JEM

Last Saturday, I told my father’s cat to stop scratching the wardrobe. Dad had been dead for six weeks. I was trying to clear his bedroom before the house went on the market. The cat had been living with me since the funeral. I brought him along when I spent the day packing, thinking he might prefer somewhere familiar. Every time, he went straight to Dad’s room. He ignored the empty bed and the chair by the window. He sat in front of the wardrobe, scratching the door and crying. I moved him away. He went back. I checked his water, offered him food, and opened the curtains. Nothing helped. By that weekend, I was tired of making decisions about every object Dad had owned. Sell the dresser. Donate the clothes. Keep the photographs. I’d spent twenty minutes holding a chipped mug because I remembered him drinking from it. After that, I started working faster. The cat kept scratching. “Give me a minute,” I said, more sharply than I needed to. I wondered whether a mouse had got into the wardrobe. The house had been empty, and there were gaps behind the shelves. I finally put the packing tape down and opened the door. He stopped crying immediately.

Last Saturday, I called my son inside for lunch three times. He ignored me. So did the three cats standing beside him. All four were lined up at the garden gate, watching a man unload a van across the street. My son had one hand resting on the orange cat’s back, as though they were discussing whether the man needed help. Two years ago, those cats fitted together in a shoebox. I found them behind a storage shed, small enough that I was afraid to pick them up wrong. We looked for their mother, asked around, and eventually brought them home. My wife was pregnant at the time. I told her we’d get them through the first few weeks, then find proper homes for them. She still brings that sentence up. There were late feeds, little faces to wipe, and towels constantly in the wash. I kept a chart because I couldn’t remember which kitten had eaten and which one was simply shouting again. By the time anyone offered to take one, I’d started explaining why that particular kitten couldn’t leave the other two. Eventually, my wife stopped asking when they were going. Then our son arrived. The cats watched him from a distance at first. When he started crawling, they moved their naps to places he couldn’t reach. But once he could walk, something changed. Wherever he went, there were three cats somewhere nearby. I thought they were following him because he dropped food. Then I started noticing what happened whenever there was a noise outside.