An impossible choice — even for an avowed dog person

The vet had spoken: the cat had to go. For dog’s sake. But, but, there was an odd situation in this household – and Frankie knew something was up.

The cat had to go. Picture: istock

The vet had spoken: the cat had to go. For dog’s sake. But, but, there was an odd situation in this household – I had become the cat’s pet. Cannot explain how it came to this but she owned me, not vice versa. I was masseuse, feeder, groomer, general dogsbody/slave. Was suddenly, meltingly, doing anything to get that eyes-half-closed, chin-thrust-out thrum of demand as she sat on my chest and pinned me, helpless, to the bed. The couch. The anything. Pinned me into submission. And all this from an avowed dog person who’d always scoffed at the mere thought of cats and their weird, obsessed cat appendages known as owners. Now I was one of them. And a vet was telling me she had to go.

You may recall a column announcing Frankie’s arrival, which mightily upset the delicate balance of this household. Most particularly when it came to the dog, Chloe, who for 11 years had ruled the roost as Sole Pet. The issue … Chloe became so stressed by Frankie’s arrival she developed a stress rash. A hairless, angry patch of raw baldness, right above her tail, which she gnawed at. Stress and uncertainty are great attackers of the body’s equilibrium, for all of us, and Chloe’s rash was nasty. A landing strip of rubbly, exposed skin – the result of a reflexive action that soothed and distracted like a human’s nail-biting habit. We watched on, helpless. Nothing would make her stop. Distressing, for all of us, so distressing.

Except for Frankie. Who just stared, coldly, knowingly, at Chloe’s weakness, occasionally hissing or jabbing out a paw if her nemesis strayed too close. We see you, Frankie, we know what you’re doing. And she knew who was boss, we all did, were all enraptured by her beauty as she roamed around her new domain like milky mercury. Meanwhile, bewildered Chloe. The vet administered creams but said sternly that the new arrival had to go. To fix the dog’s rash.

Calls were put out to various cat-type friends. Surreptitiously. Because the cat was a request of the fourth child who’s raised with enormous enveloping love but the benign neglect of 1970s parents (too old, too tired for the obsessive, hovery parenting malarky and honestly, he’s the most self-sufficient of the lot.) But he did request a rescue cat, and rarely asks for anything, and so Frankie duly arrived. And was adored. And now she had to go.

No one, funnily enough, wanted a long-haired white rescue. It may have had something to do with the fur, now colonising our entire existence. Sheets, lounge, cushions, toothbrushes; how could it be so comprehensively … everywhere? I rang the rescue people Frankie was acquired from. They’d take her back, but seemed reluctant, as if this type of thing happened a lot. Meanwhile, it was as if Frankie knew. Kept her distance, a little bit; kept me hanging with aloofness like a lover going cold. A calculating lover.

And then, deep in slumbering night, the sudden weight of an exploratory paw. The padding across an outstretched limb, my sleeping body a bendy balance beam. The settling into contented stillness on the summit of a hip. The thrum of the purr, melting me into wakefulness. This was bliss, the bliss of servitude, the feline version of Stockholm syndrome – with myself as captive.

Oh, Frankie knew something was up. If I was on the phone she’d bat it away with her paw when another chin tickle was needed. Perch between shoulder blades when I was lying on my tummy, as if she was never going to let me up. Settle on my chest when I was on my back, ten centimetres from my face and staring; daring. All of which meant I could never ring the rescue people to arrange the return. You know what’s coming, don’t you? Frankie is still with us. The situation between dog and cat finally settled down; Chloe’s fur grew back. But now I am terrified of the vet.