The World According to Bob

For now, the important thing was to appreciate what I had. By most people’s standards, it didn’t seem like much. I never had a lot of money and I didn’t live in a flashy apartment or have a car. But my life was in a much better place than it had been in the recent past. I had my flat and my job selling The Big Issue. For the first time in years I was heading in the right direction — and I had Bob to offer me friendship and to guide me on my way.

As I picked myself up and headed to bed for an early night, I leaned over and gave him a gentle ruffle on the back of his neck.

‘Where the hell would I be without you little fella?’

Chapter 2. New Tricks

We are all creatures of habit, and Bob and I are no different to anyone else. Our days together begin with a familiar routine. Some people start their mornings listening to the radio, others with their exercises or a cup of tea or coffee. Bob and I start ours by playing games together.

The moment I wake and sit up, he shuffles out of his bed in the corner of the bedroom, walks over to my side of the bed and starts staring at me inquisitively. Soon after that he starts making a chirruping noise, a bit like a phone. Brrrr, brrrr.

If that doesn’t gain my full attention he starts making another noise, a slightly more plaintive and pleading noise, a kind of waaaah. Sometimes he places his paws on the side of the mattress and hauls himself up so that he is almost at eye-level with me.

He then dabs a paw in my direction, almost as if to nudge me into recognising his message: ‘don’t ignore me! I’ve been awake for ages and I’m hungry, so where’s my breakfast?’ If my response is too slow, he sometimes steps up the charm offensive and does what I call a ‘Puss in Boots’. Like the character in the Shrek movies, he stands there on the mattress staring at me wide-eyed with his piercing green eyes. It is heartbreakingly cute — and totally irresistible. It always makes me smile. And it always works.

I always keep a packet of his favourite snacks in a drawer by the side of the bed. Depending on how I am feeling, I might let him come up on the bed for a cuddle and a couple of treats or, if I am in a more playful mood, I’ll throw them on to the carpet for him to chase around. I often spend the first few minutes of the day lobbing mini treats around, watching him hunt them down. Cats are amazingly agile creatures and Bob often intercepts them in mid-flight, like a cricketer or baseball player fielding a ball in the outfield. He leaps up and catches them in his paws. He has even caught them in his mouth a couple of times. It is quite a spectacle.

On other occasions, if I am tired or not in the mood for playing, he’ll entertain himself.

One summer’s morning, for instance, I was lying on my bed watching breakfast television. It was shaping up to be a really warm day and it was especially hot up on the fifth floor of our tower block. Bob was curled up in a shady spot in the bedroom, seemingly fast asleep. Or so I’d assumed.

Suddenly he sat up, jumped on the bed and, almost using it as a trampoline, threw himself at the wall behind me, hitting it quite hard with his paws.

‘Bob, what the hell?’ I said, gobsmacked. I looked at the duvet and saw a little millipede lying there. Bob was eyeing it and was clearly ready to crunch it in his mouth.

‘Oh, no you don’t mate,’ I said, knowing that insects can be poisonous to cats. ‘You don’t know where that’s been.’

He shot me a look as if to say ‘spoilsport’.

I have always been amazed at Bob’s speed, strength and athleticism. Someone suggested to me once that he must be related to a Maine Coon or a lynx or some kind of wild cat. It is entirely possible. Bob’s past is a complete mystery to me. I don’t know how old he is and know nothing about the life he led before I found him. Unless I did a DNA test on him, I’ll never know where he comes from or who his parents were. To be honest though, I don’t really care. Bob is Bob. And that is all I need to know.

I wasn’t the only one who had learned to love Bob for being his colourful, unpredictable self.

It was the spring of 2009 and by now Bob and I had been selling The Big Issue for a year or so. Initially we’d had a pitch outside Covent Garden tube station in central London. But we’d moved to Angel, Islington where we’d carved out a little niche for ourselves and Bob had built up a small, but dedicated band of admirers.

As far as I was aware, we were the only human/feline team selling The Big Issue in London. And even if there was another one, I suspected the feline part of the partnership wasn’t much competition for Bob when it came to drawing — and pleasing — a crowd.