"i expect that by tomorrow i will have embellished the story and given myself a heroic status i do not deserve, but all he same, on this night at this hour, i am pleased to record that i acquitted myself well. i mean, how often does one get to rescue a wailing, scared cat from a tree, and come out with only a few scratches, to a few cheers from bystanders?
it's not something i do very often, rescuing animals, as i tend to be as scared as the beasts themselves on the whole, but this particular specimen looked so perfectly cute in its fear - big eyes, sad meowing - that you'd have to have been a hard bastard to have withstood this puss. i have no idea who he {at least, i think it was a he, i didn't look at the offending area, to be honest...} belonged to, and none of the onlookers {two women on a Power Walk, a little boy on a tricycle and a couple of teenagers} had seen it before, and i almost decided to keep it, but i couldn't, and anyway, as soon as moggy hit the ground, after having taken it's claws out of my shoulder, it was off, without a thank you... ungrateful cats... the last time i play he hero...
i was on my way from the shops, getting dinner for just myself {again...} and so deep in thought that the cat's sad cry for help almost went by unnoticed. stuff was occupying my mind, as it has been so often, worries about my job, about the work drying up and the prospect of the dole, and the inevitable feeling lonely during the evening ahead, which i was although used to, at the same time not looking forward to. there's nothing on telly this evening...
cats aren't easy to rescue, i give myself credit. they're awkward little blighters for starters, not happy to picked up unless you're a very close friend, and to this one i wasn't even a distant acquaintance. what chance did i have... i don't envy fire fighters who do this for a living, although they have the distinct advantage of wearing fire-retardant gear {which also happens to be cat-claw-resistant - do fire-clothing designers bear that in mind, i wonder?}, and i was only wearing a thin summer shirt. neither did i have funky equipment to hoist myself nearby the branch it was sitting on, having to climb up with the help of a discarded plastic garden chair which i found in the shrubs, then being amazed that i retained some of the athletic abilities from my youth {now quite a few years back, but still...} and feeling slightly queasy when i looked down, once up on the lowest branch. 'hope this bloody cat understands what i'm doing for him,' i thought, knowing that he very likely didn't give a toss...
i've just finished nursing the scratches, some of them quite deep. the small bottle of Tea Tree Oil and the cotton wool buds, left by the love of my life {as she was known to me for a few months} put to good use finally. i will be nursing a glass of G&T in a bit, in pain and thoughts of an ungrateful cat..."
{the prompt was: pick a novel from your bookshelf and write down the last sentence, from where you create your own short story --
-- my sentence was picked from Adrian Mole, the cappuccino years, from Sue Townsend}
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