a story of two cats

Meet Meiko.

Meet Sassy

 Meiko is my beloved cat that I picked out back in my senior year of high school when my best friends cat had kittens with an alley cat. So she has been Queen of this house for approximately 5+ years. She has never ever had to deal with another fur ball in her wee little cat life aside from the first 9 weeks or so living at the house with her mother and sibling cats. Until 5 weeks ago....Sassy came along. Sassy also had been Queen of her house but is approximately 2 years younger than Meiko, a little more curious, a lot more clumsy, and eventually going to be a bigger cat than Meiko. 

As the story goes we kept them separated and introduced them to each others smells for the first few days, then allowed them to see each other through the window, then slowly introduced them to each other. A week ago you would have asked me I thought they were making progress - they could sleep in the same room, and with taking turns having free-reign of the house at night while the other was isolated to one room. To say they hadn't changed would be a lie, both were definitely not "themselves". Unfortunately, this week got bad. I know nothing about cats, and have tried to follow the directions, but it reached it's lowest point where last night they just hissed/ growled and cried through the door to each other throughout the night (never happened). Then today whenever they were ever even in adjacent rooms it usually ended up with a fight running after each other. 

So family meeting commenced tonight to decide what to do with Sassy. One we established Sassy is an awesome cat, we love her, but she is so damn nosy and won't leave Meiko alone. Any time she knows she's close by she sneak-attacks. So sadly we're giving them until August 10th. Then we're going to have to figure something out. According to the Animal Humane Society after they get really bad it is time to issue a break, so for the next 48 hours they are going to be separated and not see each other. Then we'll slowly introduce them to each other like we did before. 

The Good:

1) They will freely use the same litter box as each other and have yet to have either cat urinate or poop anywhere except a litter box

2) Last week we got to the point where there were two rooms in the house they could be in the same room and mind their own business; usually the best if they both slept

3) They have yet to physically jump on or bite down on each other - no physical injuries 

4) Meiko is fine if she's in a separate room or sees her in another room

The Bad:

1) They're jumpy if they're in a room by themselves scared that the other cat is lurking

2) Increased hissing and running at each other/ being aggressive in the last 72 hours

3) Sassy sneak attacks Meiko (runs up when she's not looking)

4) Meiko doesn't really give Sassy the time of day and will immediately hiss or growl if she knows she's around

The Ugly:

1) They both kept up the house last night with relentless fighting between the door for the first time last night

One of the first times the two of them were introduced to each other.

Is there hope? 

I hope so, I'm attached to Sassy now and wish we could make it work! If you have any ideas please pass them our way. If we don't figure this out, as long as Meiko lives...there will never be another cat in this house.

Will there be a happy ending?