Go Wild in Winterbourne by Beth Miller

The crying weaves its way into my dream, becomes part of the narrative, causes a bicycle to vibrate with a high-pitched whine. Who’s crying? I struggle to the surface, flail slowly out of a deep heavy sleep. Is it the baby or the toddler? The alarm clock says 2.45am. The noise is frightening. One of the kids is clearly in great distress. I throw aside the covers and am half-way out of bed, when I realise that the sound’s coming from outside the house. I creep to the window and peer timidly out, expecting to see someone being murdered. Oh god, I’ll have to be a witness. And I’m rubbish at details.

At the movement of the curtains, a fox turns and looks up. It’s a clichéd moment. I’m not really your into-nature type, but this fox is so very, well, fox-like. Yes, it’s beautiful: proud head, fluffy white tail. Yes, it really does look like Dr Seuss’s ‘Fox in Socks’ that I read to my daughter only this evening. Yes, it’s prowling for food in urban Winterbourne. Yes, its mewling is exactly like the cry of a child in anguish. And yes, it’s bloody noisy.

So noisy it wakes Sleep-Like-A-Dead-Man. ‘What you doing?’ he mumbles. The fox has turned away and is rummaging under the hedge for whatever the noisy buggers eat. Chicken bones? Cheese? Ice-cream? My ignorance of wild-life is second to none. My heart’s still pounding as I crawl back into bed. ‘The noise scared me’, I say. ‘It’s probably just a fox’, he says, giving me a brisk pat on the back. Then he turns over and goes back to sleep.