I will put in all of the background so as not to drip feed.
When my exp moved in with me he brought his cat. Previously Cat and Ex had lived with his mother. Exp moved out a few years later but cat stayed.
The cat was never very loyal, would disappear for days on end but always came back and actually set up home with one of my neighbours. it spent some nights at ours and some nights at theirs, we both fed it and loved it.
In October I had to move, the plan was for me to live in a new house for a month and then after that month to move into Exp's mums house as she was moving away. Exp lives elsewhere.
Because I was moving twice and Cat had already lived at Exp's mums house most of its life we decided that Cat should go straight there and then when I moved in he would be my cat again.
Well at some point between him moving back there and me moving in Cat ran away. No one told me until I moved in and asked where he was. Exp's mum and I don't have a great relationship and wouldn't ever cjat but I would have thought they might mention my missing cat.
So by the time I found out Cat had been missing about a month. I looked for him around the area but couldn't see him, rang local vets, he hadn't been brought in. He is an old cat so I resigned to the fact that he had died but still kept an eye out for him in the area.
I had to go back to our old area last week and there was Cat, I couldn't get him straight away because I was walking the kids to the dentist and couldn't A) take the cat with me or B) carry the cat the couple of miles back on foot.
When I went back to collect him our old neighbours said they were keeping him, he was settled and that they had heard I wasn't looking after him (I wasn't no, I had left him in the care of people that I trusted too though!) . They won't give him back. They said he went back there looking for them but they he could just of easily been looking for us, he didn't know I had moved and was going to join him at Exp's Mums.
Would I be unreasonable to sneak round and steal him back or should I leave him be, he is settled, well looked after and an old cat who has already got his place in the picking order of the area and would have to assert himself again if I brought him home.
I just miss my Cat and the kids miss him too. However would it be worse on the kids if I brought him back and he ran off again?
Oh and I am allergic to him! Remind me again why I want to go cat napping?!