介绍： 猫咪爱好者们绝不能错过的一本半自传体小说，由故事的主人公James Bowen亲自执笔，讲述了一个在生活困境中苦苦挣扎的流浪歌手, 父母离异，他游走在城市的边缘地带，小偷小摸，甚至沾染上毒品，人生充斥着满满的苦涩和绝望。直到他遇见四处流浪伤痕累累的橘猫Bob，从那天起，James的生命中不知不觉得多了一份牵挂......

【Chapter 14】...

介绍： 猫咪爱好者们绝不能错过的一本半自传体小说，由故事的主人公James Bowen亲自执笔，讲述了一个在生活困境中苦苦挣扎的流浪歌手, 父母离异，他游走在城市的边缘地带，小偷小摸，甚至沾染上毒品，人生充斥着满满的苦涩和绝望。直到他遇见四处流浪伤痕累累的橘猫Bob，从那天起，James的生命中不知不觉得多了一份牵挂......

【Chapter 14】

It’s weird how you react in a situation like that. I’m sure my instincts were the same as any parent or pet owner. All sorts of crazy, sometimes conflicting thoughts rushed through my mind. Had he simply eaten something that disagreed with him this morning? Had he swallowed something in the flat that had set him off? Or was this something more serious? Was he going to drop dead in front of me? I’d heard stories about cats collapsing in front of their owners after drinking cleaning fluids or choking on bits of plastic. For a split second, an image of Bob dying flashed through my head.

I managed to pull myself together before my imagination ran riot.

Come on, James, let’s deal with this sensibly, I told myself.

I knew that all the retching and the fact that he no longer had any liquid to bring up meant that he was getting dehydrated. If I didn’t do anything he could do damage to one of his organs. I decided that some food and, more importantly, some water, would be a good idea. So I scraped him up and held him in my arms as we walked on to Covent Garden and a general store I knew nearby. I didn’t have much cash on me at all, but I cobbled together enough to buy a liquidised chicken meal that Bob usually loved and some good, mineral water. I didn’t want to risk giving him contaminated tap water. That might make matters even worse.

I carried him to Covent Garden and placed it down on the pavement near our normal pitch. I got out Bob’s bowl and spooned the chicken into it.

‘Here we go, mate,’ I said, stroking him as I placed the bowl in front of him.

Ordinarily he would have pounced immediately and guzzled down a bowl of food at a rate of knots, but not today. Instead he stood and looked at it for a while before he decided to tuck in. Even then he was very tentative about it, only picking at the bowl. He only ate the jelly. He didn’t touch a bit of the meat. Again, it set the alarm bells ringing. This wasn’t the Bob I knew and loved. Something was definitely wrong.

I half-heartedly set myself up to start selling the magazine. We needed some money to get us through the next few days, especially if I was going to have to take Bob to a vet and pay for some drugs. But my heart really wasn’t in it. I was far more concerned with watching Bob than trying to capture the attention of passers-by. He lay there, impassive, uninterested in anything. Unsurprisingly, not too many people stopped to make a donation. I cut the day short after less than two hours. Bob hadn’t been sick again, but he definitely wasn’t right. I had to get him home to the warmth – and dryness – of the flat.

I guess I’d been lucky with Bob until now. Ever since I’d taken him under my wing, he had been in perfect health, 100 per cent tip top. He’d had fleas early on but that was to be expected of a street cat. Since I’d treated him for that and given him an early worming treatment, he’d suffered no health problems at all.

Every now and again I had taken him to the Blue Cross van on Islington Green where he’d been microchipped. The vets and vet nurses there knew him well by now and always commented on what good condition he was in. So this was alien territory for me. I was terrified that it might be something serious. As he lay on my lap on the bus returning to Tottenham, I felt the emotions welling up every now and again. It was all I could do to stop myself from bursting into tears. Bob was the best thing in my life. The thought of losing him was terrifying. I couldn’t keep that thought out of my head.

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