Kitten Cupid (5 page)

‘Badger’s quite a cool name. I’d be pretty upset if I was called “Mr Woo-woo” though,’ I sneered.

Bex laughed. ‘People can sound crazy when it comes to their pets, can’t they?’

I wondered if she thought
I
was crazy, espedaily since she’d heard me talking to Jaffa like she could understand every word I said. Which of course she could.

Bex carried on. ‘But, hey, I’m a complete nutcase when it comes to Sparky! I love him to bits. If anything happened to upset him, I’d be right on to one of these chat rooms and I’d probably be writing five-page essays about it! Not that I can see Sparky finding it easy to hide behind the yogurts and the cheese – he’d probably scoff it all down in the blink of an eye and be left with nothing to hide behind. And I’d be left with a fridge full of freezing stuffed dog and nothing else!’

This conjured up such a bonkers image that I dissolved into fits of giggles, which then set Bex off too. Soon the pair of us were hooting and shrieking and coming up with even more loony ideas of what Sparky would get up to.

Perhaps having Bex around the place wasn’t so bad after all.

‘G
ood to see you two having fun.’

It was Dad. I’d been having such a blast with Bex that I hadn’t heard him come in.

‘Oh, hi!’ I said, wiping tears of laughter from my face.

‘Tee-hee! Er, hi,’ said Bex coyly.

‘Right . . . I-I’ll just go and get on with my homework,’ I stammered, pushing the chair back and making for the door. ‘I’ve got shedloads of the stuff.’

‘Oh no, you won’t,’ Dad said, barring the way. I looked up at him and realized that he was actually looking pretty grim-faced. ‘You’re not doing anything or going anywhere until you’ve cleaned up the mess downstairs.’

‘What?’ Bex and I cried in unison.

Dad folded his arms and looked at us both, head on one side in a yeah-yeah-pull-the-other-one-why-don’t-you expression. ‘So you’re telling me you have no idea how the kitchen got into the state I’ve just found it in?’ he asked.

Bex and I looked at each other, jaws hanging open.

We followed him downstairs, Bex filling Dad in on what she had found when she’d come in from work earlier.

‘Well, it looks like she’s been up to even more tricks,’ Dad said, as we walked into the kitchen, to be met by a pretty impressive replica of the scene Bex had described earlier.

‘Oh my word, she
has
done it again!’ Bex’s voice rose in disbelief.

Jaffa was crouched on the worktop under an open cupboard door, surrounded by what could only be described as a scene of devastation: ripped-up teabags, packets of crisps and peanuts, rice, pasta and cereals were tumbling off the surface on to the floor to join other shredded items of food and packaging, and yet more bits and pieces were falling out of the cupboard, as if Jaffa had, moments before, been rummaging about in there, throwing things over her shoulder in a frenzied hunt for something to eat.

‘Jaffa!’ I breathed.

‘I have to say that whoever left the cupboard door open was a bit daft,’ Dad said. I could tell he was trying to keep a lid on his temper for Bex’s benefit.

‘Well, it wasn’t me,’ said Bex, turning to me. ‘And I know it wasn’t Bertie because she was with me the whole time, weren’t you?’

I nodded. ‘That’s right,’ I said. ‘Just had a cuddle with Jaffsie to warm her up and then we went upstairs to Google something.’

‘
Warm her up?’
Dad repeated incredulously. ‘It’s hardly the bleak midwinter out there.’

‘No, er, I haven’t had a chance to tell you that part,’ said Bex anxiously. ‘Jaffa got shut in the fridge.’

Dad’s eyes bulged from his sockets and he let his hands fall to his sides. ‘Whatever next?!’ he exclaimed.

‘Miiiiaaaaow!’ Jaffa howled, backing into the wall, her forehead crumpled in fear, her hackles up along the back of her tiny neck. ‘Bertie’s dad not be cross with Jaffsie! Jaffsie not do it! Jaffsie frighted.’

‘It’s OK,’ I said softly, making a move towards her.

‘No, it’s not OK!’ said Dad firmly, stepping in front of me. ‘She looks as guilty as sin, and so she should. You are not to go picking her up and cuddling her after what she’s done or she’ll think she can get away with it again!’ Then he turned to Jaffa and shouted,’ You are a naughty girl!’

‘Miiiiiaaaaaow! Me is NOT naughty! Tell him, Bertie,’ Jaffa commanded. If she was a human I would have said she sounded tearful.

‘Nigel,’ said Bex in a measured tone of voice, ‘she’s only a kitten. It’s probably just a phase—’

‘I know she’s only a kitten!’ Dad cried in exasperation. ‘That’s what makes this so insane! If she can make this much mess when she’s only a few months old, what on earth is it going to be like when she’s older?’

Uh-oh. I heard alarm bells ringing urgently in the back of my mind.

‘Oh, it’s not that bad!’ said Bex brightly. ‘I’ll have this lot cleared up in no time. Bertie – why don’t you stick the kettle on? Your dad looks a bit frazzled.’

Even though I was thankful that Bex was speaking up for my little cat, I nevertheless couldn’t silence a nagging doubt: what if Jaffa was behaving in this bizarre way because she didn’t like ‘the Bexy lady’ that much after all? What if this was her way of showing me just how much she hated my leaving her alone all day?

Dad sat down heavily, put his head in his hands and groaned quietly. ‘I always thought having a pet would be hard work, but I never thought little Jaffsie was capable of creating such a disaster area. I mean, look at her!’

Jaffsie had made herself as small as possible and was shivering as she surveyed us with unblinking sapphire-blue eyes. ‘Me really is sorry, Bertie. Really me is,’ she whispered. ‘But you gotta believe it’s not Jaffsie’s fault.’

I just stood by the kettle, shaking my head, not knowing what to say to anyone.

Bex came back in with a mop and a dustpan and brush. ‘Kettle on?’ she chirruped.

I gave a brief nod.

‘Great. Take these, Bertie,’ she said, handing me the dustpan and brush. ‘You sweep and I’ll mop.’

‘Bex, you shouldn’t be doing that!’ Dad protested.

‘Nonsense, you’ve only just got in. Relax,’ said Bex. ‘Jaffa
will
grow out of this, I’m sure.’

‘Me is not growin’ out of nothin’!’ Jaffa protested. ‘Cos me has not grown
into
nothin’ in the first place!’

‘I know,’ I said in as soothing a voice as I could manage.

‘Well, I don’t!’ said Dad irritably. ‘This behaviour is freaky, if you ask me.’

I sniggered in spite of myself. Dad always sounds weird when he uses words like ‘freaky’, as though he’s trying to sound younger than he is.

He shot me an angry look, so I bent down and began sweeping furiously.

‘No, really,’ said Bex, beaming at Dad. ‘Jaffa’s growing up and she’s approaching adolescence in cat years, so it’s not that strange to see her flexing her muscles a bit, putting her stamp on things.’

‘What is the lady sayin’ with all those big words?’ Jaffa asked.

‘You’re growing up and it won’t be long before you’re a teenager!’ I said as quietly as I could.

‘What’s that? A teenager?’ Dad snapped distractedly. ‘That’s all I need. It’s bad enough having a hormonal daughter without having to look after a moody cat as well.’

‘Thanks a lot!’ I cried.

‘No, no, it’s not as bad as all that,’ Bex said hurriedly. ‘It’s like I said: Jaffa’s probably just going through a bit of a phase. But she’ll settle down quickly enough, you’ll see.’

‘Mmm.’ Dad was not going to be convinced that easily. ‘But you don’t seriously think that she could have opened the cupboard on her own, do you? Are you sure neither of you left it ajar, even a tiny bit, by mistake? And what about her getting into the fridge? How did that happen?’

Bex stopped mopping and she and I exchanged puzzled glances. ‘I’ve no idea,’ she said. She sounded as though she was getting a bit peeved with Dad now. For some reason that made me feel bad. I didn’t want them to argue. ‘I was sitting at the table when Bertie came in, looking through some pet-supplies catalogues, and Bertie didn’t even have time to make herself a drink because we heard this mewing coming from the fridge and – well, we ended up looking stuff up on the Internet about cats getting stuck in weird places. Which is when you came in . . .’ She tailed off.

‘So cats can open cupboards and fridges?’ Dad said sceptically.

I found myself thinking that if this was true, my little kitten would have to be freakishly strong.

‘Looks like we’re going to have plenty of fun and games on our hands while Jaffa goes through this “phase” of hers, doesn’t it?’ Dad added.

‘You could fix safety locks on the cupboards,’ Bex suggested. ‘You know, like people do for small children. I think you can get them for the fridge as well.’

Dad went to the kettle, which had just boiled, and poured water into the mugs I’d set out. ‘Not a bad idea,’ he said. ‘Still, it’s a lot of effort to go to and I’m not the world’s greatest DIY expert.’

You can say that again, I thought. I remembered the day he’d promised to fix some shelves for me and had decided it would save time if he didn’t remove the contents first. Everything had come tumbling down on top of him and he’d broken his glasses, my animal ornaments and his nose. I was pretty miffed about the ornaments. I’d spent years collecting them.

I swept up the last of the mess into the pan and chucked it in the bin just as Bex said to Dad, ‘Let’s go and have another look on the Internet. I can show you the stuff I found about cats who get stuck in daft places and maybe we can search for some ways to prevent it happening again.’

‘I’ve got a better idea,’ said Dad. ‘Why don’t I phone for a curry and we all crash out in front of a DVD once Bertie’s finished her homework? I’m bushed.’

Jaffa was pretty happy to join us that evening. I felt a bit odd though, squashed up next to Dad and Bex on the sofa. I kept wondering if they would have preferred it if I hadn’t been there. But I couldn’t exactly ask them that. I sighed inwardly. At least I didn’t have to worry about Jaffa while she was safely with us; she was not likely to get herself shut in the fridge again after getting so cold.

The only ‘chilling’ she would be doing for the rest of the evening would be with us in front of the telly.

T
he next morning I was woken by Dad crashing into my room, his hair sticking up like an electrocuted porcupine and his expression fierce.

‘Get up at once, young lady!’ he commanded, charging over to the curtains and wrenching them open.

‘W-what time is it?’ I asked blurrily. I propped myself up on one elbow and blinked at the watery September sunlight which was shining directly on to my face. I felt like a mole coming blindly out of its tunnel, and frankly I wished I could burrow right back down again into the snuggly dark warmth of my duvet.

‘Six o’clock!’ Dad barked, storming over to the door. He stood there, hands on hips, glaring at me.

‘Six . . . ? But that’s the middle of the
night!’
I whined, pulling my duvet up and preparing to wriggle back underneath it.

Dad was too quick for me; he yanked hold of the edge and swiftly tugged it off me, saying, ‘My sentiments exactly, but sadly you have a kitten who does not seem to know the difference between night and day.’

I closed my eyes and shook my head, hoping in vain that this was a nightmare that would soon go away. I looked up. No good. Dad was still there.

I swung my legs over the side of the bed and staggered across the room to find my slippers. ‘What’s she done now?’ I asked warily, running my fingers through my out-of-control curls.

‘Words fail me,’ Dad said sharply. ‘You had better come and see for yourself.’

Something in Dad’s tone had the effect of flicking a switch on inside my brain. I careered down to the kitchen as fast as my sleep-heavy legs would carry me and saw . . . well, at first I wasn’t sure what I saw. The kitchen was in the kind of state you might expect to find if a bomb had exploded in the middle of it. Chairs were knocked on their sides, a couple of mugs lay broken on the floor, a trail of cat biscuits formed a path from the utility room, and J-cloths and tea towels lay scattered all over the place, cupboard doors were open . . . and Jaffa was sitting on top of one of the highest of those cupboards, shaking and mewing pitifully.