A Wellington woman who abandoned her holiday in Rotorua after her beloved cat went missing has been joyfully reunited with the mischievous feline on Christmas Day.
It had already been a stressful month for Ruby Carter, whose cat Othello had recently required major abdominal surgery after eating sewing thread.
Carter had taken Othello to the vet on Monday to have his stitches removed before leaving him with a house sitter while she visited family in Rotorua. That evening, she received a call from the house sitter, informing her that Othello had gone missing.
Initially, Carter wasn’t too worried and thought he might be hiding under a bed somewhere. However, by the following morning, it became clear that the indoor cat had managed to escape through a kitchen window.
The house sitter spotted Othello in the neighbor’s basement, but when she tried to approach him, he ran away.
“It was just hideous, and I didn’t really know what I was going to do,” Carter told the Herald.
When Othello still hadn’t returned, Carter booked a last-minute flight back to Wellington via Auckland. She arrived home in the Karori suburb of Wellington around 9:30 pm on Christmas Eve.
“I was walking around the neighborhood, just calling out to him,” she said. “I spent about two hours out in the dark with my phone torch.”
Carter left the front door open and set out food inside, hoping Othello would return on his own. She barely slept that night, waking up every few hours to check if he had come home.
The next morning, Carter sat by the front door with a book so she could hear if Othello arrived. Suddenly, she heard the crunch of leaves and went outside, spotting Othello. He saw her and ran away.
“I ran after him, but I don’t know where he went,” she said. After calling his name and searching the area, she thought he had disappeared again.
A couple of hours later, while in the bathroom, she heard the familiar crunching sound of Othello eating the food she had left out for him.
“I slowly got off the toilet, crawled into the lounge, and crept up quietly. Keeping the energy low, I grabbed him and shut the front door.”
Othello, completely unfazed, spent the afternoon lying next to Carter, sleeping with his paws in the air.
“He’s just lying here on his back, completely not bothered at all,” Carter laughed.
At the time of the Herald interview, Carter was still figuring out whether she could fly Othello back to Rotorua or if someone else could look after him.
Carter has had Othello for about two years. He was previously a stray living at a Rotorua campground.
“He’s the most precious thing in the world to me,” she said. “He’s my baby.”
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