by Kate Dreyer
The rest of the foxes followed suit, dispersing quickly to their dens, but Sophie couldn’t help but hear snatches of whispers as they all padded away.
‘… do you really believe…’
‘… city foxes…’
‘… one outside my den then I’ll…’
‘…put her in charge, anyway?’
Jake sidled up to Sophie and she relaxed slightly, unaware she had been so tense. Together, they returned to their sleeping chamber.
Sophie curled up in the bed of leaves, but made no effort to sleep. Jake joined her and sensed her unease. ‘Maybe the deer can get rid of the traps for us? Or move them? We can ask them tomorrow. Try not to worry too much.’
‘Mmm,’ Sophie replied. ‘It’s not just the traps, though. If the humans think there are too many of us, then they’ll just try something else, won’t they? And what happens if one of us does get trapped, or worse? Marge already blames the new foxes. How long before everyone else starts to? We can’t start preventing animals from coming to live here… Not after everything that’s happened… Can we? And you heard them talking about me, as if I put myself in charge… I don’t even want to be in charge, Jake! I don’t want anyone to be in charge! That was the whole point… Ugh!’ She pulled her tail over her face.
Jake snuggled closer. ‘I know, but going over and over all the possible scenarios isn’t going to help. And we can always leave, Soph. Find a new home, like Vince did. You were talking about it earlier. Start afresh.’
Sophie pulled her head out from under her brush and looked into Jake’s eyes. ‘I just wanted to explore, maybe for a night or two… We helped make this place decent again, we can’t just up and leave when things start to get hard. This is my home. Our home. This is where I want to be. Me and you and, eventually, our cubs.’
‘Cubs?’ Jake swallowed.
‘Yes,’ Sophie said.
Jake smiled. ‘We’ll make it work, whatever happens to the park. Me, you and our cubs.’
Sophie beamed and nuzzled into Jake’s warm neck. ‘Just one thing,’ she whispered into his fur. ‘If we have a boy, I want to call him Vince.’
Jake pulled away. ‘Um… Okay… I mean, I…’
Sophie threw back her head and laughed.
‘You!’ Jake swiped at her nose with a paw. Sophie dodged it and gave him a nip on the ear in retaliation. They gave each other a quick nuzzle before a yawn escaped from Sophie jaws.
As they settled back down to sleep, Jake whispered, ‘Try not to worry, Soph. It’s not up to you to sort all the problems out.’
‘I know.’ Sophie closed her eyes, then added, under her breath, ‘It’s not up to anyone anymore, is it?’
*
Beneath the glowing moon, Vince took a step back from the pile of earth he’d just dragged from the hole in the ground. ‘There. All done.’
Laurie sniffed at the hole. ‘Very nice. Almost as nice as my empty shop on the high street.’
Vince pulled a face.
‘I’m joking. It’s perfect!’ She laughed.
‘You haven’t even looked inside yet!’
‘Vince, I dug half of it. You watched me do it earlier, remember?’ Laurie prodded him with her nose.
‘I know, but… Just go inside.’ He pushed her towards the entrance and followed her into their new sleeping chamber.
She gasped as she saw what he’d done. A blanket of downy grey feathers covered a layer of leaves. Scattered across the feathers, hundreds of vivid flower petals gently rested; yellows, pinks, reds and purples.
‘You like it?’ he said.
‘Oh, Vince, I love it. It’s beautiful. You did this while I was hunting?’
‘Yes.’ He looked at his paws.
‘You…’ She nuzzled his neck and sighed. ‘I wish Socks were here.’
‘I know, but I’m sure he got the message. And Rita’s been talking about going back at some point. A holiday, she keeps saying.’
‘Yeah. I just wish I could see him. I was going to say he would like it here, but there’s a distinct lack of human laps and ear scratches, so I’m not sure that’s true.’ Laurie smiled. ‘Oh, by the way, Arthur finally dragged himself away from his new family to tell me how you rescued him from the train tracks.’
Vince looked at his paws again.
‘Don’t get embarrassed! I know how scared you were of the trains. It must have been really hard,’ Laurie said.
‘Yeah. Although if Coco hadn’t turned up, I don’t know what I would have done.’
‘Who’s Coco?’
‘Didn’t Arthur tell you? There was this white dog, with curly fur and a stupid tail. She grabbed her human’s scarf for me.’
‘White with curly fur?’ Laurie cocked her head. ‘How big?’
‘Bit bigger than me, why?’
Suddenly, an air-splitting sound burst into the chamber. ‘Huooh! Huooh! Kee-kee-kee!’
‘Mother Nature… ROSIE! Can you please be quiet for two blinks?’ Laurie yelled up through the passage.
‘Sooor-ry,’ the voice replied. ‘But Rita wants you. We both do.’
‘Alright, we’re coming… You know, when I first met Rita,’ Vince said to Laurie as they made their way outside, ‘I thought, that’s it. That’s the most annoying birdsong I can ever hear. No other bird can ever be as loud, as tuneless, or as sleep-destroying as Rita. It was comforting, really. I’d heard the worst, so anything else was an improvement.’
‘And then you met Rosie,’ Laurie said.
‘And then I met Rosie.’
‘At least Rita’s happy,’ Laurie said. ‘They get on so well.’
‘Oh, I’m not doubting their happiness. I just wish they could be happy quietly.’ Vince laughed. He was joking, really. Rita had taken to Broxbourne like a duck to water, building an enormous domed nest in the biggest oak tree she could find, singing from sunrise to sunset. Rosie introduced herself not long after, and they’d been inseparable ever since. It had only been a couple of nights, but it was like they’d known each other for years.
They emerged into the cold night air. Rosie stood next to Rita, their snow-white chests puffed out beside each other, but that was where the similarity ended. Rosie towered over Rita, and her yellow beak, grey wings and webbed, pink feet were not those of a magpie, but a gull. A very large, very noisy gull.
‘We wanted to give you a moving-in present,’ Rita said.
‘Oh, how sweet,’ Laurie said.
‘We made up a song for you!’ Rosie grinned.
‘Oh… Great…’ Laurie shot Vince a wide-eyed look.
‘What’s this about, um, a song? Can I hear?’ Arthur came scurrying out from under a nearby bush, which, he claimed almost daily ‘had the best worms’.
‘Of course, the more the merrier,’ Laurie said, beckoning him over. Vince lay on the grass and curled his tail around himself. Laurie settled in next to him, Arthur in front.
‘So, about that dog…’ Laurie whispered.
‘A poodle?’ Vince replied. Laurie nodded and they both laughed, her tail shaking, just as it had the day they met, and the way it always did when she was genuinely happy.
Rosie cleared her throat. ‘Okay, sooo, just so you know, the song is quite long…’
‘Do you mind?’ Rita said, blinking her black eyes at Vince.
Vince looked at Laurie and smiled. ‘Not at all. I can’t wait to hear it,’ he said. And he meant every word.
Acknowledgements
I would like to thank everyone at Unbound who thought my idea for a modern-day animal story was worth pursuing. Even more thanks go to the many pledgers whose support and hard-earned money gave me the motivation to write until I reached ‘The End’.
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