My brother had just fed me. And I can't help it, I feel obliged to at least clean up. It seems only fair. So, I'm standing at the sink in Bruce's kitchen on a rather gloomy, rainy Mother's Day. Dusk had come early for it had kind of been dark all day long. Bruce was behind me, staring out his sliding glass door. At what, I had no idea for his are the only outside lights down the little walkway that skirts his house, and he didn't have them on. He seemed rather intent for he didn't notice my occasional pauses from scrubbing, looking the question at him. (Even Bruce whom I would trust with my very soul, had I one, does not get to lurk behind me for very long.)
I decided to break in on that concentration. "Whatcha lookin' at?"
He didn't even turn to look at me. "Well, there's a possum outside."
Now, this is not uttered with repugnance or any obvious anxiety. It had a healthy dose of curiosity and maybe just a touch of warmth. This is a man who's had rodents as pets. He feeds squirrels with those rich orange peanut butter-filled crackers? They sometimes come up to take it from his hand.
I washed another plate and turned again. "Sooooo, what's it up to?"
I heard him take a breath, pause, and then answer in a puzzled voice, "Well, I don't know. He's doing something weird. He keeps approaching my stoop and then backing off."
His stoop consists of a block of concrete. Perhaps it's seen better days, for it's certainly more functional than pretty. Just a block that sits on the patio slab. It's got a slight tilt and no railing of any kind for the drop is a mere two feet to the ground. There's one step on the far side to facilitate entry into his kitchen.
I went back to washing, consigned as I was to his description and my imagination, what with my hands all suds'd up. "Oh, he's probably heard a rumor you hand out cookies."
Bruce laughed softly at that, his attention still on the darkness outside. "He just keeps backing off..."
I consulted my memory of his stoop. "Well, maybe he's trying to crawl out of the rain and into that crack under the slab?"
Bruce made a distracted hmm of a noise, then said musingly, "I actually think maybe there might be one already there. That's what's making him back off."
"Oh, it's a territorial thing then..."
"Yeah, I think so."
Well I thought a bit whilst I scrubbed the cheese sauce out of a pot. It was spring after all... "Well, maybe he's wandering closer and asking, 'So, are you in the mood now?', and he backs off, and then he tries again, 'How 'bout now?'"
Bruce laughed. "That's a whole new perspective, isn't it? 'How 'bout now?'... 'And now?'"
Well after all, animals are a bit more straightforward than we are . . .