One minute Jessica was there with me as we crouched on the edge of the wall looking down at a gently rocking boat. She turned and gave me that cheeky‘I dare you’ look. Her golden eyes danced teasingly into mine. The next minute she did a breathtaking jump. I saw her fly downwards with her white-tipped paws wide apart, her tail snaking. She landed on the deck of the boat and found herself a perch on top of a coil of blue rope. Her bright face looked up at me expectantly.
I was distraught. I couldn’t possibly jump down there. Or could I? While I was weaving to and fro and thinking about it, something dreadful happened. The boat’s engine throbbed into life and it started to pull away from the wall. I wailed in panic. I was losing Jessica! Shocked, I watched the boat turn in a curve of white water and head out of the harbour. I could see the man in the glass cabin, driving it, not knowing he had a cat on board. I watched Jessica getting smaller and smaller until she was no bigger than an ant – she was only a black speck and I couldn’t see her buttercup eyes or hear her meows any more.
How had I let this happen? I had lost Jessica. She might never come back. She had found herself another life as a ship’s cat, and I was again abandoned, left alone on a harbour wall with a pain in my tummy from hunger, and a new pain in my fast beating heart. I was like an empty cat. Not a purring happy cat. A shell of a cat with nothing to eat, nowhere to go, no one to love.
I glanced at the people walking along the quay. They had warm coats. I longed to be in someone’s arms, purring into one of those squashy coats, finding a heartbeat. Attaching myself to a new human would be easy for me. But I couldn’t leave Jessica. I had to stay there and watch the distant boat tossing on the waves. It was so far away now, I wasn’t sure if I was looking at the right boat, there were so many out there. So I sat steadfastly on the edge of the quay. The stones were warm from the sun but a chilly breeze was blowing. It was late afternoon and we should have been heading back to our cave in the beech wood.
I’d been with Jessica for three years now. We’d shared so much. We still played together and slept blissfully curled into each other. Forever friends. Or so I’d thought.
The afternoon sun was low and the water blazed pink. Then I heard a sound that gave me a jolt. A little boy’s voice.
‘Look, Mummy. A cat!’
He sounded so like John that I turned and automatically put my tail up, only to see it wasn’t John and it wasn’t Ellen. But it was a family, and they obviously liked cats.
‘Don’t go with them,’ said my angel.
But I purred and kinked my back and rubbed against their legs. It was second nature to me. Four of them were stroking me– a mum, dad and two young boys who were kind and loving.
‘He looks like a stray,’ the mum said. ‘He’s so thin, and his fur feels rough.’ She looked into my eyes. ‘Are you all right, pussy cat?’
No, I wasn’t all right. I was alone and broken hearted. But I still knew how to purr.
‘Would you like to come home with us?’ she asked.
‘Oh please Mummy, let’s take him.’
‘Please. He’s lovely. He’ll get cold out here.’
‘You can’t do that,’ said the dad. ‘He might be someone’s cat. Tell you what – we’ll come back tomorrow and if he’s still hanging around, he must be a stray and we’ll take him home.’
‘Don’t go with them,’ said my angel again.
I had a decision to make.
‘But I’ve lost everything,’ I said to my angel.
‘No you haven’t, Solomon. You’ve got me,’ she said.
‘But you haven’t got fur,’ I said. Sadness filled me as I walked away from the family and slumped down beside a pile of smelly lobster pots. The woman came after me and picked me up. I leaned on her red fleece jacket and listened to her heartbeat for a few precious minutes, and it seemed to recharge me for what I had to do.
She put me down.
‘He’s got fleas.’ She brushed at her coat, and I flicked my tail, embarrassed. I’d never had fleas before. Ellen had seen to that. Now they were all over me, driving me crazy sometimes so that I tore and scratched at my fur. I’d been proud of my glossy coat. Sadly, I turned my back on that nice family and sat watching the sea.
‘I expect he’s a fisherman’s cat,’ I heard her say.
I was too upset to watch them walking away. I imagined their home with a cosy fire burning. As evening settled over the sea, I got colder and colder. I huddled against a pile of wet rope and netting, trying to shelter from the wind. Tonight I wouldn’t have Jessica to keep me warm. Would she miss me too? I focused on a bright star that was shining in the evening sky, and pretended it was Jessica.
The night dragged on and on. My loneliness deepened with the darkness, and so did the hunger. To keep warm I tucked my paws under my body and eventually fell asleep. No one came. No one walked by and noticed me. The seagulls were the only living creatures in that cold, cold place and I awoke to see them sitting motionless along the wall, their yellow eyes glinting in the dawn.