OUTFOXED

We drove up the snowy, winding road toward the cozy A-frame cabin. I’m not the anxious type, but the closer to the Airbnb I had rented for the weekend we came, the more nervous I felt. This was the weekend. She would either say yes or no. It was frightening how much power one word could command. That one word would spell a new beginning for us or a quick end. A forever or a farewell.

We’d stopped off for a quick dinner and some supplies before making our way up the snowcapped mountain. The small town at the base of the mountain was bustling with activity. Tourists and locals alike were out shopping. Christmas was less than a week away and the town square was all lit up with holiday decorations. It seems somehow magical, even to a big, burly guy like me.

I glanced over at the petite redhead beside me. She was looking out the passenger window as we began the last leg of the trip. There was a small smile gracing her face as she watched the frozen branches of the pines and snow-covered ground pass by outside the window. I was always overwhelmed by how beautiful she was when she was lost in her thoughts like this. There was a sense of whimsy about her that I found irresistible.

“We’re here,” I told her as we turned off the main highway onto a gravel road that led to our cabin.

She turned to face forward again, her eyes lighting up as the cabin came into sight. It was small and remote, perfect for the weekend getaway I had planned for us.

“Are you sure this is it?” she asked, her brow furrowed slightly. “There’s smoke coming from the chimney already and a truck in the drive.”

“Yes. That’s just the caretaker. I called him while we were shopping—while you were investigating the wine selection. He’s meeting us here with keys and said he would start a fire to warm the place up for us.”

“Oh, perfect!” she said, smiling and reaching her hand across the console to softly touch my arm.

I parked the car next to the truck and brought her hand up to my mouth to kiss the back of it before hopping out and running around to her side to open the door. It was an old-fashioned thing, opening the door for a woman, but she found it quaint and it was just something I’d learned during my decades of life.

She stepped out and took my hand to balance herself on the gravel, which was beginning to ice over a bit now that the sun had set and the temperature was dropping. Her foot slipped sideways and she teetered a bit toward me, but I caught her and held her steady.

“My hero,” she said with a little laugh.

“Always,” I replied.

I silently filled in the rest of the thought with, I hope.

“Dalton and Juniper, I assume?” a man said as he opened the door to us even before we knocked.

“Yes,” I replied. “You must be Marvin.”

“That I am. Let me give you a quick tour and I’ll get out of your hair,” he told us.

The cabin was small, so the tour didn’t take long, but he went over a few of the things we’d need like where to get more wood out back and how to turn on emergency power if it got too rough and we lost the main electric. Then, he was out the door and gone.

“Alone at last,” Juniper purred, pulling me close to her and raising on her tiptoes to kiss me.

The subtle scent of plumeria and coconut wafted all around. There was a faint scent of something beneath, but I couldn’t quite make it out. I loved the flowery undertones of her existence. Though she steered clear of any heavier perfumes to spare me more difficulties with the allergies I’d told her about, I could still smell the traces of scent left behind by her shampoo, soap, and lotions. Most would hardly notice them but for me, they were magnified by an amplified sense of smell.

I hoped this weekend wouldn’t change that. Tonight, I just wanted to enjoy being with her. If this was our last night together, I wanted it to be memorable. I wanted to always have it with me, no matter where I roamed. She pulled away and studied my face, just as I studied hers.

“You seem pensive,” she said. “Almost sad. Are you okay?”

“What? Yes, of course. Just really tired from the drive,” I lied.

“Well, let’s get our stuff inside and we’ll cuddle up by the fire with some wine. Yes?”

“Yes!” I replied.

I helped bring our things in and she went about putting away the supplies. There was some wood already in the house, but we would need more if we were going to keep a fire during the night. I busied myself bringing in some additional logs while Juniper put away the food we’d bought and put the wine on ice to chill. Then, she disappeared into the bedroom, emerging a few moments later in a pair of flannel pajamas with little snowmen all over them.

“Oh, now that’s adorable,” I said, smiling broadly.

“I’m glad you think so. I brought you a pair too,” she told me, pulling a plastic bag out from behind her back and offering it to me.

“You’re kidding, right?”

“Nope. You can’t spend a weekend by a cabin fire drinking wine without flannel jammies,” she told me, grinning widely.

“I could,” I told her, taking the bag and pulling out the package inside it. I looked through the clear plastic at the pajamas inside. They were dark blue with snowflakes. It could be worse. They were Christmassy, but not completely silly.

“Put them on,” she told me. “I’ll get the wine.”

I stripped down by the fire and slipped the pajamas on. How was she always so good at everything? We’d been dating for nearly six months, but she had never bought me clothes other than a t-shirt we saw in a shop that she’d seen me looking at. Yet, she’d sized the pajamas perfectly.

The night was magical, laying by the fire, sipping wine and laughing. We talked about our childhoods and I offered what I could of mine. It was sketchy. There was so much I couldn’t tell her. I wanted to change that. This was the last night I intended to lie to her, tell her half-truths, or omit things that she shouldn’t know.

I watched her face as we abandoned our talk for more carnal activities. I watched as she tilted her head back and closed her eyes, enjoying the way we felt together. Every sensation seemed to imprint across my skin, tingling along my nerve endings with anticipation as our passion built to the most beautiful climax.

Afterward, we slipped off to bed and curled against one another. She slipped quickly off to sleep, wrapped in my arms. I was tired too but sleep wouldn’t come for me. It rarely did, not at a time like this. I glanced out the window at the moon. It was beckoning me, inviting me out to play. Not tonight, moon. Not tonight. Soon, you and I will have more time together, one way or another.

I was up the next morning, hours before Juniper. I made us breakfast—toast scrambled eggs and several strips of bacon on the side. I was pouring orange juice when she came wandering in from the bedroom, her hair disheveled from sleep as she approached me and kissed me on the cheek.

“This looks delicious. I’m starving!” she said.

“Well, enjoy it. It’ll be your last meal until dinner,” I told her. Maybe longer, I thought.

She glanced over at the two day-packs I’d prepared and nodded.

“You’ve had a busy morning,” she noted, sitting down on a stool at the countertop bar.

I took a seat beside her. She pulled out the trail map we’d picked up in town. We mapped out our route as we ate. I didn’t tell her that I knew these trails like the back of my hand. As far as she knew, we were discovering this mountain together. Another lie. The last lie I would ever tell her.

After breakfast, we headed out. The trailhead wasn’t far from the cabin. It was why I had picked this particular cabin. I had stayed here before, many times. Marvin was an old friend and knew not to let on that we knew one another. I’d told him ahead of time. If things went south, she might want to get back to the cabin quickly and I wanted to give her that option. Marvin would be waiting for her there if she ran from me. He would take care of her for me.

“Let’s stop here for a moment,” I told her.

She looked at me and then around us as if she were confused. We hadn’t been walking that long, maybe thirty minutes and she knew from other hiking ventures that I could go for hours without being the slightest bit tired.

“Are you okay?” she asked, concerned that I had perhaps hurt myself somehow.

“I’m fine. Let’s just sit on that rock over there for a moment?”

“Okay,” she replied, the worry still showing on her face.

I followed her and sat down beside her. I took a deep breath and reached for her hand, looking down at her upturned face as she searched my face for signs of what was going on with me.

“I have to tell you something,” I told her.

“Is it bad?” she asked. I could hear the dread in her voice.

She was preparing for the worst. Nothing good ever started like this, did it? You didn’t bring someone out into the woods to reveal some dark secret and it turn out to be the greatest thing on Earth.

“Listen, it might be better if I show you and before I do, I just want you to know that I would never hurt you. You have nothing to fear from me, but I’ve been lying to you about so much, and when you find out why you will understand, but you might not forgive me. I should have come clean a long time ago. I was just scared.”

I was babbling. I knew it, but I couldn’t stop myself. As long as I was talking, I wasn’t getting to the thing that would change it all and take her away from me.

“Just tell me—or show me. Let’s see what you think is so horrible,” she replied.

“Right. Yes. Okay, just don’t be scared.”

“Too late,” she said, biting her lip.

I nodded knowingly and sat my pack down at her feet. I began pulling off my shoes and then my jacket and shirt in the middle of the clearing where we stood and she gasped.

“Dalton! What are you doing? It’s freezing out here and what if someone comes up the trail.”

“No one is coming. No one ever comes up this trail,” I replied, immediately regretting it.

“What? You’ve been here before? When? What is going on, Dalton?”

“Just watch me. Don’t scream.”

Now she looked terrified. I was handling this so very badly. I hurried to finish getting undressed and then began. The sound of crackling and snapping echoed off the trees behind me as my body began to break apart and reform in a different configuration. Hair sprouted and claws emerged. Juniper watched, unmoving as I shifted. It took only seconds for me to finish the transition from man to animal. I stayed very still, so as not to spook her.

“You’re a wolf,” she said, looking me over.

Her tone was surprised, but not frightened. It wasn’t at all what I had expected. Then, much to my surprise, she began to laugh. I watched as she stood up and stripped off her clothes and then began her transition. A moment later, I found myself looking at a sleek red fox. It stared back at me with haunting blue-green eyes. I knew those eyes. I knew them very well. We stood there, staring at one another for a moment, and then both of us shifted back.

“Why didn’t you tell me you were a fox?” I replied.

“Why didn’t you tell me you were a wolf?” she replied.

We both began dressing as we puzzled over how either of us had hidden this fact from one another. We were animals at heart. How had we not smelled another shifter?

“I mask my scent with a blend my grandmother taught me to make years ago. I panicked a bit when you said you were allergic because I was afraid reducing it would reveal my smell.”

“You were wrong. By the way, I’m not allergic. I just have a really strong sense of smell and needed you to tone it down to my level, but how did you not smell me?”

“The formula works in the reverse too. I smell it too, so it keeps me from smelling other shifters. I started using it when I was a teen. I didn’t want to stay in the pack, so I moved away and masked my scent from any stray shifters I might encounter.”

“Isn’t that dangerous? Not being able to detect another shifter that might be a threat?”

“No, not in downtown New York,” she laughed.

“That’s fair enough, I replied with a shrug. But I should tell you that I lied to you about a lot of things.”

“I lied to you about a lot of things too.”

“Nothing important though, not about who I am or anything, just about wolf-related stuff,” I interjected.

“Same,” she said with a knowing smile. “So, what now? I mean you’re a wolf and I’m a fox. Do we have a future?”

“If you want one. I left my pack years ago too so I have no one Alpha to please.”

“What about kids though? Do you want kids?”

“Yes, but if it doesn’t work out, we’ll adopt a bear kid or something. Might as well mix it up a little more,” I laughed.

“I like that. You know, when you brought me up here, I couldn’t decide whether you were going to propose or try to murder me.”

“You think I’m a psychopath?” I teased as we picked up our packs and stood facing one another on the trail.

“You never know,” she shrugged, a large grin spreading across her face.

“Did you want me to propose?” I asked.

“Not yet. Let’s sort out all the lies we’ve told one another first.”

“That seems fair. What now then?”

“I think we should take these stupid packs back to the cabin, strip down and do what comes naturally and then head back up this mountain on eight legs. What do you think?”

“I think I love that idea.”

With that, we headed back down the mountain, both of us smiling from ear to ear. This was not what I had expected at all. I had expected the worst, but I hadn’t expected to be outfoxed.

*****

A year later, we returned to the same cabin as man and wife. Two years later, we returned as expectant parents of a child that could be a wolf, a fox, or something completely different according to the shifter doctor we visited on a Montana reservation. We’ll see what year three brings when it comes around.