Felix The Railway Cat

Gradually, life returned to normal for Felix – well, as normal as life ever gets when you’re a senior pest controller with thousands of adoring Facebook fans. She settled back into her routine of helping the team leaders with the night shift and the morning rush, but she still chose to avoid the evening crushes and especially the rowdy customers from the Friday night Ale Trail. Once again, she took to settling in her favourite spot on the customer-information desk. It was a great little location, for not only did she have a prime view, she was also right by the door to the back offices, which meant any and every team member who went by could give her a stroke or a pat on the head as they passed – and they all did. It was as if they couldn’t resist her; but it had been that way from the start.

In the summer, Felix got involved in a charity fun run, wearing a GPS tracker on her purple collar to measure out her own 5k race; she raised more than £5,200 for a children’s charity. She was also present for the opening of Huddersfield’s new first-class lounge, and had a special grooming session to keep her cool in the summer heat. Her fans often paid attention to her grooming on Facebook – even commenting if her travels across the train tracks had left her with dirty feet – so Angie tried hard to make sure her baby always looked in tip-top shape.

Felix and Mark Allan still met regularly at 6.30 a.m. by the Head of Steam each working day. Mark was always pleased to see her, and was not ashamed to say it. It had become part of his morning routine, as well as Felix’s.

So fixed was that routine that when Mark went off on holiday for a week, he felt very weird indeed on his last day before his vacation. Felix doesn’t know I’m going away on holiday, he thought sadly.

Indeed, it was a very sad Felix the following day: Chris Bamford looked out to see her sitting in her usual chair on the metal bench, looking hopefully up towards the station entrance, but the tall man in the dark-grey suit never came. She waited every single day of that week for him. Chris felt so sorry for her that he went down to see her himself.

‘He’s not coming,’ he said helplessly. ‘I don’t know how to tell you.’

He gave her a few treats and they kept her going until Mark got back. When Chris looked down towards the Head of Steam on the day he returned, the routine was back up and running: the cat and the commuter were sitting side by side on the bench, Mark’s face lit up by a smile as he laughed at her playful antics.

So Felix continued to do what she had always done best: touch people’s hearts.

There came a warm day when Andrew McClements was out on duty. It was a Saturday, a day when the station was always full of people travelling to Manchester or Leeds for the weekend. It was very busy, about lunchtime, when he noticed a mother with a five-year-old son battling towards him on the platform. He approached, closing the distance to help them out.

‘Hello, there!’ he said in a friendly fashion to the boy.

But the child stared pointedly at the floor and refused to make eye contact with him.

‘Hello,’ his mother said. She wafted a hand around her face, which was framed by her blonde hair, gently fanning herself; it was a scorching day, and even in her cool summer dress she looked a little harried and hot. ‘I was wondering,’ she went on, anxiously. ‘I understand if we can’t, but can we see Felix, please? My son really likes Felix.’

Andrew glanced at the child again. ‘Oh, do you?’ he said jovially; but once again the child said nothing. He stood unmoving by his mother’s side, his eyes boring holes into the ground. He seemed really shy – or perhaps, Andrew realised, it was something else.

‘It would mean a lot to us,’ his mother said, speaking for her son again.

‘Let me see if I can find her,’ Andrew replied.

He fought his way through the daytrippers waiting on the platform and nipped into the back office to see if Felix was around. He really wanted to find her because it seemed to him that the child deserved this special treat of meeting her.

It had occurred to Andrew that perhaps the boy had autism. Maybe, just maybe, Felix could make his day.

Felix had just woken up from a beautiful sleep in the shower room and was more than happy to accompany Andrew back along the platform. ‘If you need me, I’m here,’ her merry walk seemed to say. The two of them made their way back to the mother and her son.

As soon as the station cat loomed into view, the child raised his head.

‘FELIX!’ he yelled exuberantly – the first thing Andrew had heard him say. ‘Felix, Felix, Felix!’

He started flapping his arms and grinning wildly. Andrew had never seen anyone so excited in all his life. The boy became incredibly animated and flapped his way over to the cat. ‘Felix, Felix, Felix!’ he kept saying, over and over and over again, as if in that one word were all the words in the world: love, hope, happiness.