These stories were originally shared on The Animal Rescue Site. Submit your own rescue story here. Your story just might be the next to be featured on our blog!

I am orange kitty.

PHOTO: Laurie

I had a home... well, what you might call a home. My owner's live there. I have been on my own finding food and shelter for many years. I had fleas and tics all over me. My owner's didn't care. They didn't care that I was left alone in freezing weather. I lost part of my ear because of you.

I came across a house one day. A house where I saw other, happy cats in the window lounging on a cat condo. I sat on the other side of the glass looking in thinking "I have a dream". "Why can't I too have that?"

Just then, a human came out of the house. I have a hard time trusting humans. After all, it was humans who left me alone to fend for myself.

I keep my distance from the fat, happy one who wants to pet me. Her voice is very soothing. She reaches out calmly with her hand. She gives me cream and kibble to fill my empty stomach. She reaches out to me to fill my empty heart. She worries if I don't come by everyday. She really cares about me.

I really didn't know what it feels like to be loved.

PHOTO: PEXELS

To my previous owners, you lost a wonderful cat. You didn't think I was worth your time, care or money. Someone else thinks I am.

I have a new "family". I am safe, cared for and loved.

I am orange kitty... hear me roar.

Story submitted by Laurie of Kent, Ohio.

Love rescue stories? Keep reading!

Love at First Meow

In October of 1991, an orange cat strolled into our townhouse as we were packing for a trip to Vermont. I wasn't into cats then, but I was charmed by this friendly, chill cat. He just sauntered in like he owned the place. Our neighbors ended up adopting him. As I got to know, and love, more cats over the years, I would sometimes think, "Lord, I'm ready for that to happen again!" Also, for some reason, I knew that if we ever did get a cat, it would be male, and his name would be Walter. Who knew where that came from!

Fast forward to April of 2020, the strangest of years, as we were driving up to my Mom's, about an hour away. GPS had me taking a left at Roosevelt Ave in Manville, NJ, but I felt like going straight. But when I looked in my rearview mirror, there was a line of cars, so I went ahead and made that left hand turn. That small act changed our lives for the better, for good!

Within ten yards or so, we almost hit a small orange cat who was crossing the road. I immediately pulled over, and also waved my arms madly at an oncoming car. He thought I was nuts until I told him I didn't want him to hit this little cat. He said, "Well, he's under your car now!" I knelt down, we locked eyes and this little fella meowed - I scooped him up in my arms and he hugged my neck and started purring madly. It was love at first meow.

PHOTO: KATE HAMMETT

After I went to a few houses to see if he belonged to anyone, I brought him back to the car (and my infinitely patient husband) and said, "Watch him while I go knock on some more doors!" We had our tiny maltipoo, Lily, in a crate in the back seat, and she was yowling and howling. The cat, for his part, just calmly and curiously put his nose up to her to say "Oh, hi there!" Then hopped up to sit on her crate as if it was something he did on a routine basis.

We did due diligence to see if he belonged to anyone in the neighborhood, but the story we got from a couple of people was that there were a LOT of stray cats in Manville. And he most likely would have been a dead stray cat if we hadn't flagged down that oncoming car. Which would not have happened if I had not made that left onto Roosevelt Ave! Oh, the importance of these small decisions we make in life!

So now we have our male, orange cat, as friendly and chill as the one who walked into our home so many years ago, and have indeed named him Walter. He was estimated to be 7-9-months-old when we found him, so he is just around a year now. He is sweet, funny, curious, mischievous, and will do a meow that sounds like he's saying "Huh-rowwww? (Hellooo?)" He is also so beautifully marked! Truly, our own little tiger. I didn't know I could be this much in love with a CAT!!!

I also did some research after we took Walter home, thinking about how friendly and chill he is. (Although he definitely has his Crazy Cat times too.) For some reason, orange tabbies have a rep for being very friendly and outgoing. Sure is the case with our guy!

We found a new home this year after almost two years of looking; and we found a cat who I love to the moon and back. Lily and he are quite companionable now - he actually seems quite attached to her, and I call him her Bratty Little Brother. This year has brought so much weirdness and heartache, but Walter is one of the biggest silver (or orange!) linings to 2020.

Story submitted by Kate Hammett from Princeton, New Jersey.

Enjoying these orange tabby stories? Here's one last tale for you!

The Rescue of the Dryer Kitten

I am a dog person. My kids are 17, 16 and 14, and I have survived this long turning down pouty pleading faces, without giving in and getting a cat.

On the day before Halloween, my son walked into the house with this tiny orange kitten, claiming it climbed up his pants leg while he was taking the garbage out and wouldn't let go. This thing was soaked. Shivering. Crawling with fleas. His tiny nose and one eye was crusted over almost completely. Waaaay too little, skin and bones. My heart broke. I STILL said no... But I told the kids we would fill his tiny belly, get him warm and clean, and find out what meds he needed. Then, when he was healthy, we'd find him a forever home. We gave him a can of tuna and almost immediately had to start taking it away in increments because he ate it like he'd never eaten before.

PHOTO: JETT FROM MILLSBORO, DELAWARE

When his tiny belly was finally full, the next on the agenda was a bath. Too little for flea meds, he got a bath in blue dawn every day for the next three weeks to get and keep those nasty things away from him. Because he was so tiny and was so cold for so long, baths meant being blow dried with the hair dryer and a nap on a bed with a heating pad until he was dry completely. We ordered kitten formula. He apparently was doing just fine with wet food, but the more time we spent with him the more I came to the conclusion that being sickly and the runt, mama pushed him away. I decided to supplement with the formula to make up for what he missed out on.

He got meds immediately for his runny nose and eyes, and a week later, antibiotics. We also got ointment for his eye, which after getting all of the stuff cleaned off of it, we realized was completely clouded over and permanently damaged. (The vet that helped us with him later confirmed that despite the clouding, he can see perfectly fine!)

Shortly after his first bath, I sent a photo of the tiny, sickly kitten to my daughter, captioning it "Well, this happened." She replied with a photo of him in her arms, a week prior. I had been duped. The kids had found this kitten, and I'd said "no" so many times they were trying their damnedest to care for him themselves, keeping him with old towels in a discarded dryer in the barn. (This explains why our tuna was disappearing.) They were just biding their time and trying to keep him safe and warm until they thought I was in a good enough mood to say yes, apparently.

I believe it was the third day, watching him play with the dozen new kitty toys after waking up sleepily in his new cat bed with his own cozy blanket that I realized, he wasn't going to any forever home but this one.

ORANGE TABBY. PHOTO: PIXABAY/RIHAIJ

Jack (named for Jack O'Lantern, since he moved in on the day before Halloween) is now about seventeen-weeks-old. He has gotten so big and healthy that sometimes it's hard to remember that he showed up on our doorstep at death's door. He is fifty percent our wild child, so crazy that I roll my eyes and wonder how in the hell I, the dog person, got into this mess. The other fifty percent is the most affectionate cat I've ever seen in my life. I can't sit at the table without him perched on my shoulder like a parrot. When I come home from work, he runs up and tries to run up my pant leg and meows until I pick him up. The second I let him out of my son's room in the morning, he's my shadow, has to literally be in my arms while I make my coffee and work lunch and get ready for work.

I don't know if it was because he physically couldn't purr with his ailments when he first arrived or if it just took him a while before he was comfortable and felt safe enough, but the first couple of weeks he didn't purr at all. Now, if you just LOOK at Jack, he starts purring, so loud that you can literally hear it on the other side of the room.

Now, I will admit, in his crazy moods I have threatened to send him back to the dryer. If he understood Human he would laugh at us, because he knows as well as I do that this kitten will be loved and spoiled and safe as long as he lives.

And this, folks, is how I was coerced into being a dog person AND a cat person.

Story submitted by Jett from Millsboro, Delaware.

Orange-Kitty's, Walter's, and Jack's stories were originally shared on The Animal Rescue Site. Share your very own rescue story here!