Ten Days' Visitation

I had been cold-hearted with cats for years, until Ivy walked into my life.

Other cats usually intruded my house to rest, to use the garden as their public toilets, to look for fish bones or fat that I had thrown at a particular place for them, or to try to steal food that I had carelessly left uncovered.

This kitten first appeared at the backyard on a Friday and tried to get my attention by mewing. With her innocent eyes, tiny frame and long fluffy tail, she looked too cute to be ignored.

But since I had made up my mind not to keep any pets at home, I prevented her from entering the dining room. But she often successfully found an opportunity to slip into it.

She was seeking a shelter, and most of all, love.

Whenever she saw me at the wet kitchen, she would approach me and passionately rub her head against my feet. Conscious about the hygiene, I felt so irritated to have any physical contact with a street animal that I kicked her off. Sometimes discouraged for awhile, she would soon forget about my unkind act and continue to show her friendship to me. At night, she slept on the slippers on the shoe rack outside.

Once I tried to let her follow me to other roads, expecting her to go astray. But she found her way back to my house which offered no warm welcome. I even planned to leave her at Tanjung Bidara. But VC dissuaded me.

I finally gave up my attempts to abandon her. Instead, I let VC to give her some milk which she strangely did not even touch with her tongue. Only later VC explained to me that sick cats were generally not active. This kitten was lack of appetite probably because of her eyes which were always filled with smelly yellow liquid. When it was dry, the cat could hardly open her eyes. Only when she rubbed it away with her front legs, she had a better sight.

I remembered a lovely cat that I had reared when I was small bore the same characteristics. Compassion arouse in my heart and I began to loose my boundaries. One rainy morning, the skinny cat must be feeling very cold that she insisted to squeeze her body into the house and stayed motionless next to the dustbin. This time, I decided not to chase her out. Nevertheless, I still did not allow her to move further inside the house and made sure she was out at night.

After one week of her appearance, I was much more tolerant with her rubbing. We started to call her Ivy. A piece of cloth was specially put on the shoe rack so that she would have more warmth when sleeping on it. The ninth day of her presence, she was watching me under my car while I was cutting grass. I photographed her for the first time.

Ivy was definitely underweight. But she could hardly finish half of any food we placed in front of her. She became so uninterested in eating that even cat food that VC purposely bought for her did not stimulate her appetite. It ended up in the stomachs of other lucky bigger and fatter cats who passed by.

We thought of bringing her to an animals' clinic but we had no idea if there was one nearby. I used to be acquainted with two veterinarian friends. Unfortunately they were no longer in Melaka.

The tenth day of her visit, a Sunday afternoon after I came back from church, I took the initiative to caress her and clean her dirty eyes with tissue paper. She looked fine despite her frail body. I tried to feed her with a hot dog but she just refused to eat. So, I still cut a small piece and left on the shoe rack where I saw her for the last time.

The next morning, she disappeared. The meat was neither there. I optimistically thought she had just gone to neighbours' houses and would come back later. Up to today, there is no sign of her.

It was when I was ready to give my love to Ivy that she left me. Life is like that sometimes, isn't it?

If you see this cat somewhere, please tell her that I wait for her to come back.