Tiffy was found under a deck as a nursing kitten with her mother and siblings. By the time we saw her she was the only one from her family left at the local shelter. She takes a while to warm up to new people, so she was passed by when potential adopters came to visit.
My family discussed whether we really wanted to adopt a fifth cat, and decided to go for it. We brought Tiffy home a week later, and put her in the bedroom that was used only when my youngest was home from college.
She promptly made a break for it, and disappeared into the basement. We found her almost a week later, got her back into the room, and put a collar with a large bell around her neck. She promptly escaped again, but with the collar we found her within 24 hours. One more escape, and she was found after a few hours.
After that she decided to trust us and turned into a love-bug when we came into her room. After a couple of weeks we started leaving the room door open, but Tiff refused to leave. However, whenever one of us walked past the room Tiff was right up there demanding attention.
My daughter came home from college so Tiffy finally left her room. She started making lots of progress, and now spends her time exploring the living room, playing, playing, playing, getting into mischief, and (my favorite) hopping into my lap for cuddles. While Squawkie was living with us the two of them teamed up to get into more mischief, and the learned to cooperate in dumping the kitchen trash can. We had to put a brick in the bottom of it to make that more difficult.
She is a delightful little girl -- sweet, playful, and funny. Well worth the effort it took to get her comfortable here.