style="font-size:15px;"> ‘I’m surprised Salmon isn’t here, spying.’
‘Thank goodness he isn’t. Look!’
I saw a teenage boy enter the kitchen. He was wearing jeans and a hoody and he looked a bit moody. He sat down at the kitchen table, but didn’t appear to speak. His mother (I guessed), went over to him and planted a kiss on his head but he acted as if he didn’t even notice.
‘He doesn’t look very nice,’ I observed.
‘He’s a teenager. I think in general they aren’t very nice. Well my owners say they aren’t. Apparently they are mainly what is wrong with this country.’
‘Really?’ I hadn’t had much experience of teenagers, so I found this fascinating.
‘Yes, they are lazy and slovenly and don’t care about the world. That’s what they say anyway.’
‘But you’ve never had a teenager?’ I asked her.
‘No, but my family have a couple of friends who have teenage children. They grunt rather than speak and they never say thank you, apparently.’
‘Sounds horrible.’
‘Yes, but then they grow up and get better, or some of them do.’
‘Well that’s something, but I’m already dreading the day that Aleksy becomes one.’
‘I know, imagine if he’s just like that boy there.’ We both grimaced.
As we looked, a very pretty blonde girl walked into the kitchen. We retreated slightly as she came over to the floor length windows we were looking through. She looked older than the surly boy, so perhaps she had outgrown this teenage thing. She was tall, taller than her mum, but shorter than her dad. She had beautiful blue eyes but when I looked properly there was something missing from them; she looked distant as she stood in her new home and I had seen that look before. More than once.
What was it with Edgar Road?
After a little while, Tiger got bored and started trying to pull leaves off a bush, but I was mesmerized by the house. People called houses homes but I also thought they were places that contained stories, both happy and sad, and that was what drew me to them.
‘Can we go now?’ she asked having resorted to looking at her own paw.
‘Not yet,’ I hissed. ‘I just want to see a bit more.’
‘Alfie, you and this obsession with humans. Really!’ She rolled her eyes as a leaf came loose and landed on her head.
‘It’s more sensible than your obsession with leaves,’ I shot back, staring pointedly at the pile of leaves she’d collected at her feet.
‘Is not,’ Tiger replied, looking sulky.
‘Anyway, we can go soon, I just want to see if it’s just the four of them. If it is, then it might not be a bad bet. Another house for me to visit. They might like having a cat around, in any case and there’s a nice big kitchen for me to eat in.’
‘Oh Alfie, you have enough families who love and take care of you, when will you accept that? And besides, that teenage boy might not like you.’ Tiger looked exasperated from having to repeat herself so much.
‘My first owner, Margaret, always used to say this thing, Tiger.’ I paused as I pictured the kind old lady that I had loved with my whole heart. ‘She used to say “We must never rest on our laurels.” Now I don’t exactly know what it means but I think it means that I shouldn’t take anything for granted. I once said I would never do that again. And it wouldn’t hurt you to take a lesson from me.’
‘I’m too lazy. If anything happens to my humans I know you’ll sort it out.’ She smiled, and of course she was right. It was the sort of cat I was.
A noise startled us.
‘Oh my, we hadn’t even noticed that,’ Tiger said as a cat flap slowly lifted up from the other back door.
‘And bang goes my idea of being their doorstep cat,’ I murmured, disappointment flooding me. We both stood, stock still as we watched a cat emerge.
‘Wow,’ I said, unable to contain myself.
‘Well,’ Tiger said, instantly lost for words.
‘Who are you and what are you doing in my garden?’ an unfriendly voice hissed and I felt myself glued to the spot as I found myself staring at the most beautiful cat I had ever seen in my life.
‘Who are you?’ the beauty hissed angrily at us. I wanted to move, or speak or something but I was rooted to the spot and struck dumb.
‘We,’ Tiger replied, feistily, ‘are your neighbours. I’m Tiger and that’s Alfie and we are here to welcome you to Edgar Road.’
I glanced sideways at Tiger, she neither looked nor sounded very welcoming.
‘Right, well now you’ve welcomed me, you may leave.’ The exquisite creature stood in front of us. I had never seen such soft fur, bluer eyes or a whiter coat. Her face was like a work of art. She was truly gorgeous, although, admittedly, not at all friendly.
‘But we … we … we could show you round,’ I stammered, feeling my legs trembling, in an alien sensation.
‘Thank you but I think I’ll find my own way round. I don’t care to ask you again, but would you please get out of my garden.’
‘No need to be so rude, whitey,’ Tiger hissed. ‘We were trying to be friends, but I can see we’re wasting our time.’
‘Yes you are,’ the white cat replied, turning her beautiful back on us and heading back into her house.
‘Well, I’ve never met such a rude cat,’ Tiger said as we made to leave.
‘I’ve never met a more beautiful one,’ I sighed, stretching my legs out, to try to regain my composure. I had to admit I felt flummoxed. On the one hand, my original idea to become their doorstep cat had been scuppered, but then how could I mind when it had been scuppered by such a beautiful creature? For some reason, the idea of the white cat made me happy and not at all disappointed. In that moment, my aim had changed, rather than be their doorstep cat, I wanted to be the white cat’s friend. I was determined to be so.
‘Really? You thought she was beautiful? She was horrible, Alfie!’ Tiger was angry.
‘I didn’t think she was nice, just pretty,’ I defended myself, but it fell upon deaf ears and Tiger shot me a withering look and stalked off. I followed her but I couldn’t get the white cat’s image out of my mind.
I trailed behind Tiger as we headed to our little recreation
