Timba Comes Home

by Sheila Jeffries

  Later that morning I escaped into the garden. It had long grass, piles of boxes and broken bikes. Out in the sunshine I felt alive again, smelling and listening, my whiskers twitching, my eyes following every movement. The sky felt like a blue umbrella, a friendly sheltering dome above me, and the breeze ruffled my fur. I tried to sense my brother and figure out where he was, but a different animal smell came to me from a tunnel. Intrigued, I ventured inside, following the curve of it, hoping it might be a way out of the garden, a chance for me to run away from Leroy and search for Angie.

  But deep down in the grass tunnel was a creature bigger than me with a pink snout of a nose and two beetle-black eyes. A rat! I turned into a ball of wire bristles and hissed at him. He lunged at me in a blaze of whiskers and a gleam of white fangs. I fled in terror, hearing his enraged squeak as he chased me. He would kill me. Where could I go?

  I shot out of the tunnel and made for the doorstep. Leroy was sitting there laughing at me. ‘What’s the matter, Timba?’ I dived inside his jacket, settling under his arm, where the slow beating of his heart calmed me down, made me feel safe again. When I peeped out there was no sign of the rat, and I was glad to let Leroy carry me indoors. Humans do have their uses, I thought, despite their bizarre behaviour.

  Chapter Three

  SURVIVING

  Leroy’s bed was a chaotic heap of clothes, pillows and smelly old teddy bears. Without undressing or washing, he kicked off his shoes and got in, keeping me there on his shoulder as he dragged a duvet over himself. To my surprise, he went to sleep instantly, and then, in the stillness and the silence, I saw his angel.

  She wasn’t hovering in the air. She was all around Leroy like a shining blanket, her beautiful face close to his head. I meowed, hoping she would notice me, and she did. We gazed into each other’s eyes and for me it was like drinking when you are thirsty. The radiance of an angel’s eyes is limitless and sustaining. I was thrilled when she spoke to me.

  ‘It was me who told you to purr, Timba,’ she said, while I soaked up every life-giving word. ‘You are a fabulous kitten, a messenger of love and fun.’

  ‘So why have I ended up with Leroy? It feels wrong,’ I said.

  ‘It isn’t wrong, Timba. You’ve done everything right and we are proud of you. Leroy is having a difficult childhood, like you, and he needs your love. You are a tiny kitten, I know, but your love is not tiny. Your love is huge and powerful. Your love is like an angel. Always remember that.’

  As if I would forget! Her words were music to me.

  ‘You will mature into a strong and magnificent cat, Timba. You and Leroy have a special bond. There will be happy times. You can have one right now, while Leroy is sleeping!’

  She closed her beautiful eyes and her light lingered around the sleeping boy. I got up and stretched my small body. It felt flexible and re-energised. In the dim orange glow from the street lights outside the window, I surveyed Leroy’s bedroom and felt excited. So many interesting things to play with. If only Vati was there with me.

  Playing on my own made me use my imagination. I patted a silver bottle top and pretended it was a mouse. Even though I had never actually seen a mouse, my instinct told me how fast a mouse moved and how it dived into holes. There were plenty of ‘holes’ around. Carrier bags, shoes and piles of clothes cluttered the floor, creating pockets of darkness. I practised chasing the bottle top into one, then stalking it like a grown-up cat. I found a toggle hanging from a coat and had a go at leaping and twisting to catch it, not always landing the right way up, and frightening myself a little, especially with the noise I was generating. Loudest was a paper carrier bag. It crackled like thunder when I was jumping around inside it, and the sound excited me. My tail bushed out and everything became too vivid, as if no barriers existed between imagination and reality. Tense with excitement, I stood looking up at Leroy’s football which seemed to be shivering all by itself. I patted it, and it moved. Was it alive? I pretended it was that dog’s face, and launched myself at it, digging my claws in and kicking. It rolled over on top of me, scaring me so much that I ran faster than ever before and skidded into the slot under Leroy’s bed.

  Peering out at the football, I watched to see if it would move again, if it was really alive and planning to attack me, but it just sat there. The hiding and the watching made me feel lonely. What I needed was another kitten to share the experiences, someone to practise fighting and chasing with. A football was no good. It didn’t squeal and kick me back.

  I needed my brother Vati. I needed him so much that the space around me seemed to be hurting my fur. Empty space, inanimate objects, dead-eyed teddy bears who refused to move. I crept out again, looked up at Leroy’s sleeping face and wanted to be close to the warmth of another living being. In my sadness I no longer saw the angel, only the troubled boy who slept with a frown on his face.

  Perhaps I would never be happy without Vati. We were meant to be together, like our names. Something was wrong with the world if two kittens couldn’t grow up together as nature intended.

  Overwhelmed by my lonely playtime, I managed to climb up the duvet and nestle down close to Leroy’s face. His steady breathing calmed me. In his sleep he smiled and whispered, ‘Timba,’ and for once his hand touched me gently. We had survived our first day together, and for me it had been scary. I didn’t think I could stand another one, not without Vati by my side. Before being abandoned, we’d begun to play and wrestle together, challenging each other, but never hurting. We’d learned how to be kind to each other, washing and licking and pressing close, and the three of us had slept in a comforting mound, our limbs tangled like the roots of a tree.

  Now I had only this unpredictable boy to give me warmth and security. While he slept, I sat beside him on the pillow and made myself wash and wash until my long fur felt damp and clean. I listened to the sounds of the street outside, and they were different from the sounds I’d heard from the hedge. Humans are noisy. Banging drums, blowing pipes, twanging strings and yelling out songs. They call it music, but to my sensitive ears it was unfriendly, an unwelcome vibration that pulsed through the floorboards. Any fragments of silence were ripped apart by aggressive roars from motorbikes and cars. They gave me a headache.

  My sense of isolation deepened. Rebellious thoughts crowded into my mind. Thoughts of escaping, making my own way in the world, spending my life on a journey which would never end until I found Vati.

  In the morning, long before Leroy was awake, I climbed the curtains, getting my slender claws caught in the coarse threads of heavy fabric which had once been red. Like everything else in that house, the curtains smelled rancid. Determined to get onto the windowsill, I swung precariously and finally made it in time to catch the first rays of the sun on my fur.

  The view was mostly of rooftops and chimneys, a few trees, lots of windows flashing in the sun, and a street full of doors where a lost kitten might find a home. A street of opportunities! I looked up at the window and noticed the top was open. Immediately I smelled the grass and the briny rivers of the countryside beyond. It was powerful. Somewhere out there was my brother Vati. I looked down, and my heart leaped with excitement. Directly below the window was a sloping roof, its red tiles already soaking up the sun. A blackbird was there, pecking at small domes of moss and chucking them all over the place.

  I SO wanted to be out there.

  The open window was tantalisingly high, the glass too slippery for my paws. Today, I thought, today I’m going to practise jumping, eat as much as I can, and build the strength in my back legs. It won’t be long before I’m strong enough to spring up and escape through that window. I’ll be a rooftop cat, and live on birds, and sunbathe, and at night I’ll listen for owls hunting over the distant fields. When I know the direction, I’ll set off on my journey to find Vati.

  I sat bolt upright to watch something VERY strange turning into the street. A car, a bright, optimistic red . . . with an aura! The aura emanated from whoever was inside.

 
Astonished, I stared down as the car pulled in and stopped right next to our front door. The aura got out, and, hey, it was Angie! I meowed and scrabbled at the annoying glass with my paws, but she didn’t look up. She reached into the car and extracted a blue plastic bag bulging with mysterious packets. Then she tiptoed across the pavement in a swirl of black skirts, a floaty scarf trailing bits of scarlet. She hung the plastic bag on the door handle, and tiptoed back to the car. I glimpsed her mischievous smile as she stepped in and closed the car door with a secret click. The car purred off down the street, its aura of aqua and lemon brighter than before.

  I cried after her, and carefully observed which way she went. Angie was going to be part of my journey.

  ‘Hello, Timba!’ Leroy’s face popped up next to me, his hands reaching to lift me down. I wondered what terrible idea he would have to ‘entertain’ me with that day.

  The early sunshine looked inviting, I thought, but in the kitchen Janine was already angry. ‘Sunday bloody Sunday,’ she muttered, pushing mugs and bowls around on the worktop. ‘And why is this so sticky?’

  Leroy didn’t answer but stood in the doorway with me clinging to his shoulder. ‘You want your breakfast, Timba?’ he asked. I meowed back. I hadn’t yet learned what ‘breakfast’ was, but I was starving and it seemed a good idea to meow about it.

  ‘Don’t give him cornflakes,’ said Janine. ‘Look in this bag. It was on the doorstep. And you can guess who left it there . . . interfering woman. I never did like the schoolteachers.’

  Leroy’s eyes shone. He put me down next to Angie’s blue plastic bag on the worktop and looked inside. ‘Kitty milk!’ he gasped and took out a round tin. ‘And . . . look, Mum, proper cat food in sachets . . . for kittens. Look, Timba. What do those other words say, Mum?’

  “‘Specially formulated to give your kitten the best start in life” . . . and when are you gonna learn to read?’

  Leroy arranged the sachets along the wall. They had glossy pictures of kittens looking satisfied, and one was like my tabby-and-white sister! I touched noses with the picture.

  ‘He wants that one,’ said Leroy and began to tear the top of the sachet.

  ‘Don’t be so impatient with everything,’ grumbled Janine. ‘And don’t give him too much. His tummy is the size of a walnut, it says here.’

  ‘What’s a walnut?’

  Janine rolled her eyes, but she didn’t tell Leroy what a walnut was. ‘Best mix him some kitty milk first.’

  ‘I want to do it. Let me, Mum. LET ME,’ shouted Leroy, and he pushed his mother out of the way as she tried to open the tin.

  ‘Stop pushing and shoving.’ Janine snatched the tin from Leroy’s eager hands. ‘Or I won’t let you do it . . . ever. Badly behaved BRAT.’

  ‘But Timba is my kitten.’ Leroy started his loud crying again. He tried to tug the kitty milk tin out of Janine’s hands and it crashed to the floor and burst open. The precious kitty milk powder scattered across the grubby tiles.

  In a frozen moment of horror, we all stared at it, and to me it smelled delicious. I wanted to jump down there and lick it up.

  Then Janine exploded.

  ‘Look what you’ve done! Look at it, you evil little brat!’

  ‘I didn’t mean to, Mum,’ whimpered Leroy. He looked up at her, desperate for a spark of love to rescue him. But Janine’s eyes were barren and tired. The sight of Leroy’s crying face, and the milk on the floor, and me wobbling on the edge of the worktop seemed to ignite a bonfire of rage. It flared through her aura, and she screamed at Leroy, hitting out at his head again and again as if she couldn’t stop. He fell against the cupboard, howling and pleading. ‘Stop it, Mum. Stop . . . please, Mum.’

  Shaken and afraid, I tumbled off the worktop and ran, low to the ground, searching for somewhere safe. I dived behind some bulging black rubbish bags stacked against the wall. Between the two of them, I found a wigwam of space, and cowered in there, hungry and bewildered.

  I heard Leroy’s feet stamping up the stairs and his loud nasal crying. The sound of Janine breathing and moaning, ‘I can’t cope. I can’t do this any more. That kitten will have to go.’

  Chilling words. I was too young to be sure exactly what Janine meant, but I sensed foreboding in the tone of her voice. The fear of it was stronger than the hunger in my belly. The memory of how I had stood up to the dog gave me courage and pride. Solomon’s best kitten, the biggest and the best.

  I crouched there watching her scraping the kitty milk powder back into the tin with a brush.

  Footsteps thudded out in the street and went quiet outside the door. I was immediately on alert, my whiskers twitching and my nose trying to smell whoever it was standing silently out there, apparently listening, then knocking. Not friendly.

  Janine glared at the door, as if it was the door’s fault. She put the brush down, muttering curses. ‘If it’s that sodding social worker . . .’

  She flattened herself against the wall, her eyes wide and scared, her lips pursed. The knock came again, louder, and Janine’s legs began to shake.

  Leroy appeared at the top of the stairs. ‘Mum, someone’s knocking at the door,’ he whispered.

  ‘Shh!’ Janine held her finger to her lips and held the other hand up as if to stop Leroy. He rolled his eyes and went back to his bedroom. I stayed where I was, cowering behind the rubbish bags, getting hungrier by the minute.

  The knock came a third time, insistently, and a man’s voice called out. ‘Mrs McArthur. Answer the door, please.’

  Janine shut her eyes and pressed herself harder against the wall.

  ‘Mrs McArthur. I know you’re in there. Answer the door. You’ll be in trouble if you don’t.’

  Still she didn’t move.

  ‘Mrs McArthur. It’s Trevor from Getta Loan. You are now six weeks in arrears with your payment. If you don’t pay we’ll be taking legal action to reclaim the money you owe us.’

  Janine just stood there until eventually the man said, ‘I’m going now, but I’ll be back tomorrow and I shall expect a payment.’

  A piece of paper shot through the letterbox, and I heard the man walking away. Janine’s back slid down the wall, and she sank to the floor, breathing in gasps and whispering, ‘What am I going to DO? Oh God, what am I going to do?’

  After a while she got up and resumed sweeping up the powdered kitty milk from the floor.

  ‘Timba. Timba. Where are you?’

  Janine was searching for me. Calmer now, she scuffed around in her slippers, looking under furniture and behind curtains. Thoroughly frightened, I stayed hidden. Instinct told me that a cat should not reveal a hiding place in case it was needed again. Wait until their back is turned, then magically appear, with your tail up as if everything is fine.

  I waited until Janine was at the worktop, vigorously mixing some of the powdered kitty milk with water. It smelled wonderful, so I emerged, meowing, with my tail up, absolutely starving.

  ‘Oh there you are.’ She put a saucer of kitty milk on the floor. ‘Here you are, sweetheart.’

  I lapped and lapped, enjoying the creamy milk, even though there were lumps in it and flecks of dirt from the floor. Strength and comfort flooded into my small body. I cleared every last grain of it from the saucer, and sat back. I was so fat that my tummy swung from side to side when I tried to walk.

  ‘You WERE hungry.’

  Watching me feed seemed to bring out a different side of Janine, a tenderness. I wondered why she didn’t treat Leroy as nicely as she was treating me.

  Gingerly she picked me up and carried me over to the sofa. She slumped into the cushions and closed her eyes. I walked around on her spongy body, glad of a few moments of peace, away from Leroy. He had stopped crying and was bouncing his football harder and harder against the walls and floor upstairs. Every time it knocked something over, Janine tensed and her face, neck and shoulders went hard. Both of us were on alert. What would happen when Leroy came downstairs?

  Chapter Four

&nbs
p; THE OWL WOMAN

  The next thing Leroy did that same day was the worst so far. In the small back garden, amongst the piles of discarded stuff, was a supermarket trolley upside down. Leaving me shut in the house, Leroy dragged it out of the brambles and wheeled it inside when Janine was upstairs.

  ‘Come on, Timba. I’m taking you for a ride,’ he said, looking at me with one bright eye. The other one was swollen shut from Janine’s frenzied attack on him. He picked me up and lowered me carefully into the wire trolley. I didn’t like it in there. My paws slipped between the wires and I couldn’t stand up. It was uncomfortable.

  ‘You want something to sit on, Timba?’ he asked – nicely – and took my answering meow as a yes. He grabbed a red-and-white tea towel from the kitchen, folded it, and put it in the trolley. He sat me on it, but it was still uncomfortable. I didn’t like it and tried to climb out. ‘No, Timba. It’s too high for you,’ Leroy said, and kept me there. He looked up at the stairs, and listened. ‘Mum’s asleep,’ he whispered. ‘I’m taking you out in the sunshine.’

  He opened the front door very quietly, and pushed the trolley out into the street. ‘I got a key, Timba,’ he said, and showed me a shiny thing on a string around his neck. He closed the door and I sat still on the red-and-white tea towel, sniffing the afternoon air and distant, familiar smells of grass and honeysuckle. There was the sky above me and the sun was warm on my fur.

  For a few minutes I was OK and might even have felt happy, but Leroy started to run, the trolley bouncing crazily over the rough pavement. Shaken, I clung to the tea towel, meowing in fright. ‘Stop, please stop!’ Crying now, I sent him that desperate thought, but he didn’t get it. At the end of the street he stopped by a portly red letterbox. He picked me up and held me against it, pushing my head into the black slot. ‘That’s where you post letters, Timba,’ he said. I wriggled and kicked with my back legs skidding on the shiny red paint, terrified he was going to drop me into that hole. I twisted round and looked at him, and my eyes must have been black with fear.