The comfortable quiet of the evening was shattered by the sound of slipping ceramic.
Leo's head snapped up from his book, his heart giving a familiar lurch of impending doom.
It was his father, David, who had been admiring the very same antique vase Milo had nearly destroyed a few weeks prior. The vase now sat on a higher, supposedly safer, shelf.
Supposedly.
David had been dusting it with a feather duster, a look of focused concentration on his face. He was a practical man, a retired engineer who believed in logic, physics, and the immutable reliability of a well-made tool. He did not believe in things like 'bad luck' or 'cursed vases'.
The vase, however, seemed to believe in gravity.
As David turned, the duster caught the lip of the vase, sending it skittering towards the edge of the shelf with a sickening scrape.
Time seemed to slow down.
Leo saw his father's eyes widen in horror.
He saw the vase teeter on the precipice, a porcelain acrobat performing its final, tragic bow.
He saw it begin its long, graceful plunge towards the hardwood floor.
Leo's mind went blank. There was no time to move, no time to shout. He could only watch, a helpless spectator at the execution of a piece of his family's dubious history.
But someone else was not helpless.
Milo, who had been a lazy, sleeping lump on the back of the sofa, moved.
It wasn't a pounce. It wasn't a leap.
It was a blur.
A flicker of silver fur that defied the normal constraints of time and space.
He launched from the sofa, not with the frantic scrabble of a normal cat, but with a silent, impossible grace. He was a silver bullet fired from a gun made of naps and disdain.
He didn't jump at the vase. He flowed around it, a dance with gravity itself.
Mid-air, a single, impossibly precise paw extended.
He didn't slap the vase. He didn't catch it.
He nudged it.
A tiny, delicate tap that altered its trajectory, sending it spinning back towards the wall instead of plummeting downwards.
The vase struck the wall with a soft clink, slid down the wallpaper, and landed with a gentle, muffled thud on the plush rug below.
Intact.
Not a single chip. Not a crack.
The world seemed to forget how cats worked. For a moment, the laws of physics took a brief, unannounced coffee break.
David stood frozen, feather duster still in hand, his mouth hanging slightly open. His logical, engineering mind was currently a blue screen of death.
Leo let out a breath he didn't realize he'd been holding. His heart hammered against his ribs.
Milo landed on the floor as if he'd just stepped off a low stool.
He stretched.
He yawned.
He then proceeded to preen, meticulously licking a paw as if to say, Yes, I just casually rewrote a few fundamental laws of the universe. It was trivial. Do try to keep up.
David finally found his voice. "Remarkable," he breathed, staring at the cat. "Absolutely remarkable."
Leo saw his opening and seized it. "He's got a great sixth sense," he said, his voice bright and just a little too loud. "Incredible reflexes."
His father, however, was already in problem-solving mode. He knelt, examining the vase, then the shelf, then the floor.
"It must be a fluke," David said, more to himself than to Leo. "Or perhaps a particularly strong spring in its hind legs. You know, high-quality pet food can do wonders for muscle tone."
He looked at Leo, his eyes seeking a rational explanation. "No, Leo, it wasn't defying gravity. Just… extreme athleticism. Definitely not a ghost cat."
His eyes, Leo thought, struggling to maintain a neutral expression. David's eyes. They were begging for a scientific explanation. He would rather believe in super-cat-food than in magic.
"Exactly, Dad," Leo said, nodding enthusiastically. "It's the new kibble. Full of… athletic-enhancing proteins."
Milo, having finished his preening, trotted over to the intact vase. He sniffed it, then gave Leo a pointed, expectant look.
His gaze flickered towards the kitchen, where the good treats were kept.
His message was clear: I have saved your priceless, ugly vase. My compensation is due. I accept payment in the form of salmon-flavored morsels.
David shook his head, still trying to process the event within his rigid framework of reality. "The angle of the fall… the velocity… it shouldn't have been possible. His reaction time would have to be in the microsecond range. Unless… there was an updraft from the heating vent that slowed the descent?"
He crouched down, peering at the vent on the floor.
Leo felt a surge of something between pity and profound relief.
His father's stubborn refusal to see what was right in front of him was the only thing protecting Leo's secret.
His parents' blissful ignorance was a blessing. And a constant, low-level dread.
"Maybe the vase itself has some unusual aerodynamic properties?" Sarah said, walking into the room, having heard the commotion. "Did you see that, David? It was like the vase just… hovered! And Milo, he was so fast!"
She looked at Milo with unabashed pride. "Certainly not the cat. Cats aren't that agile."
Leo watched his parents debate the physics of falling pottery, offering theories that grew more and more elaborate and scientifically unsound.
They discussed air pressure, micro-earthquakes, and the possibility of the rug having unusually high-friction fibers.
They would believe anything, it seemed, except the simple, impossible truth.
Milo, having decided he'd waited long enough for his reward, abandoned all pretense of subtlety.
He walked directly to the treat cupboard, sat down, and stared at the handle with an intensity that could probably melt steel.
"I think he wants a treat, dear," Sarah said, smiling.
"He's earned it," David conceded, finally abandoning his investigation of the floorboards. "That was the most remarkable display of… well-toned musculature I've ever seen in a domestic feline."
Leo went to the cupboard and retrieved the bag of salmon treats. He gave one to Milo, who accepted it with the regal air of a king accepting tribute.
He looked at his parents, their faces a mixture of pride and bafflement. He looked at his cat, a creature of casual miracles.
He wondered, a familiar chill running down his spine, just how many other people out there were having similar conversations.
How many other pet owners were watching their cats and dogs do the impossible, and then desperately trying to explain it away with talk of air currents and premium kibble.
The world felt a little bigger, and a lot stranger, than it had that morning.