Story 115: Reza Shadey Meets Bob (A Cat-and-Bull Story)
Settle in, little listeners. This is the tale of the afternoon Reza Shadey discovered that the largest creature in his kingdom might also be the most dangerously charming.
It was late spring, the air full of warm grass and the faint optimism of distant barbecues. Reza Shadey was on border patrol — his daily march along Mrs Higgins's back fence, tail erect, muttering phrases like "territorial optimisation" and "under-utilised meadow assets", which sounded important even to him.
Then he saw it.
At the far end of his domain, where the garden gave way to a scruffy wild-flower meadow, stood an enormous brown-white pied bull. The creature grazed with the serene focus of a living lawn-mower.
Reza froze. His emerald eyes narrowed.
"Hmph", he said to himself. "Look at that oaf. No ambition. No branding. Probably thinks a business plan is a kind of sandwich."
The bull looked up, blinked slowly and said, in a voice deep enough to cause the buttercups to vibrate, "Why?"
Then he laughed — a warm, rumbling laugh that rolled across the meadow like distant thunder.
Reza's whiskers shot forward. No one laughed in his kingdom without clearance.
He marched down from the fence. "Good afternoon, bovine. I am Reza Shadey, Chief Executive of this entire postcode. You appear to be grazing. Is that your whole strategy?"
The bull chewed thoughtfully. "Why not?" he said, and chuckled again.
Reza decided intervention was required.
"In the modern world, one must innovate", he lectured, puffing up until he resembled a startled duster. "I myself run Aerial Empire™, Purr-to-Power™ and a very nearly profitable bicycle-basket navigation consultancy. You, sir, are wasting prime executive potential."
The bull blinked his huge, gentle eyes. "Why?"
Reza stumbled. "Why? Well... to achieve dominance! To be the Boss!"
"Why?" asked the bull again, chewing a clover.
"To... to ensure an uninterrupted supply of premium salmon, obviously!" Reza spluttered.
The bull looked at the endless green grass around his feet. "I have grass right here. Why bother?"
Reza opened his mouth, then closed it. He felt like he was arguing with a very large, very calm wall. The bull tilted his massive head. "Interesting. Back in my corporate days I was Associate Executive for Bovine Wind. Invented a wind turbine powered entirely by shed cat hair."
Reza inhaled so sharply he squeaked. "Cat hair?!"
The bull shrugged amiably. "Why not?"
By the next day, half the neighbourhood cats had gathered in a neat semicircle around the bull — whose name, it turned out, was Bob — and were listening with wide eyes.
"...and of course, I was the original model for the Lamborghini logo", Bob was saying, casually swishing his tail at a fly. "But I was too fast. They had to slow me down in the drawings. It was a safety issue."
Tiger gasped. Penelope murmured, "Most impressive." Ginger Tom dabbed away a tear. "Legend."
"Oh yes", Bob continued, "and before that, I was the stunt double for the cow that jumped over the moon. The original was afraid of heights. Lovely cheese up there, by the way. A bit crumbly, but decent."
Then Reza arrived in a whirlwind of offended fluff.
"This", he announced, leaping onto the nearest hummock, "is a classic cock-and-bull scenario! I demand proof of the cat-hair turbine!"
Bob beamed the serene smile of someone who has never, in all his life, hurried. "Why certainly."
He wandered off and returned with a contraption so ridiculous it was almost majestic: a rusty bicycle wheel, a broken spotty umbrella and a garden gnome's red hat perched proudly on top.
"Prototype Bovilox I", Bob declared. "Requires only a breeze and a cooperative cat."
Reza saw his chance to reclaim authority. "Excellent! An official unveiling, tomorrow. I shall serve as Chief Technical Consultant."
Bob just blinked. "Why?"
The news travelled faster than free treats. By afternoon the meadow was full — picnic rugs, snacks, sunglasses and Tiger buzzing with the kind of excitement that usually precedes disaster.
Reza strutted around the contraption issuing orders. "Penelope, align those spokes! Tom, stop eating the prototype! Tiger — stop spinning the wheel with your face!"
Then, Reza narrowed his eyes at the gnome hat. "This aerodynamic profile is all wrong", he announced importantly. "It needs a 45-degree tilt for maximum velocity." He climbed up and began to wrestle the hat into a jaunty, unstable angle.
Bob stood nearby, calmly chewing a dandelion. "Why?" he asked gently.
"Because I am the expert!" Reza snapped.
At last Reza climbed onto a stump and raised a paw. "Behold! The Bovine Wind Cat-Hair Turbine, demonstrated by its inventor and expertly overseen by me!"
That was the cue Tiger had apparently been waiting for. "GO REZA! MAKE IT SPIN!" he cheered, bouncing so hard the ground shook.
He launched forward for a closer look. His head collided with the umbrella. The umbrella flipped inside out. A sudden gust of wind whooshed through the meadow.
The turbine came alive.
The bicycle wheel spun furiously. The umbrella twirled. The gnome hat flew off and smacked onto Reza's head at a jaunty angle. The whole contraption wrapped itself around him like a confused mechanical squid and dragged him backwards through a patch of nettles before depositing him upside-down in the grass.
He spun around and around, his paws flailing like the sails of a frantic windmill. "WHOA! STOP THE ROTATION!" he yelled.
For three long seconds, the meadow was silent.
Then Bob let out the biggest, friendliest laugh yet.
"See?" he said. "Told you it works on cat hair."
The meadow exploded with giggles. Penelope hid her face, shaking with silent laughter. Ginger Tom fell over. Tiger jumped in circles yelling, "Again! AGAIN!"
Reza wriggled free, bristling with indignation and nettles. "This was sabotage! Gross structural incompetence! A scandal!"
Bob gently nudged the bicycle wheel upright. "Why?" he asked.
Reza opened his mouth... closed it... opened it again... then stalked off toward the cat-flap, muttering darkly about "gullible bovines" and "the tragedy of genius".
Just then, Mrs Higgins looked over the back fence. "Oh, look!" she exclaimed. "What a lovely big cow in the meadow!"
Reza huffed. A 'lovely big cow'? The indignity!
Later that evening Mrs Higgins found a slightly soggy business card tangled in his fur, which he had accidentally snagged during his tumble:
Bob Bull – Associate Executive (retired)
Bovine Wind Ltd.
Making the impossible sound perfectly reasonable.
Reza pretended to be asleep, very loudly.
From the meadow floated one last warm, rolling laugh — a creature entirely content, needing to prove nothing to anyone.
Night night. Sleep tight.