Cats in Heaven: And Other Animals. Heartwarming stories of animals from the other side.

Copyright

Some names have been changed to protect

the privacy of the story tellers.

HarperTrueFate

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First published by HarperTrueFate 2016

FIRST EDITION

© Jacky Newcomb 2016

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be identified as the author of this work

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Sources ISBN: 9780008144470

Ebook Edition © August 2016 ISBN: 9780008144463

Version: 2016-07-27

Dedication

My faithful companions, RIP

Magik – 19 August 2013

Tigger – 16 June 2015

Contents

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

Chapter 1: Magik

Chapter 2: Paranormal phenomena

Chapter 3: Saying goodbye

Chapter 4: Connecting in other ways

Chapter 5: Psychic cat and human connections

Moving Memoirs eNewsletter

About the Author

Also by Jacky Newcomb in the HarperTrue series …

More by Jacky Newcomb

About the Publisher

Chapter 1
Magik

When my cat Magik died I was devastated; I sobbed so hard that the following day I ended up at the doctor’s surgery with two infected eyes. Magik came to us as a rescue kitten. She was being taken care of at an army home in a local barracks. I still remember my visit. I walked into the house and kittens were everywhere. Fluffy white balls with various dots of colour – all males, I was informed.

I was at the house for one reason. I’d had a dream that we were getting a new cat to add to our existing two-year-old ginger tom. This one was black, a kitten, full of life and fun … but female. In my dream the cat was playing with a butterfly and the following morning I began my hunt for the cat in my dreams.

My husband and I had a massive row about it. He’d been reluctant to get Tigger, our tomcat, but my ploy of taking him to the rescue home along with our two daughters worked. He, too, fell in love with the ginger striped cat that we brought home that very day. Tigger had a brother and a sister. Coincidentally the sister was a black female, but there was no way I could persuade my husband that we should take them both.

So there we were, two years later, and the longing for a second cat had always been simmering in the background. The dream had persuaded me; it was out of my control. I clearly remember my husband yelling, ‘We are not having another cat! You have to make a choice … it’s me or the cat!’

Seething, I quietly turned away from him. ‘I’ll miss you …’ I uttered, walking away. I was taking a big risk and I still don’t recall how I had the nerve. ‘I’ll miss you …’ Those words make me roar with laughter now, but at the time it was pretty mean of me. I loved my husband, but I wanted a cat so badly. Anyway, I reasoned, I’d been shown the cat in a dream; it was like destiny had stepped in. I couldn’t help myself. That’s the excuse I came up with.

After making numerous phone calls I finally found a rescue kitten being taken care of by a Cats Protection rescue family. It fitted my description. Now, sitting on the sofa in this home, I’ll be honest I was disappointed when the woman placed a small brown fluffy – and a little bit unattractive – kitten on the sofa next to me. Her brothers, twice the size, looked like the sort you might find in a magazine or television advertisement. This one was clearly the runt of the litter. But then everything changed in a moment. She looked up at me and crawled along the sofa and then climbed onto my lap. I think I loved her from that very moment. We connected and I knew that, yes, this was my cat, even if she didn’t look ‘quite right’ yet.

Magik would be ready for rehoming a couple of weeks later. When I telephoned to make arrangements to pick her up, however, I was told the cats had ear mites. ‘No problem,’ I protested. ‘I can treat her at home.’ But no, there were rules, apparently. The kittens had to be treated before they could be adopted and taken away. Another week passed and I called several times. Each time it felt like I was being fobbed off and I was beginning to panic. I rang my sister. ‘Come with me!’ I begged. ‘I want to go and collect her now!’ We had no appointment, no way of knowing if they’d even be home and it was a good 25-minute drive away. But we did it! I grabbed my cat carrier, a blanket to line the bottom of the hard plastic case and the money we’d agreed for the exchange. We jumped in the car and drove right to the house. Bizarrely, a removal van was sitting outside the house. Unexpectedly the family were being moved to a new location and were surprised to see me. The van was half loaded with boxes and household items. They were moving out that very moment! I was completely shocked. Whether they had changed their minds about having the kitten adopted or not I will never know. Faced with me and my sister standing determinedly at the door with a smile fixed firmly on our faces, cat carrier in hand, we made the transaction and I put my bundle of fur into the basket.

I cried with relief as I drove her home. I felt a psychic connection had been made. Why was I feeling so panicked about the cat? She was meant to come to me and I was feeling a great urgency that someone … or something … was directing at me. Why did I feel that way? What made me want to drive so far without an appointment and no guarantee that anyone would even be home? I can honestly say I have no idea, but whatever or whomever it was that was warning me, urging me on, I thank them to this very day. I always think it’s important to follow that ‘gut instinct’ or strong urging that we feel from time to time. It’s not usually wrong.

Magik never really grew very much. She was always a tiny cat. So much so that her nickname was ‘kitten’ and she would happily come to me if I called her that. She spent much of her day sitting on or under my desk. She was always clean and right from the start she litter-trained herself. I recall there was only ever one accident and it was totally my fault. I hadn’t cleaned her litter box to her satisfaction, so she found her own litter tray – a cardboard box full of books that was sitting under my desk. As I saw her climb in I simply laughed … then I noticed her squatting! I grabbed her but it was too late – she and I both got very wet that day. But it never happened again and it made a funny story, which I repeated over and over.

As the weeks went by she shed her brown baby ‘fluff’ and a fine, silky black fur emerged. She had a tiny triangle-shaped face. More like a Siamese cat, really; she was gorgeous. She finally looked like the cat of my dream. She really was adorable, and had a lovely temperament to go with it. She loved to be with me. She was the companion that I needed and had hoped for.

One day shortly after the squatting incident, I was sitting with my family watching the television when we heard a gentle thud, thud, thud. Curious, we all rushed into the hallway just in time to see a box gently slip down the last two steps. Then the box popped open and Magik poked her head through the top. Realising she was okay we all burst out laughing. She had effectively skied down the stairs! As she peeped her head out of the box it was like she was waiting for us all to clap! It was the first of many such humorous moments.

Another day we were all sitting down in the living room again when we heard an almighty smash. Rushing to the bedroom upstairs I saw a large angel statue broken into numerous pieces all over the floor. Its previous location had been the windowsill and I was surprised to see that the window was closed – no breeze. What had happened? As I turned around both Tigger and Magik were snuggled up on the bed. Neither had moved, which was surprising in itself, and both were looking up with a strange ‘innocence’ about them, a kind of fake ‘Who? Us? … No, that was nothing to do with us …’ look upon their faces. Once more I found myself laughing, but of course I couldn’t prove a thing.

Tigger and Magik were never really best buddies, but it was a respectful tolerance that they shared. As they passed each other they would sometimes lift their heads up as if they were saying ‘Wass’up?’ A sort of ghetto-cat greeting. At other times they would rub up against each other, but it usually ended up with Magik’s head in Tigger’s mouth. Don’t worry; Magik always got her own back. Even though she was small she was always much brighter than her ‘big brother’. Magik was more agile and would jump onto a higher surface, tapping or grabbing at Tigger when he passed by. He was never bright enough to work out what was going on. She loved to climb on top of the pine wooden box in our living room – it served as both a footstool and a coffee table and was also the perfect height for her to attack her nemesis. Magik loved to reach out and pat Tigger on the head when he walked by. Tigger would spin around, trying to find her, and then run round and round the box. Magik would tuck herself back out of sight and get him on his next trip around. Tigger never did work out that Magik was on top of the box, and it provided us with many hours of amusement.

Tigger regularly jumped on Magik’s back or got her in a headlock. However subtly, that little ‘kitten’ always found a way to show him who was boss, though. One day Magik was asleep on a chair and Tigger jumped up and pushed her off so that he could claim the chair as his own. It was a deliberate move. Magik slowly snuck underneath the chair and pulled on his wagging tail, which was hanging down the back of the chair, before making a mad dash for it. Once again, Tigger, always a little dopey, had no idea what was happening. By the time he’d worked it out and looked under the chair, Magik was hiding behind the nearby sofa, no doubt having a giggle at her cleverness! Cats give us hours of fun and laughter, don’t they? I’m sure you have similar cat stories of your own.

Being a writer is a lonely business, or it can be. Lots of writers have cats … or dogs. Their gentle companionship is soothing and relaxing. It’s easier to say, ‘Well, I was talking to the cat,’ rather than admit one was talking to oneself! Both cats spent a lot of time with me in my writing room (a conservatory at first, then a large converted garage at the next house and then two bedrooms in the next two houses – yes, we moved a lot).

Both cats loved being in the room with me, but my little one wanted to be under the desk at my feet or right on top of the desk, sometimes on the keyboard itself. One of my earliest photographs of her was of her peeking around my laptop. She was so tiny that the laptop would have hidden her completely. There is another wonderful photograph of her sitting in a basket of fan mail and readers’ letters that were waiting to be answered. These images regularly appeared on my website and in my columns and magazine articles. The cats developed a bit of a fanbase of their own. People would often write and ask me how they were. I also wrote about both cats in my books. When Magik passed, the first thing I did was to share the news on my social media pages. The support I had from my followers was amazing, and I will never forget their kindness.

When Magik died it was completely unexpected. The vet told me that she had complete kidney failure. We’d missed the signs, if in fact there had been any. Right up until 24 hours earlier she had been leaping six-foot fences and climbing on the roof next to the window where my office was. She showed no signs of the muscle wastage the vet found. She was always a noisy cat, so if she’d been yelping more than normal we couldn’t tell. Could we have done something? Should we have noticed? Maybe. I’ve owned cats my whole life and had never come across this before. Who knows? And anyway, for Magik, her time was done. There was no point in the ‘could have, should have’ that we all put ourselves through. She was still a young cat, but she was gone.

She was the sweetest, gentlest cat you could ever wish to own. We all loved her very much. Several family members shed a tear for the loss of this precious little girl and she will never be forgotten. Thankfully we have stacks of lovely photographs to remember her by.

So now, as I sit here typing, I feel her with me, urging me to write. Go on, Mum, tell some wonderful true-life stories. So here they are.