The story is a bit long, but this particular cat had a major impact on my life and was defiantly no ordinary cat, as you will soon see. Even now, many years after his death he still impacts my life greatly... Sadly, I have no pictures of him...

Several days later, my best friend and I went to the West Hollywood Animal shelter in search of a cat. The perfect solution. A kitten would be even better! Yes, defiantly this was the perfect thing to do.

On arriving though, to my dismay there were only a few cats! Three of them stick out in my mind from that day, although I think there were one or two more. (But not many more...) On one wall in a high cage was a BIG Black cat with beedey yellow eyes that just kept staring at me. On the other side way in the back at the bottom was a mixed up alley cat crouched in the back of his cage with HUGE eyes, growling! A sign on the cage said in big red letters: "ATTACKS!"

On the same side as the attack cat at the far end was a little calico kitten, probably about 6 months old who PURRED and rubbed against the cage when I came near. PERFECT! But she wasn't yet up for adoption! The Calico kitten had still a long time to go while waiting for it's rightful owner. No good, I needed a cat right away. Not only for my health, but I didn't want to impose on my friend to drive me to the animal shelter again.

So it was either going to be the one with the beady eyes, or the attack cat. I stood (or kneeled) in front of both their cages and studied them. Beedy just kept staring at me and the alley cat hissed and took a swipe at me from the back of his cage.

I went outside to smoke a cigarette and I thought really hard. This, after all, wasn't a decision to be made lightly. I did realize that the attack cat was frightened out of his wits, just looking at his dilated eyes and fur sticking out in all directions told me that.

I asked the attendant about the attack cat. They told me it had been found by a veterinarian in West Hollywood. Yes, "IT" ... as they didn't know if it was a male or female as they couldn't get close enough to find out. (OH, Wonderful, I thought...) They also told me he was to be destroyed at the end of the day. His time was up, no one had adopted him in the alloted time. Hmmm, so he'd been hissing and lunging at people for a couple of weeks and probably hasn't slept or eaten either from the look of him.

I went back outside and smoked another cigarette while I thought about it. A really nice elderly and rotund lady joined me. She had noticed my inquiry about the attack cat. She told me that she had once adopted a cat like that, an attacker, that turned out to be the most loving cat she had ever owned.

Okay, back in we go, let's see if he will let me hold him. The attendant went to his cage and put on thick gloves. Opened the cage, and poked a stick at him. Well, there's the problem, I thought. How would you feel if a stranger with gloves poked a stick at you. I think I'll wait to hold kitty, though; as he tried to shred the stick and the man right then and there. I paid the fee and off he went to have "the operation" that is required and to get his shots.

Several days later I went to pick him up at the vet's office. Brought by my friend and having a BIG carrier cage. (One normally for a small dog, which I had just purchased for kitty figuring it would have more than enough room.) The vet's assistant was a really nice young lady. I spoke to her about the cat. She had also noticed that he seemed frightened much more than he should... and that he hadn't stopped growling, hissing, spitting...or attacking.

She took the carrier and went in the back. Several minutes of yowling later she came back, cat in cage, Gloves in hand. And bleeding from several good sized scratches despite the ribber gloves.. Oh my, am I really SURE about this?

About a week later I awoke to find him missing and strange noises were coming from the refrigerator... He'd managed to get under it to hide. I ended up having to chase him out with a broom. MEOWWWWW, whoosh! Through the door and into the bathroom! "Nice Kitty" PFFFFTTT! MEOWWW, whoosh! Back under the fridge! After several circles of this I figured out to chase him from under the fridge then shove the cage into the bathroom door so he'd go back into it.

I waited another week and a half and his giant frightened yellow eyes were still staring at me from deep in the cat carrier. This will never do, I have to get him out of there. As luck would have it, the carrier I had bought was in two pieces and could be disassembled for storage and cleaning. As I hadn't heard him growling for a couple of days, I slowly popped the clasps holding it together. I took a couple of days to do it, and finally one day I removed the top half. He couched down, looked up at me and hissed. He stared at me for a whole five seconds like that.

PFFFTTTT! WHOOSH! Off in a panic he ran for the fridge, only to find it now blocked up. He clawed at it for several seconds and then ran into the bathroom. Okay, well, at least he's out of the carrier. I put his food and water next to the fridge, where he could easily see it from where he was.

My roommate related to me the next day that he had an interesting experience. Early the next morning he went into the bathroom to get ready for work and was greeted by PFTTTTT! MEOOOOWWWW! GRRRRR!

His eyes were still huge with fear, but he was growling a lot less and had stopped taking swings at us. I decided it was time to try actually picking him up and holding him. Not being one for pain, I took a towel and threw it over him. Right on cue, he hissed and fizzed and tried to shred the towel. After about a minute, I carefully grabbed a corner and took it off him. I repeated this several times over the next few days until he only hissed a little. Then I grabbed him. I was rewarded with several scratches, but none too major. I just held on for a few seconds then let go without picking him up. After a few days of this, I actually picked him up and took him (kicking and screaming) over to a large office chair I had and sat down with him on my legs, still covered with the towel.

He only stayed a few moments, and when he wanted to go, I let him. After a couple of days, he decided to stay so I reached carefully under the towel and started rubbing his back. It took several days of repeating this every few hours before he stayed more than a few minutes. But I was noticing that he was trembling in fear. I also started grabbing him at bedtime. I would get him wrapped in the towel and put him next to me. Always by morning, he'd be back in the bathroom.

After about four more days of this, I heard a different sound from him. A low off key weird growl. It took several minutes for me to figure out he was purring under that towel! Lets see what happens if I take away the towel. Peel it back slowly and there are those big frightened eyes looking up at me and PFTTTT! WHOOSH!

The next time I tried to pick him up he was ready. He squirmed around, grabbed my wrist with his claws and bit my finger. And REALLY hard, in fact, even through the doubled up towel he made a big hole in my fingernail. He wasn't kidding around! After several minutes of hopping up and down and yelling in pain I said Nope! No cat is getting the better of me and threw the towel at him and grabbed him. Then sat in the chair shoved my hand in the towel and rubbed his neck. He didn't run away this time, He stayed with me about 20 minutes.

But I noticed something was wrong. As I was rubbing his neck and the back of his head, I was feeling a large number of bumps and protrusions that didn't belong...

Several days later after he was with me about 5 minutes I took off the towel and held on until he settled in and started purring. The following day, I was going to toss the towel on him and he cringed. So I worked up my nerve, and slowly put the towel aside and reached down to pick him up. He growled a bit but settled into my left arm as I sat in the chair. I decided to try the cat brush I had bought, which he didn't like at first, but a few tries later we had something going.

I decided it was a good idea to try a more "cat" approach, that maybe he would respond to a feline social gesture. The cat equal of a hug between known friends is rubbing ones face against the face of the one you are greeting. I had learned this as a child and my mother's cats loved it when I did it, and decided to try and see if he would understand.

There we were on the bed playing with the little colored balls and I thought of this. So I leaned in close and rubbed my beard against his whiskers. I've have never seen a more shocked expression, not even on a human.

He stared at me for a good 15 seconds with that shocked expression on his face, then he flattened his ears and let me have it. Lightning quick he reached up with his left paw and tried to put my eye out, and he was quite serious about it from the depth of the slash. PFTTTT! WHOOSH! Luck would have it that he's a bad aim, but not by much. (I still have a small scar about 1/8 inch below my left eye from this...)

I knew that he had understood the gesture though, there was no doubt about it. After I managed to stop the bleeding I picked him up (he was cowering in the bathroom) and took him to the chair. I patted his paws and said "bad claws" then held him up and again rubbed my face on his. It took a few tries, but eventually he returned the gesture.

This episode set something of a standard for us. The next day when I came home from work he met me at the door as usual, then RAN into the living room and jumped up on the back of my big office chair and started meowing and swishing about in the manner of a "normal" cat that wants to be petted. As I approached I bent down to pet him he rubbed his face against mine. From that day on, Every day when I came home from work he would jump up on something and expect to be "properly" greeted...

Akanar had a fractured skull. He had apparently gotten into the care of the shelter after having been in a car accident or something. And he was bleeding internally, in his head. He had apparently already had surgery, and the Vet didn't think another operation would help. He gave Akanar less than six months to live...

I tried my best to make what life he had a comfortable one. Although the shelter has a "guarantee" on the adopted animals, I was far too attached to him.

Since his eyes were dilated, bright light wasn't good. (It was kind of obvious once I knew what was going on to notice that he didn't like it when I opened the drapes or turned on the light.) I put large sheets of black construction paper over my windows to block out the sun, and replaced the light bulbs with 30 watt ones. This didn't bother me as I worked graveyard shift at the time and slept in the day. So blocking the windows was fine by me and very much helped him.