October
In just a few
short months Funeral Director Max Dickinson’s cozy little life had been turned
upside down, not that he was complaining, his comfortable middle-aged existence
needed shaking up.
Which was
precisely what Geri Phillips did from the moment she breezed into his life on a
misty January day when she crashed into his car, and it turned out to be the
most wonderful thing that ever happened to him, and that changed everything in his
life in a heartbeat.
But there was a
problem, he was an average looking thirty-four-year-old stick in the mud and
she hadn’t even turned thirty and she was a cute little brunette.
In addition, he
was a funeral director, and she was a wax technician or what he would
refer to as an esthetician, however the bubbly brunette preferred the term
waxologist.
It took all of
his courage to ask her out and he couldn’t believe it when she said yes, but
she did and before he knew it, he had fallen in love with her.
Then he needed
to summon up every ounce of courage to propose, which he did, and again she
said yes which amazed him and shocked his friends and family in the process.
So far so good,
January, meet pretty, young brunette, February, woo pretty, young brunette,
March, fall in love with pretty, young brunette,
May, propose to pretty, young brunette, June move in with pretty, young
brunette, August, marry said pretty, young brunette, and finally in September
buy house with pretty, young brunette wife.
Well, it’s not
actually finally, because it was really more accurate to say, so far, because there
were to be many more chapters obviously.
They moved into
the new house at the beginning of October and after two weeks of them living
together in their new home, all was going well, and they had settled into a
comfortable routine, and it felt as if they had been together forever.
One Sunday
morning as they were sitting in the kitchen eating crumpets, Geri suddenly said
“Can we get a
cat?”
“What for?” he
retorted
“Because I’d
like one” she said sweetly
“Do we have to?”
he sighed
“Don’t you like
cats?” Geri enquired
“I have no
strong opinion either way” he informed her
“So, you don’t
dislike them?” she asked
“No not at all”
he replied
“Are you
allergic?” she queried
“Nope” he
replied
“So can we?”
she asked cutely
“I take it that
you have a strong opinion about cats?” he asked
“Oh yes” she
replied “I love them”
“They’re very
lovely, they’re good company, they’re clean, they’re not demanding” she
continued but he remained unconvinced.
“And they keep
mice away” she added as if that one reason underlined all the others
“We don’t have
mice” he stated
He had never
had mice in his old house in all the years he had lived there and was not at
all unhappy with that fact and he didn’t need a cat to achieve that.
All through his
childhood at his parents’ house they didn’t have a cat, and they were mice free,
so the point seemed moot.
“Please,
please, pretty please” she begged, and he was helpless to resist
“Ok, ok” he
conceded
“Yey” she
screamed and jumped up and down before planting a kiss on his mouth.
“But” he
interjected
“But?” she
repeated
“There are
certain conditions” he stated
“Which are?”
she asked
“No Toms” he
said “I don’t want spraying in the house”
“Check” she
responded
“I’m the only
alpha male in this house” he said pompously
“Ok Tiger” she
mocked
“No rescue
cats, I don’t want to take any chances on getting a psychologically disturbed
one” he continued
“Check” she
responded
“And no kittens”
he added
“Ok” she agreed
“Anything else?”
“No that’s the
lot” he confirmed
“Good get your
coat on” she instructed
“What for?” he
asked
“I said we’d
pick the cat up before 11 o’clock” Geri said cheekily
“And how did
you know I’d say yes?” he asked
“Because you’re
lovely” she replied “and you love me”
“Yes, well just
remember that cutesy stuff won’t work once you lose your looks” he told her as
we were going out the door
“It’ll still
work even when I’m old and wrinkled” she said cockily
They were going
to Mrs. Cooper’s house, just a few doors down from them.
She was a
lovely lady, who sadly was having to give up her cottage and the Village and
move into a sheltered housing scheme Sunny Pines in Pipershaven where pets of
any kind were not permitted.
Elizabeth had a
sweet little two-year-old black female cat called Blackberry for whom she was
looking for a good home and they were it.
Well, all went
swimmingly with Blackberry’s arrival, she quickly took to them and made herself
at home and although Max had misgivings about getting a cat, he was happy that
he had agreed, but then the presents started to arrive.
He would wake
up in the morning and make his way downstairs to make coffee and there it would
be, a mouse, a vole, a bird and, on one occasion, a coy carp.
All either dead
or very near death and all of them gifts, for Max the alpha male, from the
huntress, and sometimes Blackberry would be in attendance smugly guarding her
latest trophy.
On one
particular morning in early November, he came downstairs to find a squirrel.
“My God
Blackberry what on earth have you brought me this time?”
As soon as his
foot landed on the hall floor, she started rubbing herself around his ankles
making a series of chirruping noises as she did so.
Then she would
go and circle the stricken Squirrel, look up at him then at her prey and then
back at him as if to say
“Look what I
did”
“Yes, very
good, well done” he said without enthusiasm although he had to admit he was
impressed.
Then she
returned to his ankles and repeated the whole process again.
Blackberry had
just got to the point where she was saying to me
“I did that,
that was me”
Then Geri came
halfway down the stairs and hung over the banister to enquire
“What’s going
on?”
“Blackberry
brought in a Squirrel” he told her
“A Squirrel?”
she exclaimed “wow who’s a clever girl then?”
The cat
responded to that by repeating the whole rubbing, chirruping and gloating
sequence.
“Who’s a clever
girl?” he said to himself as he slipped his unstockinged feet into a pair of
wellies.
That was all
well and good, but she wasn’t the one who had to take the poor suffering
twitching creature up the garden to finally dispatch it with a spade.
Of course,
finding dead offerings in the hall was far better than the alternative.
You see
Blackberry didn’t catch mice and such to display them as trophies or to
supplement her diet.
She brought
them into the house primarily as toys and she would play with them for hours,
but sometimes they got away which is why he recalled what Geri had said about
cats
“They’re very
lovely, they’re good company, they’re clean, they’re not demanding” she
continued
“And they keep
mice away”
Well, there
were never any mice to keep away, until they got a cat.
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