It’s my birthday month—and this gift is for you.

By her second morning in Brassheart, Dust Bunny had made several discoveries. Breakfast was good. The couch was enormous. And somebody had attached a small striped creature to her backside.

She had first noticed it while sitting quite peacefully. It twitched. Dusty turned. It disappeared. She turned the other way. There it was again. Dusty narrowed her eyes. This was suspicious.

Across the room, Rock lowered his coffee cup. “Everything all right over there, little one?”

Dusty did not answer. She was busy conducting an investigation.

She crouched. The striped creature crouched behind her. She wiggled. It wiggled too. Then Dusty sprang into action.

Around she went. And around. And—

Plop.

She landed sideways on a couch cushion, all four paws briefly pointing in directions that had not been discussed beforehand.

Ronda laughed softly. Dusty sat up and washed one paw. That had been intentional. Obviously.

From behind a cushion, Nibs the Tinklet peered over the edge of his notebook.

“Suspect appears to be attached to investigator,” he wrote.

He considered this. Then he added: “Will require further investigation.”

The new house was full of places a very small kitten could explore. There were cushion valleys. Blanket hills. A mysterious forest of chair legs.

And beneath the couch lay a long, shadowy passage that the larger members of the household seemed entirely unable to enter. Dusty slipped underneath.

Nibs lay flat on his stomach and looked after her. “Anything to report?”

Two bright eyes blinked from the darkness. Then something moved. It was gray. It was fluffy. It rolled when Dusty breathed on it.

Dusty froze. The fluffy thing froze too. Very slowly, she extended one paw. Tap. The thing scooted away. Dusty’s ears tipped forward. Oh. So that was how it wanted to play.

She pounced. The fluff tumbled. She batted. It skittered. She chased it around a couch leg, caught it beneath one tiny paw, and looked thoroughly pleased with herself.

Nibs scrambled for his pencil. “Rock!” he called. “We have a development!”

Rock leaned down. “What kind of development?”

Nibs pointed beneath the couch. “Dust Bunny has found a dust bunny.”

For a moment, nobody said anything. Then Rock laughed so hard that Dusty looked out to make certain he was all right.

“Well,” he said, “I suppose we named her correctly.”

Ronda came to see. Under the couch, Dusty gave her new acquaintance another careful tap.

Nibs opened a fresh page. RESIDENTS OF BRASSHEART. He wrote: Dust Bunny — kitten. Then, beneath it: Dust Bunny — possibly cousin. No feet observed.

Ronda gently collected the loose fluff. Dusty watched it leave. A brief acquaintance. But an exciting one.

After the expedition came a quieter discovery. Rock was sitting on the couch. His lap was nearby.

Dusty had looked at it before, but looking at a place and deciding to climb into it were two very different matters.

She approached. One paw touched his jeans. Then another. Rock stayed still.

Up she climbed, with the serious concentration of a mountaineer making a rather important ascent. At last, she reached the top.

There was a soft fold of shirt. A comfortable place beside his arm. And room for one very small kitten.

Dusty settled in.

Rock looked down at her, then over at Ronda. Neither of them said much. For once, Nibs didn’t either.

He simply turned to a clean page and drew a little star.

Dusty stayed awhile. Then she climbed down to attend to kitten business.

A little later, she came back. And later still, she came back again.

By then, Rock had learned to arrange himself around her. This, Nibs decided, was how kittens trained people.

That morning, Brassheart carried on around them. Coffee cooled. Pages waited. Somewhere, a clock needed winding.

But on the couch, a tiny striped explorer tucked herself against Rock’s shirt and rested after a busy morning.

She had investigated her tail. Patrolled the passage beneath the couch. Met a most unusual dust bunny.

And found a lap she liked well enough to choose again.

Nibs closed his notebook. For the day’s final entry, he had written only:

Dusty knows the way back.

And for her second morning home, that seemed like plenty.