A CAT CALLED MERLOT

Thursday 12th August 2021

I looked around at the decaying houses on the estate. Opposite us, a big dog was chained up in a front garden and a group of teenagers stood on a street corner with skate boards, smoking cigarettes and laughing. When a car appeared with blackened windows, the mood changed and they dispersed. From somewhere above, a baby began to cry and a woman cursed. The noise was all at once drowned out by a burst of loud music from a house that made the world pulsate with a monotonous beat that rose up through the pavement and reverberated through my body, making me feel a little sick. This place and its atmosphere reeked of all sorts of dangers and as I lifted my head and sniffed the air, nothing smelled right. Somewhere, in this dystopian world, Marjorie was being held captive. I forced myself not to imagine how she was being treated but busied myself instead, with following Kes, who walked with purpose along the hot pavements, hood of her sweatshirt up, avoiding eye contact with anyone we passed. Finally, she glanced round to check I was with her and she slipped into another passageway that was filled with overgrown brambles and stopped. Beckoning me to her, she bent down and put her finger to her lips. “I’m pretty sure you understand what I’m saying, Merlot,” she whispered. “They live at the end here. At the back is a big shed where they keep all their stuff. I reckon they’ve got Marjorie in there, so I’m going to have a look around. Keep watch. If you hear or see anyone coming, yowl at the top of your voice and run! I’ll meet you back in the fields.” With that, she was gone.

The front garden of the large house was filled with old lawn mowers, a rusty fridge and a sofa that had seen better days. In the driveway, I recognised the truck the men had used to take Marjorie and my heart lifted a little in the hope we would find her. Kes bent low, made her way down the side of the vehicle and crept, cautiously to the back of the house. I followed, on high alert for any sound of the men but there was nothing. When we reached the shed, she turned the handle and the door opened, easily. Inside, there was an assortment of gardening equipment, brown boxes piled nearly to the ceiling and other tools I didn’t recognise. As my eyes quickly grew accustomed to the dark, I saw a cage at the far end and in it, Marjorie lay, crying quietly. My heart felt about to burst but we weren’t yet out of the woods. I heard a door open from somewhere and voices. Kes heard it too and she grabbed me and dived behind a big machine. 

  “Who left the **** door open?” Said a voice I recognised. It was the man that abducted Marjorie. I felt my tail start to expand and Kes held me closer.

  “How would I know?” 

  “Well, we need to get the cat loaded up. It’s a long drive.” He stopped dead and swore as he realised he’d forgotten something. “You go and get the van keys and a couple of bottles of water. My phone’s in my bedroom, I think.” They moved off, talking about football and traffic, and laughing. Like lightening, Kes moved to the cage and opened it, lifting a very surprised Marjorie out. Holding her to her chest and stroking her reassuringly, she whispered in her ear as we made our way quickly back to the door and out into the sunlight. 

Just before we got to the end of the drive, one of the men reappeared and spotted us. With a shout, he sprinted towards Kes, who put Marjorie to the ground and told us to run like there’s fish for tea. As he got near, he made a lunge at Marjorie and caught the end of her tail. Hearing her yowl, I did a sort of summersault in mid air, landed next to them and bit him as hard as I could on his hand. With a yell, he loosened his grip on her and we were off, down the road, following Kes through the streets, until we arrived back at the fields, where we all lay breathless in the long grass and waited.