A Cat Called Cat

“Bastard cat!” said a man with a wet patch across the groin of his trousers as he burst through the doors of the Hog’s Head. I guessed he was about my age. That is to say, the age where incontinence becomes a very real possibility.

His face was ruddy with embarrassment or anger or both as he brushed at the wet patch with his hands as if that would somehow dry them. A mousey lady, his wife I guessed, hurried out after him onto the high street and started doing the same. This just seemed to irritate the man even more, especially when he noticed me.

“I haven’t pissed myself,” he blurted at me. “It was the fuckin’ cat.”

I asked if he meant that a cat had urinated on his lap.

“No!” he said, his face now a dangerous plum colour. “Knocked my pint over, didn’t it.” With that, he scuttled away from the pub, hands over his groin, into the summer night.

“Sorry,” the mousey lady said with a nervous smile, “about the swearing.” She scurried after him.

That was my first night out in Newsome Downs, a chocolate-box hamlet in the Kent countryside. Too far from London to be the commuter belt, but close enough to attract all the ‘downsizing boomers’, as my son Aiden called us. The perfect place for a retirement village. My new home.

I remember steeling myself again to go into the pub. The prospect of socialising alone, without Bob, still filled my belly with butterflies. It felt so unnatural going to a pub – going anywhere – without Bob, even though it had been two years. Like an out-of-body experience.

Even at the shops, I’d be weighing up whether to buy this or that and, without thinking, turn to ask Bob what he thought. Then I’d remember he’s not here anymore and that feeling, dizzying and sobering at the same time, would wash over me. And that familiar sickly weight would return to the pit of my stomach.

I took a deep breath, grabbed the brass handle, swung the door open and walked in.

It’s a pretty typical country pub. Dark, cosy, fusty. The smell of beer and bar food and the chatter and clatter of people drinking and laughing engulfed me as I looked around for Liz, the one and only person I’d met since moving in. She’d invited me to meet ‘the gang’.

Liz’s smiling face popped up among the crowded tables and she beckoned me over. She introduced me to everyone at the table. Arthur and Phyllis. Barry and Norm. And Robbie. Poor, sweet Robbie. And Cat, of course, a tabby cat perched on one of Robbie’s broad shoulders, nuzzling into his neck and eyeing everyone warily in the way cats do.

“You just missed Phil and Joan,” Arthur said with a grin. “Phil had to go. He had a bit of an … accident.”

I told them about my encounter outside, and everyone laughed.

“Phil deserved it,” Barry said, “He’s always picking on Joan. You know, belittling.” Then he reached over to Cat on Robbie’s shoulder and gave her a gentle pat. “Good old Cat,” he said.

When it was my turn to get a round, Robbie – and Cat – came up to the bar with me to help with the drinks. There was something about Robbie that immediately put me at ease. Quiet but warm and friendly. A big man. Would’ve been bigger as a young man, of course. ‘A bit of a handful,’ my Bob would’ve said.

Once Robbie and I got the drinks back to the table, we started talking about growing up in London, Cat peering at me coolly from Robbie’s shoulder. I was amazed our paths had never crossed. We’d both grown up on the South Bank and had some shared acquaintances. And some of them had rather dubious associations. It turned out that, after a stint in the army, Robbie had been something of a local boxing legend. He never turned professional, he said, because when he’d fallen for his wife, Kathy, she gave him an ultimatum: it was either Kath or boxing.

Knockout to Kath.

I’m not sure his career choices after that were much better, to be honest. He’d been a doorman for a guy who operated some big clubs in London. And I could tell from the way Robbie skirted around some of my questions that there was a bit more to it than being a doorman.

We reminisced about people and places we used to know, chatting away – well, I was doing most of the chatting – as one by one, the others said their goodbyes until it was just me and Robbie. And Cat.

The barman rang the bell and shouted ‘Time, please!”

We agreed we’d better get back, both feeling a little embarrassed, I think, that we’d been so engrossed that we hadn’t really noticed the others leave. So, we headed out onto the high street. The night was cool, even though it was summer, and Robbie gave me his jacket. I say ‘jacket’. It fitted me like a tent.

As we made our way back to the retirement village, or ‘Bungalow Central’ as Robbie called it, Cat still on Robbie’s shoulder, I asked him the obvious question: how come he was in the pub with a cat on his shoulder? So, he started telling me his story. His and Cat’s story.

He told me how he and Kath had moved to Newsome Downs because they were both having trouble getting around in London. Like me and Bob, Robbie and Kath only had one child. And like me and Bob they didn’t really see their son or their grandkids. Weird how common that is these days.

He told me how they’d always wanted to live in the country and talked endlessly about moving out of the city, but they’d always put it off. They were worried they’d see even less of their grandkids than they did in London, where they were only half an hour from their son.

He told me how they’d eventually realised they couldn’t live their lives expecting or hoping their son would come and see them more often, and so they sold their house in Brixton and moved here about three years ago.

And he told me that within three months, Kath fell ill.

At first, they thought it was stomach flu, but Kath’s symptoms just got worse until their doctor sent them to the hospital for tests. It was a trip that turned out to be Kath’s first and last visit to the hospital. She collapsed while they were doing the tests and they kept her in, revealing the next day that she had bowel cancer. She never came home.

By this point, we’d reached my bungalow and I was crying. Robbie being Robbie, he apologised for upsetting me, and I explained that his story was much the same as mine and Bob’s, except Bob had lung cancer and we didn’t even get to move to the country together.

This is all making our conversation seem very dour and depressing, but the truth is we’d laughed a lot that evening, and even talking about the sad stuff felt good.

Anyway, we said goodnight and I made Robbie promise to finish telling me his story about Cat. Robbie laughed and said he would. Cat just stared at me. I tried to give her a pat goodnight, but she recoiled and ran around Robbie’s neck to his other shoulder.

“She’ll come round,” Robbie said. “She always does. Except with Phil, but that’s because Phil’s a bit of an arsehole. Excuse my French.” Which made me chuckle.

The next day, Liz called by holding a cup. Said she wanted to borrow some sugar. What she actually wanted was to come in for a cup of tea and to find out about me and Robbie.

“You’re a fast mover,” she said with a wink.

I was glad of the company but put her straight about Robbie. I didn’t hear all of his story about Cat, but one thing was clear: he still loved his wife and wasn’t the least bit interested in anything other than being friends. And neither, for that matter, was I.

Over the next few weeks, I slowly started to feel more at home. I met more of ‘the gang’. They were all basically good people, with the exception of Phil. There was just something about him. Something about the way he spoke down to everyone, especially his wife. Everyone except Robbie.

I joined Liz at some of the village’s classes. There’s an art class, a reading club, a writing class, a yoga class and more. They’re all really an excuse to get out of our bungalows and have a chat.

I didn’t see Robbie at any of the classes. Aside from the pub, he tended to keep himself to himself, but we would tend to sit with each other at the pub, talking about the old days on the South Bank. Occasionally, he’d let his guard down and let one of his stories slip. Some of the things he got up to as a young man! Nobody would’ve guessed. This gentle, quietly spoken old chap in the pub.

I got to hear his story about Cat. Not surprisingly, it involved the pub. It was about six months after Kath died and Robbie was struggling. He left the pub early – “Not in the mood” he said – and as he walked past the laneway down the side of the pub, where they keep the bins, he heard a mewling. He said he almost ignored it, just wanted to get home, but he went to investigate and found a dead cat – obviously a street cat – behind the bins. She had two kittens with her. He guessed she’d died giving berth. One of the kittens was dead. The other one was alive. Just.

He took her home, kept her warm, took her to the vet, nursed her back to health, and that’s how he came to own Cat. Well, not ‘own’ really. Cat came and went as she pleased. She was still a street cat. But she’d spend most of her time with Robbie.

You could tell from the way he told the story and the way he looked at Cat, that he didn’t think he’d saved Cat. He thought Cat had saved him.

From time to time, I’d cook Robbie dinner at my place or his. There was nothing romantic about it, no matter how much Liz and the others nudged and winked. As I say, he still loved Kath. But we became good friends and fell into a comfortable routine. We’d go for coffee, take a walk or watch a movie on the telly together every now and then. With Cat, of course. We’d even go shopping. I had someone I could ask whether I should buy this or that.

Cat never really warmed to me. She’d stick to Robbie like glue and, if he ever got too close to me – too close for Cat’s liking – she’d get between us. Honestly, the way she looked at me sometimes. If she’d been a lion or leopard, I’d have been in trouble! But that changed one day.

See, occasionally, I’d pop over to Robbie’s with something to eat. He gave me a key to his place and I gave him a key to mine. Again, nothing romantic. A lot of us in the village do that, especially the single ones. You know, just in case. But this day, I went in – I’d baked a lemon drizzle cake and brought a bit over for Robbie – and I called out but got no reply, so I went into the kitchen to leave the cake in the fridge. And there was Cat. Just sitting on the table, staring.

“Hello, Cat,” I said.

Nothing. Just that stare.

I put the slice of cake in the fridge, giving Cat a wide berth – she’d never scratched me or anything, but then she’d always been with Robbie. I wasn’t taking any chances. Her eyes didn’t leave me. I was about to go, but then I thought, this is silly. It’s a cat. I shouldn’t be scared of a cat.

“What is it, Cat?” I asked her.

She swished her tale but kept staring at me.

“You know, I don’t want to take him away from you,” I said, feeling a little silly. “I mean, I like him. I love him. But not like I love – loved – my Bob. And not like he still loves Kath. You don’t have to worry.”

Nothing.

But then, she cocked her head, more like a dog or a human than a cat.

I stepped closer to the table and Cat took a step towards me, so I reached out and stroked her neck, the way I’d seen Robbie stroke her. Gradually, she softened and started purring. I heard the keys in the front door and Robbie came in.

“Ah, you two are finally friends, eh?” he said with a smile. And from that point, we were.

If Robbie and I went for a walk, Cat would sometimes stroll with us, but other times she’d take off and leave us to it. She’d still be there whenever I went around to Robbie’s for a cuppa or something to eat, but she’d be just as likely to sit in my lap as curl up on Robbie’s. Or sometimes she’d just say hello to me when I arrived and slip out the door to do whatever Cat did when she was being a street cat. It was like she was giving us her approval. Like Robbie didn’t have to be protected.

When we were at the pub, Cat would still spend most of her time with Robbie, but if he went to get a round in or went to the toilet, Cat would hop into my lap. And it was one of those times – Robbie had gone to the toilet – that everything went wrong.

Phil was holding court again, as he did when he’d had one too many. Cat was in my lap and Arthur, who was sitting next to me, gave Cat a gentle ruffle behind the ears, which Cat liked.

“Hands off!” Phil laughed, taking a swig from his pint. “That pussy is just for Robbie! Ha!” And he leered at me, daring me to say something. Joan, beside him as always, just looked apologetically at me.

Robbie came back just then and looked around the table, then at me.

“Everything OK?” he asked me. I just nodded and said it was my round. I got up and Cat hopped onto the table. I assumed she was going to jump into Robbie’s lap, but she picked her way across the table, carefully avoiding everyone’s glasses. Except for Phil’s. There was only about a third of a pint left in his glass, but when she knocked it over and Phil leapt to his feet, sure enough it looked like he’d wet himself again.

Phil was furious. Swearing, he grabbed Cat and threw her. Cat cartwheeled through the air, squealing. There was a crunch as she hit the wall. She was already running – hobbling, she was obviously hurt – as she hit the floor and shot out the front door.

I didn’t see Robbie get to his feet, but the next thing I knew he was leaning across the table with one of those big arms of his. He grabbed Phil by the throat and, just as easily as Phil had thrown Cat, dragged Phil over the table. The glasses went everywhere. Robbie pinned Phil to the wall behind us. Somehow, in doing all this, Robbie had managed to hold onto his pint glass, which he held to Phil’s throat.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry!” Phil said.

You could hear a pin drop. Everyone in the pub was watching.

“Robbie, please,” I said. “Let’s go and find Cat. Check she’s OK.”

Arthur put a calming hand on Robbie’s shoulder and gently took the glass.

Phil was gasping, but Robbie was breathing heavily too as he let go of Phil’s throat. I led Robbie outside to look for Cat, sure she’d need a vet. Robbie suggested looking down the alley beside the pub, where he found Cat, so we headed down there to look behind the bins. But as Robbie bent to look into the shadows, he fell to the floor, clutching his chest. I knew straight away what was happening. And no doubt you do too.

The ambulance arrived and I went with Robbie to the hospital. He slipped in and out of consciousness on the way. At one point, he said something. I couldn’t tell exactly what through the oxygen mask. It could have been, “I’m coming, Cat.” Or maybe he said ‘Kath’.

He was dead by the time we got to A&E.

We had Robbie’s funeral six months ago, although it seems much longer. I miss him. The same way I miss Bob. Bob would’ve liked Robbie.

Everyone was there. Not Phil, of course. We haven’t seen much of Phil. Or Cat. Arthur and I looked for her for days after Robbie died. We didn’t have any luck.

But then, I went to Robbie’s grave a few weeks ago and there she was, plain as day, perched on the rickety old fence that separates the church and graveyard from the neighbouring wheat field. I walked up to her and she purred as I fussed her and asked her where she’d been. She just looked at me for a beat, then turned and hopped into the field.

I haven’t seen her since, but I don’t think I have to worry about her. Not just because she’s a street cat, but because she wasn’t alone. As she disappeared into the wheat, I caught a glimpse of another cat padding along beside her. Grey and shaggy. A big tomcat.