[Video Description: Olivia, then a tiny kitten, hops all around a cardboard animal carrier, sticking her paws in the air-holes and generally being annoying. After a few moments, while Livs isn't paying attention, Matilda sneaks out one side of the box, in which she'd been hiding, and slinks away undetected.]
For those who don't know the story, Olivia came to us one morning on our way to work, many years ago when Iain and I worked at the same place. I was driving that morning, and, as is not unusual in our exurban area, we were following a truck towing a big piece of farm equipment.
Halfway to work, two kittens tumbled off the trailer. One ran off like a shot into the field abutting the road. The other ran under our car, and I felt the dull thud as a rear wheel ran over it, killing it. Tears. I was driving and sobbing; Iain was reassuring me it wasn't my fault.
We turned from the country road onto the highway, and had just accelerated to full speed when a third kitten came flying off the trailer, hitting the pavement and bouncing back into the air before landing in the verge. I pulled over and Iain ran into the long grass and collected the wee thing, running back to the car clutching her against his chest. His sweater was covered in blood.
I drove to our vet. The little grey kitten's paws were scraped and her chin was badly hurt. We left her in their capable hands and went to work.
At the end of the day, we went to the vet to check on the kitten and pay the bill. We didn't intend to adopt her. They told us she'd come through her surgery fine; they'd given her a chin implant to replace the smooshed bone, stitched her up, and, when she'd come to, she immediately went to her bowl and started munching on hard food like nothing had happened. When we arrived, she gave us this look, like, "Hey! I remember you! Whuzzup?!" She was a character. We couldn't let her go.
We took her home and cleaned her up. Turns out she was white under all that dirt.
Iain noted that she'd had a rather Dickensian start, being a filthy little orphan and all. I proposed calling her Olivia Twist.
"Got any treats?"
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