One Young Fool in Dorset (23 page)

“University?”

“Yes. In Birmingham where my family come from. I’ve
handed in my notice here. I’m leaving tomorrow and going on holiday
with my family first.”

“What?”

Shock robbed me of words.

“This is my last week. I’m sorry. I knew you’d be
upset so I’ve been keeping it from you.”

“Birmingham?
Birmingham?
But what about
us?”

Silence.

That silence told me all I needed to know. There was
no ‘us’. I didn’t figure in Tony’s future.

“How long have you known?”

“A long time. I just couldn’t face telling you.”

His hands were gripping my arms but I threw him
off.

“You’ve known all this time? How
could
you!”

I turned on my heel and left him standing there,
smoothing his bristly moustache down with his forefinger. I burst
into Sandy’s pen, flung my arms round the old retriever’s neck, and
buried my face in his golden fur.

The next day I phoned in sick. There was no way I
could face Tony, no way I could say goodbye to him. I felt as
though somebody had stamped on my heart.

I scraped my hair back and stared at myself in the
mirror.
I will never trust a man again,
I told myself.
I
will never eat again. I may shave my head. I’ll just languish here
in my bedroom, nursing my broken heart. He’ll be sorry when he
hears I’ve died of a broken heart. And if they force-feed me like
they do Gordon the Gannet, and I survive, I’ll never go into the
outside world again. I’ll stay here like Miss Haversham, gathering
dust.

“
Ach,
how are you feeling?” asked my mother,
popping her head round the door. “Mrs James at Cullens says there’s
a nasty bug going round, you’ve probably caught that.”

“I think I’m going to die,” I announced with a
quaver in my voice.

“
Ach,
I don’t think it’s that bad, just a
tickly cough and a bit of a sore throat. I’ll make you some
semolina to soothe your throat.”

“No food,” I said feebly. “I can’t face any
food.”

How can semolina mend a broken heart?

“Okay,” she said and left me alone.

I heard her go down the stairs and close the back
door. I knew she was on her way to check her compost heap.

“Nobody understands,” I whispered, burying my face
in my pillows.

All those daydreams where he and I would walk off
together into the sunset to save the world…

All that paper I had wasted at school doodling his
name and practising writing my signature,
Mrs Victoria
Fletcher….

All for nothing. He didn’t care about me.

If I survive, I’m going to become a nun.

By the next day, I was starving, and rather bored
with being in my own bedroom for so long.
Okay, I’ll eat,
I
relented,
but my vegetarian days are over.

“Glad you are feeling better,” said my mother. “I
didn’t think you’d be eating anything much yet, so I haven’t
prepared any vegetables for you. We’ve got sausage pie.”

“That’s okay.”

“But you are vegetarian?”

“Not any more.”

The sausage pie tasted great and I had a double
helping on principle, just to spite Tony. But I didn’t feel any
better for my traitorous behaviour.

I stopped listening to Bob Dylan and played Simon
and Garfunkel records instead. Tears of self-pity coursed down my
cheeks as I played
Bridge over Troubled Water
again and
again.

When I went back to work, two big things
happened.

First, I found a note that had been pushed into my
locker through the crack in the door. My heart lurched and I held
my breath as I unfolded it. He’d changed his mind! He wanted me
back!

Dear Vicky,

I’m sorry it had to end this way.

It’s my fault, I should have told you I was planning
to go to uni.

I hope we can stay friends.

I’m going to be popping into the sanctuary to say
goodbye properly before I leave for the new term.

I hope to see you then.

Tony

Huh? No kisses? No ‘I miss you’ or even ‘All my
love’? Friends? What was the point of that? I had already designed
the wedding dress. I was going to borrow my mother’s pearls and
wear a blue garter. I planned on spending the rest of my life with
Tony and he had snatched my dreams away. He didn’t deserve my
friendship, and I certainly wasn’t going to look out for his
visit.

But I was lying to myself. During public visiting
times, when the gates opened, I would search the visitors, always
hoping Tony the Hippy would be amongst the sea of faces.

The second big thing that happened was that the
schedule had been changed. According to the new schedule pinned to
the noticeboard, no longer would I be working in the Special Care
unit. Instead, I would be working in the cattery.

22
Cats

Crêpes Suzette

B
eing told that I’d been moved out of the
Special Care unit would normally have plunged me into a deep
depression as I would have been separated from my beloved Tony. But
as he had abandoned me without a backward glance to explore distant
exotic shores, (well, Birmingham) I was pleased not to have to work
where there were constant reminders of him. No longer would I have
to walk past Tony’s old caravan, which was now occupied by Big
Denise.

Yes, working in the cattery would suit me fine.

I love cats. I love their individuality and their
general snootiness. I’ve had cats as pets since, but I’ve always
felt that they owned me, not vice versa. I hadn’t realised how many
different shapes, colours, sizes and personalities of domestic cat
existed in the world until I worked in the cattery at the animal
sanctuary.

The cattery was made up of a long line of pens. Each
outdoor part had structures to climb, or hide in, and a basket for
its occupant to snooze in the sun. A little doorway led to an
indoor compartment with more snug beds and different levels to
climb. It was pussycat paradise, but not freedom.

Kittens were usually re-homed very quickly. The more
mature feline residents had to wait until they were noticed,
although the sanctuary did its best to make their lives
pleasant.

Each cat had a story, and many were found as strays,
like Hamworthy.

“Why is he called Hamworthy?” I asked Big Denise who
was showing me the ropes.

“He was found trying to stow away in the First Class
compartment of a train on the London Waterloo line. The
stationmaster discovered him at Hamworthy junction.”

Hamworthy rubbed his ginger cheek on my leg and
purred. I scratched him behind the ear and his eyes glazed in
pleasure.

“And Seafore? I guess he was found on the beach or
something?”

“Nope. It should be ‘C for’ really. C for cat. We’d
run out of name ideas when he came in.”

“Oh. And Carpenter?”

“Ah, poor old Carpy isn’t very bright. He has never
really been properly house-trained. I expect somebody dumped him
because of that. We call him Carpenter because he’s always doing
little jobs around the place.”

“Jobs?”

“Yes, smelly ones.”

“Oh.”

Work in the cattery was very simple. I had to go
from pen to pen, cleaning them out and replacing the cat litter. I
made sure the drinking water was fresh and clean, and filled the
food bowls morning and evening. Any spare time I had, I could spend
stroking and playing with the inmates.

Some of the cats were so shy that they’d vanish into
their indoor sleeping quarters as soon as I appeared. Others didn’t
flee, but watched me with one wary eye cracked open. If I attempted
to stroke them, they were gone.

Some of the cat pens were empty with the doors
propped open. The cats living in these pens were there on a Dinner,
Bed and Breakfast basis. They were very tame and allowed to roam
freely around the sanctuary during the day, returning to be fed and
shut in at night.

A few cats in the closed pens were friendly, almost
tripping me up as they wound themselves around my ankles as I tried
to carry out my chores. The cat I remember most clearly, and with
huge guilt, was a little tabby cat called Blossom.

Blossom lived in a closed pen with three much shyer
kitties. As soon as I arrived, she twisted figures of eight around
my ankles, clamouring for attention. I rubbed under her chin, which
she loved, and behind her ears. If I had time, I would sit with her
awhile and she’d climb into my lap, purring like an industrial
lawnmower.

“Why don’t we allow Blossom out of her pen during
the day?” I asked Big Denise, who had recently been promoted to
Assistant Manager. “She’s so friendly and affectionate. I’m sure
she’d love the extra interaction with the staff and visitors. She
might even find someone to adopt her.”

“I’m not sure,” said Denise. “There must be a reason
for her being kept in a closed pen.”

Over the next few days I brought up the subject
whenever I could.

“I think it’s unfair,” I declared. “Poor
Blossom.”

“If you are sure she’s so tame,” said Denise, a
little doubtfully, “perhaps we could let her out on trial and see
what happens.”

“Fantastic! Now?”

“Yes, why not?”

Together we walked to Blossom’s pen. As usual, her
three shy roommates streaked away into their indoor quarters, while
Blossom came forward to greet her admirers.

“You’re a lovely little cat, aren’t you?” crooned
Denise, stroking Blossom until she purred like a pneumatic drill.
“Would you like a taste of freedom?”

“You see how tame she is?” I said.

“Yup. She knows you, why don’t you pick her up and
take her outside, see how she likes it?”

I picked Blossom up and cuddled her. She purred even
louder. I walked out through the door, closing it behind me with my
foot to prevent her roommates from escaping.

The purring stopped abruptly. I felt Blossom
stiffen. Then she exploded out of my arms and hit the ground
running. Denise and I watched in horror as she streaked across the
field and disappeared into a hedge.

“Oh no,” we said, staring in disbelief, first at
each other, then at the distant hedge.

“Blossom! Blossom! Here, kitty, kitty!”

But no amount of searching, calling, or coaxing
flushed Blossom out of her hiding place.

We mentioned the incident in the staffroom.

“Blossom?” asked one of the old-timers,
mid-sandwich. “Little tabby cat, very friendly?”

We nodded.

“Oh, she’s agoraphobic. Doubt you’ll ever see her
again.”

Denise and I were horrified, but although we never
gave up searching, nobody ever saw Blossom again.

Racked with guilt, I vowed that in future I would
never again interfere. Never would I assume that I knew better.
However, I’m afraid, looking back on my life, I acknowledge that
I’ve often meddled in affairs that were none of my business. I
should have learned my lesson from what befell little Blossom.

In spite of the loss of little Blossom, I had found
my niche working in the cattery. I loved them all, but of course I
had my favourites.

I loved Marmite, the sneaky, handsome, coal-black
cat who liked to jump out at me from behind corners, then wind
himself around my ankles in apology. I loved Frosty, the deaf white
cat with no ears, a skin cancer victim who still lived life to the
full in spite of her misfortune. She loved to doze in sun puddles
and rolled luxuriously onto her back to have her tummy rubbed
whenever I approached. But most of all, I loved Nig-Nog.

Poor Nig-Nog would never win a prize at a cat show
because he was not a handsome cat. He was a huge boy, probably from
a mixed heritage because his colouring ranged from splotches of
white on his face, to hectic ginger stripes up two legs and brown
patches over his back. It was as though his designer couldn’t
decide what colour he should be, and experimented with all of them.
Even Nig-Nog’s eyes were eccentric as he had one green and one
yellow. But what Nig-Nog lacked in beauty, he made up for in
personality, and he was one of the most endearing, comical cats I
have ever met.

Nig-Nog didn’t live in the cattery. He was his own
boss, and chose to roam the sanctuary by day and sleep in the
stables with the goats at night. I don’t know how he knew the
difference between weekdays and weekends, but every Saturday and
Sunday morning he’d be waiting for the staff minibus to arrive. As
soon as the driver applied the handbrake, Nig-Nog shot forward and
circled the bus, looking for me. He would stand on his hind legs
with his front paws on the side of the vehicle, his head tilted
back as he stared through the windows searching for me.

When I jumped off the bus and called him, he would
gallop forward to greet me, his head butting me in welcome. My
fellow staff members rolled their eyes in amusement. Nig-Nog didn’t
like to be picked up, so I leaned down to stroke his head and talk
to him. And that was another of Nig-Nog’s endearing traits: he
talked.

“Hello, Nig-Nog, how are you this morning?” I
asked.

“Meowwww-purrp.”

“Oh good. I hope you’ve been keeping those goats in
order.”

“Meoooow-meowwww.”

“Right, and have you been sorting out the mice?”

“Purrrp-mew-meooow…”

And so on. Nig-Nog and I chatted all day, and
wherever I was, he was only a scamper behind.

As I worked my way along the cattery pens, Nig-Nog
would wait for me, not at the gates of the pens, but on the
chicken-wire roof. His weight caused the roof to sag and it can’t
have been comfortable for him, but that was his chosen position,
the place where he could keep a green or yellow eye on me.

Nig-Nog didn’t know he was a cat. I’m not sure what
he thought he was, but if I threw a little stick, he would dash to
chase it and fetch it back. So perhaps he thought he was a dog.