When my father was dying, I traveled a
thousand miles from home to be with him in his last days. It was far more
heartbreaking than I’d
expected, one of the most difficult and painful times in my life. After he
passed away I stayed alone in his apartment. There were so many things to deal
with. It all seemed endless. I was lonely. I hated the silence of the
apartment.
But one
evening the silence was broken: I heard crying outside. I opened the door to
find a little cat on the steps. He was thin and poor. He looked the way I felt.
I brought him inside and gave him a can of fish. He ate it and then almost
immediately fell sound asleep.
The next
morning I checked with neighbors and learned that the cat had been abandoned by
his owner who’s moved out.
So the little cat was there all alone, just like I was. As I walked back to the
apartment, I tried to figure out what to do with him. Having something else to
take care of seemed like the very last thing I needed. But as soon as I opened
the apartment door he came running and jumped into my arms. It was clear from
that moment that he had no intention of going anywhere. I started calling him
Willis, in honor of my father’s best friend.
From then on,
things grew easier. With Willis in my lap time seemed to pass much more quickly.
When the time finally came for me to return home I had to decide what to do
about Willis. There was absolutely no way I would leave without him.
It’s now been five years since my father
died. Over the years, several people have commented on how nice it was of me to
rescue the cat. But I know that we rescued each other. I may have given him a
home but he gave me something greater.
1. When the author first saw the cat,
she_____________.
A. was very
happy
B. felt sympathy for him
C. didn’t know what to
do D. was angry with his crying
2. The underlined sentence in the third
paragraph implies that the author___________.
A. needed something to fill the
empty apartment
B. was too busy and tired to
keep a cat
C. loved to stay alone in the
apartment
D. needed something to take care
of to kill time
3. The cat rescued the author by ____________.
A.
making her feel better in her hard times
B.
giving her courage to go on with her life
C. helping her tidy the
department
D.
telling her what life is
4. We can learn form the passage that
_________.
A. Willis was named after his
previous owner
B. Willis didn’t like staying in the apartment
C. the
author and Willis were both homeless
D. time
passed quickly after the author adopted Willis
5. What’s the best title for the passage?
A. A little
cat
B. A painful experience
C. How to take care of
animals D. What I got
from a little cat
