Once upon a time, there was a little black cat named Simon, who lived in an old, crooked cottage at the end of a street in a small town. Simon was not an ordinary cat. He could talk – and he did so a lot. In fact, Simon talked all the time, so much that it often made people tired. No one could get him to stop!
Simon talked about everything under the sun. He had opinions about the weather, what people wore, and what they ate for breakfast. But even though Simon talked so much, he was a smart cat, and there was nothing he loved more than helping people figure things out – whether they asked him to or not.
One Halloween night, while the children in town were out trick-or-treating, Simon overheard something strange. Someone was lost! The children couldn’t find their way back to town from the woods, and Simon knew he had to help.
“Oh no, oh no,” he muttered to himself, “I must find them and lead them back right away!”
Simon dashed off toward the woods, and it didn’t take long before he found the three children wandering confused among the trees. There was Emily, Victor, and little Sophie, who all looked very scared.
“Fear not!” shouted Simon as he gracefully padded along the path. “I, Simon, the most talkative cat in the world, will help you!”
The children looked at each other in surprise. “A talking cat?” said Victor, wide-eyed.
“Yes, yes, yes! I can talk, and it’s a great advantage for you because I know exactly how to get out of this forest,” Simon replied proudly. “Follow me!”
And so Simon started talking – all the way through the woods. He told the children about the history of the forest, about the plants that grew there, and how his great-grandfather once chased a mouse through the same paths. He talked and talked, and though the children first thought it was a bit much, they soon got used to it. Simon really did know a lot, and his endless chatter made them forget that they had been scared.
But after a while, the children still hadn’t come out of the forest. They began to wonder.
“Are we almost there?” Emily asked cautiously.
“Oh yes, yes, of course!” Simon answered, “I know exactly where we are… hmm… maybe we should go this way… or no, that way!”
The children couldn’t help but laugh. Simon had talked so much that he had forgotten to pay attention to where they were going! But it didn’t matter, because they were having fun together, and the forest didn’t seem so scary anymore.
Finally, Simon found the right path out of the woods. As they reached the edge of town, Simon looked up at the children and smiled – in his own cat-like way.
“See, I told you, you could trust me,” he said proudly.
“Yes,” Victor said, laughing, “but you almost talked us in the wrong direction!”
They all laughed, and Simon nodded. “Maybe I do talk a bit too much,” he admitted. “But the important thing is, we found our way back.”
The children waved goodbye to Simon and headed home, while Simon, with a happy and talkative purr, slinked back to his cottage. And even though he might have talked a little too much, he was still the best cat to have by your side when you got lost – especially on Halloween.
