Stephen had always wanted a ginger cat. To be truthful, so had I. I had grown up on a farm where all the cats were gingers. All 7 of them. The one who guarded me and my pram and lived until she was about 15 was Twinkle. She was a great farm cat and died one Christmas Eve of a heart attack, just after the first snowfall of the winter. But back to the main event here.
So, I got a call from a vet friend of ours telling us there was a litter of ginger kittens which had been brought in, were we interested. Mum and the kittens were homeless, they all must be found homes. Off we drove to take a look and "choose". It wasn't hard,even though they were all beautiful. We wanted a boy kitten. In strutted this little ginger stripey chap tail erect, hips swinging, full of confidence and ready to explore the entire surgery. Thats the one we said more or less simultaneously. But we couldn't take him then, paperwork had to be completed first.
We thought the second kitten would be a synch. After all Scooter was there to show him the ropes. We couldn't have been more wrong. Besides we had also aquired two dogs, a rottweiler and a bull terrier. We were a little worried about how "the lads"(one is female incidentally, just a name my Mum coined for them) would take to him.
Scooter hated him, yes, it was that bad. She hissed and spat and then decided to totally ignore him. Cyborg (the rottie) sniffed him, all the hairs on Wickets back stood erect and his weeney tail looked like a bottle cleaner. Stacey (the bullie) taking her lead from the older and bigger Cyborg also sniffed him. He stood his ground.
We had one major problem with Wicket, and that involved his toilet habits. He just didn't get it right. He did it everywhere, under the table under the chair on the tiles in the bathrooms, in the kitchen everywhere but the litter tray. This we realised probably stemmed from when he was in a cage at the surgery as the kittens had a litter tray as their bed, so, I guess his litter box that we were trying to get him to scratch and wee in was effectively in his mind his bed! No wonder he would have none of it. Apart from this maddening habit he was a wonderful kitten.
Stacey became his surrogate Mum and he would sleep curled up against her tummy, she was quite happy with this arrangement. Eventually and with much cajoling and with me actually taking Wicks to the litter box and scrapping his paws in the kitty litter and sitting him down and telling him wot to do he finally got it right, with the occasional mistake, well a kitten has much to do and see, sometimes there's just not the time to take a detour to the litter box you know.
As he grew, we realised we had a wanderer and a very independent cat on our hands. He loved to sit on the corner between three gardens watching the birds, his potential prey. He also used to spend many hours whiling away the time in our neighbours garden, taking no nonsense from his cats and taking over where Scoots had left off. He wouldn't come when called unless he wanted to. He would stand definantly on the neighbours roof and march across the apex and down the other side out of view. It drove us mad. He was effectively just cocking a snoot at us.
At other times he was surprisingly affectionate, he would like to come and curl up on my back if I was reading on the bed, nestling down in the crook of my back after an initial kneeding session... not bad for a back massage and he was pretty gentle with the claws.
At other times if we were sitting on the sun lounger you would be almost asleep but a movement of your foot was far too enticing to be left and a paw with sprung claws would lash out from his position under the bed and sink into your foot or any other part of your anatomy that might be exposed.
Wickets favourite thing was salty biscuits, he simply loved them. If we had the biscuit barrel open on the kitchen counter he would amble across and stick his paw in and fiddle about taking a long look to spot his favourite brand and then quick as a flash out would come a salticrax and off he would scurry.
Cyborg and he became firm buddies and they had quite a system going , if a food item was out of my rotties reach in would go Wicket and knock the food close to the edge of the counter or off on to the floor where Cyborg would gobble up the spoils. I like to think that Wicket got his fair share but perhaps he was just a really accommodating kitty.
As well as catching the odd bird, which we as his human parents did not approve of, he was quite a dab hand at thievary. Twice he came through the burglar bars into the lounge with items of food obviously filched from next door, once a half eaten sandwich and another time a pork chop!
He loved Christmas, well in truth he loved the christmas tree and its myriad of decorations that dangled so temptingly out of kittys reach, unless of course you hopped on to the back of the chair and tapped them off from there. This was not as much fun as launching oneself into the middle of the tree and seeing wot happene of course.
One morning I was in the bedroom when I heard an almight crash, I hardly had time to blink and a streak of orange and half the tree decorations swept past me and out of the window, lengths of tinsel and a couple of sundry baubles dropped from the burglar bars . I looked out of the window to see Wicks racing across the lawn for all he was worth apparently fleeing the vicious tinsel which had naturally launched an unprovoked attack on him. Half way across the lawn the last piece of tinsel freed itself and Wicks lurched to a halt, gazed about , just I am sure to check that no one had seen his somewhat undignified exit and then proceeded to give himself a lengthy groom. He stayed outside for quite some time and they say animals know no embarrassment!
When Wicks was still quite a youngster we acquired another cat, Welsey. My eldest cat Scooter refused to have anything to do with him, but Wicks decided to take him under his wing and show him the ropes. I think Wicks was a little misguided he didn't seem to beleive in corporal punishment and happily succumbed to all manner of Wesley's geurrilla tactics with not so much as a growl let alone a paw raised in anger. And they became inseparable.
During the course of the spring he became unwell. We took him to various vets and he seemed to fair no better. Eventually I decided to take him to have a blood test. Off we went Wicks a happy kitty sitting on the back seat with his paws on my shoulder. We certainly got some astonished looks from other road users. After a while he decided it was better to lie flat out on the rear window shelf.
On my way back I stopped to get a cool drink and when I got back into the car, well it didn't smell too wonderful! I had to take the samples to the medi-clinic for them to send through to the path lab, I must say I got some funny looks there as well,when I said what it was. Perhaps eccentricity runs in the family? For weeks I had to drive around with the windows wound down and dreaded having to stop for petrol, believe me cat pee sure has staying power.
I was used to Wicks not appearing for breakfast on time, he generally could be found stalking about in the neighbours garden, and when called would steadfastly refuse to even acknowledge he had heard you. However I was also used to seeing him milling about by the front door on my return from work complaining bitterly in his tiny voice that this was really not good enough. That night he was nowhere to be seen. Both of us had that sinking feeling but put on brave faces all the same. He was a wanderer, right? He's bound to turn up. Stephen did the walk around the neighbourhood, in fact our immediate neighbours were very fond of Wicks, thief that he was, and even they had not seen him. We started to fear the worst.
Day three without Wicks dawned, and we thought either he had moved house or he had been run over. I gave it one last chance and put his food out on the back patio and did a circuit of the garden, calling and whistling (yes my cats actually do answer to a whistle, my husband thinks it is ridiculous, but it works) . I could hear a very loud yowling, I didn't for a moment beleive it could be Wicks as he, as I mentioned had a tiny voice. I pulled one of the garden chairs close to the wall and leaned over, there he was, I couldn't see anything wrong with him, but I could see his efforts to jump over the wall to the safety of home were being hampered in some way.
There was nothing else for it but to race around to my car and drive to the neighbours, hoping that they were in. I sped down the road and around the corner, my heart thumping. Just as I pulled up my neighbour came out. I told him Wicks was in the garden, so we went through to the back to fetch him.
First of all I couldn't see him, but eventually we located him undeneath the honeysuckle bush, apparently none the worse for wear. He could walk but his tail was dragging. I scooped him up and put him in the car. He settled on to the seat.
It was only when I finally got him indoors that I noticed a large dent and swelling on his back so grateful had I been that he was safely home. I could see what was wrong as he could walk about just fine. Anyhow I gave him some food and settled him onto my bed, he was purring and seemed to be glad to be home. I phoned Stephen to let him know that Wicks was back.
When I got home the news was bad. I think I had been hoping against hope that he would be just fine, of course this is the real world and he wasn't. Stephen said it looked like his back was broken, his tail was just dragging on the ground. Stephen's daughters were staying that weekend, anyway I let Wicks out into the garden for perhaps the last time. Wesley couldn't understand why his best buddy wouldn't play with him, Cyborg his great pal and he sat quietly on the patio. I couldn't face taking him through to the vet so Stephen and his daughter took him.
X-rays were taken his vertabrae had been pulled apart, he was given injections to reduce the swelling, his bladder and bowel were paralysed, they would see if it were merely the swelling that was causing this. After a few days of trying many things, it was obvious he was not going to recover. We went and said goodbye I was pleased that he had been able to say farewell to my other animals.
He was a beautiful cat and we won't forget him and his wicked Wicket ways