We All Need a Billy
In 1984, a tiny grey kitten named Billy adopted our family - and changed everything.
These days, it sometimes feels like the world could do with a few more stories like his. So I’ll take a little trip down memory lane, reminding myself - and perhaps you - of happier, gentler times.
Before Billy, we had known the quiet grace of a white Cornish Rex named Tripitaka - Tripi to us. With his great ears and gentle presence, he reminded us of the monk from the old Japanese television series Monkey. Calm, wise, and kind, Tripi was, in every sense, a small white god in our home.
And then he was gone.
My daughters were heartbroken. They sobbed and cried, and even now, all these years later, they remember that day—the day love left the room and took something with it.
As a parent, I could not bear their pain.
Enter Billy...
So I called the breeder. She had one kitten left - a grey Cornish Rex, still too young to leave his mother. I pleaded. I begged. The breeder hesitated, but she heard the desperation in my voice.
At just eight weeks old, Billy came home.
He arrived like a whisper. Grey, soft, and so small he looked more like an oversized mouse than a cat. But what he lacked in size, he made up for in spirit. My daughters fell upon him with a kind of love that only children can give - fierce, immediate, and complete.
They named him Billy, after Bilbo Baggins, deciding he would be the bearer of a golden thread that would bind us back together as a family.
And somehow… he was.
We lived then beside a river in Queensland, not far from the Coral Sea. It was a beautiful place, the kind where life feels a little slower and a little closer to the elements.
Billy thrived there.
Though “thrived” may not quite cover it.
Because Billy was no ordinary cat.
Billy loved to swim.
He would wander down to the river, slip into the water, and paddle about quite happily - until one day he discovered the neighbouring restaurant. A fine dining establishment, known for its seafood and its paying customers, who did not expect to see a soggy grey creature emerging from the river like something dredged from the depths.
When wet, Billy resembled a drowned rat.
This was… not ideal.
One evening, Billy took things a step further.
He swam across, strolled through the dining room as if he owned the place, and made straight for the kitchen. There, upon the chef’s table, sat a magnificent Red Emperor - worth a great deal of money and intended for someone who had no idea it was about to be intercepted.
Billy leapt.
He grabbed the fish.
And he ran.
He was later found under a car in the carpark, happily eating his prize.
There was a knock at my door not long after.
The restaurant owner stood there, not unreasonably requesting compensation for the stolen fish.
I paid. A lot.
Billy, meanwhile, was entirely unrepentant. That night, he curled up beside one of my daughters, full-bellied and content with what he clearly considered a successful expedition.
I was asked to ensure it would not happen again. I passed the message on. Billy must have understood the gravity of the situation.
He never went back.
Though I suspect the sight of a chef with a cleaver may have helped reinforce the lesson....
Billy joined bath time when it suited him. He waited until the temperature was just right, then stepped in as though invited.
He “helped” with sewing by launching himself onto carefully laid patterns.
He allowed our flightless lorikeet, Scooter, to snuggle into him - though I suspect he would have preferred that detail remain private.
He travelled in the car, hopping out with the dogs for roadside stops, then leaping back in as if ticking off items on an itinerary.
He was, in every sense, part of us.
In time, we moved from the river to the beach.
And there, as the waves rolled in and the sand stretched endlessly ahead, Billy remained exactly who he was.
He walked with us. Not behind. Not ahead. With us.
A family: two adults, two children, a poodle, a Staffordshire Bull Terrier named Jessie… and a cat padding along the shoreline as if this were the most natural thing in the world.
And perhaps it was.
Later, life shifted again.
The girls had grown and left home, and the house had taken on that quieter, hollowed feeling that comes when the noise of family life fades into memory.
We moved to the outback.
It was a different world entirely. The heat pressed down during the day, and the flies came in clouds thick enough to test the patience of a saint. Daylight was something to endure rather than enjoy, so we learned to live at the edges of it.
At dusk, when the sun slipped away and the air softened, we would walk.
By then, our little procession had changed - but not diminished.
There was Billy, of course. Toby, the poodle. Jessie, our steady Staffordshire Bull Terrier. And Sally, the lamb I had rescued, who had somehow become convinced she was part of the family.
Leading us all, as if appointed to the role, was Billy.
Out into the dimming light he would go, tail up, unhurried, entirely certain of his place in the world… and we followed.
A cat, two dogs, a lamb, and two adults, moving together through the quiet of an outback evening.
Even then, it felt unusual. Now, it feels like something from a story.
And that’s the thing.
Sometimes, you don’t just get a pet. You get a soul. Something sent - not to replace what was lost, because nothing ever truly can - but to carry you through it.
Billy did that for us.
He arrived when our hearts were broken, stitched us back together in the most unexpected ways, and then, quietly, after many years, he left us again.
Billy died of old age in 2000.
But he never really left.
Even now, I can see him clearly - as though no time has passed at all.
I sometimes wonder about these things. About how, just when life feels too heavy, something - or someone - arrives to steady us.
A cat. A companion. A small grey creature who swims rivers, steals fish, and somehow binds a family back together.
I think we all need a Billy again - some small, unexpected soul who swims rivers, steals fish, and stitches broken hearts back together with nothing but mischief and love.
Billy proved that for us.
He was a very good cat.
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