For two weeks, a cat kept coming to the window. The staff couldnt believe it when they found out why.
Emily burst into the nurses stationfresh out of college, her eyes bright, cheeks flushed.
“Margaret! You wont believe ithes back again!”
“Whos he?” The ward sister rubbed her temples, exhausted. The night shift had been gruelling, and now this
“The cat! Grey, with one white ear Hes been sitting there for an hour! And he comes every single daycan you imagine?”
“Every day?” Margaret, the head of the intensive care unit, sighed and shuffled through her paperwork. Their newest patient in Ward Four still hadnt woken upfourteen days in a coma after being hit on a zebra crossing. Some reckless driver had run a red light As if they didnt have enough to deal with already.
Emily perched on the edge of a chair.
“Its been two weeks now. He sits by the window where Mrs. Thompson is. Just stares inside The porters shoo him away, but he always comes back. Weve started calling him the Nightshift Cat.”
Margaret scowleda stray was the last thing they needed. She was about to scold the young nurse but caught something earnest in her voice. Reluctantly, she stood and walked to the window.
There he wasa grey cat with one white ear, just as Emily had described. Thin but clearly once well cared for, his fur mussed but not neglected. He sat oddly upright, like a sentry on duty, his gaze fixed on the window where their unconscious patient lay.
“Good grief,” Margaret muttered. “Weve got someone fighting for their life, and were fussing over a cat”
Still, something nagged at her. The cats persistence, his refusal to leavewhat kind of devotion was that? Most people didnt even show that much loyalty.
“What do we know about the patient?” she asked abruptly.
Emily shrugged. “Not much. Mrs. Thompson, fifty-two. Lives alone, sometimes visited by her daughter. She was hit right outside her block of flats”
“Which block?”
“That grey onejust past the hospital fence.”
Margaret looked back at the cat. He turned his head as if sensing her stare, and a chill ran down her spine at the intensity in his green eyes.
The answer came unexpectedly later that day when Mrs. Thompsons daughter brought in some documents. A photo slipped outMrs. Thompson sitting in an armchair, cradling a grey cat with one white ear.
“Is this?” Margarets voice wavered.
“Thats Whiskers,” the daughter said, wiping her eyes. “Mums cat. Went missing two years agodarted out when the plumbers left the door open. She put up posters, searched every alley She even refused to move. Said, What if Whiskers comes back? How will he find me?”
Margaret felt another shiver. So the cat *had* found herbut too late. Maybe hed been nearby when the ambulance took her away, followed it here, and somehow picked out her window.
“Where where does she live?”
“Just behind the hospital. That grey block of flats”
A sudden beep from the monitors cut through the silence. They rushed inMargaret, Emily, the daughterjust as the ECG showed the first flickers of consciousness. The cat was forgotten.
When Mrs. Thompson finally opened her eyes, everything was a blurbright lights, voices, the hum of machines.
“Mum?” Her daughter, Sarah, leaned in. “Mum, can you hear me?”
Mrs. Thompson managed a weak nod.
“Easy does it,” Margaret soothed. “Youre doing brilliantly.”
Later, Sarah held her mothers hand, tearful but smiling.
“Mum Ive got the most amazing surprise. Youll never believe it. Whiskers is back!”
Mrs. Thompsons eyes widened, her lips trembling. Recognition, disbelief, joyall flashing across her face.
“Dont try to speak,” Margaret said gently. “You need to rest.”
“But imagine, Mum,” Sarah whispered. “*He* found *you*. Came here every day, sat by your window The nurses noticed. And when I brought that photothey knew straight away!”
Tears rolled down Mrs. Thompsons cheeks.
“Ive taken him home,” Sarah went on. “At first, he wouldnt leave the hospitalkept trying to come back. But weve made a deal. Ill bring him to see you every day, once youre well enough.”
When Mrs. Thompson was moved to a regular ward, Sarah arrived with a large carrier bag, a disgruntled meowing coming from inside.
“No pets allowed!” a porter snapped.
But Margaret just waved a hand. “Let it be. That cats earned his place more than most.”
“Honestly,” Emily muttered. “We thought we were imagining things.”
“You werent,” Margaret said quietly. “Sometimes love finds a waypast every obstacle, even time.”
“Nearly there,” Sarah cooed, lifting a ruffled Whiskers from the bag. “Youll see her in a second”
The cat froze, sniffed the airthen bolted for the bed in a blur of grey fur.
“Careful!” Margaret calledtoo late.
Whiskers was already nuzzling Mrs. Thompsons face, purring so loudly it echoed down the corridor. And sheshe laughed and cried at once, her trembling fingers stroking his fur.
“My God,” Emily whispered, wiping her eyes. “Its like something out of a film.”
After that, Sarah visited daily. Strangely, Whiskers seemed to *know* when it was timepromptly at four, hed pace by the door, yowling impatiently.
“How do you *do* that?” Sarah would laugh. “Can you read clocks now?”
Hed just flick his tail, eager to go*Hurry up, Mums waiting.*
“You know,” Margaret mused one day, watching them, “in twenty years of medicine, Ive seen a lot. But this”
She trailed off, searching for the right words. Then she smiled.
“Maybe we humans still have a thing or two to learn about loyalty.”
Back at home, Whiskers curled up beside Mrs. Thompsons bed just as he had years beforeas if no time had passed, no coma, no hospital vigil.
And Margaret? She saw things differently now. Whenever someone claimed animals couldnt love or that miracles didnt happen, shed just smile. Because she knewreal magic didnt come from wands or fairy tales. It came from love.
And every time she walked past that grey block of flats, shed glance up at the third-floor window. There, sunbathing on the sill, was a familiar silhouetteWhiskers, eyes half-closed, perfectly content.
