AllFreeNovel
Share Us
So about my flat.
It’s fine. It’s completely fine. It’s in a nice area and it’s above a nice butcher’s shop but, well, it’s above a butcher’s shop which is convenient but also a bit Common People, especially since I’m here now with a feller who’s probably never been to a supermarket. And I haven’t really done much to it, partly because I can’t because it’s rented and partly because… In any case, even by rented flat standards it’s a bit spartan—okay very spartan, so spartan I could probably hold it against a whole army with just two hundred and ninety-nine other fellers.
As soon as Gollum hears the door open, he lies down on the floor next to his bowl and starts making how-could-it-have-come-to-this-terrible-tragedy noises. Which is bollocks because I’d left him plenty of food while I was away and, actually, he eats better than I do on account of how I got him gourmet cat food once, just to help him settle in, and now the bugger refuses to eat anything else.
I try to pat him to say hello, but he flops his tail like he’s too weak to move. Mind you, his tail is pretty floppy anyway. I don’t know what happened before I got him, but it’s all bent into a kind of permanent question mark.
“Alright lad,” I tell him. “The thing is, we’ve got to go to London for a little while.”
He makes a sort of strangled noise which I take for agreement. And to keep him sweet I open up a new can of Wild Alaskan Salmon & Shrimp cat food. The rest I pack up into a holdall, along with some of my own clothes and other necessaries. Then I clean out his litter tray ready to bring it down to Croydon with us and, at the last possible minute, I get out the carry case.
I thought I’d been subtle. I’ve not been subtle.
The moment he hears it rattling, Gollum bolts. Fortunately, the nice thing about living in a tiny bedsit above a butcher’s shop in Sheffield is that when your cat bolts, he’s not really got anywhere to bolt to. To give him credit, though, he gives it a good go.
First, he gets behind the telly, right in the middle of all the wires, and I’m a bit anxious he’s going to get electrocuted, but I flush him out okay. Then he squashes himself under the sofa like he’s made out of pâté, so I shift that off him and he streaks between my legs, out the door and into the toilet, where he knocks over the toilet brush and—while I’m cleaning that up—he streaks back and hides under the bed. He curls into a tiny ball and starts crying, which would be heartbreaking if I didn’t know he was putting it on.
So, I’ve got my arse in the air and my head under the bed, and I’m making kissy noises at a ball of fluff and claws, when I hear the door open.
“What,” asks Jonathan Forest with a layer of concern hastily dropped over a deep well of contempt, “are you doing?”
“What’s it look like I’m doing?”
“I dread to think.”
“I’m trying to get my cat out from under the bed so I can get him in the carrier.”
“And it’s definitely your cat? This is the behaviour of a cat that is yours?”
I pull my head out and stare at him. “How many people do you think live here?”
“Honestly?” Jonathan contemplates my very unloved bedsit. “Zero.”
This was exactly why I didn’t want him up here. Well, this and not wanting him to see I still know where everything is. “I’ve probably just moved in or something.”
“If you say so.” He’s not sneering, but he blatantly wishes he was allowed to.
I wish-sneer back. “What are you doing up here anyway? Didn’t I ask you to wait in the car?”
“I thought you might need some help. Clearly, I was right.”
“I suppose this is what I get for taking the piss out of you not knowing how to use a washing machine.”
His mouth does that reluctant, out-of-practice twitch that’s almost a smile. “It definitely is. Especially because I didn’t make you drive for four hours so you could rescue the washing machine.”
“I promise,” I insist, “I do know how to operate my cat. It’s just a bit more complicated than a tumble drier. This is how they are when they like you.”
Gollum is still a bundle of spit and betrayal under my bed, butI plunge both hands under and grab him anyway. He does not take well to being grabbed.
“Get the carrier,” I yell to Jonathan. “Get the carrier.”
Somehow, Gollum has developed at least six extra paws and he’s swinging them all over the place like a lad who’s had one too many bevvies on a Saturday night.
Jonathan seems genuinely alarmed. “What carrier?”
I try to point with my nose while a yowling cat does its best to headbutt me. “The one in the middle of the room.”
With, if I’m in a mood to be fair, commendable alacrity Jonathan picks up the carrier and fiddles with the door. “How does this even work?”
