To Be A Cat

Best Friend(ly Giant)

BARNEY LOOKED AROUND nervously. Saw the ginger moggy still staring at him. Perhaps he should have followed Mocha. But, no. He wanted to stay here in the hope of convincing his mum who he was, even if it meant being at the mercy of a swiper.

The fat ginger cat started to walk out from under the car. He beckoned down the street with his tail, and soon there were other cats there too. Street cats of varying shapes and furs prowling menacingly towards him.

‘Right, lads, this is the boy,’ said Pumpkin. ‘Do yer worst on ’im.’

The cats got closer and closer.

‘Wait,’ said Barney. ‘Please, I don’t want any trouble.’

‘Well, that’s all we’s be wantin’, see,’ Pumpkin sneered. ‘That’s all we about, innit, fellas? Trouble. And the causing thereof. And, besides, we be ’avin’ our orders.’

‘Who’s ordered you?’ Barney asked, panicking as three more swipers headed up the path. One, an evil-looking cat with oversized ears, hissed in Barney’s face. ‘Prepare to die!’

Barney had no idea how he would prepare for his death so thought he’d better try and avoid it for a while. He backed away, heading down the side of the house. ‘Mocha? Are you still there? I might actually need some help here.’

But if Mocha could hear him, she certainly wasn’t saying.

‘Now, swipers,’ said the ginger moggy. ‘Let’s be showin’ what we’re made of.’

‘What he’s made of, you mean,’ laughed big-ears, her claws at the ready.

‘Wotchit, Lyka. I do the jokes round here.’

Barney tried to run away but he was faced with a giant compost heap blocking his path. He tried to climb over it but his feet kept sinking into the mush of leaves and earth and weeds, some of which had probably been thrown there by his dad over two years ago. There were now five cats down the passageway, and they all had their hair raised and their claws out, ready to pounce.

And I can assure you they would have pounced if they hadn’t heard something behind them.

Or rather, someone. Humming tunefully to themselves as they walked along the path.

‘Pumpkin, what shall we do?’ asked Lyka in her evil cat hiss.

‘We can’t be doin’ no murder with ’oomans round. You’s know the rules.’ So, on Pumpkin’s orders, the street cats fled, running over the compost heap and over Barney, their sharp claws scratching him as they went.

‘Don’t worry,’ said Pumpkin, before disappearing across the top of the heap. ‘We be seein’ you shortly.’

Barney felt sick. His cat nostrils could pick up smells a human nose would miss, and there seemed to be a million different queasy odours coming from the compost heap which, mixed with his fear, was really too much to bear.

Somehow he pulled himself together enough to leave the narrow passageway and run back round to the front of his house.

He saw a pair of boots he recognized. Black boots with a daisy painted on the ankles, now sidestepping a window-cleaner’s ladder and then walking up the path.

It was Rissa.

Of course it was Rissa. For her and for everyone else, this was a totally normal Wednesday morning at – well, Barney worked out it must have been about quarter past eight if Rissa was on time.

Rissa, he called. Rissa!

Even when he tried to shout her name as loud as he could, all that came out was a faint, breathless miaow. Watching her giant feet take T. rex strides up his path he felt a heavy sadness in his stomach. He crawl-walked towards her and nudged his head against her ankles.

She stopped and looked down. Slowly her face broadened into a smile.

Rissa, Barney kept on saying, even though he was beginning to realize it was pointless. It’s me, Barney. Please understand me … please understand me …

His friend kept smiling, but it was that empty smile you give to animals, not humans.

‘Hey! Hello, cat,’ she said.

She crouched down and stroked the top of Barney’s head. Her hand seemed massive, was massive, like the hand of some monster in a 3D movie that had actually managed to break through the fourth dimension.

I’m not a cat, he said, feeling a weird itch in his ear. I’m your best friend.

‘Where do you live?’ She asked him this the way people ask animals questions, without expecting an answer, but he gave her one anyway.

You know where I live. I live at seventeen Dullard Street. That’s right here. This very house. Barney panicked, the memory of Pumpkin and the swipers burning like the scratches on his back. Please, you’ve got to help me. It’s dangerous out here.

Rissa kept smiling, then stroked her best friend under his chin, which he found quite annoying. Not that it was her fault, or anything. How could she know who the cat she was stroking really was? How could anyone know?

‘Well, gotta go,’ she told him. ‘You’re lucky. You’re a cat. You don’t have to go to school.’

No. No. I am not lucky. I am deeply unlucky. Rissa, please, it’s me.

She stood up. She hummed happy human tunes, then rang the doorbell.

Barney stayed still for a moment.

Then he realized. She was calling at his house. The house he wasn’t in, and his mum was going to answer and say he wasn’t there, and Barney would be able to miaow at them like crazy and maybe – just maybe – they would understand.