Nor were her tricks limited to just football that spring. One cloudy afternoon, Sara called out on the platform, ‘Felix! Felix, catch!’ The railway worker’s long blonde hair cascaded over her shoulder as she looked down at the station cat.
In response, Felix balanced carefully on her hind legs and sat up to attention, like a begging dog at a circus show. She may not have been willing to chase balls down the corridor for Dan, but when treats – such as the one in Sara’s outstretched hand – were involved, Felix was always game.
The cat kept her green eyes fixed firmly on the treat, as Sara continued to instruct her to catch. Milliseconds after Sara released the cat biscuit, Felix caught it nimbly between her two front paws, stopping the treat in its tracks as it descended. It seemed she had a future career not only on the football field, but also on the cricket green. With gratitude, Felix swiftly gobbled it down and looked up at Sara, hoping for more …
A short distance away from this scene stood Karl, Sara’s colleague. Through smiling eyes, he observed not only the game but also his friend’s affection for her feline colleague. Sara had so much love to give, he thought. As Felix successfully snatched a second treat, Karl and Sara shared a smile over Felix’s head, like two siblings enjoying a well-worn joke.
Further down the platform, team leader Dan watched them too. He soon came over for a natter. He was a joker himself – albeit the cracker of bad ‘Dad jokes’, as Sara liked to tease him – and it wasn’t long before the three of them were giggling away at something Felix had done. Dan bent down to stroke Felix and the cat curved her head lovingly into his hand.
Sara watched the two of them somewhat shyly, the last traces of her laugh still showing in her smile. She thought it was really, really sweet, the way Dan and Felix were together – whether they were cuddling or staging penalty shootouts on the concourse. Not all the blokes at the station were into the cat, but Dan wasn’t ashamed to show how much he liked her. Through his affectionate cuddles with the famous Felix, Sara could tell that he was a really loving and truly kind man. As if in agreement, Felix purred loudly as Dan rubbed firmly behind her ears.
Just then, the team leader’s radio crackled into life. ‘Base receiving,’ he answered, standing up from Felix and walking off back down the platform to attend to his work, raising a hand in fond farewell to his two friends as he went.
Sara watched him go without saying anything. She was still watching when Karl came over to her side and not so subtly coughed.
‘Nice bloke, isn’t he?’ he said knowingly.
Sara blushed. ‘He’s all right,’ she said – knowing that she didn’t need to say any more. Sara and Karl had no secrets.
Karl nudged her with his elbow. ‘“All right”, eh?’ he teased. ‘Whatever you say, princess.’
That small seed in Sara’s heart was not the only thing beginning to blossom at the station that spring. Felix’s multi-platform media career was also sprouting new buds – as Mark Allan, who was always looking for ideas to pep up her Facebook posts, now began screening Felix’s antics via Facebook Live.
He had wondered for a while what that button on Facebook labelled ‘go live’ did, and so he decided one morning at 6.30 a.m., as he was hanging out with Felix on the platform waiting for his train, to give it a try. What was the worst that could happen?
Famous last words. When Mark pressed ‘go live’, the first, alarming thing that occurred was that he saw his own face looking back at him. It turned out that his default camera setting on Facebook Live was for selfie mode! Rather than a beautiful pussycat filling the screen, being broadcast to hundreds all around the world, his own ‘ugly mug’ instead took centre stage! He did a rapid recoil and flipped it round, to where Felix was sitting patiently, ready for her close-up.
For that first video, he filmed her chasing after a treat – but despite the movie’s simplicity, it went down really well. As it was live, fans could engage with her in real time, and Mark noticed that her international fans in particular – for whom it wasn’t 6.30 a.m. – were especially enthusiastic. ‘Greetings from Sydney!’ came one message; ‘Hello from Oregon!’ was another; a third declared: ‘Just going to bed in Utah. Goodnight, Felix!’ A wave of hearts and likes swept across the screen, so fast that Mark couldn’t keep up with them.
After that, he and Felix often ‘went live’ during Mark’s early-morning commute. The whole experience was a learning curve for the mild-mannered commuter. During one ‘broadcast’, Mark’s train arrived while he was still mid-shoot. Rushing to catch his service, he completely forgot to press ‘stop’, so that Felix’s global fans were treated to a rather perplexing video of Mark’s fellow passengers’ legs. He had crowded on to the busy train and set off for Manchester, all without realising that he was still broadcasting live to over 400 of Felix’s fans! On other occasion, he was busy filming a train coming in when Felix suddenly decided to jump down into the four foot – the railway-industry name for the deep man-made valley in which the train tracks run.
What do I do? thought Mark, panicking. Felix was perfectly safe, and he knew that she would get out of the way of the incoming train in plenty of time, but he was worried about the safety message her antics might send out. So, as soon as Felix had leapt into the abyss beyond the platform edge, he abruptly stopped recording.
Her fans, of course, had no clue as to what had happened to their favourite feline friend. Had that train that they’d seen coming in actually made contact with the cat? Was that why Mark had ended the film – because of a terrible and tragic accident? It didn’t bear thinking about it – but they had to know. Felix’s Facebook page was soon flooded with messages from worried fans.
‘I’m all right!’ Mark wrote on her behalf, as soon as he realised their concerns. ‘I just had to go and scare off some pigeons!’
The love that her Facebook fans felt for her was simply beautiful. Mark tried hard to make her Facebook page a place of warmth and goodwill and the fans responded in kind. People came for a laugh and a smile – and, increasingly, to chat with their fellow fans. It wasn’t long before a sense of community sprang up between the ‘Friends of the Floof’ (FOTF). They had their own affectionate acronyms and words (flooftastic, pawsome, Huddersfloof station …), as well as regular traditions such as ‘pub o’clock’, 4 p.m. on a Friday, when Felix would officially declare that the weekend had begun. Too often these days the online world could be combative and full of rage, with trolls appearing more and more, but Felix’s Facebook page was ‘a beacon of friendly, cheerful, fun-filled light’ – as one fan, Barbara Blackie, put it – and this loving community of fans soon found that friendship with Queen Felix opened up all sorts of other opportunities too. Across the ether, new friendships formed and hearts were healed, all thanks to Felix the cat.
Felix brightened up people’s days. She entertained them. She made them smile – even at their very darkest times. People wrote to tell Felix that she had helped them through their breast cancer treatment, or made them feel that life was worth living again after they’d struggled with depression. ‘I get very down sometimes,’ one friend, Jennifer Adele Berry, confided in her, ‘with depression, anxiety and panic attacks – but I don’t tell people, really, as they always say things like, “Cheer up, it might never happen.” I’m grateful to be here, but sometimes I just want to shut the door and close the curtains. Yet hearing your stories and seeing your beautiful face makes me smile from the bottom of my heart.’