Cat the cat

Catherine was a stubborn and easily annoyed cat. She would get annoyed by just about everything, from the stale and boring leftover the owners would leave for her to the ugly and small houses that seemed to be the only structure known to builders in the small town that she lived. Her first memory of being annoyed at something goes as far back as when she was a kitten.

"We'll call her Catherine" said Mama.

She did not like her name but she couldn't protest as she didn't know how to talk yet.

The other local cats seemed to love the town which annoyed her even more but it was nothing compared to the new Fisherman-Bob- that had just started getting really popular. He was the son of the previous fisherman and the old age 83 the old fisherman finally thought that he should rest so he gave his son complete control of his trade. Bob wasn't as good as his father at catching fish or as hard-working but he gave free fish to many people which made him famous. Now this was all fine for Catherine but the problem was that he only knew how to catch the easy fish which used to stink a lot and since he used to give free fish Catherine was stuck with stinky fish for dinner every day.

 Life wasn’t fun but it’s not like she had a chance or so thought Catherine until one day when she was laying around doing nothing at the local market in the afternoon, as was her usual routine, she heard something quite mind-blowing. She heard of huge and beautiful houses, big parks, fancy restaurants and many more things. This made her think about leaving this old and boring place. Everyone knew each other here, the older cats used to judge her for not doing anything and everyone was always gossiping about the whatever little happenings of the town. But if she were to go to a BIG city where there would be too many people for everyone to know then she could live life the way she wanted to live.

Catherine had once wandered so far off that it seemed as if she had reached the end of the world without any buildings or roads when she was but only a few years old because of this she knew there was a very huge distance to travel in order for her to reach this dream city. Then a miracle, as if it was her destiny, happened; the old fold who’s garden in which she lived in had their children coming from a big city. She was still a bit hesitant on leaving but figured this would be a great opportunity to know how the people in the city were so she planned on spying on them.

She was instantly impressed when they came up in their shiny new car and dazzling clothes. The way they spoke sounded sophisticated as well but she was too shy to meet them and so hid and spied on them. The best part? They had a sweet girl-Amy- who was going to be 13 years old in just a couple of days. Amy’s grandmother had already baked a cake as they weren’t planning on staying for too long. Amy had heard about Catherine and really wanted to see her so her grandma called for the cat. Shyly, she stepped out from the bushes to meet the girl. Amy at first stood staring wide-eyed at the cat then shrieked and ran to hug her.

“I really like her! She’s so cute! Can we keep her please?” 

Her grandma couldn’t say no after everything she witnessed but she was said she was surprised the cat didn’t run away or claw.

“Of course not” thought Catherine “She’s not like the rest of the people here”

They were to leave the next morning so Catherine thought it would be fitting to have one last look at the boring old place. She walked around the streets slowly taking everything in even though she knew the place by heart. And finally the long awaited morning came, it all happened too quickly after that. The old granny even came all the way out to say goodbye and this did make Catherine sad. She quickly shook her head to forget this as new and happy memories were going to take its place. She was placed in a cage which she wasn’t too happy about but was willing to sacrifice this much. They sped past so many things she could barely stop herself from not getting dizzy.

She must have slept somewhere along the ride as when she woke up they were already getting her out of the box. She missed everything! The lights and parks and roads. But they weren’t home. The first stop was at the pet store where they got her a brand new collar.

“Catherine is too… long and old of a name. Let’s shorten it to Cat.” said Amy and so it was her new name.

“We think alike and are so similar!” thought Cat.

Finally, they reached at the foot of their building. Such a tall and big house thought Cat but little did she know that this was shared by many people. They got into the elevator and this scared Cat out of her mind. A small and moving room made her feel sick and dizzy, she had to close her eyes and prayed that it ended soon. At long last they reached the door of their apartment. It was much smaller than the house and smelled a bit funny. That’s alright, I’ll get used to it thought Cat. The food she got wasn’t really food, it was hard and didn’t have to much flavor sure it didn’t smell as bad as the fish but it just wasn’t… as good as she expected it to be. Well it didn’t matter as she thought she had the entire building to herself but she quickly found out that she couldn’t leave the small apartment. This was a major let down but she shrugged it off, she wasn’t ready to accept that the place she left could be better than the new one. She thought that she would meet some new cats at night but instead found out that she had to sleep inside the house.

She slept with a heavy heart but hoped that the new day would be much better. Little did she know that it would be even worse. As Amy’s birthday came there was a huge party and many of her friends came- from the neighborhood and from her school- and one of them even kicked her which was not very pleasant but her friends weren’t going to be here every day right? Then Amy got her brand new cellphone (from her parents) which was the hot topic of the entire day and her “best gift ever”. This made Cat a little sad but Amy wouldn’t forget her just because of some little machine would she? She would.

 Life moved forward and in about a week things got pretty boring real fast, school had started and she was left alone in the house in the mornings. Even when Amy did come home she was too busy with her phone. Amy’s mom used to tell Amy to take Cat out for walks in the evening but even then she was talking on the phone. Cat now had a new and most annoying thing- Amy’s phone. She slipped away when Amy was sitting on the park bench (too busy with her phone to notice) and went to meet the local cats. Cat had thought that the other cats here would be cooler as they were from the city but as she went in some narrow alley froze. There was a big, black cat with a long scar starting from the middle of his head all the way down to his left eye. He was fighting another smaller cat for what seemed to be garbage. He obviously won and the other cat ran away. After gobbling up his war loot he went over to Cat and said

“Ye look new ‘ere, What’s yer name?”.

  “C-c-cat” barely able to say her name properly as she was too frightened.

“So listen up, this is my turf and if ye got a problem with that, then we can settle it the easy way” he showed of his long and scary claws while he said that.

“N-no I mean yes absolutely. I have no problem with that” she said as she quickly ran away.

This was the final straw for Cat, she could no longer take anymore of this. She lived in a small apartment with no garden or trees and didn’t have any friends to talk to, right now even the old cats that would lecture her for not doing anything were better. There were so many people here that nobody cared for anybody and you had to fight for your own food. She had only seen the ugly side of the city and the problems that came with living in one and she’d rather stay back in the village.

As she went back to her building (which she thankfully remembered) she saw Amy looking for her, all worried. She quickly picked her up and told her not to do that ever again. As they reached home Cat had only one thing on her mind: Why couldn’t I look at the positives instead of the negatives back home?