I saw Jessica come running back, low to the ground, her black and white face clearly visible through the dark trees. She crawled into our cave and collapsed. She’d had a fight with a feral cat and it had bitten her on the neck. She was shaking violently and breathing very fast.
Concerned, I sniffed at the wound on her neck, but she wouldn’t let me touch it. All day she lay there, exhausted, and I went out to catch mice on my own. I brought her one but she wouldn’t eat. She just wanted to sleep.
I inspected her fur and found she was in poor condition. She was thin, and her coat was dull. Along her back she had patches of bare skin. Mine was the same. We were both suffering from living wild in the cold damp winter. Some days the weather was so bad we’d had nothing to eat.
Jessica did recover for a few days, but she wouldn’t go far from the cave and she didn’t eat much. I stayed beside her, feeling powerless.
Then I noticed she was lying down more and more. Her eyes were dull, and the wound on her neck had turned into an abscess. I knew we needed help. She needed a vet and an antibiotic injection like I’d been given. She needed a car to take her to the vet, and a caring person to do that for her. It was no good going to Joe. He hadn’t got a car now, and Pam only had her bike. I thought about Karenza, but how could I get Jessica to her?
What would Ellen say if she knew?
I felt angry and desperate.
My angel had tried to tell me to let Jessica go. Was this what she had meant? Did I have to sit in this cold, dark wood and watch my best friend die? Jessica was more than my best friend. She was my love. And now she was all I had.
I lay down beside her and licked her face very gently.
‘Do you think you might make it back to the campsite?’ I asked.
Jessica looked at me through half-closed eyelids.
‘No,’ she said. ‘Just lie beside me and keep me warm.’
An icy wind was zigzagging through the wood. I patted Jessica with my paw, and she was limp, her tail stretched out on the ground. I set about washing her pink paws for her, licking the dried mud off them. She wanted to go outside and lie down in her favourite spot under an oak tree. Her legs were wobbly, but she made it, and I sat beside her, trying to place my body to shelter her from the bitter wind. I fluffed my fur out to keep myself warm.
The winter afternoon was darkening minute by minute. Jessica was weak now, her breathing rapid and shallow, but she managed to say one last word to me.
‘You must let me go, Solomon. Go back and wait for Ellen.’
‘How do you know that?’ I asked.
‘Your angel told me.’
I was devastated. I wanted to say thank you to Jessica. Thank you for all the fun times, and our beautiful kittens, and thank you for showing me the sea. I’ll never forget you, Jessica.
But it was too late. Jessica was gone. She looked suddenly, utterly peaceful, her face curled around in a sort of smile.
I sat still and watched the light leaving her body like a haze of gold. Then I saw lights coming through the woods, golden lights and green lights low down on the forest floor, crowding in around the peaceful little cat. I moved back respectfully, and watched the tiny beings of light form a ring. The rays of light crisscrossed and made a dome-shaped lattice, which I recognised at once– the golden web.
I had passed through it when I was born, and now Jessica’s buttercup light was rising, going through that sparkling web, leaving her body behind like an old coat. I watched the light melting away through the trees and the sky.
Broken hearted, I turned my attention to covering her body with leaves. I raked them up with my long paws and piled them over her as best I could.
My grief at losing Jessica was too painful to think about. I needed to be doing something positive before dark. I would run and run until I found the old badger hole again.
I was too upset to work out where to go. Through the night wood I ran, my body low to the ground, my tail down. I was aware of badgers, rabbits, and an owl, but I ignored them. Oblivious to the rain and the wind buffeting my fur, I ran and ran until I found myself on the high bridge that spanned the busy road.
Mesmerised by the headlights, I crouched with my head through the railings. If only one of those lorries would slow down, I’d have a chance. Jessica’s words came back to me. ‘Don’t do it,’ and she’d taken me to see the shining ocean. ‘Because,’ she’d said, ‘you have to know what wonderful things are out there.’
I thought it through. Even if I did manage to make a spectacular leap onto the roof of a speeding lorry, I would have to cling on tightly for hundreds of miles, and it was raining. Or I might get blown off and killed on the road. What a waste of a cat like me. Memories of good things I had done started replaying in my mind. Being kind to little John. Walking into that hospital with my tail up. Playing penguins with Jessica.