Paws off! Orange Is the New Black star Selenis Leyva had her cat Oreo for two months before she could even touch the feline. “She’s not very trusting with strangers,” Leyva, 44, explains in this installment of the Us Weekly Video series “Meet My Pet.”
Leyva, who lives in New York City with her daughter, Alina, reveals Oreo was a feral cat that came from a litter born outside her home. The Levyas passed the kittens each day as they left their residence, and Alina, 13, named them all. But Levya says she woke up one morning to find only Oreo outside. “I couldn’t just leave her out there,” she says. “We had to bring her into our home.”
The 2-year-old Oreo spent the next two months hiding under the radiator and “only coming out for food,” says Levya. “There were many nights where I thought, What did I get into? I’m gonna live with a cat who doesn’t let me touch her.” Leyva remained patient — and it paid off. One afternoon, Oreo “let me touch her. And she stopped and let me touch her again,” recalls Leyva. “The second time I touched her, I heard her purr.… That was a big moment!”
The cat is friendlier with other animals. Since getting Oreo, Leyva also adopted dog Zeus. “They go ballistic chasing each other around the entire apartment and wrestling,” says Levya. “They don’t hurt each other. It’s really cute to watch.”
Oreo, however, still has her standoffish moments. “You never know where she’s hiding,” says Leyva. Indeed, during Us‘s video shoot, Oreo squeezed herself underneath the cushions of Levya’s couch!
Meet Oreo and Zeus in our exclusive “Meet My Pet” video.
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