Felix The Railway Cat

‘So which one do you think should become the railway cat?’ Joanne mused aloud. She was a short, smiling woman with blonde highlights and a great sense of humour, though this issue was no laughing matter. It seemed a rather serious question: to be debating the future of these kittens as they gambolled obliviously about the place, investigating every new sight, sound and smell with a kitten’s classic inquisitiveness. The five hadn’t been outdoors at all yet, as they weren’t inoculated, but there were enough new experiences in their home to keep them occupied for weeks. But what new experiences awaited the station cat: the lure of the train tracks, the rhythm of the trains, the hours and hours of walking about on cold platforms in the middle of the night …

To Joanne’s mind, the fluffier of the two seemed more suited to this occupation. For even at this young age that kitten seemed to be taking after his dad, Gizmo, who was a total fluff-ball and enormous because of it. Surely a nice thick fur coat would stand a station cat in good stead? The other kitten had shorter hair and was nowhere near as large.

Chris described them both to Angie. ‘One’s really big and fluffy like his dad,’ he told her.

‘Well, we’ll have that one then,’ she said decisively. Angie liked the idea of having the fluffiest cat – and this little kitten really was a fluff ball, currently no larger than the size of a man’s hand. Chris sent her some snapshots of the kittens – and that’s when the team really knew this dream was coming true.

Angie showcased the photographs all around the office, more smile than woman as she did so. ‘Meet our little cat,’ she said to Gareth as she showed off the photographs as proudly as any new mum would snaps of her newborn.

Gareth grinned right back at her. ‘We’ve done it, haven’t we?’ he said. ‘We’ve only gone and done it!’

But there was still a lot to sort out before the railway cat could arrive. He couldn’t leave his mum until he was at least eight weeks old, so in the meantime the station team began preparing for their little boy’s arrival. They got fleecy blankets for him to sleep on, and bought a white plastic double-aperture bowl for his food and drink. There was a lot of excitement around the office at the thought that, soon, the newest member of the team would be joining them. Judging by the enthusiasm on everyone’s faces, this little kitten was going to be the most popular colleague at the station by quite some distance.

But not everyone was thrilled by the promise of the new arrival. Some colleagues even started talking up the fact that they were highly allergic to cats, and that therefore the whole plan should be called off – but these ‘allergies’ were something they had never once mentioned during Gareth’s three-year campaign to get a cat, so he didn’t really buy it.

But Chris Briscoe, for one, was definitely looking forward to the terrible twins moving out. Each night he and Joanne had to have a roll call for the kittens to find out where they’d got to, as they were forever playing hide-and-seek and trying to get into places where they shouldn’t be. ‘Right, how many have you got?’ Chris would say, his hands full of tiny tabby cat, as Joanne picked her way across the living-room floor and exclaimed, ‘There’s one at the side of the fireplace!’

Those two would be returned to Lexi’s side, placed gently into the snug brown-and-white cat bed, but by the time the other three had been located, the first two would have gone AWOL again. Tiring as it was, Chris’s daughter thought she would be very sad to see her new friends move on, as they were due to any day now. Lucy Briscoe was eleven years old and besotted with the kittens. She and the Briscoes’ grand-daughter, six-year-old Ellie, had taken the lead in getting the kittens used to humans, so they were forever picking them up and giving them cuddles – as were Joanne and Chris, in all honesty. All five little ones had received an equal amount of human playtime, personal affection and friendship in their formative first eight weeks. The Briscoes would, in some ways, be sorry to see them go.

And that day came all too soon. On Tuesday 12 July 2011, the kittens reached an all-important milestone: they were now exactly eight weeks old. It was time for the members of the litter to say goodbye to each other – and hello to their brand-new homes.

Spadge was the first to leave, moving out to live with the Briscoes’ son in Sheffield; a day or so later Max and Percy headed off to their new lives in Manchester. Now only the as-yet-unnamed black-and-white kittens remained. Both would be heading to Huddersfield station on Thursday 14 July. Aged eight weeks and two days, it was time for the terrible twins to take a journey they would never forget.

4. Welcome to Huddersfield

‘In you get,’ Chris Briscoe urged the terrible twins.