In my household, my cat Jombie has many nicknames. Just to name a few: bubba, monster, and little killer. As an outdoor cat, we didn’t know much about his life outside of our house. We assumed that he’d wander around, catch some mice, come back inside for food and water, and eventually, sleep.

No one could have predicted what would come of my cat’s outside adventures.

That was until we got a phone call from my one neighbor, Nancy. She and her husband, Ed, told us about Jombie coming to their porch for attention. In total disbelief, my mother began apologizing profusely. The retired couple claimed he wasn’t doing anything wrong; he was just looking for company.

We laughed it off, until we heard from our other neighbors and fellow cat owners. Their cat, Chibbs, has had multiple encounters with Jombie. He, too, began to go to Ed and Nancy’s across the street.

Now we felt horrible. These poor people are feeding our cat to get him to leave them alone!

However, that wasn’t the case.

As time went on, Jombie and Chibbs formed a rivalry against one another. We’ve been awoken at 3 A.M. to screeching outside of our one-story house, only to find the two wrestling in the bushes. After multiple days of evaluating and watching from afar, the two cats started each day emerging from their respected territories, ready to defend it. When they got tired of be on-guard, they would stalk over to Ed and Nancy’s house for treats. This went on for years.

Eventually, Nancy decided to experiment with Jombie, and find out what would happen if her door was left open. Unsurprisingly, Jombie entered the house with caution. He ended up staying for a half hour or so before returning to the outdoors.

Now three months into the process, Nancy has learned Jombie’s daily routine. It starts with a 5 A.M. wake up call and my mother kicking him out of the house. At 7 A.M., Nancy wakes up and makes her coffee before turning to see my cat porched on her second-story roof. She then opens the door downstairs and he comes inside. He goes into a spare bedroom and takes a nap. When he emerges from the room hours later, he goes and sits with Ed to watch something on the TV. After a few nibbles of food, he goes back outside.

When neither Nancy nor Ed are home, he sits outside their front door on their welcome mat and awaits for their return. There have been instances when we’re coming home from work or school and we’re calling for him to come inside our house, but he’ll glance at us and turn back to the door. He finally comes back into my house around 7 P.M.

We thought this was the worst of it, that he wouldn’t bother anyone else. At least Nancy and Ed don’t mind.

Then we heard of more stories spotting Jombie outside of their house, hanging out on their porch.

Keep in mind, there’s not much my family can do now. This has gone too far, so far that we cannot rein him in.

When we were speaking with the other neighbors, we were apologizing over and over, expressing our hopelessness. Yet again, they told us that not one person, out of the lot of them, minded my cat hanging around their house.

That was when I began to realize, Jombie isn’t terrorizing them or bothering them: he is keeping tabs on them. Similar to a neighborhood watch crew, my cat is checking up on each house to see what’s new and to say “hi”.

Jombie unknowingly connected my whole neighborhood together by doing what he feels is his job.

I will never understand how we ended up here, but I’m happy that I can share the happiness of animals with my neighbors.

And yes, my neighbors do seemy family, too. They just see Jombie more often than we do!