In a romantic comedy, endgame is The Love of Your Life.

In a cat sanctuary, endgame is The Forever Home.

In the wilderness, games don’t end.

Welcome to the wilderness, kittens.

In case you didn’t realize it, you’ve been living here since the day you were born.

When you were born, a billion little and large dreams were born, like infant galaxies in the universe of you. The universe is constantly expanding, and so your dreams developed and grew muscles and picked out cool outfits from the Dream Department Store.

Some wore funny little hats with rhinestone pins: I Will Glitter With Grace.

Some wore pleather pants with stirrups: I Will Be An Individual.

Some wore cargo shorts: I Will Be Brave.

Some wore double-breasted suits: I Will Succeed.

Some wore sturdy suspenders: I Will Change The World.

They all wore fuzzy microfleece vests: I Will Be Loved.

But before they were even out of toddlerhood, your dreams learned that microfleece vests get dirty in the wilderness. Much safer to smush them down under sensible trench coats: I Will Survive.

Cats are, of course, living, breathing microfleece vests, with neither the ability nor the desire to tuck themselves into trench coats. (Let us all pause to ponder the splendor of CAT in a trench coat. OK, now we can move on.)

CAT was no different. Born as honest as the birches and stars, the kitten was dripping with dreams. Like strings of pearls long enough to loop around ten times, they shone (pearls “pop” against black microfleece).

CAT had a mother, whose love was surely as good and strong as every mother cat who ever trod the earth. (Presumably CAT also had a father, although we shall not expound here upon the fitness of feline fathers, all clad in Green Day T-shirts and backwards baseball caps. Their dream: to enjoy a minimum of responsibility whilst spawning a maximum of children and consuming a maximum of macaroni and cheese.)

CAT was safe in velveteen love. Surely this was the dream: to be fed, to be filled, to be the pearl of your parent’s world. Life was endless yards of fleece.

The wilderness has its way with fleece and with mother cats.

We don’t know all the chaotic costume changes that unwrapped CAT’s cocoon, but the endgame turned into only an opening move. By the time our pieces popped onto the board, the dream was in total disarray.

CAT was disoriented. CAT was discombobulated. CAT was not dressed for success. CAT had had to barter away her favorite little hats and cutest little flats for a few bites of mediocre meat. Wilderness-walloped, CAT’s fleece was on backwards, with holes in the lining and weird stains in questionable places.

We, weirdly dressed ourselves, could fix all of that. We sewed patches, ironed wrinkles, knit a jaunty new cap for CAT’s trembling head. We promised CAT, with a thousand hoodie-warm hugs, “your day will come!”

From the belly of a black hole, new dreams danced forth. CAT would be the sweetheart of SUITE. CAT would be admired by staff and volunteers and random repairmen and visiting children, who would scream as though in the presence of one Taylor Swift. CAT would command the floor. CAT would pull all the strings and all the pieces and all the hearts into one vast coat of many colors.

And ultimately, CAT would be adopted.

After all, that’s the dream. That’s the ultimate. That’s the game we’re all playing.

Right?

Nobody asked CAT, so nobody knew the true answer. We were all too busy whirling through our closets, dressing ourselves and each other and our poor patient cats up in the obvious answers. Of course every cat should be adopted. This is how the novel ends; this is where the symphony comes to a crescendo; this is where all the buttons line up for the best-dressed life; this is when we put all the pieces back in the box, satisfied with another success story.

This is only part of the story. Stories, inconveniently, incandescently, iridescently, don’t end.

CAT watched as many microfleeced friends reached the “finish” line. CAT and CAT and CAT were adopted; CAT and CAT and CAT were chosen; CAT was promoted to ROOM, which is arguably even better, a ride to the moon and a Chanel wardrobe and a lifetime supply of macaroni and cheese all in one. But CAT herself was a shaggy singleton, the last star in the western sky, the forgotten game of Jenga still tottering after everyone moved on to Monopoly.

In the CAT Movie, this is where CAT would grow wistful, riding the bus to buy herself flowers to a HIPSTERMUSIC soundtrack. This is where CAT would gaze at the sky longingly, pulling her fleece around herself, shivering to ask, “will my time ever come?”

In the wilderness, there is no CAT Movie. There’s only CAT.

No endgame has a monopoly on dreams.

CAT knew all along: her time had already come. Her time came every time there was a time called “time.” She could no more stop her time from coming than we can keep our microfleece vests hidden forever.

CAT was — is — colossally cherished, right here, right now, right between the ocean and the moon, right between arrival and adoption. CAT is surrounded by creatures in crazy costumes, but if you strip us all naked (PLEASE DO NOT DO THIS), our birthday suits bear names like Ferocious Loyalty and Reckless Devotion and Unconditional Love. If every adopter from here to 2053 ignores her, CAT has already been chosen. CAT has more friends than a lottery winner. CAT chooses herself every day.

CAT’s dreams are coming true right in the middle of the wilderness.

If you do a DNA test on CAT, you will confirm that she is 100% cat. Accordingly, she is 100% dream, 100% vegan-proofed, and 0% agitated over adoption.

We long for every cat to get to our goal like we long for every person-in-process to get married, or get graduated, or get situated, or get dressed in the dreams available off-the-rack.

But maybe some dreams are couture made of questions.

Maybe some novels end with the heroine unadopted.

Maybe some rom-coms romp towards a happy ending where our hero has a half-dozen devoted friends, and a closet full of colorful fleece vests, and a world filled with meteors and macaroni and mercy and Shaq.

Maybe some creatures — although only those who approach 100% cat — are game for a game that doesn’t end, that doesn’t demand a certain dress code.

Maybe we’re all living the dream on the way to the next dream, and the next, and the next.

Maybe adoption and romance and the finish line are not big enough.

Maybe the endgame is to love today, and tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow.

Maybe we can shyly show each other our microfleece vests.

Maybe the universe really is ever-expanding.

Maybe CAT will be adopted. Maybe not.

In the wilderness, warmth and wildness mean she’s already won.