BERRY

My name is Berry and I am a mixed breed cat.

My past is the dirt and dampness of the trench where I lived with my sister. I don’t really remember how we ended up there completely alone, without my mother, literally in the middle of a war. The sky above us was always rumbling, the earth was shaking, and each new day brought only fear. We huddled together, trying to keep warm and not think about the fact that everything was too dangerous around us.⠀

Sometimes I dreamed that everything would change, but every explosion brought me back to reality. We ate everything we could find, drank rainwater, and when it became especially scary, we just closed our eyes and tried not to hear the sounds of war.⠀

One day, soldiers came down into our trench. I saw the light of their flashlights and froze. We didn’t know what would happen next. But they turned out to be good. I remember looking at one of them and feeling hope for the first time.

For some time we lived with them in this terrible trench. They shared canned food, bread and water with us. And at some moments, hope for a peaceful life returned to us all. Especially when my sister and I forgot where we were and began to play in front of the soldiers with some dry leaves or from the laces on the boots of one of them. Then, this gloomy trench was illuminated by warm smiles, albeit for a very short moment.

Then we were taken out of there. And the soldiers handed us over to the shelter with the hope that a new life would begin for us here. And that is exactly what happened. My sister and I spend time here with other rescued cats, play, eat delicious food and most importantly, we no longer hear those terrible sounds of war.

My sister and I have been through too much, but now I know for sure: life can be different and one day, as the soldiers who saved us wished, I will find a forever home and a family that will become the whole world for me.