English Family Thought It Cremated Its Missing Cat, But Then He Reappeared

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It must be quite a shock to go through the process of cremating your cat only to watch him walk right back through your door again. But that's exactly what happened to Rachel Fitzsimons' family.

"So we cremated someone else's cat," she told the BBC.

That six-word admission seems bonkers-and it is!-but the explanation makes sense.

Fitzsimons' cat, a 16-year-old tabby named Frankie, had gone missing from her family's Warrington, England, home on May 19, the BBC reports. After he was gone for a few days, the family sent out search parties to look for their missing cat. No luck.

Later on, Fitzsimons was driving along the M6 highway when she saw a dead cat along the motorway who looked like Frankie. Highways England, a rough equivalent to a department of transportation in the United States, confirmed the cat's markings to the family, and delivered the body to the family, according to the BBC.

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It sure seemed like Frankie had met an unfortunate end, so the family cremated the cat and brought the ashes home in a box. That's when Frankie Tom Sawyer-ed his way right back into his family's home-frail and hungry but most definitely alive.

"It's a miracle. We thought he had died," Fitzsimons' 7-year-old-son Remy told the BBC.

Frankie ain't going away that easily. Take it away, Simple Minds.