When Harvey Arrives
2025-Aug-26 • Greg Lemon
Holy mother of hell, do we need to talk about Mr. Harvey Kittencat. And as we do, my friend, I beg of you to listen, and listen good.
Because when Harvey Kittencat comes to your favela, my amphibious amigo, you'd best be ready. And by ready, I mean huffed and puffed, because let me tell you, he is going to blow your house down. For while it is the unprepared who may, given the correct cloud alignment and fractional reserve interest rate, unknowingly reap the sowings - the shavings, if you will - of their town's underworld cactus barber, it is also the unprepared who will inevitably eat 20 points of trample damage as Harvey Kittencat comes 'round and lights up their tiny ghetto hamlet like a goddamned Christmas tree.
Look, I'm gonna spell it out for you, crystal clear. It doesn't matter what you're doing once Harvey shows up. You wanna go hang out with a bunch of rabid dogs and get a cheap looking spray tan at some place that gets two stars (barely) on Yelp and has no website? Go for it. Enjoy. Your inevitable hydrophobia and agonizing sing-song death cry will be the rage of TikTok for all but one second. Congrats, you crashed a server in Pony Town and gave birth to a new hashtag, #LookAtMeImOrangeAndDyingOfRabies. Your contributions towards elevating humanity into the next yuga will be forever etched on the cyclic calendar of infinity by a legion of telepathic elven sculptors.
Or not. But again, it doesn't matter. Not when Harvey shows up.
Maybe, instead, you're feeling like a trip to the mall might be in order, so you can gawk at seedy vagrants seeking flimsy beachware to cover their wrinkled, pustuled meat suits that cry themselves to sleep every night, weeping skin tears as they lament the poor choice in tattoos imposed upon them by the mindless knobs directing their movements. Sound like a dream come true? Fantastic! Heave ho, off you go then. Try not to park like a spoon when you get there. Not that it matters, because it doesn't, not even in the slightest way. Harvey will make sure of that.
Perhaps the above activities are too flamboyant for your taste, and a simple trip to the backyard (accompanied by a museum dose of psilocybin) is more your style. Lovely choice. Down that blue-ish fungus, throw on some jazz, and find yourself a spot in the shade. Sit for awhile with some friends (they don't actually have to be there), talk to the lawn, and then spend the rest of the day trying to decipher a secret map clearly embedded in some random piece of tree bark you found while you were helping the entire universe give birth to itself for the umpteenth time through your dilated third eye. Don't answer the phone or make any travel plans (aside from the far reaches of the universe) and you'll be right as rain. At least...until Harvey shows up.
For none of these choices - not A, nor B, nor C - will make any difference in the end. For when Harvey arrives in your neck of the galaxy, my little psychic ameoba, he will stomp his way through your zipcode so hard it will knock the jellyfish right out of your casserole.
Neighbors you never knew will emerge from folds in space, chasing you down the block with neon spatulas. Easy listening music will drip from streetlights, creating a series of hazardous yet soothing puddles that will fill the air with smooth melodies that never evaporate. Ducks and tigers will marry, celebrating their nuptuals by parading down the roads of your town wing in arm, walking in such dense clusters that traffic will grind to a halt. The sun will eat the moon, the sky will take a nap, and the mailman will begin to speak Etruscan. And while all of this is going on, Mr. Kittencat will be sitting in his lawnchair, smoking a cigar, watching the whole order of things unravel itself like a ball of yarn in a hurricane.
So it's best to be ready. Several steps are involved. All of them are absolutely crucial, but none of them are even remotely comprehensible. So it will do us no good to discuss them here today.
Therefore we must rely almost exclusively on urban legends and arcane heresay. Gardening gloves have been rumored to help. Keeping a freshly polished saxophone nearby might as well. I did hear a rumor from long ago that packets of hot sauce, stapled to a cheap cotton shirt in an arrangement resembling the constellation Delphinus, might act as a protective measure, if such a garment was worn constantly, day in, day out, for at least one month prior to Mr. Kittencat's arrival.
But if it's raining on a Tuesday when he shows up, all bets are off. If the frequency of the song the cicadas sung the night before is greater than 1.3 kilohertz, no deal. And if the mailman delivers the post between 11 and 22 minutes past the hour on the day of Mr. Kittencat's arrival, you are squat out of luck, my dear friend.
For under those conditions nothing can be done to stop Harvey. No hex, no charm, no saving throw nor talismanic rune can be of any use. And so if perchance you find yourself in this predicament, there is only one thing you can do. Pop out a lawn chair and a fine cigar, and pull up next to the man of the hour, the one and only HK. There you can sit in his company and enjoy a smoke, as together you watch the ducks and the tigers and the crazed neighbors with their neon spatulas jostle for space while the the delicate sounds of easy listening flow into your ears from those amazing puddles that never go away, all while the whole order of things unravels itself like a ball of yarn flying around in a hurricane.
Greg Lemon
Greg Lemon writes stories that primarily seek to question and challenge dominant perceptions of reality while exploring the unknown through the lens of innocent wonder. His work often manifests as a dreamlike soup that may incorporate elements of fantasy, science fiction, horror and/or magic realism. He seeks to challenge his readers while engaging them, orchestrating prose, structure and pacing to create a dynamic tension that draws the reader into the story from start to finish.
The return of Cthulhu. Or current events in the US. Carries the charge from end to end.