

Then Tammy laughed. “The sabotage was accidental.”

“More like flavorful,” Betty said, undeterred. “And you all needed a little wake-up call. We’ve been using the same stuffing recipe for fifty years.”

Beatrice looked like she might faint.

Mrs. Temperance patted her shoulder. “Well, perhaps we can call it a… bold variation.”

“Or revenge,” Marjorie muttered.

I jumped back onto the windowsill and stretched, satisfied. Case closed.

Later, as the humans fussed over leftovers and debated whether spicy stuffing would become a new tradition, Tammy slipped me a sliver of turkey under the table.

“Good work,” she whispered.

I purred in reply. A little mystery, a little mischief, and a morsel of dark meat—now that’s what I call Thanksgiving.

***
More flash fiction shorts like these can be found in the backmatter links of Book 3.5: Turkey, Telescopes & Tallmadges