The cat sat on the windowsill, staring down at the yard where pigeons squabbled over a crust of bread. Simon watched the cat. Seven years they had lived together, not counting his wife Emma and their daughter Lucy. But the cat—Tiger—was his. From the very first day, when a three-month-old ball of fur had latched onto his jumper and fallen asleep in the crook of his elbow.
Emma was simmering stew on the stove, the smell of bay leaf drifting through the kitchen. Lucy, twelve years old, sat at the table, her thumb scrolling across her phone screen. An ordinary Saturday evening, the kind there had been a hundred times before and would be a hundred times again. But Simon noticed his daughter kept glancing at her mother with a kind of expectant look. And her mother, stirring the stew, gave her a subtle nod, as if they had agreed on something beforehand.
“Dad,” Lucy began, in that voice she used when asking for a new phone or permission to sleep at a friend’s.
Simon put down his newspaper.
“Yes?”
“Well, Lena’s cat had kittens. And there’s one nobody wants. He’s a bit lame—front leg’s crooked. They’re going to… you know…”
She didn’t finish, but it was clear enough. Simon looked at Emma. She was stirring the stew with extra vigour, though there was nothing left to stir.
“No,” he said. Not angrily, not harshly. Just said it.
“But why?”
“Because we’ve got Tiger. He’s seven years old, he’s used to being alone. You bring another one in, there’ll be fights, marking, even more fur. I’m against it.”
Lucy looked at her mother. Emma turned off the hob and sat down beside her husband.
“Simon, the kitten’s three months old. The leg healed wrong. If nobody takes him, Lena’s taking him to the shelter, and they don’t keep ones like that.”
Simon understood. But he didn’t nod.
“I’m against it,” he repeated, and lifted his newspaper.
—
A week passed. Lucy didn’t ask again, but at dinner she passed him the bread in silence. And Emma stopped asking how his day at work had been. Simon felt it like a draught—the windows shut, but a chill creeping in anyway.
On Friday, Lucy came home from school with red eyes. She dropped her rucksack by the door and went to her room. Emma went in after her, and came out ten minutes later.
“What?” Simon asked.
“Lena said they’re taking the kitten to the shelter tomorrow morning. There’s a place on the outskirts, but Lucy saw photos from there. Tiny cages, maybe two hundred cats, the smell…”
Emma wasn’t pushing. She just told him, then went to wash the dishes.
Simon stood alone in the hallway. From Lucy’s room there was no sound at all, which was worse than crying.
—
In the morning, Simon woke earlier than anyone. He only got up this early for fishing, and the season hadn’t started yet. The kitchen light was on above the stove; the window showed a grey dawn. He pulled on his jacket, grabbed his car keys, and left.
He’d found Lena’s address in Lucy’s phone the night before, while she was asleep. Scribbled it on a scrap of paper and shoved it into his jacket pocket.
He parked outside Lena’s building and dialled.
“Hello?” A sleepy, irritated voice.
“This is Simon, Lucy’s father. Is the kitten still with you?”
A pause.
“Yes… yes, still here. They’re coming from the shelter at eleven.”
“Don’t bother. I’ll take him. I’m coming up now.”
He hung up and sat in the car for a minute.
Lena opened the door in her dressing gown, wordlessly handed him a shoebox. Inside, on an old towel, sat a kitten. Grey-striped, thin. The front leg stuck out at an odd angle, as if put together in a hurry. Yellow eyes, frightened.
“He’s quiet,” Lena said. “Hardly mews. Eats anything. Litter-trained.”
Simon nodded, took the box, and carried it to the car.
—
He returned home while everyone was still asleep. He set the box on the hallway floor, took off his jacket. The kitten inside made no sound. Simon peered in: the little creature had pressed itself into the corner, staring up at him without blinking.
“Well, what am I supposed to do with you?” Simon murmured.
The kitten raised its crooked paw, as if trying to reach his finger but falling short. Simon sighed. He went to the kitchen, poured some milk into a saucer. Then he remembered kittens shouldn’t have milk, tipped it out, got some boiled chicken from the fridge, and chopped it finely.
When he returned to the hallway with the saucer, Tiger was already sitting beside the box, looking inside. His tail didn’t twitch, his back wasn’t arched.
The kitten scrambled out of the box, limping, made its way to the saucer, and started eating. Tiger sniffed and walked off to his armchair. No fight, no hissing.
Lucy found the kitten first. Simon heard a stifled gasp from the bedroom, then quick footsteps, and his daughter burst in with the kitten in her arms.
“Mum! Mum, where did he come from?!”
Emma sat up in bed, squinting sleepily. She looked at the kitten, then at Simon. He was lying there, hands behind his head, studying the ceiling with great care.
“Dad?” Lucy turned to him. Her voice trembled. “Was it you?”
“If you make a fuss, I’ll take him back,” Simon grumbled, not taking his eyes off the ceiling.
Lucy sat on the edge of the bed and cried. Not the kind of crying you do at school from being upset, but a different kind—when you can’t put it into words. The kitten in her arms went still, pressing against her jumper.
Emma said nothing. She placed her hand on Simon’s arm and squeezed it. Quick, short. Then she got up and went to the kitchen to put the kettle on.
—
They named the kitten Muffin. Lucy wanted to call him Duke, but Simon said, “Duke? He came out of a shoebox. He’s Muffin.” And Muffin settled in as if he’d always lived there. Tiger kept his distance for the first week, tolerated him by the second, and by the end of the month they were sleeping together on the same armchair—Tiger, ginger and dignified, and Muffin, grey with his crooked leg, tucked into Tiger’s side.
Simon would watch them in the evenings and say nothing. Once Emma asked, “You were against it. What changed?”
He was quiet for a moment, scratching Muffin behind the ear. The kitten purred and half-closed his eyes.
“Lucy was crying. I could hear it through the wall. And I thought—I’m always fixing things, but here there was nothing to fix. Just to go and fetch him. Simple as that. And I was holding out over what? A bit of extra fur?”
Emma smiled and said nothing more.
—
Six months later, Muffin had grown. His leg was still crooked, but he tore through the flat like a mad thing, knocking over slippers and leaping onto the wardrobe. Tiger would just watch him go.
And Simon sometimes caught himself in the evening: Tiger on his lap, Muffin asleep on his shoulder, football on the telly, and he didn’t hear the score because he was afraid to move.
And that, perhaps, was better than any score.
