Lara The Runaway Cat: One cat’s journey to discover home is where the heart is. Sophie Pembroke
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we’ll take her with us!’ Mum sounded strangely excited at the idea. Maybe she thought she’d been missing out on some adventures, too.
Personally, I was considerably wary of the whole idea. I mean, I’d never been anywhere before, and now they wanted to start off with China? I might not have travelled, but Dad had a map on the wall with pins showing all the places he and Mum and Gobi had travelled to. He’d pointed China out to me one day.
It was a long way across the map from my house.
‘For the whole tour? Three weeks travelling around China, doing interviews, appearing at bookshops and so on …’ Dad shook his head. ‘I’m not sure how she’d cope with all that travel and fuss. She’s more of a homebody, our Lara.’
‘Hmm, I suppose she hasn’t really been anywhere before, has she?’ Mum agreed.
Even though I’d just had the exact same thought, my ears flattened to hear Mum say it, and my tail started to wave warningly from side to side. I would cope magnificently, of course, with whatever it was they were talking about doing. Really, Dad should know better than to suggest I couldn’t do something! Just because I never had didn’t mean I couldn’t. It only meant that it had been below my notice before now.
Before Gobi, at least. Because things were very different, now.
Suddenly, all the things I’d been before Gobi – an indoor cat, a pampered princess, a fluffy homebody – they didn’t sound like good things any more.
‘She’s just not an adventurous sort of pet,’ Dad said, pressing the point home. ‘Not like Gobi.’
It was those last three words that made my mind up. If Gobi could do it, so could I. And I’d do it better and cleverer, and with more panache too.
I’d be the most adventurous pet anyone had ever had, if that’s what Mum and Dad wanted me to be.
I focussed in on their conversation. It always takes more effort to understand humans talking than other animals. But sometimes you have to put the work in to stay on top of what’s going on.
Dad was talking about a tour – like the ones he and Gobi had been on before, around Britain, and overseas too. Gobi had travelled almost everywhere with Dad, while I’d stayed home in Edinburgh. I’d stared out of my window and waited for them to come back, when Dad would stick another pin in their map. Somewhere else they had been and I hadn’t.
But this time, I had the chance to go, too. To find out what an adventure was really like.
I wasn’t going to pass that up.
Dad petted my head, and noticed my flattened ears. ‘I’m not sure Lara likes the idea, anyway.’
Honestly, humans! Do they understand nothing?
I meowed loudly and jumped up onto the table. Maybe Mum would understand more.
‘I don’t know,’ she said, stroking my fluffy fur. ‘She’s always the first one into the suitcases whenever we go anywhere. Maybe she’s been longing to take a trip with us all this time.’
I purred in agreement. Okay, my desire for travel was only a few minutes old, and I only usually climbed in the suitcases because they were filled with warm and soft things for snuggling on, but still … It was closer than Dad’s interpretation, anyway.
‘Okay, say we do this, how would it work?’ Dad stood up, crossing to the kettle to make himself a drink. I followed, just in case he opened the fridge and there was anything interesting in there for me.
‘Well, we could all take the ferry to France together, so Lara and Gobi don’t have to travel in the hold of the plane leaving the UK,’ said Mum, obviously thinking things through as she made up her plan on the spot. ‘The overnight one, maybe, for a change? To break up the journey a bit. Then we can fly from France to China with the animals with us. We’d need to book pet-friendly accommodation everywhere anyway, for Gobi, so adding Lara into the mix won’t make much difference for the hotels. And we can all explore the country together. It’ll be fun!’
It did sound sort of fun, I supposed. Apart from the ‘with Gobi’ bit. I’d seen pictures of planes, and I knew they had windows. And Dad and Gobi sometimes videocalled from hotels when they were travelling, and they didn’t look all that much different from the bedrooms at home.
But most of all, it was an adventure. Maybe I’d finally find out what all the fuss was about, and why people wanted to have them in the first place.
‘What about when Gobi and I are doing interviews, or book signings and events and stuff?’ Dad asked. Because of course, it was still all about Gobi. Everything was.
‘Lara and I will come, too! Come on, Dion! You and Gobi have been everywhere together – the States, Canada …’
‘Holland, Italy, France and Switzerland,’ he added, in case we’d forgotten quite how many places they’d been together. Like we didn’t have the map to remind us.
‘Exactly. Maybe it’s Lara’s turn for an adventure.’ Mum didn’t say ‘and mine too’, but I got the feeling she was thinking it. ‘Besides, it would be so nice to spend the summer all together as a family.’
That was true. Even if I wasn’t completely thrilled that our family was made up of four of us now instead of three, I really didn’t like the idea of the other three going off and having fun together and leaving me behind all summer.
‘It would be nice,’ Dad admitted. Reaching down, he picked me up and held me against his shoulder. ‘What do you think, Lara? Would you like to come on an adventure with us?’
Most importantly, if I could show Mum and Dad that I was just as good at adventures as Gobi was – better even – maybe they’d remember that I was their favourite pet and quite clearly the superior animal in our household.
Even if I wasn’t entirely sure what having an adventure entailed, yet. If Gobi could do it, how hard could it really be, anyway?
So, I meowed my agreement. Loudly. It was my turn to travel with Dad for a change.
Mum laughed, looking pleased, and Dad smiled too. For one precious moment, it was just the three of us again – and it was perfect.
Of course, Gobi picked that moment to wander into the kitchen, looking sleepy. She’d obviously just woken up from her afternoon nap, and arrived just in time to butt in on my important moment with Mum and Dad. As usual.
Dad put me down and went to make a fuss of Gobi instead. I slunk back to my ball of fluff again.
‘Guess what, girl?’ Dad said, sounding excited for the first time in the conversation. ‘We’re all going on an adventure. Together!’
Gobi barked her approval of the plan. I just hoped that they had prawns in China. And that I didn’t have to share them with Gobi.
The planning for our trip took a lot more work than I’d expected. Before, I hadn’t really paid much attention to what went into getting Gobi and Dad ready to go away. This time, though, I watched every detail, usually from inside a suitcase, where I couldn’t possibly get forgotten. After a lifetime of happily staying inside, I was suddenly terrified of being left behind and missing out on the adventure.
With every day that passed, the excitement and anticipation grew in my belly – closely matched by the worry and the fear. Dad was wrong, obviously, about me not being able to cope with adventure. But that didn’t change the fact that I’d never actually had one before, only heard about theirs.
In my experience, new things could be