1 ACROSS, 4 DOWN

by Pauline Dewberry

It was the first time I’d cried since the funeral more than a month ago. Lifting up the cushion to his chair I found it and it set me off. Tom always cut the crosswords out of the paper each day and then he’d spend an afternoon while I went shopping with Wendy working his way through them.

“Here you are, love,” he’d say, handing me the almost complete grids, “I’ve left you the easy ones to fill in.”

This was our little joke because we both knew I was hopeless at even the easiest of crosswords, but Tom, to his credit, always tried to make me feel as if I contributed in some way.

Tom would always write some little term of endearment at the top of the page above the grid, something just the two of us shared. It might be as innocent as ‘Dinner was wonderful,’ or more intimate like ‘You blew my mind last night.’ But what had brought the tears today was the ‘I love you, precious’ written in capital letters, each word underlined several times.

I had found him when I got back from an afternoon trailing around the shops with Wendy. She was going on a cruise with Sam and needed ‘the right attire’ to impress the captain and her fellow travelling companions. To be honest, I’d been in half a mind to cancel our trip as Tom had been in a particularly playful mood before lunch and I really wanted to spend some time with him.

“It’s alright, Yvonne,” he’d said at the time, kissing me until I was breathless, “you go and help Wendy and we can finish what we started when you get back. I’ll have a nice tea waiting for you and then we can cosy up on the sofa. Don’t worry, Mistral will keep me company while I do the crosswords.”

Mistral – so called because she’d breezed in through the open kitchen door one morning – a tortoiseshell, had been between five and six months of age, so the vet said upon examination. A week or so after taking up residence with us, we got up one morning to a lovely surprise; four little babies mewling their hearts out. She looked up at us as if to say ‘aren’t I the clever one?’ and our hearts and lives were completely won over. 

Mistral had always favoured Tom for some reason, threading herself around his legs in that sinuous way and kneading his lap before settling down to sleep. And it had been Mistral who had alerted me when I got back from my shopping trip with Wendy. As soon as I opened the front door she was waiting for me in the hallway, meowing plaintively, pacing back to the lounge door and then back to me in the hall as I took my coat off and hung it up.

“Miaow! Miaow! Miaow!” she chivvied.

“I’m home, Tom,” I called out. I wasn’t surprised at the silence – he could have been in the shower or even waiting for me in bed. But it was Mistral’s unusual behaviour that puzzled me as she darted back and forth to the lounge door, mewing loudly.

I followed her into the lounge and saw my Tom, my beautiful Tom, slumped in the armchair where I’d left him, eyes closed, mouth slightly open. Mistral jumped up on his lap and nudged around his neck and chin with her head, then kneaded his lap, miaowing and looking at me with concern and worry on her face.

I ran to Tom and touched his face – he was quite cold. I tried to feel for a pulse in his neck, then his wrist and let out a sob.

I rang for an ambulance and explained what had happened, my voice rising with hysteria. Tom had always said I was the best one to have around in a crisis because I could always be relied upon to be calm and reassuring. Trying to describe Tom’s present condition to a faceless person at the other end of the phone while remaining calm was nigh impossible. I lost it completely.

It turned out that he’d had a massive heart attack and died instantly, probably only a few moments after I’d left. Wendy said I wasn’t to blame myself because even if I had been at home with him there wouldn’t have been anything I could have done to prevent it from happening or saving him once it had.

Mistral claimed Tom’s chair for herself and spent hours sniffing it all over, taking in his scent before kneading the cushion thoroughly and then settling down to sleep.

About a month after the funeral while Mistral was outside I picked up the seat cushion on Tom’s chair, which by now, was covered with her multi-coloured fur. Something caught my eye down the side of the chair and I pulled on the corner of a piece of paper. It was the crossword with a couple of clues left for me to fill in; 1 across began with a ‘V’ and the clue was: ‘Capital of Malta’ and 4 down, which began with the last letter of the answer to 1 across was ‘intense love’.

I replaced the seat cushion and sat down, folding my arms around my body, trying to imagine Tom’s arms around me, his hot kisses on my neck and me turning round to face him, our lips meeting in a tender embrace. “Tom,” I cried out to the empty room, “I miss you so much, my darling man.”

Mistral had walked back into the lounge at that moment and she stopped a few feet away from Tom’s chair. Surprised at seeing me sitting there, in what she probably perceived as her inheritance from Tom, she mewed quietly and touched my leg with her paw. With tears still streaming down my face I looked at her and patted my lap. She hesitated at first and then jumped up, thrusting her head around my face and neck. I held her close to me, remembering that she and Tom used to enjoy amazing cuddle times.

“I know you miss, Daddy,” I quietly said to her, “I miss him too.”

She looked into my face and began to knead my lap for a while, before settling down to sleep.

Comforted by her presence, I reached over to the table next to Tom’s chair and picked up one of his pens. Looking at the crossword grid, I filled in the two clues he’d left for me: Valletta and Adoration.

Once again, I saw his message written in capital letters, each word underlined. ‘I love you, precious.’

“I love you too, precious,” I said, as Mistral purred a deep contented sigh.  

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