Alfie in the Snow

‘No, I understand, it’s taken me a while and I still wake up and forget.’ We both looked up at the grey sky. A lone bird flew overhead, the wind whistled, the clouds threatened to unleash some rain. And next to me was Tiger, my love, my best friend, the cat who, next to George, meant most to me in the world and I was losing her. I knew as I looked at her, trying to remember every stripe in her fur, every speck of colour in her eyes, that I would have to say goodbye, and I felt as if part of me was dying too.

I have had more than my fair share of goodbyes in my life. When I was younger and lived with Margaret I had to say goodbye to Agnes, my sister cat, who was much older than me and died. That was hard, but then Margaret died, which was even worse as it rendered me homeless. I had to say goodbye to Snowball, although she didn’t die, but I knew I would never see her again. I had to say goodbye to Tasha and her son Elijah when they moved to Dubai, although I did expect to see them again sometime. I have said goodbye, in my words and heart, many, many times and, you know what, as I looked at Tiger and committed every inch of her to my memory, I realised that it didn’t get any easier. Saying goodbye never got any easier.

Chapter Eleven

It was hard to tear myself away from Tiger, but she needed to rest. While I was with her, she was still my Tiger, she was still here. I knew the minute I was alone, thinking about losing her, I would fall apart. And we still had the problem of George to contend with. My poor boy. My heart was breaking for me but, more than that, it was breaking for him. His first taste of loss was going to be one of the worst, and I wished with all that I was that I could protect him from it. But I couldn’t. I couldn’t protect either of us from this one.

I’d discovered a lot since becoming a parent but this was another level. I knew that not only could I not protect him from Tiger dying, I couldn’t stop the devastation he was going to feel. There was a terrible feeling of hopelessness, there was literally not a thing I could do. For a cat who believed there was a solution to all problems, knowing that there was nothing any of us could do to stop this was horrific. It was the worst feeling ever.

I wanted to wallow, of course I did. I wanted to lie in my bed and cry, and yelp and brood and feel sorry for myself but I couldn’t. Until we told George, which we hoped to do the following day, I had to put a brave face on. I licked my whiskers, and prepared to act as if everything was alright, when in fact at the moment it was exactly the opposite.

George came home just after me.

‘Where were you?’ I asked, hoping my voice sounded normal.

‘I went to see Rocky and he and I chased around a bit then I went to see Hana, who was very pleased to see me in fact,’ he said proudly.

‘I bet she was. Did you have a nice time?’

‘Yes. Dad, your voice sounds funny.’

‘I might have a bit of a furball,’ I said, hoping he would believe me. He nodded and seemed to accept it.

‘Anyway, I want to tell you that there is trouble next door,’ George said.

My ears pricked up. Trouble? Not more, not today. All my energy was going into trying to stay calm, to not fall apart, I had nothing left for trouble.

‘Hana said that Sylvie and Connie had a big row last night. It seems that Connie has been seeing a boy, whatever that means, and Sylvie said she was too young and it had to stop.’

‘Do you mean she’s got a boyfriend?’ I asked. I had learnt a lot about the complexities of human relationships in my time. We cats had relationships but we were far more sensible about it. Though not always, I admitted, thinking of George’s first crush. There was nothing sensible about that.

‘I think so. Hana said that Sylvie was so angry and Connie said she hated her mum, before storming off. Apparently Sylvie took her phone away from her.’

‘Gosh,’ I said, thinking of Aleksy. ‘To a teenager that’s like chopping off one of their limbs.’

‘Well, she couldn’t see what was on the phone as it was locked and Connie refused to unlock it for her. She even threatened to call her dad.’

‘Who, Sylvie or Connie?’

‘Sylvie. Then Connie shouted that her dad didn’t care about her, so to go ahead and she stormed upstairs and slammed her bedroom door, so even Hana couldn’t go and see if she was alright.’

‘Well I’m sure they’ll sort it out, parents often row with their teenagers,’ I said, thoughts of Tiger weighing heavily on me. ‘But if they need help we’re here,’ I added, as brightly as I could.

‘That’s exactly what I said, Dad.’

I tried not to think about Tiger, and how much losing her was going to affect us all, but as I looked at my lovely boy, it was, in fact, all I could think about.

George was playing with Summer and Toby when Franceska called round. She was on her own and Claire let her in, giving her a warm hug. I rubbed her legs, Franceska was one of my favourite people. She was so calm and loving normally but today she didn’t look it.