Crazy Like a Fox

Let me preface this post by saying, first, that I am not afraid of woodland creatures. Deer, rodents, vermin, small animals...they don't generally scare me. If anything, they startle me if they appear from out of nowhere, lol.

Directly across the street from my apt complex is a heavily wooded park, largely populated by deer; there's even a "beware of deer crossing" sign nearby. We're used to seeing deer, see them all the time, especially late at night. I've subconsciously come to expect to see them leap out in front of my car as I drive by so I'm always careful not to drive too fast on that back street.

Late last night I returned home from a, uh, *ahem* midnight run, and I'm sitting in the car listening to music. I'm one of those weird people who will sit in the car and listen to music (like I don't have the very same music in the house) because I'm feeling too lazy to get outta the car at the moment. Anywho, I'm sitting in the car, the headlights are off and its very dark except for a streetlight about 400 feet away.  I'm lost in the music, having my own little jam session, eyes closed, just GOING FOR IT at 1:30am (lol) when I look up and see a cat creeping by in the darkness. I was expecting to see deer this late, but no, just a cat. Its moving pretty slowly and, because I'm about to get outta the car, I'm trying to be mindful not to make too much noise to scare it off. I love stray cats (blame that on my dad. He always brought home strays when I was a kid); i know better than to try to pet them, but i always try to get them to come to me when I see them (knowing they're too afraid to), or stop and gush over how cute it is (if its not dirty and scraggly looking #eww!). Because this cat was surrounded by darkness, I didn't wanna try to walk up to it in case it was dirty  or  had something dead in its mouth but I walked pretty close to where it was positioned in the trees.

As I walk by, I'm calling out to the cat softly "heeeeere, kitty kitty kitty. *clicks tongue* hhheeeeeeere kitty kitty kitty" (I know Taya is side eying the HELL outta me right now, lmao! She hates cats!) and it begins to move forward. it's making this noise that's not quite a meow but not quite a growl...it's like a......a chortle, lol, if you can believe that. It was weird, but I figured it's a stray cat; the noise could be anything. Now, don't ask me why i was even bothering to stop and make friends with a stray cat at 1:30 in the a.m. in the freezing cold December weather last night because I wouldn't have an answer for you. I guess I was in a good mood. *giggle*
Which is probably why, as a car drove by and the headlights fell onto this whole scene, I couldn't even dare to hold in my scream when I saw that this cat I was trying to entice outta the trees was, in fact, a red fox. Do not, AND I DO REPEAT, Do NOT ask me how I didn't know that what i thought was a cat was actually a damn fox because, AGAIN, I wouldn't have an answer for you. Alls I know is he'd seen me the entire time, and was inching his way over to me very slowly...but when I saw HIS ass....all hell broke loose in that parking lot. hmph. I know THAT. The scream I let out was something I'd never heard myself make before. I wasn't afraid of the fox, i was just startled because i'd thought it was a cat. LOL. I'm chuckling as I type this, but last night when I saw those beady eyes reflecting back at me in the headlights, jumped back AND screamed, that bastid hissed (who knew foxes hissed??!) and took off towards me. The problem was he was running towards me to get to the  park across the street, and I had to run towards him because, well, my apt was behind him....only I thought he was running towards me because he wanted to chow down on the Alandria Express. *smh* I think I was expecting that, if he were afraid, he would run for cover, off into the bushes or behind a car or something logical like that. But, uh, no. And he really did look like a cat from the front. I didn't see how long he was and how much bushier his tail was until he turned sideways.

So, we danced around each other for like 6 seconds, neither of us knowing which was the safest way to go. He ran left, I ran right, it looked like we were both running to kill each other, so we switched directions at the same time...and it still looked like we were running for each other. *smh*
Eventually, I turned around and ran back to the car and dove in, slamming the door. He high tailed it across the street but didn't run directly into the trees; instead, he ran along the side of the road, glaring at me in the car, and hissing. As he ran, his tail was bent sideways, like, parallel to his body, which made him run with this awkward sideways two-step. Dont ask me how I remember that, but I will never forget the look he gave me.

I stayed in the car for about 25 more minutes, listening to music. Lesson learned: leave the damn cats alone.