The Rich Text of Race Car Drivers

The Williams motorhome on a Saturday morning was a moving jungle of human feet, chair legs, alarming noises, and pieces of metal in boxes which winked like the sun. All of these Alex ignored with ease, even the tiny glittering bits—“which,” he said to himself, “any other cat would have stopped to play with. It’s terribly lucky for the team that I’m a professional.” Instead he lightly batted no more than two of them under a chair and continued on his way.

In doing so he was accompanied by a variety of surprised noises. Several people in Williams uniforms said sentences that included the word Alex; others reached down to seize him with great pink hands, which Alex evaded promptly and beautifully. He was so pleased with his work that another of the Williams personnel, taking advantage of his distraction, actually got her hands around his midsection and tugged. With incredible dignity, Alex turned into a liquid, streamed through her hands to the floor, and made himself scarce.

He understood that, if he were in possession of a human mind, he would have been at least a little upset about the situation in which he now found himself. It was highly clarifying to be a cat. In fact, now that he had experienced it, it surprised him that anyone was ever anything else; he felt quite sorry for the human version of Alex, who was tired, and had a meal plan, and who thought often about how he was going to lose the things he liked someday, and who could not even jump three times his own height, let alone six. Human Alex worried about whether his sisters had enough money, and about what he would do if something in his body broke again, and about how he couldn’t remember the last time he had slept in one bed for longer than a month. Cat Alex was currently having a difficult time understanding what a month was.

“Pets are not allowed to roam in the Williams motorhome,” someone behind a door said in a low growl.

Alex’s tail fluffed out like a bottlebrush. “Who said I’m a pet, mind your business, fuck off,” he said. Fuck off is an expression that cats have over one hundred ways to say; he chose the eighty-fourth rudest.

There was a long, suspicious silence. “You smell like Carlos’s friend,” said the voice.

The name Carlos was accompanied by a spectrum of emotions untranslatable into human words. “Oh, Piñón,” said Alex. He was surprised by how pleased he was that one of Carlos’s friends thought of him as Carlos’s friend, even if that friend was—heinous!—a dog.

 “Carlos said I had to be here,” said Piñón. There was a faint whine in his voice. “He said he wasn’t allowed to take me to his meetings. He said I couldn’t help him make coffee, or help him make dinner, or help him drive his car. Why are you allowed?”

The point about the car hadn’t occurred to Alex. He supposed Williams would need to make the car smaller so that he could drive it. How long would that take—a whole day? Maybe even two? “I’m a cat,” he told Piñón, in answer to the question.

This earned another growl from Piñón. “You’re not allowed,” he said, low. “One of the bosses ought to come get you.”

“Oh, please,” said Alex, which is an expression that cats have over three hundred ways to say. He understood that by bosses Piñón meant human beings, and he found his ears had gone flat against his head.

Piñón whuffed. “Promise you’re going to go back to Carlos’s friend’s room where you’re supposed to be,” he said. “Promise it or I’ll shout for help.”

“Listen,” said Alex, with unbelievable magnanimity. “When I’ve got a roast chicken from the kitchen, I’ll take it back here. Then I’ll unlock the door—” he’d sort out the issue of thumbs somehow—“and let you out, and you can have a scrap or two. Maybe even a leg—”

“Help!” Piñón barked. “Thief! Help! Thief! Criminal! Help! Criminal! Robbery in progress! Citizen’s arrest! Somebody help! Help me!”

“Boot-licker,” said Alex, and fled.

Unfortunately, though dogs had apparently no skill whatsoever at maintaining omertà, they were very talented at raising an alarm in a crowd. Alex found himself at the center of a thunderstorm—here hands, here legs, here people running, here someone with an enormous blanket whose hem he only just dodged in time. “Don’t they know I’m a racer!” he said, outraged.

But it was dawning on him that he was getting a little lost. And, what was worse than this, the hunt was becoming noisier and noisier: there was the stomping of boots on linoleum, the shouting of incomprehensible grating words out of huge red human mouths, the sharp bronze scents of alarm and suspicion and confusion, the barking of Piñón several hallways away. His instincts were beginning to tell him that someone was out to get him; which, of course, they were, but he was increasingly unsure whether he was being chased by humans alone, or perhaps by a wolf pack, or by some kind of hawk or raptor, or a car—but he liked cars, didn’t he?—only he was no longer sure of this, he was no longer sure of anything, his tail was enormous and his claws were click-clacking on the tiles and his eyes were as wide as saucers, he was majestic and talented but he was quite conscious now that he was nine inches tall and nobody else in the motorhome was shorter, and any of them might fight him, or eat him, and he did not really know how to get home, and he did not really know where home was, and he did not really know if home was anywhere at all, and he did not know where to go or what to say or what to do except run and run and hide and run and hide and hide and run and hide and hide and hide and hide and hide.

He found himself in a dark little space beneath a sofa in what was apparently an unused conference room. It was cramped and musty; he had to tuck his tail all the way around himself in order to be sealed in properly. It was unfortunate that he was going to have to spend the rest of his life here, Alex thought, but such was fate. He put his chin on his folded paws and stared at the little crack of yellow light on the linoleum, feeling sorry for himself.

“Alex,” called someone from the hallway. “Al-ex.”

Alex was far too clever to come just because he’d been called—he wasn’t a dog—but his ears slowly unflattened. He knew the voice.

“Alex,” the voice went on. There was the creak of hinges, a sigh, and a click. “Alex, are you down here? Everyone’s too busy to tell me where you’ve gone.”

Another door opening and closing, this one nearer; and then a third creak, this one very close indeed. “Albon,” said George. “Albon-oooo. Are you hiding somewhere?”

“Yes,” said Alex, slithering out from under the sofa. George, who had been closing the door to the conference room, stopped and blinked. Alex went over to him and hit his head on George’s shins three or four times. “Georgie, I’ve had the most awful morning. Pick me up.”

George picked him up—not with very much skill, his hands clumsy under Alex’s arms, but Alex submitted to it with good grace. It was sort of pleasant to be patient with people, as long as people were George. “They’re going to need to delay the third free practice until they can make my car smaller,” he informed George. “Can you have a word with the race director about it?”

“Hallo there,” said George. “You’re a handsome old thing, aren’t you?”

George’s observational skills were fantastic, thought Alex with a wave of possessive pride. He wriggled a little to get George’s hands under his back legs and, when he was stable, plastered himself limply over George’s silver-jacketed chest and propped his chin on George’s bony shoulder. “Blimey, you’re friendly,” said George, petting the back of his head. “Whose cat are you?”

Cats have only one expression that answers this question. “I’m my own cat, thanks,” said Alex, though he softened it slightly by purring. It had occurred to him that it was a little strange that he could understand what George said, when everything else humans said had sounded like so much nonsense; but then again, George always talked a lot of nonsense, and Alex had always managed to understand him before

“You’re Alex’s cat, I bet,” said George. “You're new. He didn’t tell me he’d brought one of them. I thought they lived at home with his mum.”

“Not for a long time, Georgie,” said Alex.

“Well, anyway, I bet he’s looking for you,” said George. “I don’t suppose you know where he is?”

Alex yawned. He was feeling very comfortable now, despite the roughness of the silver polyester, and very sleepy. The desire to venture forth questing for food had left him, replaced by a distinct, almost physical sense of safety. “I’m ready to go back to my room now,” he instructed.

“I’d better take you back to Alex’s room, then,” said George. “He always turns up when you really need him."

Alex was not at all sure that this was true, which was how he knew he was not going to be a cat for much longer. He let George carry him through the motorhome—George walked like he had springs in his soles, but that was all right, it kept Alex from falling asleep—and half-listened to him saying things to the Williams staff like yes, I think he must be, and I know, I’m just going to find Alex now, and no, no, he didn’t give me any trouble at all. When they finally reached his room, he trickled out of George's arms onto the desk and sat with his tail wrapped round his paws, blinking up at George very slowly.

Like this, he could see himself reflected in George’s sunglasses. He hadn’t known what kind of cat he’d become, but there he was now, sleek and athletic and black and very lovely. It was nice to see himself like this, if only for a minute.

“You should clear out of here before I turn back,” he told George. “I don’t want to give you too much of a shock before qualis.”

“I’ll look for him somewhere else,” said George. “You keep safe, all right? Don’t go running off again.”

“No promises,” said Alex, but when George was gone, he leapt down to the floor, curled up, and folded his paw over his eyes.