The Fairway Close Cat Encounters - #1 Kill Your Darlings.

There is a saying in writing circles that you must ‘kill your darlings’, which means often pieces a writer loves or is attached to often have to be cut because it ends up having no place in the book. This little piece called The Fairway Close Cat Encounters was a piece that made it all the way through to the final edits of one of my books, but in my heart, I always knew it was going to have to go. I revisited it recently and thought I would polish it up and give it a home here - enjoy!

I was nine when we left Fairway Close and perhaps the hardest part of having to leave was that I had no one to blame for it but myself. Mum tried to convince me that at some stage we were always going to have to move anyway, but I know in my heart it was me that burst the bubble of our life there. In many ways, the move closed the last chapter of my childhood. 

For months I had been feeding a stray cat, hoping to lure it in to be my pet. A few of the other kids in the street wanted her to be their pet too but after a lengthy battle for her affection, she finally made up her mind. I named her Jessie. We soon settled into a routine. whereby Jessie arrived at our door every morning and night, signaling her arrival by meowing loudly until I went outside to pat her and give her a bowl of milk, her slender black frame purring to be let inside.

 “You can feed it Renee, but it is not to come inside, ok? Who knows what diseases that feral cat has got!” Mum didn’t like animals, but I think she was secretly warming up to Jessie, because whenever Mum came outside, Jessie would start to rub up around Mum’s legs and purr until Mum eventually had to give in and pat her. After a while, Mum even started to let me feed her my leftover dinner scraps. She loved sausages and rissoles, even mashed potatoes but no matter how much I fed her she always cried for more, soon I was saving half my food for her, which drove Mum crazy “I’m not slaving away at The Factory to buy food for that bloody cat you know!”

One night Mum was around the back of the unit complex hanging out a load of washing on the shared lines. It was dinnertime and Jessie was already at our stoop, lapping away at the small bowl of milk I had just put out for her. When she finished, she sidled up to me. This could be my only chance I thought, I picked Jessie up like a baby and made sure the coast was clear, before cradling her over the threshold. Quick, Quick! Before Mum comes back! Looking around for a place to hide her I realised there were not a lot of options in a tiny two-room unit, but I didn’t want to abandon the plan now that I had set it in motion, so I quickly put her in the shower which was ensuite style and slid across the screen shower door so she couldn’t get out. 

Sitting down to dinner I started to worry. Every time Mum got up to get a drink, the pepper, or a little more food, I started to panic that she was going to go to the toilet. If she did, she would immediately see Jessie. I had to move her. Excusing myself I dashed into the bathroom and picked up a groaning Jessie, full of her milk. Scouring around, my hiding options had not increased. There was only one other option. The bedroom cupboard. Clearing aside all Mum’s shoes, I put Jessie inside and shut the door, ignoring her cranky meows, I dashed out of the room and slid back into my chair. Cool as a cucumber. After dinner, Mum and I sat down to watch Home and Away. By some miracle, it was nearly bedtime before we heard a loud yowling noise. At first, it sounded like it was coming from outside, but it kept getting louder and louder and then the scratching started. 

“I’m going to go to bed Mum, I’m so tired. Love you!” I jumped up to kiss her and then headed into the bedroom and shut the door, hoping that Mum would not come in until I had settled Jessie quietly under the covers with me.

I let Jessie out of the cupboard, cuddling her tight in my arms, and made my way over to my bed, trying to make her lay down with me.

‘Yeeeeoooow’ Jessie shrieked, her marble eyes were wild.

“Shhhhh Jessie, you have to be quiet, or Mum will find you. I’m sorry for locking you in the cupboard. I love you!”

But still, she yowled. She was getting louder and louder and more frequent in her cries. I guess she was really mad about the cupboard. 

Jessie stayed next to me in the bed because she couldn’t get away from my tight grip, but she was distressed. The noises she was making were not normal meow sounds and they were getting worse the longer she was out of the cupboard. No matter how hard I cuddled her to me, she would not calm down.

Mum came in and turned the light on.

“What is going on in here Renee?”

Yeeeeooooowww. 

“Nothing Mum, Nothing!”

“I’m not deaf Renee, did you bring that stray inside even when I told you not too?” 

“No. Yes. Well it’s just that I really wanted a pet and you said I couldn’t have one, but I thought if she was in here and you didn’t notice her, you would see that she won’t be that much trouble.”

‘Yeeeeeoooooww.’

“Please Mum, please can I keep her? She’s just not feeling well right now”.

Mum came over to look at Jessie lying next to my head. She bent down and petted Jessie whilst Jessie kept on yowling. 

Feeling her belly, Mum said, “I think she might be having kittens”.

I could hardly believe my luck -  kittens!

Mum and I both sat on my bed stroking a distressed Jessie. “Good girl, good girl, you can do it!” Mum kept saying and Jessie seemed grateful. Maybe Mum would fall in love with Jessie after all? 

Within half an hour Jessie had given birth on my pillow to two black kittens and one little tabby with a crooked corkscrew tail. It was the most incredible thing I had ever seen. Messy but incredible! After that, even Mum could not bring herself to kick Jessie and her babies out of the house, so she went out to the bins to find a box that we could use to make a bed for them. I donated my pillow seeing as though it was covered in cat muck and I couldn’t use it anymore.

“We are not keeping them ok!? They can stay just until we can find them a new home” Mum said, but I was convinced she would love them all like I did in no time. Especially the corkscrew tail Tabby. Jessie and her babies slept in the box between Mum’s and my bed, all six of us exhausted from such an eventful night.  

Within a few days, the unit was infested with fleas, we could see them hopping on the carpet and both Mum and I were covered in itchy red blotches, although I vehemently denied my blotches were from the fleas. Whilst Mum and I were at work and school the kittens and Jessie started to pee all over the carpet, scratching and tearing at the lounge and cupboards, and still no matter what spray or bomb Mum brought home, she could not get rid of the fleas. 

Mum was furious with me “We are going to have to move. We cannot live like this, nothing I do is working. I am going to lose all the bond money too, all because of your stupid cat. I told you not to bring it inside!”

Soon after, a man from the RSPCA came to pick up Jessie and her babies. It was on the same morning that the final pieces of our furniture were being loaded into Mum’s friend’s truck - we were doing a runner! Soon the unit was empty except for the fleas. Mum wrote a note to the real estate agent apologising for the infestation and left the keys in the mailbox. Not long after, Mum’s boyfriend came to pick us up in his van. The van only had two seats, so I hopped in the back and sat in my usual spot tucked up on the floor between all his delivery boxes, fishing rods, and a couple of giant surfboards. I had to keep my head down in case any police saw me inside the back of the van because Mum said her boyfriend could lose his license if anyone saw me. Knowing no one could hear me over the engine, I put my face in my hands and started to cry. I cried because I was leaving my friends behind, I cried because there were no windows in the back of the van so I couldn’t even see the street one last time, but most of all I cried because I really, really thought Mum was going to let me keep that Tabby kitten. 

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