The Kitten Nobody Wanted Read Online Free

before.
    “Hello, sweetie,” Mia whispered, and the kitten mewed back, trying to scrabble his way up the side of the pen.
    “Wow! He’s never done that before!” Emily murmured, her eyes wide.

    “Can I pick him up?” Mia asked hopefully. “Would Silky mind?”
    Silky was still feeding one of the tabbies and the black kitten, but she had her head up, and she was watching Mia and the white kitten carefully.
    “It should be OK, don’t you think, Mum?” Emily asked. “We’ve picked them up before, and you can see he wants you to!”
    Very gently, Mia reached into the pen and scooped up the white kitten, snuggling him carefully in her lap.
    The kitten let out a little breath of a purr, padding at her school skirt with his paws. Then he curled up with a contented sigh. This was what he had wanted.
    “He’s so soft!” Mia whispered. “And I’m sure his whiskers have grown since I last saw him. Just look at them!”
    The kitten stared up at her. He liked her voice. He recognized it from when she had come before, and the girl’s smell. She had stroked him, and he’d wanted her to cuddle him. He yawned and his waterfall of white whiskers shimmered.
    “None of the others have whiskers like that!” Mia laughed. “You should call him Whiskers, Emily. You haven’t named them yet, have you?”
    Emily shook her head. She had a huge smile suddenly. “Well, we’ve only named the black kitten, because we’re keeping her! She’s going to be my birthday present!” She picked up the black kitten, who seemed to have fallen asleep while she was feeding. “I’m calling her Satin, to go with Silky, you see?” She snuggled the kitten under her chin lovingly.

    “You’re so lucky!” Mia smiled, but her stomach turned over. Of course. The kittens would have to go to new owners. She sighed, and the white kitten made a little grumbling noise as his comfy lap shifted. She’d only known Whiskers – she couldn’t help calling him that, even though she knew it wouldn’t be his real name – for a couple of weeks, but already she knew she would miss him.

Chapter Five
    Whiskers wriggled himself further into the cosy fold of the blanket. He was still only very tiny, but he was starting to understand more about the world, and today the world felt cold. He didn’t like it. Usually he would have snuggled up next to his mother, but she had disappeared. Now that he and his sisters were a bit bigger, nearly fourweeks old, she did that every so often.
    Something soft landed in the pen next to him, and Whiskers twitched and woke out of his half-doze. It was a big, round, bright pink thing. He had no idea what it was. Neither did his two tabby sisters, who prowled towards it together, hissing fiercely. They were very good at being fierce. Whiskers and Satin watched worriedly as one of the tabby kittens dabbed a paw at the pink thing. It bounced a little. She tapped it again, and it wobbled in an interesting sort of way, so she jabbed at it with her claws out, this time.

    The balloon burst with an enormous bang, and the tabby kittens jumped back in surprise, eyeing the shrivelled bit of pink rubber that was left. Whiskers cowered back in the corner of the pen, mewing with fright and wishing his mother would come. He had no idea what had happened! How had the round pink thing disappeared, and why had there been that terrible noise?
    Silky shot back into the room, convinced that someone was hurting her babies, and leaped into the pen, checking them all frantically. Whiskers pressed up against her, shivering.
    “I’m sorry, kittens.” Emily crouched down by the pen. “I didn’t mean to scare you. It was only a balloon – I’mblowing them up for my birthday party, and that pink one must have rolled off the table.”
    Whiskers mewed again, eyeing the other strange round pink things he could see on the kitchen table. Did that mean there were going to be more horrible noises? When Emily tried to give him a comforting stroke he let