The Fox

The Fox sits on the toilet, staring at the metal hook on the door, an inverted triangle-shaped hook with two protruding iron pieces. It looks like a fox’s face. Recently, strange scratches have appeared on the bathroom door. They’re not from The Fox, but he worries someone will suspect they are. He hears the flush in the stall next to his, the footsteps of someone exiting, a sigh, the faucet turning on, then the door slamming. The Fox doesn’t make a sound. He’s still sitting, pants around his ankles. His phone lights up with reminders. Fifteen minutes. He feels the numbness in his feet, finally stands, and opens the door.
At his company, The Fox pretends to be human.

The Fox sits on his sofa. A yellow water stain marks the wallpaper- a triangle with blurred edges, and a long streak extending from it. Another fox’s face. He pulls his tail out from where it’s hidden in the pants, orange fur falling onto the cold Hawaiian pizza on the floor. He stays there on the sofa, scrolling through his phone. The sky outside slowly darkens.

At his company, no one knows The Fox is a fox.
Every morning, The Fox hits his alarm, grabs a plaid shirt from his single bed, heats a frozen chicken sausage in the microwave, and rushes to the bus station. Twenty minutes of squeezing between backpacks and jeans, cologne and urine, and he arrives. At his desk: folders, rows of numbers in spreadsheets, endless repetition. Capital A, lowercase A. In the hours ahead, he’ll make three coffees, take five bathroom breaks, go out for one smoke, and look out the window on his way to the printer ten times.
The manager throws the campaign onto the desk, red ink slashed across the pages: “Redo.” A cold command. The Fox says nothing, his eyes drifting to the window behind the manager, to the old tree outside. It’s dead now, decaying in the season, its branches almost bare. A bird perches at the top.
Bus. Bathroom. Coffee. Bathroom. Back door. Bus. Sofa.
More scratches appear on the bathroom door today.
Outside, children walk by wearing yellow baseball caps and holding chocolate ice cream. One boy pats another from behind, then he chases him. The Fox remembers his childhood in the forest. After the rain, white mushrooms would bloom there, water droplets clinging to their skirts and dripping onto the grass. His mother would take him and his sisters to play by the stream. Under the crystal water, he finds a small fish wagging its tail. He tries to catch it, but it swims away.
Bus. Bathroom. Coffee. Bathroom. Back door. Bus. Sofa. Bus. Bathroom. Coffee. Bathroom. Back door. Bus. Sofa. Bus. Bathroom. Coffee. Bathroom. Back door. Bus. Sofa. Bus. Bathroom. Coffee. Bathroom. Back door. Bus. Sofa.

One day, The Fox is sitting on the toilet when he hears a scratching from the other side of the wall—scritch, scritch. Something sharp is scraping against the wall, he can almost see the plaster peeling off in thin, crumbling layers, revealing the cement underneath. Different faces flash through him: the police, the mailman who comes to the apartment every morning, the kind old lady at the grocery store. How would they look at him if they knew he wasn’t a human? He feels invisible ants are crawling up his ankles, burrowing into his stomach. He wants to leave this space immediately.
At the same moment, The Fox and the neighboring stall open their doors. The two eyes meet. It’s Timmy! The fox’s tail hasn’t had time to hide, and Timmy’s paw is still visible. They work together, and Timmy is a bear!

The Fox steps out of the bathroom. He looks around again carefully, prompted by Timmy’s words. Jack, who sits across from him, turns out to be a golden retriever and always carries a tennis ball in his pocket. Intern Nicole is a wolf who sneaks up to the rooftop to howl during lunch breaks. Designer Gemma, a giraffe, wears a long scarf year-round. Even the manager is a Chihuahua on stilts.
We all come from the same forest.