According to Lucy, when the man-made lake was filled in, several feral cats drowned and still haunt the lake and the surrounding park. The angry cats are rumored to attack people and scratch out their eyes. After Lucy tells Jennifer the story about the feral cats, Jennifer spies one of the cats while coming back from the restroom later that day. After Jennifer kills Michelle, she realizes that the sole witness to her crime is another cat.

Throughout the novel, the wild and uncanny cats come to represent a wild and violent aspect of the world—antisocial and without rules. Their behavior is echoed in Jennifer’s own violent actions and in the cruelty of the world at large. Because the cats are feral, they are neither domesticated nor well integrated into human society, which parallels Jennifer’s own childhood of neglect and abandonment. There is no befriending or saving these cats—they will always be angry and on the outskirts. Jennifer is associated with the cats, but they are also on one end of the spectrum in which Jennifer falls somewhere in the middle. She is not entirely uncivilized but walks close to the edge of the line between civilization and wilderness.