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Kitty was the one who introduced Laura to the idea of birthday presents, so this year she wants to get Kitty something spectacular. She gets Papa to take her to the mall, which she usually hates, because the mall is so loud and terrifying and there are so many people and none of them are targets, which confuses her, and spends hours and hours going through the stores that Kitty likes to go to. Kitty has pierced ears, though Laura doesn’t. She goes to the purple store called Claire’s and looks at earrings. Kitty likes bright shoes. She goes to the sneaker store and looks at Hello Kitty light-up shoes. (Kitty likes Hello Kitty; she told Laura once that growing up she thought the cat was specially named after her, and even after she found out otherwise, she still likes it.) Some things are very Kitty, but none of them match the only thing Kitty had asked for this year, when Laura had apologized for not knowing enough about birthdays to get her something last year.
Kitty had said, “Get me something you’ll like, too! We’re still making up for all the birthdays you didn’t have, so this way it can be a little gift to yourself.”
Except Laura has so little experience with birthday presents she doesn’t even know what she likes. Last year Kitty had gotten her mittens with holes in them for her claws.
Dad is arguing with people at the Apple store now. Papa yawns but doesn’t complain. “Maybe you can make her something, li’l fox,” he suggests on their second circuit of the mall. Laura hums, dissatisfied. The idea of making Kitty something is even more daunting than the idea of finding her the perfect present. Kitty likes things from the mall, Laura knows she does. She has no evidence that Kitty likes things Laura makes. She’s never made anything, anyway. She wouldn’t know where to start.
Papa finds butterfly earrings for Jas at Claire’s on their third go-around, and they’re checking out when Laura sees it. The perfect gift.
Kitty gets in trouble for chewing bubblegum all the time, but Laura thinks it’s cute. She wishes she could chew bubblegum, but the smell and taste are usually too overpowering for her senses. When it’s on Kitty’s breath, though, the scent is diluted just enough that she can pick up on the candyfloss and sugar scent that must be what other people taste when they chew bubblegum, and she loves it. She points at the display of bubblegum flavors on the wall behind the cashier. It takes Papa a second to figure out what she’s gesturing towards, but when he does, he smiles, a smile as warm and wide as eggs on toast for breakfast.
Laura gets Kitty four flavors: green apple, grape, strawberry, and blue cotton candy. Kitty doesn’t like yellow or orange, so she stays away from the lemon and tangerine flavors. Dad shows her how to use wrapping paper, and Papa shows her how to cut wrapping paper with her claws more precisely than with scissors, which Laura hates using because they feel like deformed claws. She uses a lot of tape to hold it all together, but Dad promises her that Kitty will love it.
She writes, in shaky letters—she’s just learning how to write from the Professor—TO KITY, LOVE LAURA. And before she hands it over, she takes a minute and holds it to her heart and impresses the entire last year, all the hugs and the giggling and the smiles and the laughter, she focuses on it all so hard and so deeply that it must sink into the flavors, all of her thankfulness and all of her love.