Library Cat: The Observations of a Thinking Cat

Shame

Shame. That’s what Library Cat felt right now. Pure, unadulterated cat shame.

He had been sick. On his turquoise chair in the library. The vomit clearly contained the dark brown threads of the previous night’s catnip. His memory of the night was a blur. There had been Puddle Cat, and a beautiful tortoiseshell, he remembered that much, but that was all. Now his lamentable loss of dignity in the sober surroundings of the library led to him being shooed out into the cold square.

My head feels like a lead ball, thought Library Cat, the effects of last night’s debauchery forcing him into the heady heights of metaphor.

But there was more. An hour of so earlier, Library Cat had headed home only to discover Saaf Landan Tom drinking from his water bowl once again, contaminating it with large chunks of chicken jelly. And then something terrible happened. Library Cat lashed out. For the first time in his life, the red mist had descended. Incensed by his cousin’s boorish impertinence, and still fat-tailed with jealousy over Tom’s evidently more successful time On The Prowl the night before, Library Cat had dealt his cousin a smart blow to the neck, with all five claws fully deployed. It was over in an instant. Saaf Landan Tom had fled the house and Edinburgh hissing curtly, his great ginger tail swishing through the air like a medieval torch.

This was worse than the vomit in the library. This was worse than ostracism to the square. This was a slight of character. Up until this point, Library Cat had fought all his wars with two deeply coveted weapons – weapons of infinite virtue, that brought their bearers certain victory against cats and Humans alike, and which were brandished by thoroughbred thinking cats all over the world. The two weapons were: thoughts and expressions. They’d never failed Library Cat before and, he assumed, they never would. But he’d swiped, there was no escaping the matter. And it was his own flesh and blood at the receiving end – his dear, well-meaning half-thinking cat cousin, Saaf Landan Tom. For a thinking cat to engage in warfare at all is a slight of character; but for a thinking cat to lash out rather than stare down or outsmart brings even greater embarrassment to the thinking cat community. And yet the only thought Library Cat had had at the time was, to put it succinctly, Take that you slobbering, ginger, nip-addled, toilet-brush-tailed b*****d!

Library Cat looked mournfully at the trees in the square and at the tiny fractals of ice that were beginning to encircle their boughs as the teeth of winter sank deeper into the land. Beyond, he could see the Humans in their tenement houses, moving to and fro in their yellow-warm lounges behind world-muting glass. This was definitely the lull after the drama – the cold, cobble-contemplating lull, the bleak, autumnal, dank tumbleweedy solitude. Library Cat almost felt as if the weather was conspiring to make him feel even guiltier.

What came over me? Oh, the humiliation. Vomit and a swipe on the same day!

His long held dream of becoming university rector cat seemed to slither away before his eyes.

Is this the cat I’ve become? Am I to live a life punctuated with violence and covert catnip deals beneath flickering street lamps? Shunned by thinking cats, and exiled from the delicious warmth and literary pleasures of the Towsery?

“Yo! Cat! Hey, wait up!”

A Human was running towards him, his red satchel bouncing off his waist. Just as Library Cat thought he’d stop, he continued running past him.

Fine, run on by me sir, your indifference means nothing to me, seethed Library Cat inwardly.

But now another Human, a girl this time, approaching him more slowly.

“Hey Library Cat! Hey, come here…”

She bent down and kissed the air in his direction. Pleased for the company, Library Cat rose and moped over, avoiding eye contact.

“There, there, no need to look so sad! Here, have some tuna.”

TUNA!

“There, there. Good boy.”

BOY? … hmmm strokes, yes, strokes, strokes, strokes… mm… KEEP STROKING!

“More? OK, here you go.”

No, not more Tuna, you cretin, more strokes!

“Mmm? No more? OK… Your coat is so soft…!”

YES! Strokes… Mmmm… strokes. That last stroke was scrummy.

The Human eventually rose, towering up above him, turned and walked away smiling. Then the night before came flooding back to Library Cat once more.

But it had disappeared for a moment. During the strokes, his mind had become unstuck. It had lifted away, beyond the past and lingered in the present. For a second, he had forgotten about the last twenty-four hours.

It was a start.

Recommended Reading

‘Whatever Happened’ by Philip Larkin.

Food consumed

1 x lump of tuna (probably more than a day old so technically “illegal”).

Mood

Cyclonic. Slowly stabilising.

Discovery about Humans

Sometimes, they are a much-needed distraction.