The Kitten Hunt

by Anna Wilson

  ‘Go away!’ I shouted.

  A passing man walking his dog gave me a funny look and then walked quickly in the other direction.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Kaboodle said softly.

  I sighed a wobbly tear-filled sigh and scooped Kaboodle up into my arms without waiting for an invitation. I knew none of this was his fault. I couldn’t speak, though – couldn’t tell him what was going on in my mind. I was so confused. I ended up burying my face in his fur and breathing in that dark musky smell of his.

  Kaboodle purred an even deeper purr and licked my cheek with his sandpaper tongue We sat there, saying nothing, until I began to feel hungry. I didn’t want to go home though, and I didn’t have any money. I got up and motioned for Kaboodle to follow me. I needed to move around to stop myself from freezing solid.

  We walked through the park. We must have looked odd, a girl taking a kitten for a walk, but my mind was on other things.

  ‘What am I going to do?’ I asked Kaboodle at last. I flumped down on to another bench and settled Kaboodle back on to my lap and stroked him, as much to keep myself warm as to pet him.

  ‘You know, Bertie, one good thing could come out of all this,’ Kaboodle said.

  ‘Oh yeah?’ I snapped. He wasn’t going to try and convince me that Pinkella would be a good mum, like Jazz had the night before, was he?

  ‘Well, if your dad marries Ms P, you and I will be living together,’ Kaboodle purred.

  I nodded quietly. That would be cool. But it didn’t make me change my mind.

  ‘Let’s go to Jazz’s,’ Kaboodle suggested, breaking the silence.

  I must have looked surprised at this suggestion, because Kaboodle put his head on one side and fixed me with a serious look. ‘I hate to admit it but she’s going to be more help to you than I can ever be,’ he added sadly ‘I can’t exactly offer you a place to stay or give you any food, can I?’ He was right. All I wanted right that minute was for my best friend to give me a hug and tell me everything was going to be OK. Minutes later I plodded up the driveway to Jazz’s front door, shivering quite violently now rubbing my arms and stomping my feet to keep warm. Kaboodle sat by me while we waited for someone to come to the door.

  ‘Shouldn’t you go home?’ I muttered through chattering teeth.

  ‘No,’ he said simply. ‘I’m not leaving you until I know you’ll be all right.’

  A light flicked on in the hall and there was the sound of running footsteps, then Jazz flung open the front door.

  ‘Thank goodness!’ she screamed and flung her arms round me, whipping my face with her braids. ‘We were so worried.’

  ‘Eh?’ I mumbled into a mouthful of hair and beads. What was Jazz worried about? She didn’t know I’d run off—

  ‘Bertie!’

  I backed out of Jazz’s arms sharply. I was face to face with Dad.

  ‘No!’ I cried. ‘I don’t want to talk to you! I don’t want to see you ever again!’

  I turned back to the door but Jazz had placed herself firmly in front of it and wouldn’t let me out. Dad came up behind me and put his hands on my shoulders.

  ‘You’re freezing!’ he said, trying to hug me.

  I whirled round and pummelled my fists at him. ‘Get off me!’ I yelled. ‘Get off! Go and find your girlfriend and get her to give you a hug.’

  ‘My WHAT?’ Dad cried.

  ‘I tried to tell you, Mr F,’ said Jazz.

  He caught hold of my elbows and shook me gently. ‘Bertie, what girlfriend?’ he asked, his voice struggling to hide an urgent tone.

  ‘Oh, please. You know exactly what girlfriend!’ I spat. ‘Pinkella – I mean, Fen-ella – Ms PINKINGTON!’ I yelled.

  ‘Told you,’ said Jazz.

  And then Dad did something completely unexpected, and in the circumstances, totally unsettling.

  He laughed.

  And it wasn’t just a snort or a chortle. It was a full-on, throat-wobbling, belly-exploding, out-of-control eruption that filled the hallway and shook me to my boots. Or trainers. He let go of my elbows and held his own sides as he fought to get his breath back.

  I stood there, glowering at him, hands on hips, waiting for this bout of hysteria to stop. Jazz shrugged and pulled a face as if to say, ‘No idea what that’s all about.’

  I tapped my foot impatiently.

  Kaboodle, meanwhile, had gone into hiding under the coat stand and whispered, ‘I think you should phone for the vet. He looks as if he needs to be put out of his misery.’

  I shot a withering look in his direction and then shouted above the ridiculous cacophony of whooping and wheezing gathering force in front of me, ‘WILL SOMEONE PLEASE TELL ME WHAT IS SO AMUSING?’

  Dad wiped his eyes extravagantly on the back of his sleeve and motioned for me to follow him.

  In the kitchen he pulled up a couple of chairs, and still wheezing and hiccuping with the remnants of hysteria, he made it clear he wanted me to sit down. I did, but I was frowning hard and feeling very confused, not to say hurt. Jazz had followed at a safe distance and stood in the doorway. Her mum appeared over her shoulder and looked as though she was about to ask what was going on, but the expression on my face probably changed her mind. In any case, she disappeared swiftly, whispering to Jazz and dragging her away by the arm.

  Dad reached across the table and took one of my hands. I tried to pull it away, but he held on firmly. ‘Listen, Bertie,’ he said, in a suddenly serious tone that forced me to look him in the eye, ‘I am not going out with Fenella Pinkington, OK?’ He waited for my reaction. I didn’t satisfy him with one. ‘I’m not going out with anyone! Bertie,you’ve got to believe me! Whatever gave you that idea?’

  That’s when I really exploded. ‘OH, I’ve absolutely NO IDEA what could have given me the impression that you and that PINK PERSON were dating!’ I yelled. ‘Now, let me see . . . could it be that you went out with her last night and shoved me over here to get me out of the way? Or that you’ve spent more time with her these past two days than you’ve spent with me in the past year? Or that I walked in on you today while you were DOWN ON ONE KNEE AND DECLARING YOUR UNDYING LOVE FOR THE WOMAN?’ I ended, narrowing my eyes at him witheringly.

  I was pleased to see that Dad’s jaw had dropped so low that it was practically lying on the floor. And the temperature in the room seemed to have dropped a few degrees.

  The only sound was the fridge humming like a demented wasp.

  Eventually Dad closed his mouth. He made a throat-clearing sound and a look of bewilderment crossed his face. ‘Bertie,’ he said finally, and I hardly recognized his voice, it was so small and hurt, ‘how could you think those things? I’m so sorry.’ He shook his head. ‘I owe you an explanation.’

  I nodded a bit shakily, my lips firmly clamped in a tight line, quivering with anticipation and fear. Somewhere deep inside I knew I was being a bit dramatic, but I didn’t care.

  Dad blinked, took off his glasses and cleaned them on his shirt. ‘Bertie,’ he said slowly, ‘I’ve been wo rking on something for a while. A private writing project. I hadn’t told anyone about it because it was just a bit of a dream, really. Pie in the sky. A kind of release from the rubbish I have to write for my job. I never imagined I would actually show it to anyone. But then I got chatting to Fenella last weekend when she came home early from her, erm, unfortunate experience in Scotland.’

  He stopped and looked at me.

  ‘So?’

  Dad took a deep breath and continued. ‘OK, let me start from the beginning,’ he said.

  19

  The Play’s the Thing

  Dad cleared his throat and shuffled in his chair. I bit my nails nervously. Then he began.

  ‘Remember Fenella said she’d gone for an audition for a film called Love, Don’t You Know?’ he asked, ‘and she’d been rejected because the director said she was too old for a leading role in a romantic comedy? Well, we were chatting about this and how awful and ageist it was, and then Fenella asked me what I did for a living
and so I told her about my dreary job.’

  ‘What has this got to do with anything?’ I muttered, getting impatient again.

  Dad smiled weakly. ‘I was just getting to that,’ he said. ‘I was sympathizing with Fenella about the fact that it gets harder and harder to find interesting jobs once you’re older, and that it was the younger writers on the newspaper who are picked to cover the best stories. Then suddenly Fenella had a brainwave.’

  ‘Good grief!’ I muttered. ‘Was it pink, by any chance?’

  Dad raised his eyebrows and said, ‘She suggested that I have a go at writing something for her.’

  ‘What, an article about being “In the Pink”?’ I jeered.

  ‘No,’ said Dad, completely ignoring my sarcasm. ‘A play!’ His eyes twinkled.

  ‘A play,’ I repeated, putting my hands on my hips.

  ‘Yes!’ said Dad. ‘So I said,“Well, it’s funny you should say that because I’ve been writing a play for months in my spare time,” and she said, “How thrilling!” and asked if she could read it.’ Dad paused as if he was waiting for me to say something, but when it became obvious that I wasn’t going to, he finished, ‘So that’s what we’ve been doing together.’

  I still didn’t completely understand. ‘What do you mean? WHAT have you been doing together?’

  ‘Working on the script!’ Dad beamed. ‘Fenella took the first draft away with her last weekend and asked if we could meet up again last night. She said she would give me some feedback and promised to be brutally honest. I was so worried that she would think it was a load of nonsense that I didn’t want to tell you about it until she had read it, so I kept it a secret from you.’

  ‘Well, thanks a lot, Dad,’ I said. ‘You had a right go at me when I didn’t tell you about the Pet-Sitting Service, and then you go and keep a secret like this from me? And let me go around believing you and . . . that woman were going on a date!’

  Dad blushed. ‘I know . I’m sorry.’ He looked down at the table and began tracing patterns on the wipe-clean tablecloth, like a child being told off by the teacher.

  Poor Dad. He was so excited about this play thing. He just wanted me to be excited about it too.

  I came round to his side of the table and put my arms around him and leaned my head on his shoulder.

  ‘I really am sorry, Bertie,’ he mumbled. ‘I’m a rubbish dad, I know – working all the time, palming you off on Jazz and her family. I just find it so hard sometimes, keeping things going and doing that stupid, boring old job just to pay the bills. I’ve tried to do my best, y’know,’ he added softly.

  I pulled away from him and hoicked myself up on to the table to face him. He looked up at me and smiled faintly. ‘Tell me about this play, then,’ I said, smiling encouragingly.

  Dad’s face brightened and he said, ‘Really? You want to know?’

  I nodded.

  And then he told me that he’d had an idea about a year ago to write a play which was a romantic comedy, and he’d started on it in the eve – nings when I’d gone to bed. It had become a bit of an obsession though, and soon he found himself wanting to write it at weekends too. He was struggling to meet his deadlines for the newspaper as well as scribbling at his play, which was why he’d been so away-with-the-fairies most of the time.

  ‘Anyway, the great thing is that Fenella loves the idea!’ he explained. ‘And she thinks that with her contacts in the theatre and film industries and with my local contacts through the paper, we could put on our own production of it, right here in town! And on top of that, she thinks this could be just the thing to save the old theatre that everyone’s got so heated about.’

  ‘What – the one that’s going to be knocked down and turned into a car park?’ I asked.

  ‘Yes,’ said Dad. ‘That’ll shut the old moaning minnies up – and it’ll make a much better story for the local paper too.’

  Something had just occurred to me. ‘But if Fenella’s too old to get a part in the film she was auditioning for, won’t she be too old to star in a play?’

  ‘You’re forgetting how much people love it when a celebrity does something local! And anyway, my play is written specifically for the “more mature leading lady”,’ said Dad. I rolled my eyes at the dramatic tone in his voice. ‘It’s tailor-made for the older actress. Fenella says it’s got everything: humour, pathos, romance. She thinks it could be a hit!’

  I rolled my eyes even more. As if Dad was going to be the next best thing in Hollywood since plastic surgery!

  ‘So you’re definitely not going out with her?’ I asked, just double-checking.

  ‘Come here, you noodle,’ he said. ‘There’s room for only one real leading lady in my life.’ Dad smiled and opened his arms. It was a bit of an awkward hug with me still perched on the table, but it was a lovely one all the same.

  ‘Ahem!’

  I peered over Dad’s shoulder to see Jazz had reappeared, and was holding a disgruntled-looking Kaboodle.

  ‘When you two have finished all that soppy making-up stuff,’ said Jazz, ‘I thought you’d like to see who I found skulking in the hallway.’ She held Kaboodle out to me as if he were a parcel of sausages.

  ‘I was not skulking,’ said Kaboodle, through gritted teeth. His ears were so flat in indignation that I could hardly make them out. ‘I was trying to find a way out of this overheated hellhole. I could tell that I wasn’t wa nted any more. And besides,’ he sniffed, ‘I needed the loo.’

  ‘Oh no! I hope you didn’t have an accident!’ I cried, and then gasped, my hand flying to cover my mouth.

  Jazz was frowning at me with her you’re-a-nutcase look again. It was becoming a bit too regular an occurrence, her looking at me like that.

  ‘What’s going on?’ said Dad. ‘Who’s had an accident?’

  ‘No one,’ said Kaboodle. ‘We felines are far too hygienic to embarrass ourselves in that way.’

  ‘Good,’ I whispered.

  Jazz sighed. ‘Like I said, now you and your dad are mates again, can you take this cat off me? He must have followed you here. I think you should take him back to Ms P’s.’

  Dad said, ‘Oh, is that Fenella’s kitten? Strudel or something?’

  ‘Kaboodle,’ Jazz and I chorused.

  ‘Obadiah de la Chasse, actually,’ said Kaboodle. ‘But, oh, what’s the point?’

  I giggled. ‘Yeah, we’ll take him home,’ I said, jumping down off the table and letting Jazz put the little cat into my arms.

  ‘I’ll come with you,’ said Dad, putting an arm around my shoulders. ‘Fenella and I can tell you a bit more about the play, then.’

  ‘Play?’ said Jazz. ‘What play?’

  ‘Oh yeah, Dad’s been writing—’

  ‘Nothing,’ said Dad hastily, gripping my shoulder a bit too tightly.

  ‘Da-ad?’ I said, looking up at him.

  ‘I – I’m not ready to tell everyone about it yet,’ he said.

  ‘Dad, you know what? I think we’ve got to make a pact,’ I said firmly.

  ‘Oh yes? What’s that then?’ Dad asked, looking worried.

  ‘We’ve got to promise not to keep any more secrets,’ I said. ‘I kept the pet-sitting from you, and that was wrong, I admit it. But you should have told me what you and Ms P were up to, and not left me to put two and two together and make one hundred and fifty-six!’

  ‘You’re right,’ said Dad. He took a deep breath and looking at Jazz said, ‘I’ve written a play and Fenella reckons it’s quite good, so we’re hoping to do a production of it in the old town theatre.’

  ‘Yay!’ said Jazz, jumping up and down and clapping her hands. ‘Can I be in it? I’ll do anything – I’ll even be backstage if you like.’

  Dad laughed. ‘We’ll see,’ he said.

  ‘Just as long as you keep me out of it,’ hissed Kaboodle.

  I grinned. ‘No worries,’ I whispered in one tiny ear.

  ‘And, Bertie,’ Dad added, giving my shoulder a squeeze, ‘you do realize how bonkers y
ou’ve been, don’t you?’ he laughed. ‘Honestly! Can you imagine me and Fenella – a couple?’

  Kaboodle stretched and flexed his front claws. ‘Not really,’ he said.

  I shook my head at the little kitten. ‘Your miaow is sharper than your claws, you know,’ I breathed.

  Kaboodle nuzzled my cheek and purred.

  Epilogue

  Life was Full Steam Ahead after that. Pinkella was in the paper nearly every other day promoting the refurbishment of the old theatre and giving loads of interviews about the play She got hordes of her old thespian ‘luvvies’ to pledge their money to the upkeep of the theatre and ran a campaign called ‘Keep Theatre Alive and Kicking!’

  And then, once the theatre was up and running, rehearsals started in earnest for Dad’s play Love for Old Time’s Sake.

  The opening night got such fantastic reviews that the rest of the run was a sell-out and Dad was soon hounded with calls from actors and directors alike, a sking him to write more plays. It was, as he could not stop telling me, his ‘dream come true’, especially as it meant he could finally quit his boring old job on the Daily Ranter.

  And it was pretty cool for me, as it meant he worked from home all the time and didn’t have to go out investigating stupid car park stories. We got to spend loads more time together.

  We also spent quite a lot more time with Pinkella. But that was fine by me now I knew she wasn’t plotting to take Dad away. And I finally had to admit that she actually was quite a nice person once I got to know her properly. Especially when Dad took her aside one day and put her straight about calling me Roberta and fussing over my hair and she actually apologized to me!

  Pinkella’s career had taken on a new lease of life after the success of the play. She had been the star of the show, and received letters by the bucketful every day from directors who wanted to put her in other plays and films.

  ‘And it’s all thanks to you, Bertie dear,’ she told me. ‘If it hadn’t been for your Pet-Sitting Service, I would never have come round that night after those dreadful auditions and I would never have had that chat with your wonderful father. You have changed eve rything for the better, Bertie! You are an angel.’