Before It’s Too Late

The operation is set for twelve oclock. Its routine, scheduled, an hour under anaesthetic, simple steps and shes due home the same day. She doesnt insist I go with her she knows Im busy and the new London office is about to open.

Everything will be fine, she says, planting a kiss on my cheek. She tosses a few sachets of cat food for the basement cats into my bag and darts out the door.

I straighten my tie, give myself one last critical look in the mirror, grab the project folder from the desk and head to the office. As chief executive of the firm I built into a market leader over the past few years, I must give everything I have. I do, every spare minute, justifying it as for us, for her, even for the cats she constantly feeds.

I dont dislike cats, but her obsession feels pointless, frivolous, without any real significance. I treat it like a quirk I have to live with, just as I tolerate the flaws of someone I love. Thats why every time she suggests bringing stray, fleainfested kittens home, I reject her outright. Theres no sense in it, no benefit. I propose an exotic Persian cat as a compromise at least it carries some status. Basement cats? I never understood why she cares, and shes grown tired of explaining.

—

Operation routine scheduled nothing special I should have gone with her!

How many times this week have I repeated the thought? Thousands? Ten thousand? I race to the hospital, abandoning everything, clinging to the white coat, trembling at the doctors steady gaze. I tear the project apart, the one that kept me away, and kneel beside the bed, forehead pressed to her hand, begging her not to give up.

She stays silent. Neither of us knows that a simple scheduled operation, an hour of anaesthetic, can turn into a coma

Were doing everything we can, the doctor tells me.

Youre doing nothing! I snap, paying for her transfer to a private ward.

Theres a chance, we have to wait, the nurse says, trying to calm me.

Wheres that chance?! I shout down the corridor when a week passes and she still hasnt awakened.

I try everything: top specialists, music, long talks. I flood her room with flowers. I stop showing up at work, just to be there every free moment. I beg, promise, even threaten. In moments of frantic hope I kiss her, recalling the ridiculous Sleeping Beauty tale, and each day drags me deeper into despair, into a feral rage that wants to smash everything in its path.

A overturned chair, a shattered vase, a bag flung in a fit of fury, its colourful packets of cat food scattering across the floor. She never gets to feed those useless cats that Ive always pretended not to mind.

Stupid! God, how stupid he is!

If only I could rewind, erase it all with a wave of my hand. Id crawl on my knees for those cats, bring them home, love them, just to

The adrenaline that had been coursing through me suddenly drains. Looking at the mess I created, I shake as I pick up the colourful packets, planning to be at the basement door in ten minutes.

—

This is called felinotherapy, though there are no recorded cases like ours, the attending doctor says, watching me haul the sixth carrier into the ward.

So well be the first, I manage, releasing the animals from their cages.

Theyre her cats. Understand? Mine! Id give anything to tell her that.

Ill inform the staff, the nurse replies.

Thank you I should have done this sooner You see

Never lose hope. We all learn from our mistakes, remember that.

I wont forget I wont ever forget again.

—

The operation is at twelve. Routine. Scheduled. An hour under anaesthetic, simple steps and she isnt demanding I be there. Again. Yet she cant hide the bright smile when she watches me, after loosening my tie, wrestle with the sixth harness for the resistant, darting cats.

Her cats. The same basement, fleacovered felines that knocked her out a year ago, leaving her gasping for breath without understanding whats happening.

Seven pairs of eyes drill into her. Six relieved breaths, barely audible, and one triumphant, joyous cry shell never forget.

Maybe thats why, now that she must face the same ordeal again, she feels no fear. When she sees me, exhausted, a few strands of cat hair clinging to my shirt, looking at her with a reproachful glance, she smiles even wider.

Then she laughs openly at the onlookers. A man in an expensive suit, surrounded by six straylooking yet impeccably groomed cats, each pulling a thin leash in a different direction, filling the street with indignant Meow?!a sight for the fainthearted.

The operation, I mutter quietly in the hospital courtyard, surrounded by the cats, a slightly chewed but still beautiful bouquet of roses on my lap.

I glance at my watch, adjust six coloured leashes, quickly checking the harnesses havent loosened, and look toward the windows of the ward where my wife is waking from surgery. Soon theyll let us in. Then Ill finally be able to complain about the six lazy tailed troublemakers who ignore me without her.

And tell her that I love her, that Ill love her forever, even when she disappears for days in the cat sanctuary his company funded months ago.

A fool, perhaps but whenever I recall the day she opened her eyes, I realise that as long as shes near, nothing else matters. So Ill keep chasing those impulsive, absurd whims that somehow make her incredibly happy.

Always, while its still not too late.