by James Bowen
There was no doubt that he regarded her home as a safe haven as well. The previous year, when he’d run away from Angel one evening after being attacked by a dog, he’d headed for Belle’s flat, even though it had been a long walk away. It had taken me hours to work out that he’d taken refuge there. It had been the longest night of my life.
The closeness of their relationship certainly made life easier for me. But it also gave Bob licence to be mischievous.
One morning I got up and headed into the kitchen to make myself a cup of coffee, expecting to find Bob settled there. Just like at home, he tended to hang around in the kitchen early in the day, mainly in the hope of picking up any spare bits of food that might be going. There were times when he could be a real gannet.
Today, however, there was no sign of him. There was no sign of Belle either.
It had been raining heavily that morning but the weather had already cleared. It was now a really bright sunny morning and the temperature was already rising. The forecast was predicting sweltering heat later in the day. I noticed that Belle had already opened the window in the kitchen to let the fresh air into the flat.
‘Bob, where are you mate?’ I said, heading off in search of him, still wearing just my boxer shorts and a t-shirt.
There was no sign of him in the sitting room or the hallway, so I headed to the back bedroom where Belle slept. When I saw the window there was also ajar I got an instant sinking feeling.
Belle’s flat was on the first floor and the back bedroom window overlooked the roof of the extension on the ground floor flat below us. That roof overlooked a yard and, beyond it, the car park for the building. From there it was a short walk to the main road, one of the busiest in that part of north London.
‘Oh, no, Bob, you haven’t gone out there have you?’
I managed to squeeze my head through the gap in the window and scanned the rooftops below. There were extension roofs protruding all the way along the building. Sure enough, five flats along from Belle’s, there was Bob sitting, sunning himself on the roof.
When I shouted his name he slowly turned his head in my direction and gave me a confused look. It was as if he was saying: ‘what’s wrong?’
I had no problem with him sunbathing. I was more concerned with the fact that he could slide off the slippery roof, or that he might go down into the yard and from there out through the car park on to the main road.
I panicked and began taking the security screws off the window so that I could open it fully and climb out on to the roof. After a couple of minutes I was able to squeeze myself through the gap. I still hadn’t managed to put on any clothes.
The slate tiles were slippery from the rain earlier in the morning, so keeping a grip wasn’t easy, especially given the fact I was in agony with my leg. Somehow, however, I managed to scamper across the rooftops to where Bob was sitting. I was within a few feet of him when I realised that I was on a wasted mission.
Bob suddenly picked himself up and scuttled his way back across the rooftops, nonchalantly passing me. When I tried to grab at him, he just growled at me and made a sudden spurt towards Belle’s open window. Again, he shot me a disdainful look. He was soon disappearing back indoors.
I, of course, had a long way to go. It took me a few minutes to scramble back across the slippery slates. To my complete embarrassment, a couple of faces appeared in the windows. The looks on their faces spoke volumes. They were a mix of shock, mild pity and hilarity.
Moments after I got back into the safety of the flat, I heard the front door closing and saw Belle standing in the hallway with a small bag of groceries.
She burst out laughing.
‘Where the hell have you been?’ she said.
‘On the bloody roof trying to rescue Bob,’ I said.
‘Oh he goes out there all the time,’ she said with a dismissive wave of a hand. ‘He even goes down into the yard sometimes. He always comes back up.’
‘I really wish you’d told me that sooner,’ I said, shuffling off to my temporary bedroom to finally put on some clothes.
It wasn’t long before he’d turned the tables, however. Soon after that, it was Belle who was cursing his playful ways.
As I’d discovered the hard way, Bob loved exploring the back of Belle’s block of flats and took full advantage of the fact that he was on the first rather than the fifth floor.
In some ways it was a healthy thing. Bob loved going out there to do his business in the mornings and evenings. But, of course, this also allowed him to exercise his other natural instincts.
I knew that it was part of his DNA to hunt. No matter how much people might think they are cute little fluffballs, cats are also predators – seriously effective predators at that. As we settled into life at Belle’s flat, he began to bring us presents. One day we were sitting in the front room when he arrived with a small mouse dangling from his mouth. He’d placed it carefully at my feet, as if he was offering me a gift.
I’d chastised him about it.
‘Bob, you will make yourself sick again if you eat that,’ I said.
Realistically I knew there was nothing I could do, apart from keeping him under house arrest, which I didn’t want to do. And I wasn’t going to resort to putting a bell on him, at this stage, at least.
Predictably, this meant that he became a little bolder in his behaviour.
One morning, I was lying on my bed, reading, when I heard the most almighty scream. It was Belle.
‘Oh, my God, oh my God.’
I jumped up and ran into the living room where she was doing some ironing. There, sitting on top of a pile of freshly-pressed shirts and bed sheets, was a little brown frog.
‘James, James, pick it up, get rid of it. Please,’ she said, calming down slightly.
I noticed Bob standing in the doorway taking all this in. There was a strange expression on his face, what I could only call mischievousness. It was as if he knew exactly what had happened.
I got hold of the little frog and cupped it in my hands. I then walked the long way round via the front door to the area at the back of the building with Bob following me every step of the way.
I went back inside, started to read my book and forgot all about it. But then, about an hour or so later, I heard another scream, accompanied by the sound of something hitting a wall. This time it was coming from the hallway.
‘What is it now?’ I said, heading towards the kerfuffle.
Belle was standing at one end of the corridor with her hands on her head and a horrified expression on her face. She pointed down the corridor at a pair of slippers that she’d clearly thrown down the hallway.
‘It’s inside my slipper now,’ she said.
‘What’s inside your slipper?’ I said, puzzled.
‘The frog.’
I had to suppress a laugh. But, again, I retrieved the frog and took it out to the garden. Again Bob marched behind me, trying to look like it was a pure coincidence that this frog had now appeared inside the flat twice in the space of an hour or so.
‘Stay there, mate,’ I said, sensing that I had to make sure I disposed of the frog properly this time.
He looked at me disapprovingly then turned and slinked off back into the house as if to say, ‘you’re really no fun at all!’
As comfortable as we were at Belle’s, after a while I began to realise that it wasn’t ideal, in particular for my relationship with Bob.
The pain in my leg had made me short-tempered and generally less fun to be around than usual. So, perhaps inevitably, as time wore on, Bob and I had started spending less and less time together. Sensing that I was sleeping longer and wasn’t in the best of moods when I woke up, he wouldn’t always come into the bedroom for an early morning play. Often Belle would rustle up a breakfast for him instead. He would also head off out of the window to explore the back of the flats on a regular basis and would sometimes be gone for long stretches. I imagined he must be having a great time out there.
I al
so had a very strong suspicion that he was eating elsewhere too. He had begun arriving home from his sessions out on the roof and in the yard around supper time. But when Belle or I put down a bowl for him, he did little more than play with his food. At first my heart sank a little. He’s eating in the bins again, I said to myself. But Belle and I checked the garbage area at the back of the building and came to the conclusion there was no way he could get into the giant, locked receptacles. The explanation must lay elsewhere.
One day, when we were heading out to work, I saw an elderly gentleman downstairs, collecting his mail. Bob saw him and fixed him with a knowing stare.
‘Hello young fellow,’ the man said. ‘Nice to see you again.’
Suddenly it made sense. I remembered that children’s book Six Dinner Sid by Inga Moore, about a cat that charms its way into the affections of everyone on his street, earning himself a dinner in every house each night. Bob had pulled the same stunt. He had become Six Dinner Bob.
In a way it was a sign of how comfortable and happy he was making himself there. But it was also a sign that he was getting used to life without me at the centre of his world. Lying there at night, trying to think about anything and everything but the throbbing pain in my leg, I began to ask myself something I’d not asked in all the time we’d been together. Would he be better off without me?
It was a fair question. Who needed to be hanging around with a crippled, ex-junkie with no money and no job prospects? Who needed to be out on the streets in all kinds of weather being poked and prodded by passers-by? Especially when there were friendlier, less complicated souls around to give you a square meal every day.
I’d always felt that I could give Bob as good a life as anyone else, if not a better one. We were soul mates, two chips off the same block, I told myself. For the first time since we’d got together, I wasn’t so sure about that any more.
Chapter 8
None So Blind
It’s incredible what pain does to the human mind. At night in particular, you lie there, unable to sleep, hallucinating, thinking the most insane things. At one point, for instance, I began to fantasise about having my leg amputated. I imagined having a prosthetic limb instead of the throbbing, bloated one I now had – and was actually comforted by the thought.
Another time, I was limping through the car park in a local supermarket when I saw a wheelchair, sitting there unoccupied. A man was lowering a hydraulic ramp on the back of a small van, from where, I assumed, the chair’s owner would soon be helped out. The thought of being able to travel around without having to put any weight on my foot was really tempting. For a split second, I thought about stealing it. I was ashamed of myself the moment the idea entered my head.
As I lay there in a kind of fever some nights, I also found myself thinking more and more about Bob, or more specifically, losing Bob. The worse my leg became, the more I became convinced that he was ready to leave. I imagined him in the company of the old man next door, being pampered and fussed over. I pictured him lying on the sunny roof at Belle’s without a worry in the world while I hobbled off to sell The Big Issue on my own.
It wasn’t such a leap of the imagination. Back at Belle’s I was spending more and more time on my own, lying in my room asleep. As a result, I had less patience for Bob than usual. He’d sidle up to me on the bed, waiting to play catch with some treats, but I’d fail to respond. Sometimes he would try to drape himself around my leg, which I found unbearable. By now my leg was a violent, red colour and the pain was relentless.
‘Go away and play somewhere else, Bob,’ I’d say, brushing him to one side. He’d reluctantly slide off me and head out of the bedroom door, throwing me a disappointed look as he went. It was hardly a surprise that he was starting to look elsewhere for affection, I told myself afterwards.
I’m not much of a friend to him at the moment.
I knew it wasn’t helping anyone, least of all myself, but I didn’t know what to do to dig myself out of the black hole that had been slowly consuming me these past few weeks. One morning, however, I woke up and decided that enough was enough. I simply had to do something about it. I didn’t care what the doctors thought about me and my past: I wanted some answers, I wanted this problem to go away. I got dressed, grabbed my crutch and headed for the local surgery, determined to have a proper examination.
‘That’s an interesting crutch you have there, Mr Bowen,’ the doctor said when I turned up in the consulting room.
‘Necessity is the mother of invention,’ I said, sticking the weather-beaten pole in the corner and climbing on to the examination table where he began casting an eye over my thigh and leg.
‘This doesn’t look too good. You need to keep pressure off that leg for a week or so. Can you take time off work?’ he asked me.
‘No, not really. I sell The Big Issue,’ I told him.
‘OK, well you need to see what you can do to keep your foot elevated at all times,’ he said. ‘I also need you to have what’s known as a D-Dimer blood test which looks for clotting in the blood cells. I suspect that’s where your problems lie.’
‘OK,’ I said.
‘Now, what are we going to do about this crutch of yours? I think we can do better than a tree branch,’ he said.
‘No chance of a wheelchair?’ I said, suddenly remembering the one I’d seen in the car park.
‘Afraid not. But I could offer you a decent set of crutches while we try to get this swelling and inflammation down.’
By the end of the morning I was the proud owner of a pair of proper metallic crutches, complete with rubber grips, arm holders and shock absorbers. I was soon clunking my way around with my legs flailing in front of me. I was acutely conscious of the way it must have looked. I felt silly, even sillier than I’d looked with a pole under my arm. I could feel what people were thinking about me. It was depressing.
The time for feeling sorry for myself was over, however. I didn’t waste any time and went to have the blood test done the following day. It wasn’t that straightforward, of course. Taking a blood sample from a recovering heroin addict is easier said than done.
The practice nurse at the clinic asked me to roll up my sleeve but when she tried to find a vein she failed miserably.
‘Hmmm, let’s try this other arm instead,’ she said. But it was the same again.
We exchanged a look that spoke volumes. I didn’t need to spell it out.
‘Maybe I should do it,’ I said.
She gave me a sympathetic look and handed me the needle. Once I’d found a vein in my leg, I let her extract the sample. The humiliations of being a recovering addict were endless, but I wasn’t going to let that deter me.
A couple of days later when I rang the clinic the female doctor confirmed my worst suspicions. She told me that I had developed a deep vein thrombosis, or DVT.
‘You have a blood clot which I’d like to have further investigated. So I need you to go to University College Hospital for an ultrasound test,’ she told me.
In a way it was a relief. I’d always suspected I’d caused myself a problem on those long flights to and from Australia. Looking back on it I could see that I’d suppressed the thought for all sorts of silly reasons, partly because I hadn’t wanted to sound paranoid but partly also because I hadn’t wanted to have my suspicions confirmed. I knew that DVTs could cause all sorts of problems, particularly coronary ones, strokes in particular.
Given all this, I was on edge over the next week or so while I waited for the ultrasound appointment. Bob and I carried on going to work but I was only going through the motions. I was terrified to do something that might trigger a stroke or heart attack. I even stopped interacting with him when we sat on the buckets together. He’d look at me every now and again, expecting me to produce a treat so that we could start performing for the commuters. But more often than not my heart wasn’t in it and I’d turn away. Looking back, I was too wrapped up in myself. If I’d looked I’m sure I’d have seen the disappointment wri
tten all over his face.
When the appointment day came I dragged myself to UCH on the Euston Road and passed through a room of expectant mothers waiting in the ultrasound department. I seemed to be the only person who wasn’t excited to be there.
I was led off by a specialist who slapped loads of jelly on my leg so that he could run the camera around, the same as they did for the mums-to-be. It turned out that I had a massive, six-inch-long blood clot. The specialist sat me down and told me that he suspected it had started as a small clot but had thickened and clotted further along the edge of the vein.
‘It was probably hot weather that set it off and then you’ve exacerbated it by walking around on it,’ he said. ‘We will prescribe you a blood thinning medicine and that should sort it out.’
I was relieved. Unfortunately, I wasn’t quite in the clear.
I was prescribed an anti-coagulant that is used a lot to thin the blood of potential stroke victims. But I didn’t pay any attention to the leaflet that came with it. It didn’t occur to me that there might be side effects.
A few nights after I started taking the tablets, I got up at around 5am to go to the toilet. Outside it was pitch black, but there was just about enough light in the flat for me to find my way to the bathroom and back. As I walked down the corridor I could feel something trickling down my thigh. I turned on a light and was horrified to see that my leg was covered in blood. When I got back into my room and switched on the lights, I saw that the sheets of my bed were soaked red as well.
Bob had been fast asleep in the corner, but woke up. He could tell there was something wrong and shot up to stand at my side.