by Matt Haig
So, his plan had failed.
Barney hadn’t been able to look like anything but an insane cat, and now his mother’s hands were on his ribs, trying to pull him off the carpet his claws didn’t want to leave.
She carried him – past all the books made specifically for human hands, books he knew he might never have the chance to read again. And now there was someone else.
Jeremy.
The orange man.
‘What is that doing in here?’ he asked, disgusted.
‘No idea,’ said Barney’s mum. ‘Believe it or not, I’m pretty sure this is the same cat I saw in my house this morning. You know, the one I was telling you about.’
‘Odd,’ said Jeremy. ‘Oh well. This isn’t a zoo.’
He pointed to the automatic doors, meaning for Barney’s mum to throw him out of the library. And she would have done if it hadn’t been for the little girl in pink. The one who had been screaming ‘DVD’ moments before.
Florence.
‘Mummy, look! Look, Mummy! LOOK NOW!’
Her mummy looked.
‘Oh, gosh! It’s Maurice.’
Maurice?
Who was Maurice?
Barney saw them both walk over, and the woman tell his mum and Jeremy that the cat belonged to them.
‘How can we be sure the cat’s yours?’ asked Jeremy suspiciously.
Florence’s mum got out her phone, and moments later showed them a picture of a black cat with a white patch of fur around its left eye. To Barney’s horror, the cat was dressed in a fairy costume, complete with wings, and looked very uncomfortable.
‘Wan’ go home!’ Florence was wailing. ‘Wan’ go home an’ see Gaff-Gaff!’
‘There you go,’ said Mrs Willow, handing her son over to a complete stranger.
Mum. It’s me.
For the one thousandth time.
Barney saw the automatic doors slide behind him and his mum standing inside the library, watching him leave.
I love you, he said, because it seemed like a very long time since he had told her that, and because he didn’t know if he would get the opportunity again.
Not that it meant anything.
It was just another faint miaow, lost on the breeze.
The Cattery
HI. IT’S THE author again. Now, I know what you’re wondering. You’re wondering, Hey, what happened to that cat you mentioned nearly a hundred pages ago? Mocha, or whatever her name was.
Oh? You’re not wondering that? Oh dear, that author M-RMR (Mind-Reading My Readers) kit my mum bought me for Christmas must be going a bit faulty. Never mind, I’ll tell you about Mocha, anyway, because by telling you about her I’ll really be telling you about something much more important.
She was there in her cage in the cattery. By ‘cage’, I mean a soft, warm room with a giant sheepskin rug for a carpet and a view of rolling meadows out of the window. And by ‘cattery’ I mean swank palace. Seriously, Edgarton Cattery was like the poshest hotel you’ve ever been to. Only better. Well, if you were a cat you’d think it was better. Because of the toys and stuff. Fluffy mice, scratch posts, litter trays – which instead of that uncomfortable gravelly stuff had a picture of a dog for the cats to look at as they toileted all over said canine’s poor poochy face.
Right now, Mocha was enjoying a late lunch. Grilled sardines coupled with battered field mouse and washed down with a saucer of double cream. Of course, the company could have been a bit better. It wasn’t much fun listening to the cats on either side of her. One, a no-hoper who was now an old tabby called Tiddles but had once been a human chartered accountant called Peter Michael Thimblethwaite, kept on moaning about how he’d visited Blandford Golf Course to visit his brother but hadn’t been recognized. ‘He had me kicked me off the blinking course! He wouldn’t even be a member if it wasn’t for me!’
The cat in the other neighbouring cage was a fireside called Elton – a fluffy white Persian moaning about his early retirement.
‘I used to be a calendar cat, you know … Oh yes, humans used to take photos of me sprawled out on the grass in the sunshine … My face adorns over a million walls, you know … Well, for one month of the year … But now I’m too old apparently … My fur’s all tired and matted … My eyes have lost their twinkle … And Persians are out of fashion, they say … “Your look is too opulent … It is too 1980s … We want scruffy-looking cats …” And they do! Have you seen the models recently? They have swipers now … Seriously, where has all the class gone? It’s all filth and fleas! Filth and fleas!’
Elton went on like this for hours. But Mocha didn’t mind, and concentrated her thoughts elsewhere, such as on the tall human girl talking to the cattery owner, who the cats knew only as the Man of Infinite Kindness. A man who every cat seemed to feel affection for, without understanding why.
She was there, this human girl, leaning over the desk and staring into the man’s face. Mocha had seen this human girl before. She had walked by Mocha’s house once with Barney Willow. And now she was talking urgently to the Man of Infinite Kindness.
‘But you look exactly like him,’ the girl was saying, getting nothing but an awkward glance in response. ‘So … what is your name then if it’s not Mr Neil Willow?’
‘It’s Smith.’
‘Just Smith?’
‘Please, I’ve got a lot of things to do …’
Mocha watched the Man of Infinite Kindness type something on his computer, trying to look busy. But there was no stopping the tall girl with the crazy hair.
‘Your son is worried about you. He thinks you might be dead … I’m Rissa. Rissa Fairweather. I’m Barney’s best friend.’
‘I’m not him.’
‘But you sound like him. You look like him. Barney’s … Barney’s missing. I think he might have come to look for you.’
‘There has been no boy here, I assure you …’
Rissa was trying not to get angry. ‘Well maybe you could help us. Maybe if you made a public announcement and told local TV that you’d come back, or something.’
The Man of Infinite Kindness was also the Man of Infinite Patience, Mocha realized. He just sighed thoughtfully and seemed genuinely worried for the girl. ‘Listen, the boy you are looking for might not be missing.’
‘What? Of course he is.’
‘He might have come to you but you didn’t recognize him. Trust me, keep your mind open to the impossible and you will find the truth.’
Rissa had no idea what he was talking about. ‘Look, if you see him will you contact me?’ She handed over a crumpled piece of paper.
And then he looked at Rissa with eyes that were as honest as eyes can look. ‘Of course.’
Rissa looked uncertain, but just at that moment a woman came in carrying a Burmese cat called Lapsang, who Mocha knew from the fences. ‘Hello, I’m Mrs Hunter,’ the woman said. ‘I’ve booked Lapsang in for two weeks … We’ve heard ever such good things about this cattery.’
The Man of Infinite Kindness smiled softly, pretending Rissa wasn’t still there. ‘Well, I just try and make cats as comfortable as they can be.’
Lapsang, meanwhile, was looking all around over Mrs Hunter’s shoulder, miaowing in pleasure. ‘Now this is more like it. Oh, Mocha, sweetie darling, I didn’t see you there.’ Then Lapsang spied someone else, a grizzled and rather scruffy-looking moggy in a cage near the entrance. His ear was damaged, bitten. ‘Oooh,’ she mewed in disgust. ‘A swiper.’
‘That’s low,’ grumbled the moggy. ‘I’m a rescue cat, posh-paws, there’s a difference …’
But Mocha stayed watching Rissa. The girl was looking confused and a bit defeated as she backed away out of the cattery, wondering what was best for her friend.
Over The Hill From Weird
RISSA CAUGHT A bus home.
‘This isn’t just weird,’ she told herself. ‘This is over the hill from weird.’
She stared out of the window at the fast-moving houses. She knew that the man had looked very mu
ch like Barney’s dad, but at the same time there was something that wasn’t right. When she had looked into his eyes she had felt, very surely, that she had been looking into the eyes of a stranger.
Again, all this weirdness was making her more worried about Barney. She got off at the closest stop to home, walked through the streets, along the river path to her parents’ barge. She stepped inside, crouching as she went down the little wooden steps to the galley and then the narrow living quarters beyond.
Her mum and dad weren’t there.
Rissa went to the small fridge, which was old and battered and had a big sticker of a rainbow on it.
She opened it up and saw some of her mum’s special carrot cake. Normally she couldn’t get enough of the stuff, but today she realized she wouldn’t be able to eat anything, even though she’d left most of her pizza at lunch.
She went to her bedroom. Bedroom wasn’t really the word for it. It was more like a narrow box, with a tiny porthole and a futon instead of a bed, and a beanbag instead of a chair. But Rissa liked it. The sound of the water lapping against the bow of the boat usually made her feel very calm.
Usually.
Not today, though.
On the floor by her futon was a book her dad had taken out of the library especially for her. It was a book Barney had always gone on about and she’d wanted to try herself.
The Water Babies, by Charles Kingsley.
She’d started it last night, and had decided she didn’t like the way the boy character was so perfect and the girl was so horrible. But she did like the way the writer had made water so magical. Looking out of her porthole at night and seeing the moonlight reflected on the surface of the river was enough to make you believe life was full of a million unfathomable wonders. It was the same feeling Rissa had when looking through her telescope at stars that had died millions of years ago, even though their light lives on.
She stared at the book. And then it came to her. Of course. The library.
She phoned it, asked to speak to Mrs Willow.
‘Oh, Rissa. Hello. What’s wrong?’
Rissa thought about telling Barney’s mum about her visit to the cattery, but she really didn’t know what to say. Had she seen Mr Willow or hadn’t she? So instead she said: ‘It’s Barney.’
‘Barney? I phoned the school earlier and spoke to Miss Whipmire. She told me he’s fine. He’s at school. But he’s been a bit badly behaved.’
Rissa waited a moment. This didn’t make sense. ‘No,’ she said. ‘He’s not been at school today. He ran away. I tried to tell you in my message but the bus driver took the phone off me.’
A pause. Rissa heard Mrs Willow’s anxious breath creating a fuzzy noise on the phone. ‘Miss Whipmire assured me he was there.’
‘Well,’ said Rissa, not knowing how else to put this, ‘I’m afraid that Miss Whipmire is a liar.’
Princess Piglet’s Pink and Pretty Perfectly Perfect Princess Party (and Other Forms of Torture)
IT WOULD HAVE been a massive house even by human standards, but from a cat-sized perspective it was like entering the largest palace you could imagine.
Everything was cream-coloured. The carpets, the walls, the lampshade, the sofa in the front room. It was there that Barney was now sitting watching the seventeenth episode of Princess Piglet in a row (‘Princess Piglet’s Pink and Pretty Perfectly Perfect Princess Party’). That would have been torture enough, even without Florence trying to poke his eyes between episodes and holding him so tight to her he could hardly breathe.
Florence’s mummy came in after a bit. ‘Oh, come on, Florence, leave that poor cat alone,’ she said, and to Barney’s relief rescued him from the little girl’s hands.
‘No, Mummy! Want cat! Want cat eyes! Like ’weeties.’
‘Florence,’ said her mother calmly. ‘Cats’ eyes aren’t sweeties. And neither are dogs’ eyes. Poor Leonard. Honestly, you and your brother!’ And then she looked down at Barney. ‘No wonder you ran away, is it, Maurice?’
Oh, no, thought Barney.
Florence had a brother.
A brother, who, by the sound of things, was just as bad as Florence.
Who between them (and possibly the dog) had caused him – or Maurice, rather – to run away.
He’d run away.
Well, obviously they thought that. But it was impossible for Barney to know if that was true. The cat had left his house and had bumped into Barney after he’d ripped up Miss Whipmire’s letter. But had the cat actually run away? Florence’s mum thought he had because she hadn’t seen him, but she hadn’t seen him because he’d become a human, and because Barney had become him – Maurice. And if there was a way of getting back into his own body then Maurice, the Barney-Who-Wasn’t-Barney, would know.
As he was placed back down on the carpet Barney had a thought. A tantalizing and brilliant thought.
Maybe Maurice had come home.
And so Barney went out of the room to search the enormous house for signs of his human body.
But it wasn’t any good. There was furniture – a lot of furniture – but nothing else. He couldn’t find himself anywhere on the ground floor. But in the kitchen, next to the cat basket, he found something quite worrying.
A larger basket with a faded, smelly tartan blanket creeping out onto the floor.
The dog’s basket. And a big dog, judging by the size of it.
Barney looked around for an escape route. He saw one.
A cat flap next to the fridge.
Locked.
His heart sank, anchored, then lifted again.
He stared at the food Florence’s mum had put out for him. Jellied meat shone from the small bowl, looking almost as disgusting as it smelled.
Then a thought.
Dogs talk cat.
Cats talk dog.
And not all dogs were Guster.
With this in mind Barney decided to go upstairs for answers. But upstairs didn’t have answers. It just had a carpet which made him sneeze, a bathroom with a very slippy floor, and lots of toys lying about everywhere.
Giant baby dolls, mutilated teddy bears, armless Barbies. As he walked along the landing, Barney felt like he was surveying a battlefield after a completely one-sided war.
He spotted four bedrooms. There was the one with a neatly made double bed and a picture of Florence’s mum with a man who Barney guessed was probably Florence’s dad. It reminded Barney of the photo of his mum and dad on holiday in the south of France. A photo that Mum ripped up during the divorce and then stuck back together after his dad went missing. There was another photo too, of Florence and her brother. Barney couldn’t see it very well as it was high up on a chest and, plus, the sun was streaming in through the window reflecting on the glass into the frame; still, he was sure he recognized the brother from somewhere.
Florence’s room had even more wounded toys than the hallway. There was a toy ambulance, which was very appropriate, lots of plastic farm animals and Princess Piglet characters, along with a giant, over-stretched stethoscope.
The next bedroom was a spare one and looked empty, so Barney didn’t bother exploring. But opposite was a near-closed door. Must be the brother’s bedroom.
The toxic smell of stale socks and spray-on deodorant wafted towards him, making his whiskers curl in disgust.
Barney felt prickly with nerves as he entered, although at first he saw nothing too worrying. Just posters of cars and shelves of video games. He looked at some of the titles.
ENDLESS WARFARE IV: TOTAL DESTRUCTION
ALIEN APOCALYPSE
JOE HERO AND THE LAND OF
ENDLESS VIOLENCE
As he looked around the room – at the football on the floor, at the giant TV and brand-new computer, at the rugby jersey over the back of a chair – he had a very troubled feeling.
He remembered what Florence had said.
Gaff-Gaff.
He looked at the door.
There was a sticker on it which said:
&nbs
p; GOVERNMENT WARNING – THIS ROOM CONTAINS
TRACES OF
Gavin
ENTER AT YOUR OWN RISK!
Downstairs, a phone rang.
Florence’s mum answered. ‘Yes, I’m Mrs Needle … How can I help you?’
Needle.
Gavin.
Needle.
No.
No no no no no.
And, yet, it made terrible sense. It certainly explained Florence’s evil-ness. She was a Needle! Gavin’s little sister.
Marmalade, he told himself. But that only made him think of Rissa and reminded him he was all alone. How ungrateful I’ve been! he thought. OK, I didn’t have a dad. But I had Rissa. I had Mum. That made me twice as lucky as I am now.
He noticed, after he’d thought this, that some fur from his face and neck had dropped down onto the carpet forming a little cloud of black hairs.
Miss Whipmire’s Visitor
BARNEY’S MUM HAD only met Miss Whipmire once before. It had been after Barney had got in trouble for causing disruption in a school assembly.
She had believed her then.
But now, in Miss Whipmire’s office, she wasn’t sure what she believed.
‘Yes, Mrs Willow, what can I do for you?’ This was strange. Miss Whipmire hadn’t turned from the window she was staring out of, a window which offered a view of a grim February sky and green playing fields where Year Ten girls were engaged in a rather shouty game of hockey. There was no reflection in the glass. And yet she had known precisely who had been knocking on the door.
‘Erm, hello … yes, it’s me. Barney’s mum. Elaine. I was just a bit confused about something.’
Miss Whipmire turned sharply. ‘Confused? I don’t understand.’
Mrs Willow sniffed the air and realized she was smelling fish. Sardines, she would have guessed. ‘Well, it’s just – Barney. I’ve been told by a good friend of his that he’s not been in school today,’ she said, noticing a very ugly-looking pen pot on the desk. ‘So I don’t mean to contradict you but I think you might have made a mistake.’