The Cat Sleeping on the Windowsill

Nando was a white cat with a grey patch on his thigh and a great passion for windowsills.

Of all of them, he preferred the kitchen windowsill, where there was a pot of mint and one could see a small piece of sea far away.

Aurora watched him.

“Nando is always sleeping.”

Mother smiled. “Nando rests well.”

Aurora did not understand the difference. When she stopped, she immediately thought of what she could be doing: a drawing, a run, a question, a game.

One afternoon she became angry because a tower of blocks fell three times. Nando opened one eye from the windowsill and went mrrr.

“What do you want?”

The cat tapped his tail once. Then he moved a paw, closed his eyes, and breathed.

Aurora imitated him as a game. She leaned her back against the chair. She breathed in. She smelled the mint. She breathed out. She smelled the faraway sea, or perhaps imagined it.

Nando opened the other eye, satisfied.

On the windowsill, between his paws, there was something: a small dream, rolled up like a ball of yarn.

“Is it yours?”

Nando pushed it toward her.

Aurora closed her eyes. In the dream she built a slow tower, one block at a time. When it fell, she laughed.

After resting she returned to the blocks. The tower fell again, but she did not shout. She had more space inside.

From then on Aurora learned the windowsill rest: mint, breath, closed eyes, no hurry.

And Nando, silent teacher, continued to sleep like someone who knows an ancient secret.