Let This Evening Be the Last, For He Will Spend it Beautifully. He’ll Gaze Upon His Love, Wish Her a Long Life, and Then Curl Up by Her Window, Drifting into His Dreams, Never to Return…

Let this night be my last, and Ill go out in style. Ill stare at the love of my life, wish her a long, happy life, then curl up by her window and drift into my dreams, never to return.

Ive survived three winters in a row and that isnt an exaggeration. For a street cat, thats almost a miracle; most toms on the backstreets dont make it that far.

I was born in a modest terraced house, next to my mother, a tabby who trusted people. Life, however, turned on a dime.

The owners were killed in a car crash, and their adult son a man who despised cats and kept a fierce bulldog as a guard decided the extra tenants had to go. Without a second thought, he tossed the whole feline family out onto the pavement.

The first winter took them all mother, brothers and sisters. Some went hungry, others froze solid, a few were chased off by dogs, and some were run over. Only one survived a ginger tom.

A groundskeeper found him. Found is a generous word; he merely spotted the little orange bundle, snatched it from the mothers side, hauled it down to the cellar, and set it near the hot water pipes. He fed it through the cold months.

Thats how I stayed alive.

No one gave me a name. Through a cracked cellar window Id slip out, learning the hardknocks of street survival staying clear of dogs, hiding from people, scavenging rubbish, and outwitting hunger.

The second winter I faced alone. The original groundskeeper was sacked for drunkenness, and a stricter replacement took over. He stopped feeding me, but at least he didnt bar the cellar window. That was enough; I survived another year, learning to fight for both food and life.

The third winter was the cruelest. All the cellar windows were boarded up. Where could I go? Where could I hide from the biting cold?

I had to find a new refuge. The cellars were sealed, but in one back garden I discovered an odd spot: an old, forgotten trench where a warm steam pipe ran just beneath the surface. Thick hedges hid it, and the locals never knew it existed.

I piled old rags and torn clothing into the trench, making a crude nest. Overhead, balconies cast a slight shield, and the snow fell less heavily. Still, the heat from the pipe melted the snow, and the damp, icy wind seeped to my bones

I made it through that winter, emerging a halfghost: skin and fur hanging in ragged strips, eyes forever wary. In streetcat terms, old age hits early, and I was already considered an elder. Food now came only as pity scraps.

Then the trench was discovered. Before the first autumn rains, someone finally noticed the unsightly ditch and decided to fill it in.

I came, as usual, to spend the night on the pipe and saw fresh earth being shoveled in. I settled on a small mound and stared. It was, in effect, my death sentence. I understood at once that there was no other place like it, and the few spots that remained were already claimed by other cats.

I made a wet pile of fallen leaves my nightspot, shivering, but still hanging on. And in that halfdead state, on the very brink, I fell in love.

Yes, I really fell in love.

I gave myself no false hopes. She was breathtaking a sleek, wellgroomed cat who lived in a flat on the ground floor. She loved perching on the windowsill and watching the world outside. I, meanwhile, sat below, watching her. Inside the cold, something warm stirred.

One evening I gathered courage: I scrambled up a tree, leapt onto a wide metal awning beneath her window. The owners had once used it in winter to store provisions, and now it lay abandoned. From then on I visited often, perched there, gazing at her through the glass and sighing.

I asked for nothing. I simply admired her. Occasionally she would hop down to her food bowls, and I would swallow my saliva not from envy, but from a plain animal emptiness.

I decided that if fate were to claim me this winter, it should happen by her window. I would curl up, watch her, and go out not in fear but in warmth.

I even smiled at the thought: a thin ginger cat, quietly passing away on his beloved windowsill.

One day the lady of the flat spotted me and shouted, waving her arms. I fled, but then I returned. And returned again.

Her husband a man saw me and didnt chase me away. He looked into my eyes and saw everything: hope, pain, weariness, and adoration for his beautiful house cat. He couldnt send me off.

Instead, he began slipping small pieces of meat, a mince patty, a sausage, through the window. I ate. One night the man approached the glass, and I, trembling, lifted my paw to the pane and let out a soft meow.

The house cat first glanced at the man, then at me. Surprise flickered in her gaze.

You know, the man whispered, shes not supposed to have another tom. I asked for a kitten she refused.

He dropped his hands. I understood. I wasnt angry. The house was not for me. It was for pedigree, clean, young, and pampered cats.

That evening was especially bitter. I was drenched, frozen, and suddenly realised there was no point left no point in chasing leaves, no point in hunting corners, no point in endless survival.

If the end was inevitable, let it be here, by the window from which my little miracle watches.

So I decided: let this night be my last.

I wanted to meet my end with dignity. To look once more at the one my heart yearned for, to let out a quiet, warm meow, as if wishing her happiness and a long life, and then disappear. First, I would finish the morsel the man left for me; then, when she retired to her cosy nest, I would curl up right by the glass and slip into a dream where there is no cold, no hunger, only sleep from which one never wakes.

Snow began to fall unexpectedly, and the cat on the sill watched with delight as white flakes spun behind the glass and settled on my orange back. It amused her. Her eyes danced with the snows ballet. She could never have imagined that the beauty was slowly killing the creature staring at her through the icy pane. She knew nothing of frost, nothing of freezing from the inside.

Meanwhile I grew stiffer. The last sausage gave a tiny spark of warmth, but it faded with my dwindling strength. The wind burned my fur, the cold gnawed my bones, and even sitting upright became a strain. I still watched her, but I knew I could not hold on much longer.

I prepared for this farewell as if it were the most important event of my life. I wanted to go out beautifully: one last look at my love, a soft meow of kindness, a silent wish for her long, warm days, then step into my dreams a place from which I would never return.

The snowstorm intensified, and the cat on the warm windowsill watched, enchanted, the slow dance of the flakes. She liked how the white snow fell on my ginger back, a pretty little spectacle, almost a game. She had no idea that beneath the pattern lay death. She didnt understand that snow meant frost, that wind meant pain, that hunger meant torment. She never knew a street.

I, perched outside, grew hard as stone. The sausage Id eaten an hour ago left a final, feeble heat that was dying away. Every breath grew heavier, my paws went numb, my tail froze solid. I still stared at her, but my body was surrendering.

The cat kept watching her mysterious admirer, while I could no longer stay upright. My spine trembled, my eyes closed. I lifted my gaze to her one last time, pressed my numb nose to the icy glass, and, without waiting for her to leave, curled into a tight little ball.

A shiver ran through me. The cold gnawed each bone. I tried to breathe into my side, hoping to generate a sliver of warmth, and it seemed to help a little. But the frost was stronger. It stole my life slowly but surely.

Then a strange feeling washed over me: the cold seemed to fade. A sleepy, gentle blanket of drowsiness covered me like a coat. I decided not to fight. The end was near anyway.

I opened my eyes for the final time and saw her the very one Id climbed the awning for, the one who kept me alive all these days. How beautiful, I thought. What could be better? Such a gentle death

My head drooped, my eyes shut. In my mind the window opened and kind hands lifted me, stroked me, whispered tender words. Beside me stood the cat whose heart had beat for me, and together we walked toward a warm bowl of food.

What a lovely dream, flickered through me.

The house cat kept watching the snow settle on my orange coat. She meowed softly, questioning. She wanted me to move. She tapped the glass with her paw. No response. She meowed louder, then battered the pane as if shouting, Why wont you answer?!

But the cold had already seized my body. I could no longer hear. I slipped into silence.

Snow turned me into a white heap, covering me like a shroud.

Whats she shouting at? grumbled the woman in the living room. Looking at the snow?

The husband lifted his head from the sofa, stared at the window. The cat was still beating at the glass. Then something clicked. He remembered her eyes, and his own thoughts of the ginger cat.

He sprang up, rushed to the window, and started pulling the shutters aside.

What are you doing?! shrieked his wife. Are you mad? Close it right now!

He didnt hear. The cat helped, leaping, crying.

The window flew open, and snow and wind surged in.

Close it! the wife shouted, but the man was already searching. In the corner he spotted a small, frostcovered mound.

He grabbed the icy little body and carried it to the bathroom. The house cat followed, the woman trailing behind.

The bathroom filled with steam as he washed the chilled ginger cat with warm water. The cat lay on the edge of the tub, gazing at him, letting out soft feline cries.

Im doing what I can, the man whispered, rubbing the cats tiny chest, trying to coax life back into its mouth. The woman stood in the doorway, silent.

He warmed, massaged, pleaded:

Come on please come back

The cat cried with him.

Then, far off, a voice called his name back from some other place. He wondered, Why go back? Its peaceful there. Why return to pain?

But then he heard her voice the one that had kept him fighting. The one that made him live.

It cant be shes so close? I have to see. Even just a glimpse

His eyes opened slowly, as if the lids weighed a ton. He finally lifted them and saw a man with a flushed face, and beside him, the cat, alive, eyes shining with joy.

There you are! the man shouted, pulling the damp ginger into his arms.

The house cat leapt onto the floor, twirled, and purred loudly.

Get a towel! A hairdryer! Quick! he turned to his wife.

They wrapped the cat in soft towels, dried him with a hairdryer, cooed sweet words. The ginger lay dazed, unsure if it was a dream. The house cat sniffed him, nuzzling his head.

He thought, This cant be real. Its too beautiful to be true. Id have died for this.

Then his wife poured warm milk. The cat lapped it up, a wave of heat rolling down his throat. He coughed, knocked the bowl with a paw, then clutched it with both paws and began lapping furiously.

Hell live, the man said confidently.

The house cat settled against him.

Whats his name? the wife asked after a pause.

Hes called Loved One. Thats his name, the man grinned.

The cat meowed as if to confirm.

Now Loved One lives in that flat. His fur shines, his tail is fluffy and regal, his eyes calm and grateful.

They both sit on the windowsill, watching the street. Loved One sometimes remembers what it was like to be on the other side of the glass. He sighs heavily. Then she touches his shoulder, as if to say, Youre home now. Youre ours.

Below, the other street cats still roam, the ones never let inside. They still hope to survive another winter.

Hope