The Lonely Hearts Club

by BearlyThereUpstairs

Summary:

Sharla's back in town looking for a summer job when she bumps into Gideon Grey as the fox is desperately trying to get his new bakery business up on its feet. A deal is made between the two reluctant souls, but neither one expected things to turn from friendly to romantic over the summer, leading to the biggest question of all... Will they boldly go where no fox and his sweet young sheep have ever dared to go before?

Chapter 1: Chapter One: Grim Prospects and Fading Dreams

The Lonely Hearts Club

“A little story about a fox and a hound…”

(Sitting alone at the bar of a small, roadside diner just across the county border separating Bunnyburrow from Deerbrooke county, Gideon Grey was staring down at a fresh copy of a police report with his name on it, his shoulders slouching down in despair. Next to him sits an unopened beer, a ‘consolation prize’ left behind by the busy skunk bartender tending the bar as he goes to see to his other customers.)

If feeling “down on your luck” ever became a cross-country race, then Gideon Grey felt like he was ready for the Olympic track team. It had been four months now since Gideon had had the ‘bright’ idea to open up his own bakery in the hopes of starting his life over, of doing something nice for other people for a change. He’d found the perfect spot to open up a small bakery, a small general store right in the center of town, where the old pangolin couple who run it for over thirty years were retiring to spend a little quality time with their grandkits down south in Tallahorsee. And thanks to the amazing generosity of the Hopps family, Gideon had even found a reliable fruit and produce supplier right here in Bunnyburrow who was willing to extend the struggling fox a little credit until he got the business up and running. And there wasn’t another bakery shop for fifteen miles that could hold a candle to the delicious pies that Gideon made every day for the growing throngs of customers who were slowly discovering just how sweet a fox’s cooking could be.

So why was it so gull-darned hard to find somebody responsible enough to help him get the struggling business up onto its feet? Again, Gideon saw the answer to that question staring up at him from the bottom of his empty glass. They were all still afraid of him, the old Gideon… the former town bully who’d been too buried under all his ‘self-doubt issues’ to try and get a handle on the ‘unchecked rage and aggression’ that had driven him to do some really rotten things back then. Even back in junior high, surrounded by a school full of jittery prey kids, the robust red fox’s only real friend had been his buddy, Travis. Together, the two of them had terrorized their classmates, shaking down the smaller, weaker kids for their lunch money in-between classes or stuffing the meek little sheep kids into their lockers.

It had been great fun at the time, pretending that they were the biggest and the strongest kids in their classes. And the pocket change that they'd swiped off the other students meant that neither he or Travis went hungry come lunchtime because neither of their sharecropper families had enough money of their own to send anything more filling than fish-head stew in the same, battered old Tupperware container as yesterday and last week and the week before.

Every day, the jealousy and the hunger ate away at the two predator’s guts, leaving them a little leaner and a little meaner than the day before. Meanwhile, all the bunnies and other prey animals ate their alfalfa salads, drank their lemon grass smoothies and feasted on freshly sliced fruits, fresh from their families’ farms. It didn’t take long for something in the two boys to just snap, waking something ‘predatory’ in them that delighted in causing a little mayhem, especially when it meant that his prey classmates knew what it was like to go hungry now and again. They’d straddled the line more than a couple of times, but Gideon had never really hurt anyone until that day at the fair.

It'd taken months of juvenile hall and court-ordered therapy after his little ‘wrestling match’ with Judy Hopps had turned bloody for Gideon to see that the only person he and Travis had really been lying, cheating, and stealing from was themselves. But by then, the damage was done: everybody in town knew about the awfullest thing he’d ever done, how he’d clawed her at the county fair, how a normally sweet, plump little fox tod had gone ‘savage’ over a paw-full of tickets from the fair’s dilapidated old prize booth. Looking back now at the wreckage of his childhood now made Gideon feel sick, the overwhelming guilt he felt to this day about mauling Hopps sitting heavy and low like a cannonball in his gut or a bad batch of his father’s fish-head stew.

Sitting in this depressing little bar with baseball bats and painted plastic “trophy” fishes lining every wall, a freshly-printed police report sitting on the bar with his name on it, Gideon didn’t have much hope of his day turning around, not after the reliable-sounding muskrat he’d driven out to see all the way out here in Podunk did everything he could think of to distract the red fox while two of his two bobcat buddies had tried to steal Gideon’s only delivery van. If the old badger patrolling this block hadn’t caught the thieves in the act of hotwiring the rusty old van, himself, then Gideon would have been stranded overnight thirty miles from home, with only a few bucks gas money in the fox’s pockets and nowhere to sleep the night but right here on this bar stool.

Another full day wasted trying to find someone, anyone that he could trust to help him run the bakery! And yet, some part of Gideon’s heart still remembered the kind, supporting words of his therapist, Mrs. Matterhorn, as the old goat took a young todd’s trembling paw in hers all those years ago, urging him to seek out the good in people and particularly to nurture that spark of hope within himself:

“My dear boy, when are you gonna get it through that thick skull of yours that there is nobody more deserving of forgiveness than ourselves? Everyone outside that door has done things they’re not proud of, horrible things born out of desperation, malice, and mistrust, things that would shock and alarm you and me, if they were ever brought into the light. None of us is completely innocent, here. And everyone has been an innocent victim, hurt by those same awful things.”

Gideon could still smell the old goats’ tobacco-stained cashmere sweater sleeves as she frantically paced the confines of her tiny office at the Juvenile Hall, —a gift she said, sent by her family far across the sea. He’d never touched something so light and fluffy as the day she let him feel the sheer fabric of that sweater running through his paws as a gesture of trust and support. She'd told Gideon that the clove cigarettes she chain-smoked during office hours were her method of coping with the stress of being so far from home, so she understood just how a little bit of just how lonely it had been for Gideon at the Juvenile Detention Hall. It wasn’t much of a foundation for a connection between the old goat and a young, troubled fox entrusted into her care by the juvenile justice system, but it grew with time and understanding into a small friendship whose memory Gideon still cherished even to this day.

“The only way any of us can move forward in this life is to love one another enough to forgive all that pain, to break the cycle of hurt and revenge once and for all. And the only way we can even start moving towards that lofty goal is to forgive each other and start anew. That is what I want most for you in this whole world, my dear boy -for you to forgive yourself and turn your life around!”

   Grabbing his cell phone out of his overall’s front pocket, Gideon punched in the number to the Podunk police department, hoping he was doing the right thing, even as his guts tied themselves up in fretful knots. A few years ago, those two bobcats might’ve been him and Travis if fate hadn’t intervened. God bless the day that Travis met Irene and gave the sticky-fingered little ferret a reason to turn his life around. They were both there, waiting for Gideon the day he got out of Juvenile Hall, with golden bands on their fingers and a baby already on the way. And he loved Travis like a brother, but there was only so much help the newlyweds could offer Gideon right now, especially with baby number two already on the way.

“Yeah, this is Gideon Gray from earlier today. Can I talk to the Sherriff fer a minute, please? I promise I won’t take up too much of his time.”

Waiting the five minutes it took the canine deputy to go dig up his commanding officer almost had Gideon thirsty enough to down the cold bottle of beer just staring at him enticingly from the bar, but when his resolve seemed about to crumble, he finally heard the bleary-eyed old hound dog’s voice on the line.

“Mr. Grey, I hear that you’ve had yerself a busy day. I assume this little ‘social’ call is about the attempted theft of your delivery van. A theft that was by one of my finest officers catching the two thieves red-pawed, as I recall…”

Gideon could feel a tightness in his chest lifting when he tucked the police report back into its protective folder, keeping it from the prying eyes of the other diners —not that many of them wanted to sit too close to a fox with Gideon’s bad reputation. One of the coyote farmhands nearby actually clutched her handbag closer to her side in the back booth whenever he looked in her general direction. Gideon was used to getting the stink eye from the prey he passed on the street, but getting the cold shoulder from another predator right now was a new personal low.

“The bobcats who tried to take my van, and the muskrat who set me up… what’s gonna happen to them, Sherriff?”

Even over the clamor of the bar, Gideon could hear the sheriff’s old rocking chair squeak a little in protest of the old bloodhound’s pronounced girth as he leaned back in his swivel chair, no doubt alarmed by the sudden note of concern in Gideon’s voice. Suddenly, the Sherriff’s open-and-shut case seemed to be hitting a snag and the Sherriff Hubert ‘Red’ Tailor didn’t care for that, not one whit.

“Oh, I imagine that the older two boys will spend a year or two in juvenile detention before they head off to prison to serve out the rest of their five-to-ten-year bid for grand theft auto. You see, this ain’t exactly the first time either of those cats have pulled this little stunt, and I imagine the whole town’ll be mighty pleased to see them get what’s coming to ‘em. Now, Thomas -the muskrat boy- since it’s his first time getting caught, he might just squeak by with just two years in juvenile hall for the ‘conspiracy to commit,’ but that depends on whether old Judge Hoppalong is feeling particularly lenient that morning. Why do you ask?”

Gideon was too distracted by the Sherriff’s question to really notice how quiet the bar had just gotten, just a few moments after the bell over the front door rang, announcing the arrival of another customer, but he could just make out a strangely familiar sounding voice talking to the Skunk bartender at the other end of the room in hushed tones. Hearing the impatient old Bloodhound cough rather loudly into the receiver pulled Gideon’s concentration back to the question at hand.

“I-I don’t want you to throw the book at them, Sherriff –not on my account. Nobody got hurt, here today, and since there wasn’t enough gas in my old van to get them around the block, much less out of town, I was thinking…”

This time, the Sherriff’s went from a little squeak of protest into a full, creaking panic fit as the heavyset old hound all but lept to his feet. Nothing mucked up an open-and-shut case like a victim suddenly chickening out when it came time to press charges. From the sudden burst of static on the line, it sounded to Gideon like ol' Red was trying to choke the life out of his receiver with both paws.

“(Screech) Don’t tell me you was thinking of letting them mangey cats go free, not after the three of them ‘boys’ darned near drove off with your vehicle?!? We caught them in the dadgum act, fer St. Bernard’s sake!”

Further down the bar, Gideon could just hear a few whispered words of the conversation his bartender was having with the new arrival, “Nothing for you, here miss,” “we don’t hire prey here anyways, not after what’s happening out in Zootopia these days…” He could almost swear he knew the young woman’s voice when she whispered back something despairingly about there not being any summer jobs left back in Bunnyburrow right now, either.

Taking a deep breath to calm his nerves, Gideon tried to wrench his attention back to the hot-blooded Sherriff who was waiting for his answer on the other end of the line. God, grant me the serenity… He thought, aloud, as he pushed the enticingly cold bottle of beer further out of reach and stared back at the flip phone in his paw.

“N-No, sir. I know you got your job to do, same as anybody else. You caught them bobcat boys in the act, plain as day. But they didn’t actually steal mah van now, did they? W-What I mean to ask, sir, is –well– don’t 'attempting' to steal something usually get you a lighter sentence than actually stealing whatever it was?”

There was a significant pause on the other end of the line, no doubt filled with several choice expletives about foxes who thought they were smarter about the laws than the hard-working canines that enforced them all the way out here in Podunk, but the Sherriff finally confirmed what Gideon had said to be the unvarnished truth with a guttural grunt and three words uttered through his gritted teeth.

“Significantly lighter, yes...”

  Gideon found himself breathing just a little bit easier as he signaled the bartender for another round of ginger ale in his glass, holding two fingers aloft until he caught the skunk’s wary eye before gratefully pointing down into the empty glass in his other paw. If he read the Sheriff right, there was already a good chance that at least one of the boys might escape spending time in prison, but maybe, just maybe, he could save all three, if he played his cards right? Biting his bottom lip, the wearied fox decided to press his luck and find out.

“T-Then that’s exactly what ah want you to do, Sherriff… You can have somebody bring the warrant or whatever by the bakery and I’ll still sign it, but nobody deserves to go to prison for the stunt them two boys tried today, especially not when they didn’t actually drive off with my van like they was planning to…”

Heck, he might even offer Thomas the muskrat a job at the bakery whenever he got out of the juvenile hall —if the boy kept his nose clean and really tried to turn his life around. That was assuming that he still had a bakery by then —the way things were going right now made that feel like a long shot. This time, Gideon could actually hear the hard plastic receiver in the Sherriff’s paws crack under the old bloodhound’s heavy grip, but to his credit, the Sherriff of Podunk never really let his frustration enter his voice, even as he asked Gideon one final question before he hung up on the latest pain in his backside.

“And would you care to tell me exactly why you want me to treat these hardened criminals with kit gloves, Mr. Grey —so I can explain to the citizens of this little town why these cats will be walking freely among them in a couple of years, instead of cooling their heels in the prison upstate where they belong?”

Gideon groaned, pawing at his muzzle in frustration. Ever since that deputy had drug the two bobcats out of his delivery van earlier today, Gideon had secretly been dreading the moment that his criminal past came to the Podunk Sherriff’s attention —and here he was about to spill the beans, himself. He could just walk away right now, easy enough, but could he ever look at himself in the mirror again without seeing a coward staring back at him? Gideon’s rather sizeable gut said no.

“Sherriff, I can tell you ain’t looked me up in your computer yet, if’n you gotta ask that. See, my name’s Gideon Grey, and the only reason ah’m standing here talking to you about this mess today is somebody I done hurt pretty bad back in Bunnyburrow (and her family) showed me a lot of kindness when they could’a sent me to prison, myself. Don’t really seem right to me not to show them boys that same kindness now that I got the chance, don’t you think?”

This time, the Sherriff didn’t bother to hide his cussing under his breath, but he did offer Gideon a little advice before he slammed the phone receiver back down into its cradle, ending their little chat once and for all.

“Let me tell you what I think, Mister Grey… the next time you report your van stolen, it damn well better not be in my town — you get me, you pea-brained FOX?”

Gideon’s ears splayed back as the phone line finally went dead, hissing through his teeth at the way the Sherriff’s little parting shot rubbed his fur the wrong way. It was like every time he tried to do the right thing, (every single time!) somebody started tap-dancing all over his tail. Why the furry hell did this always have to be so… hard? At least the skunk tending bar brought him another glass of soda pop this time, rather than just looking right through him. That had to count for something, right?

“I-I’m sorry to bother you, sir, but the bartender said you might be looking to hire someone back in Bunnyburrow…

Gideon didn’t even see the black, wooly paw coming up from behind him until it was resting on his shoulder, but he’d never forget the day that she walked back into his life. Surprised by the sudden warmth of her paw as it accidentally brushed his cheek when he turned to face her, Gideon was shocked to see a beautiful face from his childhood staring back at him. Was that really… Sharla? Freshly sheared for the hot summer months and standing there with a wildflower behind one ear and the rays of the afternoon sun shining off of her soft black coat and 'Garfield speed-eating a lasagna' print T-shirt, Gideon grey could swear he'd just been tapped on the shoulder by an angel!

 "Gideon Grey?!? Is that really you?”

 

---

 

Chapter 2: “Mooston, we have a problem…”

“Mooston, we have a problem…”

(Standing there within easy reach of her most feared childhood bully, Gideon Grey, Sharla Woolston is a little too stunned by running into the immense fox for the first time in twenty years to really believe that she just asked him for a job, much less stop the police file folder from slowly slipping out of the stupefied Gideon’s grip to spill out in a jumbled mess all over the barroom floor at their feet .)

“Gideon Grey?!? Is that really you?”

Sharla felt her heart skip a beat when the enormous country fox turned to meet her question with confusion and frustration written plainly across his face. Finally seeing her when he looked a little down towards the floor, Gideon’s irritability disappeared, leaving only more room for bewilderment to fill up the robust young fox’s face. Sharla could swear that the big fox seemed almost… scared of her with the way the fox’s ears splayed back on either side of his head, but Sharla couldn’t imagine for the life of her what she could have done or said to make Gideon’s whiskers curl defensively like that, even as the predator took a clumsy half-step back until his fluffy, red tail was resting against the bar.

“Sh-Sh-Sharla?!? But, I-I thought you was off doing your what-cha-ma-call-it thing down in Mooston!”

The clattering of his police report folder hitting the floor half a second later seemed to snap the portly fox back to his senses, but Sharla could tell something about seeing her again had really shaken up her former childhood bully something awful. Right now, Gideon Grey looked about as intimidating as a newborn kitten after its first bath in the sink and almost as helpless. But what was he doing all the way out here in Podunk dressed in those oversized flour-stained overalls —and why did he look about as embarrassed as a schoolkit caught smuggling a frog into his teacher’s desk after recess? The whole situation was so comical that Sharla couldn’t help but giggle a little as she bent down to help Gideon pick up his jumbled paperwork off of the barroom floor.

“Gideon Grey, could “astronaut” be the word you’re trying so hard to remember right now? Or maybe even mechanical engineering? That’s what I went down to Mooston to learn, just so you know.”

Gideon swallowed a nervous lump in his throat, trying his hardest to remember if that was the kind of word you were supposed to say in front of a cute girl, much less in mixed company. At least, she seemed to find his clumsiness kind of funny, so he must’ve been doing something right. Though, for the life of him, Gideon couldn’t imagine what he’d said or done to make the sweet young sheep smile up at him in such a disarming way.

“Ah think it might’ve been something along those lines… Them four-dollar words never seem to mean what ah think they aught’ta.”

Shuffling the papers back together into a manageable pile, Gideon had to work doubly hard just to keep his paws from shaking every time they brushed up against Sharla’s soft wooly coat. But, why did seeing her smile up at him make his head swim like he’d taken one too many rides on the rollercoasters at the county fair again?

“But it’s good to see you again, Sharla… you’re looking plum amazing, so Mooston must be agreeing with you…” Gideon’s head smacked the underside of the bar with a powerful crack when he realized how what he’d just said must sound to the pretty young sheep, but Sharla’s eyes seemed glued to the floor as she swept the last of the jumbled-up paperwork back into its folder.

It wasn’t until they’d gotten the police file back into its protective folder that Sharla saw it had “Property of the Podunk Police Dept.” embossed on the outside cover. Seeing the way Sharla’s gentle smile disappeared when he saw her staring down at the folder’s cover, Gideon tried to take a step forward, only to almost trip over a nearby barstool as he raised his paws defensively to show he wasn’t the same, angry little kid who had been so mean to her and her little brother, Gareth all those years ago. 

“It ain’t what it looks like, hun… I mean, yeah, my name’s on the police report, but that don’t mean it was me doing wrong this time…”

In her head, Sharla had already had one foot out the front door of this tacky little bar and headed back to Bunnyburrow to keep looking for the job she so desperately needed right now, but there was just something so melancholy in the fox’s tone that she found herself turning to listen to his side of the story. Could Gideon really have turned such a big corner since their childhood days? I mean, stranger things had happened, right? Maybe, just maybe, this wasn’t really the same fox who’d mauled her best friend all those years ago at the county fair.  

“I just, that is, you see…” Gideon took in a big, calming breath, only to release it slowly as his composure returned with just a note of defeat making the poor country fox’s tail droop as he tried to explain the whole mess that had sunk him into a funk, here today. “I had to swear out a statement for the Sherriff when two bobcats here in Podunk tried to steal mah van this morning. See, I was trying to interview this muskrat boy for a job, but he just suckered me out here just so’s he could distract me while his two buddies took the van for a joy ride.”

Feeling the fox’s forearms tense like elevator cables as he gently helped her to her feet, Sharla could tell that Gideon was still built like a professional wrestler under those overalls, easily even stronger than he had been in their youth. What wasn’t there when she looked up into Gideon’s eyes was the constant anger and self-loathing that had followed the young fox around everywhere that Gideon went like a black storm cloud.

“So much for finding somebody I can trust to work with me, even all the way out here in Deerbrooke county!”

Something about him really had changed in all their years spent apart… something nice. Gideon guided the anxious young sheep to a nearby booth left empty by a pair of coyotes that gave them both the stink eye before hurriedly downing their drinks and staggering back out to their tractor parked in the grassy lot just outside the bar’s back door. 

“Ah’m guessing that none of ‘em knew how to drive a stick shift, ‘cus you could get that van cranked with a butter knife, the steering column’s in such a sorry state. See, it’s kind of a piece of old, beat-up junk with more rust than paint, but it still runs, even on a cold country morning.”

Gideon’s smile came back a little at a time, his tail puffing out in humble pride at keeping his first company vehicle on the road, most of the time, even if he didn’t know a lot about oil changes and the like. “I mean, it ain’t all that pretty to look at, and you wouldn’t really wanna risk taking it out for a long drive out on the highway, but it gets me where I need to go -most of the time, anyways.”

His heavy paw slapped against the table as Gideon had to laugh at himself just a little for trying so hard, yammering on to the cute little sheep sitting there in rapt attention to his little story about a silly, old delivery van. Then again, he really was proud of how his little bakery business was picking up in the face of so much adversity, even if it did occasionally feel like Lady Luck had his tail in her sights.

“Shoot! —That’s the probably the only reason they’d consider selling it to a fox in the first place.”

To Sharla’s astonishment, Gideon almost looked cute standing there scratching the back of his neck, -hey, she said ‘almost!’- in his sudden vulnerability and eagerness to genuinely comfort her, even as the embarrassment crept from the fox’s ruddy, dimpled cheeks all the way up to the red fox’s inner ears. She really felt that this new Gideon wouldn’t hurt a fly, even though the rest of the world didn’t seem to want to return that simple kindness.

Then again, Sharla had met plenty of longhorn bucks back in Mooston who played at being sweet and harmless one minute and on the next, stomped all over her dream of becoming an honest-to-goodness astronaut, someday. Truth was, none of them seemed terribly interested in dating the first lady sheep to ever find herself on NASA’s shortlist to go into space someday, much less a girl who knew more about mechanical engineering than them and their whole families combined. 

“You know what, Gideon? I think you and me are having the same run of rotten luck, here, today…” Sharla reached across the table to rest one consoling paw on Gideon’s forearm, trying to silence the worries that flashed clearly across the simple country fox’s fretful brow. “But I think that maybe -just maybe- we might be able to help eachother turn things around.”

Now it was Sharla’s turn to sweat the details, her frustration at not being able to find a job for the summer simmering up to ruffle the poor sheep’s wooly locks. After all, she’d been pounding the pavement all over Bunnyburrow looking for a job and the only thing Sharla had to show for all of her efforts were some swollen feet and a serious case of sunburn on her slumping shoulders.

 “You see, I came back to Bunnyburrow looking for a summer job to make a little quick cash to help my family out while they wait for the crops to come in and my mom rests up after her surgery, but I got here too late to catch a job at most of the places in Bunnyburrow because most of those jobs went to the bunnies in town who just got out of school for the summer…”

Shifting uncomfortably in the heat, to say nothing of how stressful she felt unloading all of her frustration on the fox sitting across the booth from her, but it felt nice to have someone listen to all of her problems for once, without butting in to give their ‘two bushels’ worth.  “Heck, some of those girls could still wear the work uniforms handed down from their older sisters and even their mothers and cousins before them! I mean how can a girl compete against that kind of family planning?!?”

Sharla took a lone ice cube from one of the coyote’s untouched water glasses and drug the cube’s delightfully cold surface across her forehead and neck, trying to fight off the relentless summer heat that had been beating down on the sheep’s shoulders all morning long. Working day in and day out with the different engineers, pilots, and technicians in Mooston had done wonders for helping a shy, sheep country girl get over her fear of talking and working with predators.

Of course, it helped that she’d met more than a few predators in her travels that had opened their homes and their hearts to a poor sheep so far from home, belying all the horrible stereotypes about ‘vicious’ predators that Sharla and her brother, Gareth had grown up taking for the gospel truth. One of them, the suave skunk tending the bar circled back to clear their table, leaving them two fresh glasses, a clean bar towel, and a small pitcher of ice water just for the two of them, a knowing smile on his face as he took Gideon’s last four bucks back to the till.

“The yearly ‘bunny boom’ they call it. There’s literally nowhere in town that has spare jobs right now, not even on the farms out on the city limits, which is why I’m all the way out here, but it’s the same story all over Deerbrooke county -nobody wants to hire a prey in town that’s mostly predators right now, not after all the nonsense on the news that they’ve seen about mammals going ‘savage’ in the big city.” Sharla’s shoulders rose and fell in a disgruntled shrug, but she really was trying to come to grips with the fact that she’d simply come home too late in ‘the season’ to find a job in her small hometown.

Gideon’s shy, audible gulp when he saw her pop the last sliver of that ice cube into her mouth to crunch it down to oblivion grabbed Sharla’s attention and brought a little blush to the sheep’s cheeks when she saw how eagerly the robust fox was now studying his full water glass, just to keep from staring at her. Heck, he was practically hiding behind that small glass of water, but Sharla couldn’t tell if it was her or himself that Gideon was so afraid of at the moment.

“But a-ah just don’t get it… You’re so smart! Anybody in town would be lucky to have you working for them -bunny or not!” Gideon stuttered a little as he pushed the small pitcher of ice water her way, clearly struggling with finding the words for what he wanted to say, so he wouldn’t scare her away. “I mean, I don’t know much about this ‘mechanical engine-deering’ stuff, but I know you and Judy were always first in our classes when they passed out the report cards and such!”

He’d always hated ‘report card day’ back when they were in school; like Gideon needed another reason to feel like he was dumber than everyone else in the class, just because he couldn’t read, spell, or do math as well as some of the other kids in his class. None of them had to get up before dawn to pull a plow all by themselves so their families could earn their daily bread, neither, but nobody ever gave out a report card for that kind of thing, now did they? Then again, that all ended when Gideon’s dad went and sold the family’s tiny homestead and moved the family out to the big city while Gideon was still locked away at Juvenile Hall, so maybe it was all for the best, after all?

“It’s called being ‘overqualified’ and you can trust me, Gideon, it’s no fun: going door to door looking for a job with a bunch of hormonal bunny teenagers looking down their noses at you every store that you enter, either.”

Sharla let out a long-suffering sigh. In a lot of ways, she and Gideon were a lot alike, as nobody in their hometown wanted to give either of them a chance, despite how far each of them had clearly come to change their circumstances. Heck, Gideon opening up his own successful business in a town that patently looked down on foxes and distrusted them was almost as miraculous as a small town sheep being accepted into NASA’s engineering program all those years ago. A part of her heart went out to the poor country fox because she knew exactly how rotten it felt to have come so far and to have people slam the door in your face when you finally get where you’ve always wanted to go.

“But why would you need a summer job? I-I mean, don’t ‘astronaut’ stuff down in Mooston pay better than working down at the Tasty Freeze back in town?”

This time, Gideon didn’t bother to hide his confusion, as he slid the bar towel over to Sharla, along with a fresh cup half full of ice chips so she could cool down a bit more. She could even see a small tinge of admiration for her dancing behind the fox’s big blue eyes and feel the warm sympathy of his voice leading to another kind of chill waltzing up and down her spine.

“T-They do, I mean it does pay better, on paper, a-a-anyways…” This time it was Sharla’s turn to struggle finding her words, precisely because she’d just finished having this same argument with her brother Gareth just this morning and the wounds on her poor heart were still healing.

Things had gotten pretty heated in their last argument, and Sharla had told her younger brother a few 'choice' words about the way that Gareth was mishandling the family’s finances while she was away. “But between the higher cost of living down in Mooston and the fact that ‘standby’ engineers don’t make near as much money as the people whose place they’re hoping to take if the primary engineer gets too sick to go to space, I found myself getting stretched pretty thin back in Mooston, even with the help of a few really nice people I’d met there.”

Of course, these weren’t the kind of things that she’d planned on sharing with Gideon Grey, today, but there was no way the gentle country fox could miss the messy mix of emotions that splashed across Sharla’s face right now. "And now, with my mother in and out of the hospital so much and Gareth betting everything we had on the success of this year’s crops- let’s just say that I’m better off moving back here for the summer and helping out with the bills any way that I can.”

They both settled back into their respective sides of the booth, Gideon rubbing the goose egg on top of his head as he pondered this last revelation and Sharla just needing a moment to regroup, mentally after baring all of her family’s dirty laundry for all the world to hear. Swiping a pawful of ice chips from her glass to crunch loudly in her mouth, Sharla looked more than a little peeved with herself for still letting her little brother get to her. Nobody could wind her up quite like Gareth could, even after all of these years. Just thinking about the ram’s smug face right now made her want to break a plate over his head in frustration.

“Um, c-can I ask a personal question?” Gideon pulled nervously at his ear lobe, waiting for a reluctant nod from Sharla before proceeding, “Is working as a ‘standby engineer’ something like bein’ an understudy in a play or somethin’?”

Sharla nodded, trying for all the world to not choke on an ice chip, even as she reeled from the surprise direction that Gideon’s question had taken. Sharla was surprised that the corners of her eyes were tearing up with happy tears when she saw first Gideon’s laughing face light up, clearly overjoyed that the sweet country fox had finally got something right.

“Well, I might just have a job for someone like that, somebody I could really depend on.” Gideon’s smile warmed her through and through, even as the ice cooled down Sharla’s throat, but it was the soft, gentle way that he took and shook her paw in his that made the young sheep’s poor heart skip a beat. “Of course, it ain’t rocket science or whatever, but it’s good, honest work, if’n you still want it?”

Sharla’s voice almost squeaked as she leapt to her feet to shake his paw as hard as her trembling body could manage. “You’d better believe it, Mister!”

 

---

 

Chapter 3: “That Pioneering Spirit…”

The Lonely Hearts Club

“That Pioneering Spirit…”

(After striking out on her local hunt for a quick summer job, Sharla has reluctantly accepted the ride back to Bunnyburrow proffered by Gideon Grey, her childhood bully, who seems eager to turn over a new leaf, both in his professional life and by apologizing to all the mammals that he hurt in the fox’s youth.)

Standing in the parking lot next to the proud fox’s Golden Age delivery van, “Rusty” was certainly one word that leapt to Sharla’s mind, but there were a few more colorful terms that came unbidden to mind: a real ‘diesel dinosaur’, ‘escapee from the museum’, and ‘rolling road hazard’ to name just a few. The sweet old van had classy curves, true enough, but it was also a real ‘fixer-upper’  —just like all those roach-infested short-lease apartments she’d discovered in her first few weeks down in Mooston, where they advertised the crummier places as ‘rustic’ instead of run-down, just so you wouldn’t run screaming for the hotel up the street.

“So, what do you think? Ain’t she a beauty?!? And the back doors, they open up just like a saloon door on one of them pioneer tv shows!” Sure, the heavy steel frame had been lovingly shaped to evoke a sweet nostalgia for happier times and the back doors opened up onto a couple dozen pie racks that Gideon had efficiently secured to either of the van’s inside walls to protect the pies during his deliveries up and down the bumpy country roads without sacrificing the van’s old-timey appeal. And seeing the old-timey van’s ‘sweet-16 cupcake’ pink paint job and the happy, smiling pie on the side of Gideon’s van did make the kid in Sharla want to see exactly what kinds of “real good baked stuff” might be hiding inside.

But the mechanical engineer in Sharla saw right past the van’s pretty-in-pink exterior and charming, old-fashioned curves to spot the bent muffler held onto the van’s underside by one shaky, doomed bolt, the two feet of missing floorboard on the passenger side (long ago devoured by rust), and the antique radiator held together with duct tape and good intentions. Sharla just had to shake her head, because it’d be a miracle if this poor van wasn’t older than she was.

“Only fourteen more payments and she’s all mine!” Gideon’s genuine pride in the thought of owning such a relic left Sharla utterly astounded, especially when she remembered him saying its dilapidated state was the only reason that somebody would agree to sell the vehicle to a fox in the first place. It would take a monumental amount of work under the hood before Sharla would even call the old girl ‘road-safe” much less “reliable.” And the fact that Gideon had to lift the passenger side door nearly halfway off its hinges before it would swing open for her to get inside didn’t help Sharla’s confidence much, either.

One good pothole hit at high speed, and they might just leave half the van’s undercarriage sitting behind them on the roadside, not that this thought ever crossed Gideon’s mind from the way the country fox took off down the county road leading back to Bunnyburrow. Sharla had taken more than a few muddy rides through the backwoods of Podunk County on mismatched “mechanic’s specials” that some lonely country ram had cobbled together from junkyard finds, but she’d never actually watched the blacktop speed by through the gaping hole under her feet, much less felt the entire cab of the van shake like an old, wet dog when Gideon took the first turn a little too fast. What was the crazy country fox thinking when he pinned all the hopes for his new business on this mobile money pit?

“Sharla? Sorry, hun, I was just kidding about them fourteen payments…” After he gently coaxed the van to a rolling stop so a couple of John Deer tractors could cross ahead of them, slowly trudging from irrigating one field to start watering the one across the road, Gideon waved one cautious paw in front of the dumbstruck sheep’s stunned face, “I already bought her outright; with the discount they was offering, I couldn’t afford not to!”

Sharla’s eyes widened to the size of teacup saucers as she turned to face the fox behind the wheel with a mixture of shock and genuine concern for her new boss’ clearly declining mental health. If this was the way that Gideon handled his new business, then they might both be right back out here in Podunk County again next week looking for work! And here he was, driving down the winding country roads like a maniac! I mean a poor girl’s nerves could only take so much! That nervous, hollow spot in her guts at meeting her childhood bully again after so many years had slowly been filling with anger and doubt the longer that she’d been listening to Gideon chatter away about the van’s high points and ignoring all the lows like he didn’t have a care in the world, and if she didn’t let it all out, she’d just end up screaming wordlessly at him in frustration.

“Gideon Gray, I need you to pull this van over, because you and I are going to get a couple of things straight right here -right now- and afterward, if you don’t wanna work with me, or even talk to me again, I swear I’ll hitchhike the rest of my way back home and won’t blame or bother you for another thing as long as I live!” Sharla tried to keep her voice gentle but firm because she could see why Gideon would be so nervous about meeting her again after all these years.

It was no secret that Judy, Sharla and her brother Gareth had all sworn out the original police report that had gotten him sent off to the juvenile hall after he mauled Judy and everybody in Bunnyburrow knew that place was about as rough as they come, especially on newcomers, and especially on foxes. She’d been one of the three people responsible for some of the worst years of his childhood, just like Travis and Gideon had been responsible for some of the worst school years of hers. This crazy new idea of them working together was gonna be hard enough to pull off as it was, given her scientific mindset and his ‘gosh shucks, ma’am’ country boy ways, but it didn’t have a prayer of success if they didn’t clear the air before the real work started back in Bunnyburrow.

Gideon was too gobsmacked by the shy young sheep’s sudden pivot in mood to say much as he pulled the van off onto the dusty shoulder of that old country road, but the crestfallen way that the robust fox brought his long muzzle to rest on top of the steering wheel, his eyes closed like he was in silent prayer, said it all without actually saying a word: “Maybe this was all a big mistake..” Sharla put one comforting paw on top of his, waiting for the poor country fox’s eyes to turn towards hers in genuine surprise at the comforting gesture before the sweet young sheep took her chance to speak her mind.

“Gideon, I ain’t saying that reporting you for mauling Judy that day at the fair was wrong. You did a horrible thing back then, and I can tell the guilt still tears you up inside today, because I can read it all over your face any time you look at me, hun.” Watching the robust fox crinkle his brow and splay his ears out sideways like he’d just taken a generous bite out of a sour crab apple told Sharla that she’d just re-opened a wound he’d let fester for far too long. “But I wasn’t happy to hear about the kind of place they were sending you to, either —none of us were. Judy and me, we tried to get old Judge Hoppalong to go easy on you, even if her parents weren’t feeling so forgiving at the time… She’s the one who begged for the judge to get you some psychological help rather than just let you get lost in the prison system.”

Gideon’s confused stare melted away as his muzzle fell backward into a long, heartfelt sigh of relief, which only confused the pretty young black sheep sitting in his passenger seat right now. “Hoo-DOGGY, do I owe that little bunny girl an apology the next time that I see her!” Gideon actually started laughing a minute later, his eyes rolling back in sweet relief, with his other paw still firmly resting on the steering wheel. “I am gonna bake her family soooo many pies for her birthday —or maybe just one big ol’ carrot cake as long as a picnic table so they could all dig in? Yeah, I reckon Stu and Miss Bonny’d like that!”

Sharla was still staring at the lunatic sitting behind the wheel, confusion written plainly across the sheep’s pretty face as a stray bit of black wool hung loosely over one, nervously twitching eye. “Y-Y-You’re not mad at us, then?”

“Not even a little bit, sugar plum. Ya’ll introduced me to the wonderful old goat who helped me get my mind and my life back on the right track.” The robust country fox’s face lit up with Gideon’s joy at finding out it was Sharla Woolston and Judy Hopps who helped him meet the first friend that he’d ever had who was genuinely interested in helping him work through all his emotional baggage and become the genuinely better fox he hoped to see in the mirror someday soon. “In fact, I think I still owe you both a huge apology for the way ah acted back then.”

Shaking his head in disbelief at the confused smile that slowly crept across Sharla’s face, Gideon smiled back softly at the pretty young sheep in the passenger seat. “Sharla, it’s taken me years to figure out what I wanna’ do with the rest of my life. I done all kinds of taking from folks when I was a kit, especially from the three of you. This bakery, well, it may not look like much right now, but someday, it’s gonna be my way of trying to give a little something back to the folks back home… if y’all will let me.”

“But I can’t do it alone. Much as I want to show everybody back in town how sincere I was about making this bakery thing work, it’s too much work for just one person.” Sharla felt a warm tingle dance across her skin when the earnest fox turned his paw over to hold hers for a brief second, a humbled, hopeful smile dancing behind the country fox’s blue eyes.

Sharla found herself speechless for a moment: he really had gone all-in on this bakery, not just as a business, but as a concrete embodiment of the poor country boy’s desire to do right by the people that he once terrorized, people whose forgiveness -Sharla was quickly coming to see- meant everything to Gideon. “And I know I got no right to ask you to help me get this whole, crazy wagon train a-rollin,’ hun, but I’d be more than grateful if you could find it in your heart to lend me a paw for a while?”

“You want my forgiveness and my support, Mister Grey?” Yes. You sweet, silly fox. I forgive you! Sharla’s kind heart made her decision for her, even as she gave Gideon’s paw a gentle, friendly squeeze, “Then, you’d better get this bucket of bolts back out onto that highway or we’re BOTH gonna’ be late for work!”

~        +       ~        <3     ~        +       ~

The next few miles were spent in a comfortable silence, broken only by the occasional question from Gideon about the different styles of pies and pastries that Sharla had run into in her travels down to Mooston. (As a self-taught baker, he was delighted to find out that cheesecake wasn’t actually made out of cheese!) By mutual agreement, the mismatched pair decided to Sharla’s family’s ranch house on the Bunnyburrow city limits so that she could tell her mama that she’d found a good job prospect down at Gideon’s new bakery and pick up her tools for an overhaul on the delivery van that she assured Gideon was long overdue.

Old Mrs. Woolston was still feeling pretty fragile after her last trip to the hospital, so Gideon had to help her serve tea and biscuits for the three of them, even as Sharla wrapped her mother’s favorite checkerboard Afghan shawl around the frail old sheep’s shoulders to help her keep warm. And “Agatha” -as Mrs. Woolston insisted Gideon call her from now on “or she’d get the heavy wooden spoon out of the kitchen drawer and wallop him a good one”- was only too delighted to have company to share her classic tv show rerun marathon with.

Agatha even went out of her way to point out that the handsome fox, Captain Quirk was her favorite character on the “To Boldly Go” sci-fi show after the stern old badger playing Mr. Smock, his overly logical first mate, of course. (There was even a cranky old ram playing the ship’s curmudgeonly old doctor, but for the life of her, Agatha could never remember his name, because she was always so smitten with his deep, rolling voice and his aristocratic profile!)

And as much as Sharla liked to roll her eyes whenever her mother started rattling off about the crew’s trials and tribulations on this episode or that one, Gideon could see the excitement in the young sheep’s eyes whenever she saw the TV show’s spaceships come into view. They may have been just a kid’s fever dream, slapped together with varnish and paper-mâché by a poor prop department a few hours before they shot the pilot episode, but Sharla practically vibrated in her seat every time they flew across the screen. As he helped tidy up the kitchen and wash their dishes, Gideon made himself a mental note to buy his new business partner the remastered DVD set for her birthday, if she didn’t already own it, just so he could see her happily ‘geek out’ like this again.

  All-in-all, it was a lovely, lazy, and wonderfully unplanned way to spend a few hours on a sunny Saturday that had Gideon smiling ear-to-ear as he helped Sharla carry her heavy toolbox out Agatha’s front door, promising to come to visit the matronly old sheep again as soon as he could find the time. Unfortunately for them all, they’d been having such a good time watching the show with Agatha to hear Gareth’s battered old work truck come screeching into the drive like the angry young ram had just heard that his house was on fire.  

“What in the furry hell is HE doing here?!?” The intervening years may have softened Sharla’s heart towards her former childhood tormentor, but the same couldn’t be said of the powerfully built young ram that got out of his truck with a tire iron clenched in one meaty fist. Two decades of tilling his family’s farm under the burning hot sun -sometimes by hand, when their old tractor was back in the shop for repairs- had left Gareth with a thick, muscular frame and a lightning-quick fuse, and right now the sight of Gideon Grey palling-around with his naïve older sister set the young ram’s blood to boiling like a tea kettle. And the fact that he still had to crane his neck up after all these years to look the fox in the eye only ticked Gareth off all that much more.

“I-I-I… Now, G-Gareth, let’s not start s-something h-here that we’ll both re-re-regret…” Sharla was still kissing her mother goodbye on the soft spot on top of her head when she heard her brother’s angry challenge bellowing in from the yard out front, but she was out that front door and standing between her brother Gareth and the stammering fox in a split second like she was a circus stuntman who’d been shot out of a cannon.

“Gareth! Gideon is my guest here today. He’s changed his ways and wants to make amends for the things that he’s done, if you’ll just take a minute to talk to him, you’ll see what I mean…” Sharla could already smell the whiskey on her brother’s breath from ten paces, and it wasn’t even three in the afternoon, yet, but she had to try and keep him from making this horrible situation even worse.

“Ain’t gonna happen, sis! You might as well ask a cheetah to trade in his spots for a skunk’s stripes…” Setting down Sharla’s toolbox and raising both of his paws so the ram could see that he wasn’t looking for a fight, Gareth took two big steps forward, even as Gideon stepped back up the steps and onto the front porch of the Woolston family’s ranch house, almost falling back onto the porch swing by the front door.

“Hey, what are you doing with them tools, fox?” Gareth’s bloodshot eyes locked on his sister’s old toolbox as it thudded to the floor and then glared angrily up at his sister. “And here, I thought I told you we were gonna sell them tools. We need the money, Sharla!”

“And I told you there wasn’t no way in hell you were gonna pawn my tools to pay your bar tab, Gareth. I paid for every dadgum one of them out of my own pocket and you ain’t touching them. Are we clear?!?” Sharla poked her brother hard enough in the chest to push him stumbling back a pace, clearly hell-bent on getting this point through his thick skull once and for all.

“We need that money, Sharla… Mom’s hospital bills ain’t gonna pay themselves. Between that and the mortgage being so far behind, we’re in a tight spot and you know it!” Now, it was Gareth’s turn to push his sister back a couple of inches, clearly just as stubborn and desperate as she was to pull the family through this rocky patch, just clueless about how to make it work with all the bill collectors circling the family farm like a pack of vultures. “A-and you said it yourself, there ain’t nobody in town looking to hire you right now.”  

“So, go sober yourself the hell up and get back to work!” Sharla grabbed her brother by the shoulder straps of his greasy overalls, pushing him back towards his beat-up old truck, hoping he’d finally catch a clue and leave them alone long enough for her to get Gideon out of here with all of his fur still attached. “What the hell are you even doing at home at this time of day?”

“Charlie Coopworth and Johny Romney were out on a sandwich run for the boys in the north field and said they saw this one’s van parked outside my house!” Gareth pointed his crooked tire iron in Gideon’s direction like he’d like to start bashing Gideon’s poor head and work his way down to the fox’s toes, but Sharla was having none of this bluster and hollow bravado from her brother, drunk or not.

“This ain’t your house, yet.” Sharla didn’t have the heart to look over her shoulder to see Agatha standing there, holding that big wooden spoon in her paws, a shocked look on the sheep matron’s face at the drunken idiot standing there threatening the poor country fox. She’d done her best to raise Gareth to be a calm, respectful young ram, but clearly, all the stress of taking care of the family’s dwindling finances had conspired with the half-empty whiskey bottle sticking out of her son’s back pocket to rob the poor boy of whatever sense he had left. “And even if it was, you got no reason to treat Gideon like this after all this time…”

“Oh? I got EVERY reason after the way he tormented us —and for the way that he mauled poor Judy…” With paws raised, Gideon circled widely around the two arguing sheep, his head hanging low at having his worst memories thrown back into his face, but clearly not wanting to provoke the ram further, especially since Gareth clearly came here looking for a fight. “I know you foxes ain’t too bright, Gideon, so I’ll just spell it out for you: You. Ain’t. Welcome. Here. EVER! Got it?”

  “I-I-I think I’ll just wait in the truck…” Gideon’s tail could have swept the floor it was hanging so low if they weren’t already standing out on the dirt driveway to Sharla’s family home. If meeting Sharla again for the first time in so many years had been the high point of his day, then seeing her brother again had certainly been the low tide moment, and all he had left after the water receded was the emotional baggage he’d spent the last twenty years trying to leave behind him.

“That ‘poor Judy’ can take care of herself just fine, Gareth —she’s a police officer in the big city now, or have you conveniently forgotten that little fact?” Sharla picked up her tools and pointedly stepped through her brother, shouldering the ram out of the way when he planted his feet, trying to silently tell her exactly what he thought of her riding around with such a worthless fox. “And you owe Gideon, here, one whopper of an apology, even if he’s too damned polite to ask you for one.”

The ram’s last mistake was grabbing Sharla’s wrist to spin her around as she tried to storm on by, clearly unable to let his sister get the final say in the matter. “Hey, I ain’t finished speaking my piece!”

Gideon was still opening the passenger door for Sharla’s things when he saw her turn on her brother, the black sheep’s knee crashing into Gareth’s private parts so hard it made the portly country fox worry about Agatha's chances of ever getting grandkids. Coughing and sputtering for his next breath, Gareth hit his knees, his eyes bulging like a bullfrog pulled out of the creek as his sister yanked the half-full whiskey bottle out of his back pocket and sent it crashing against the front bumper of her brother’s truck in an explosion of glass and fury.

“Trust me, LITTLE brother, you’ve said enough!” With one dainty push of her foot, Sharla flipped her brother over onto his back and stepped right on and then over him on her way out to Gideon’s delivery van. “I’ll come back for my suitcase later tonight. Gareth, I suggest you make yourself real scarce when I do.”

It was only when she was finally sitting in the passenger seat, with her beloved toolbox safely stowed away at her feet, that Sharla turned to smile and wave at her mother. She’d tried so hard not to let her brother get to her, but the frustrated, angry tears were already welling up in the corner of her pretty blue eyes.

“Gideon, I am so sorry that you had to see that. Gareth’s not usually like this, but things have been really hard on the farm the last few seasons and he’s been carrying a lot of that weight on his shoulders since pop passed away…” Sharla found herself at a loss for words, hot tears streaming down her face, even as they pulled out of the long, dirt driveway leading back to her mother’s house. “And when we get together, lately, it’s like tossing a can of kerosene on a bonfire…”

Nodding his head in quiet understanding, Gideon drove for a quick minute before pulling the van into an old logging truck turn-around track by the roadside and reaching across Sharla’s lap to grab her a clean napkin from the glove compartment. “My dad and me used to have blowups like that back in the day, too. Whenever I came home from a fight with a black eye and three days’ suspension or with another awful report card, it got pretty rough, I’m not gonna lie….”

Sharla was still wiping her eyes with a napkin from the Podunk Piggly Wiggly supermarket when she heard the catch in Gideon’s voice turn painful, “And we both said and did some things I ain’t too proud of, but most people have a way of coming around if you give them a little time, you’ll see.”

Taking the sweet country fox’s paw in hers when he reached to grab her another napkin to replace the sodden one in her paws, Sharla gave his whole forearm a surprising, grateful hug against her cheek for being so sweet and supportive. It was just supposed to be a quick, quiet ‘thank you’ for being there when she really needed somebody to talk to, but Sharla held onto him for a few minutes more until the tears stopped running down her cheeks. “God, I hope so.”

Gideon didn’t seem to mind her getting his thick orange fur a soggy mess, even if they did get more than a few awkward stares from the farm folk driving their produce trucks up and down the roads leading back to Bunnyburrow. Even when a county police car circled back to make sure they weren’t two horny teenagers out here ‘pitching woo’ out there by the roadside, Gideon just shrugged at the old goat officer as if to say, “She’ll be ready to go back to town whenever she’s ready to go back to town.”

When Sharla could finally pull herself together, wiping the last few tears from her furry cheeks and smiling bashfully up at Gideon as he turned the van to head back into Bunnyburrow, the mismatched pair drove on again in a comfortable silence, even if the inside of Gideon’s ears did blush something awful and Sharla’s blue eyes still glistened with a strange fascination whenever she looked over at the fox behind the wheel. It was only when the van finally pulled into the parking lot outside of Gideon’s new bakery that Sharla finally found her voice. “Gideon, thank you for being my friend when I really needed one, today.”

As a slow smile lit up the country fox’s broad muzzle, Sharla couldn’t help but smile a little bit, herself, like the moon lighting up when it caught the sunshine being reflected off of the Earth, “Ah, shoot, sugar plum —I was fixing to tell you the same thing, myself! C’mon in inside the shop, I can’t wait to show you what we’ll be working with!”

Chapter 4: Old Friends and New Challenges

Old Friends and New Challenges...

(After a bittersweet homecoming that led to a fight with her younger brother Gareth, Sharla has agreed to help Gideon Grey get his fledgling bakery up onto its feet. In return, she’s getting a summer job to help her struggling family with their mounting bills until her brother can bring in his big cash crop come harvest season. It’s not going to be an easy summer for anyone involved, particularly Sharla, but she’s not letting that slow her down one bit…)

Walking into the back door to Gideon’s bakery with her heavy toolbox under one arm and a rolled-up sleeping bag under the other, Sharla was astounded to come chest to face with Travis’ very pretty and very pregnant young wife, Irene sweeping up small piles spilled flour into a mountain in the middle of the kitchen floor with a broom and dustpan. The pretty young black-footed ferret almost jumped out of her dungarees when Sharla’s big toolbox hit the kitchen floor with a very loud thump as the sheep rushed forward to grab the oversized broom and dustpan out of the poor girl’s hands. She hated to startle the pretty young ferret like this, but Agatha would tan her daughter’s hide if the black sheep of the Woolston family let any pregnant woman exhaust herself, kneeling down on all four paws to get the business end of Gideon’s heavy broom up under the bakery’s immense pie-cooling racks.

Given the white flour stains all over the knees of the girl’s red, white, and blue patched dungarees and the perturbed, pixyish pout spread across the ferret’s dark lips right now, Sharla knew that was exactly the kind of mischief that Irene had been up to before Gideon came tromping back into the back kitchen with a friendly sheep in tow! She pouted even harder when Gideon reminded her (again!) that her doctors wanted Irene to take it easy until her and Travis’ second baby was ready to be born, playfully shoving the much larger fox with her two flour-dusted paws, “Oh, Foo! Don’t you start treating me like I’m made of glass, too, Mr. Grey! I get enough of that hogwash from Travis back at home!”

With one subtle sweep of her foot, Sharla managed to slide her toolbox out of the pacing ferret’s path just a few seconds before Irene could trip over it since the bulge of her belly almost completely obscured the poor girl’s feet from view. “Whenever I try to pick up the least little thing, he’s right there, making sure I don’t over-tax myself. ‘The doctor says this, the Doctor says that… Fooey! If I didn’t love my sweet Travis so much, I could just smother him with a pillow while he sleeps!” Poor Irene sounded ready to strangle the love of her life, but she just shook her head at them both with love in her eyes, as if to say, “Someday you’ll know exactly how I feel!’

“And if that don’t tell you everything you need to know about ‘the joys of married life,’ then I don’t know what more I can say!” Travis laughed from the doorway leading out of the kitchen and back towards the bakery’s front counter, carrying a bus bin full of pie plates that were stacked up almost as tall as the ferret, himself. Lifting them up into the bakery’s deep-bellied farmhouse sink with a bone-weary clang, Travis stepped around the pile of spilled flour sitting in the middle of the floor to come snuggle with his irritable young wife for a moment, fully aware that Irene couldn’t hold a grudge for longer than two seconds, even if her life depended on it; her heart was just too filled with love for all the creatures of this world, even a two-time loser like he used to be. “Hello, Beautiful. Heard you cursing my name, so I figured you might could use a hug… was I right?”

Clearly, on their ride back to town Gideon hadn’t oversold the young ferret’s transformation from a wiry young teen, hellbent on raising mischief all over Bunnyburrow County into a dependable, loving young family man. Five years ago, he was still cracking open boxes for the new Wool-mart on the other side of town, but hard work and dedication to his growing family had seen Travis shoot up through the ranks until he was now the assistant manager with a massive ring of keys dangling from his belt and a bemused smile spread across the ferret’s face whenever he heard his adoring wife start in with her “country curse words.” Yes, sir, Sharla had to laugh a little to herself as she watched the two ferrets wrapping themselves up in one big happy-sappy knot, family life looked good Travis, even if it did bring a small sting of jealousy in to briefly overshadow Gideon’s supportive smile whenever he saw the two ferrets curl into one another’s arms. “Ooh-da-Lolly! I swear ya’ll are gonna give me cavities someday…”

All the tension fled from Irene’s shoulders as soon as she was curled up in the loving arms of her husband and mate, his snuggling embrace leaving little more than a purring mess of a young woman all too happy to cling to the man who held her heart so tenderly and bound himself so tightly to her side. Gideon had still been doing his time at the juvenile detention hall out in Deerbrooke county when they’d said their “I do’s” but Travis had sent his best friend a video of the wedding vows, especially the part where his best friend growing up told the love of his life that he was all hers, “for forever and a day at least as long as she could stomach having him follow her around.” When she was done nuzzling back into Travis’ shoulder, Irene turned towards Gideon and Sharla with a dreamy, far-away look in her half-lidded eyes, “Gideon’s back, sweetie, and he brought a friend with him this time! Look at her, Travis—Isn’t she so pretty?”

“That, my dear wife, is what they call a ‘trap’ question…” Travis turned Irene’s pretty dark muzzle up to meet his lips for one quick, teasing kiss that made her knees go weak, even as Sharla and Gideon turned around to blush, “You know I only have eyes for you!” The poor, lovesick fool still closed his eyes when kissing his lovely wife all these years later, like she was a wonderful dream that he never wanted to wake up from.

Rolling her pretty brown eyes, Irene pushed her cornball of a husband back a pace before turning to give Gideon a big, flour-stained hug that didn’t come close to getting around either of their substantial bellies. “Sorry we can’t stay longer, Mr. Grey, but Travis Jr. can only stay at the babysitter’s for half a day, today!”

Gideon did his best to sound perturbed with the happy couple’s public displays of affection, but Sharla could see the gratitude written across the fox’s face as he turned to shake his childhood best friend’s paw, with Irene still stuck like glue to the big fox’s side. “You know ya’ll didn’t have to man the shop while I was off looking to hire a little help around here… I could’ve managed as soon as I got home.” As clearly fond of the fox as she was, though, it didn’t look like Irene was gonna let him off the hook this time without a little bit of motherly scolding.

“Gideon, sweetie, you know that a lot of start-up businesses live or die by word-of-mouth from regular customers during their first few years, and we know just how hard you’ve been pushing yourself to get this place up on its feet…” Patting the fox’s big paw for a second, Irene slipped out of Gideon’s hug to go stand beside her husband, their arms intertwined behind Travis’ back as they both steeled themselves to have ‘the talk’ with their favorite foxy friend “But you just can’t afford to take time away from the bakery - especially during the lunch rush - or you might not have any customers left when you get back!”

Standing there in his cherry pie-stained blue “Wool-Mart” smock and black work pants, Travis brushed a small streak of flour from his young wife’s cheek before putting his own two cents in. “We know how much time and energy you’ve put into this bakery, Gideon: getting up before the sun rises to bake pies by the dozens so you can make the midmorning deliveries to the farm families on the edge of town, then there’s the midday ‘sugar rush’ with the school kids and their teachers to prepare for, and by the time they’re finally out the door, you’re already working yourself to the bone getting ready to do it all over again the next day.” Travis sounded proud of all that his old friend had accomplished, but there was also a note of genuine concern for the fox’s wearied soul. “You can’t keep running yourself ragged like this, or something’s gonna break around here —and it just might be you, buddy.” 

The sad, sweet, supportive smile on Irene’s face spoke volumes about her concern for the fox, even as Travis gave his best friend a brotherly hug around Gideon’s sizeable midsection, “And it’s not just the day-to-day operations, Gideon… Travis had me look at your books to see if there was somewhere, anywhere you could cut back to take up the slack, but there just isn’t any wiggle room left.”

Irene’s voice was so soft and sweet as she gently scolded Gideon for letting things at the bakery get out of hand that Sharla thought she’d make a great kindergarten teacher someday if she ever decided to change jobs, “You’re two months behind on the rent for this place and overextended on just about everything else: supplies, invoices, billing for your deliveries, and even maintenance on your only delivery van. Or did you forget that I was a C.P.A. down at the bank before somebody -who will NOT be named here- put me on revolving maternity leaves?” Even though it earned him a playful tail swat on his bum, Travis didn’t look the least bit sorry for his young wife’s predicament, which only made her smile brighten to match the proud, goofy grin plastered all over her husband’s face.

However, after seeing his old friend’s smile dimming down to a chagrined, ‘hound dog’ droop, Travis kissed his pretty wife on the cheek and tucked his work smock under one arm as he took boyhood best friend aside for a little supportive chat. “What she’s trying to say is we knew you could use a helping paw around here today and we both found ourselves with the morning off, so we decided to help with the lunch rush before we ducked out to enjoy a little picnic for me, Irene, and little Travis, Jr.” Gideon’s chagrined smile returned, but there wasn’t a lot of hope left in the fox’s face as he turned back to grimace at the mountain of dishes still sitting in the kitchen sink. “And I’m glad that we did, buddy… It’s pretty obvious, (even to somebody who doesn’t have all of my wife’s big brains and fancy degrees) that you’re barely keeping your head above water around here.”

“Oh, I’ve been trying, guys… Lawd knows that I’ve been trying!” Gideon let out a weary sigh as he muscled his way over to the heavy, horse-sized bakery racks fully loaded with pies for the afternoon deliveries, pushing one of them out of the way so he could finish sweeping up the spilled flour that Irene hadn’t been able to reach, even by getting down on all fours. “I’m sorry, Travis, Irene… I meant to get back in time for the sugar rush, but I had a little run-in with the sheriff down in Podunk and things got a little out of hand. See, while I was parked outside a bar over there, a couple of mangey cats tried to run off with mah delivery van…”

Irene clutched her husband’s side, burying her shocked face into Travis’s comforting shoulder. “Oh, Gideon!” Travis looked angry enough to go pull those caracal’s tails out by the roots when he saw the defeated shrug of his best friend’s shoulders, but he also knew that the last thing that Gideon needed right now was another reason to blow his top -not with the bank and the bills breathing down his neck right now!  

“And then the sheriff wanted to throw the book at them and the young muskrat boy, Thomas that they used to sucker me out there and keep me distracted while they jimmied the front doors open with a bent-up coat hanger…” Sweeping up the last of the flour pile into a steel dustpan, Gideon turned back to look at the stunned eyes of his new partner, a sad smile curling his lips even as his tail dragged dejectedly across the floor of his beloved bakery. “They didn’t really do no harm, mind, just wanted to take the van out for a little joy ride… just like you an’ me used to do back when we was kids.” Travis winced a little bit when he felt his young wife’s annoyed little paw smack him right above the tailbone for leaving that juicy part out of his stories about his and Gideon’s misspent youth.

“Heck, Thomas even had that same, stupid look on his face that I did the day at the county fair when the sheriff slapped his paw-cuffs on me.” Even in the hot, mid-day dry sauna of the bakery’s brick-and-mortar kitchen, Sharla could see a cold shiver run up and down Gideon’s spine as he rubbed self-consciously at his wrists, clearly still feeling the cold, unforgiving metal confining him, even after all these years. “Anyways, I didn’t have the heart to help the Sheriff throw the book at ‘em, so I doubt we’ll be getting any big pie orders from the Podunk police department any time soon…”

Holding her husband’s paw in hers, Irene smiled proudly up at Gideon, even if the whole fiasco had cost her and Travis their first morning off together in weeks. Finally looking up to recognize the pretty young black sheep that Gideon had brought home with him, Travis found his own reason to hang his head for a moment, biting his bottom lip in consternation as he found it hard to look Sharla in the eye. It couldn’t really be her after all this time, could it? There weren’t that many black sheep in this small town, much less ones who could carry a twenty-pound toolbox under one arm and a ram-sized sleeping bag in the other. Sharla really had come a long way from the meek little sheep she and Gideon used to pick on when they were all kids, he almost didn’t recognize the confident, headstrong young lady that she’d grown up into.

But there it was, when Travis finally looked up to see the gentle kindness that filled the sheep’s soft blue eyes as she carefully set her toolbox down on the kitchen counter and tucked her sleeping bag into a cubby hole right beneath it… Gideon really had brought the chief witness in his childhood assault case against Judy Hopps back home to see his floundering little bakery. And stranger still, she seemed willing, (eager even!) to walk right up to the big fox and put a comforting paw of her own on Gideon’s shoulder -a silent show of support that nearly floored all three of the predators in the room! Travis had lived in Bunnyburrow all his life, but there were still moments like this, where it felt like he’d stepped out into a crazy new world where anything could happen. Irene accepting his proposal to marry him was living proof of that! That couldn’t really be Sharla smiling up at Gideon right now… could it?

Sharla’s voice rang out high and sweet like a silver bell in the hot confines of the small bakery’s kitchen, “You got this, Gideon… especially when you have good friends like Travis and Irene, here. And now you got me here to help you carry the load.” Gideon’s smile lit up the room, even if the sheep’s supportive touch on his shoulder did make the poor country fox blush from the tips of his ears all the way down to the tip of his tail. “Whatever else breaks down around here next, we can fix it, but right here, right now, you need to know that you’re going to make it… We all will!”

And for the first time since he got back to the bakery today, Gideon’s fluffy red tail stopped drooping to sweep the floor and started wagging uncontrollably, just from hearing Sharla say his name. The smiling fox found it hard to swallow all the emotions running wild deep in his chest, but he did lay one gentle paw on top of Sharla’s for just a fluttering heartbeat. “Th-thank you, darlin'. That there’s g-gotta’ be the nicest thing a-anybody’s said to me all week!” He didn’t get why touching her paw made his head swim like he’d just got off the roller coasters down at the county fair or why a small blush was creeping into Sharla’s cheeks, too. Gideon just knew he never wanted this little moment between them to end.

Of course, that’s when the old shop bell over the bakery’s front door rang out its warning, followed by the over-loud, harrumphing “Hello-oooh, dearies! Is anybody back there?” of a poshly dressed badger shoved her way into their happy lives like a raincloud hovering over a summer wedding outdoors. “Doing the good Lord’s work in this blasted heat makes a body healthy, wealthy… and hungry!”

“Grrrrreat. Ms. Hattie’s back again to ask about that big pie order of hers for the church bake sale this weekend.” Hearing the badger’s heavy footsteps approaching, Travis groaned as he looked at his expectant little wife and then back to Gideon with a ‘better you than me, my friend’ shrug and apologetic smile. “That makes three times already today, so I think you can just kiss goodbye to the rest of your afternoon, buddy.”

Towering over all but the tallest of town’s predators in her Sunday-best flowery dress (the same one that she wore every single day of the week), Miss Henrietta “Hattie” McPhearson walked through the shop’s midafternoon crowd of customers like she was visiting royalty, shaking paws and petting “all the pretty babies” behind their ears without bothering to ask their young mothers’ permission, first. She even dropped a massive pawful of penny candies on all the young students who were waiting in line as she passed them all by, smiling angelically as she slowly waded up to the lunch counter ahead of six other customers anxiously waiting for their chance to grab one of Gideon’s pies on their lunch break.

 Rushing his pretty young wife further back into the kitchen where she could more easily avoid the posh badger’s overly familiar pawing at her pregnant belly, Travis winked up at his fox friend and the dark-wooled sheep that was hiding in his shadow right now. “Why don’t you show this pretty young lady where she’ll be bunking? I’ll keep ‘the dragon’ distracted long enough for you both to unpack.”

“Ah can handle Ms. Hattie, Travis…” Gideon volunteered, clearly not relishing the prospect of butting heads with one of the pickiest predators in the Tri-Counties area. Then again, this bakery was his responsibility and Irene and Travis had already done him an amazing favor just by handling the lunch rush all by themselves, so he could drive all the way out to Podunk looking to hire a little help around the shop. “Besides, don’t ya’ll gotta get back to your babysitter so’s you and Irene can have that little picnic you was talking about?”

“Oh, she’s waited this long, I’m sure that five more minutes’ won’t hurt nothing.” Travis whispered up at Gideon out of the corner of his mouth, even as he plastered his best ‘customer service’ smile on the other side of his face. “Besides, anybody who’s met Ms. Hattie for more than five minutes knows how difficult she can be to deal with. You two go on up, I got this…” Irene winked in solemn support for her mate before ducking back behind the massive pie racks with Gideon and Sharla, where even an immense creature like Ms. Hattie would have a hard time seeing them.

Travis took one last breath to steel his nerves before heading back out into the main dining area to dance with the old dragon looming over the lunch counter in her favorite floral dress, “Ms. Hattie! To what do we owe the pleasure of your delightful company again today? Perhaps you’d like to try out one of those miniature strawberry-rhubarb pies we were talking about earlier this morning…?” 

Shaking her head at her husband’s sales-mammal antics, Irene took Gideon and Sharla’s paws in hers, trying to keep her voice low enough to escape Ms. Hattie’s razor-sharp hearing for all things gossip. “You two kids should probably escape out the back while you still can. Once she figures out that Gideon’s back, there’s not much chance she’ll leave until she’s talked him into adding another five pies to her already ridiculous order -all on the house, of course.”

“Oh, come on now, she’s not that bad… Don’t let these two fool ya, Sharla.” Gideon snuck a glance around the heavy pie racks, shaking his head at the clever way that Travis blocked Ms. Hattie’s view of the bakery’s back kitchen by holding up an oversized menu in front of the fancy badger’s frustrated face. “Come to think of it, though, she does usually talk circles around me whenever we talk about her church bake sale this weekend…”

Gideon shrugged, affably, because he knew it wasn’t too hard for a shrewd businesswoman like Ms. Hattie to talk circles around almost anybody in Bunnyburrow. Whispering as he took Sharla’s paw and headed for the bakery’s back staircase that led up to the apartment over their heads, Gideon couldn’t get over how soft and warm Sharla’s wool felt on his fingers, “Okay, let’s go while Travis has her distracted!”

Picking up Sharla’s heavy toolbox under one arm and her sleeping bag under the other, Gideon stuck his tongue out at Travis’s young bride, teasing the young black-footed ferret who reached out to help him with the heavy load for a second out of pure habit, before laughing at the exasperated look that blossomed all across Irene’s pretty face. “You know I started this bakery with my own two paws, doncha’ little miss ‘fussy britches?’” He whispered as the three of them slid around the mighty twin ovens that filled most of the kitchen’s back wall and quietly ran for the safety of the stairwell on the other side of the room from the parking lot. “I really can handle Ms. Hattie and the lunch rush all by myself.”

Propping open the stairway door leading to the bakery’s small apartment upstairs with an eerily loud creak of its antique hinges, Gideon was delighted to see the normally prim-and-proper little ferret stick out her tongue mockingly at him in return, even as Sharla almost doubled over laughing when she saw Irene cross her eyes at Gideon as the cherry on top of their little silly sundae. “I’ve been doing it all by myself for the last six months just fine!” There was just no convincing Irene today, not after she’d seen the mess that Gideon had made of the Bakery’s accounts in the last six months, but that never stopped the sweet-hearted fox from trying.

“Sure, sure you have, sweetheart…” Irene called up the stairs after the mismatched pair in her sweetest, mocking “Mom” voice as she guarded the door leading back into the kitchen, “But when it comes to dealing with a walking headache like Ms. Hattie, you’re gonna need all the help that you can get!”  

---

Reaching the top of the bakery’s winding back staircase made Gideon’s knees ache, especially with the added weight of Sharla’s heavy toolbox and oversized sleeping bag tucked safely under each of the fox’s arms, but his smile couldn’t have been brighter. Travis had been his friend for so long now that Gideon couldn’t imagine a life without the fussy young ferret by his side. And Irene, she was just as amazing when he met her in person as she had been in all those letters that Travis used to write to Gideon when the fox was stuck back in juvenile hall. He’d never told Travis just how much having someone on the outside who cared about him had helped the stubborn country fox keep his nose clean and lifted up his hopes of coming back to Bunnyburrow someday. And even with another little one on the way, they’d done more than Gideon had ever thought possible to help him turn this crazy dream of his into a real-life bakery!

“You know, I’m probably biased, but I think Irene may just be the best thing that could have ever happened to Travis, doncha’ think?” Sharla’s bittersweet smile told Gideon that the pretty young black sheep still remembered the shifty, underhanded little ferret that used to follow him around, delighting in the bullying and the lunch money-stealing of their younger days, even as the genuinely astonished look in her eyes whenever Gideon caught her staring at the country fox in profile told him just how proud she was of how far both of the young boys had come towards being sweet-hearted, mature, responsible young men.

His mother used to have that same, confused, but proud look on her face whenever a much younger Gideon would come tromping inside their old house, muddy stains all the way up to his knees of his overalls from another afternoon of playing ‘hookie’ with Travis down by the creek, tugging on her apron strings to stare up simply at his weary mother until he had her full attention, just so he could ask her if she needed any help cleaning up around the house before supper time, completely ignoring the fact that those muddy paw prints all up and down the living room floor were far too small to fit anyone else’s feet than Gideon’s.

“Yeah, Irene’s one of the good ones, no doubt about that.” Gideon set down Sharla’s toolbox and sleeping bag outside of the small apartment’s only bathroom which sat right between the two bedrooms on either side like the top leaf on a three-leafed clover, his attention momentarily stolen by happy memories of his boyhood days long gone by. Even all these years later, Gideon could almost taste one of his mama’s delicious gooseberry pies cooling on the windowsill in the autumn sun, all gooey and heavenly sweet on his tongue, even if he’d never been able to duplicate the family recipe.

“Ya know, it’s crazy, but I helped the two of ‘em meet for the first time, in my own dumb way.” Wrenching his nostalgia-addled mind back to the present, Gideon turned to smile at Sharla, a bashful crimson blush creeping up her dark cheeks whenever the robust country fox turned to look the pretty young black sheep in the eyes. “See, she got lost trying to pay a speeding ticket for her daddy down at the courthouse and wandered into my trial when Travis was up on the stand trying to be a character witness…” Gideon got so wrapped up in his story-telling that he almost missed the protective way that Sharla picked up her toolbox, carrying it with her everywhere they went like it was half a dream that she never wanted to wake up from. “He didn’t know it back then, but the moment Irene heard ol’ Travis talking to the judge so sweet about me, she was hooked.”

“She followed him home from the courthouse that same day and tailed him around town for a couple of weeks before she got up the nerve to tell him he should take her out for ice cream and a movie when school got out for the summer.” Opening the door to the smaller bedroom on the left side of the hallway, Gideon showed Sharla where she’d be bunking, at least until she found her own place. It wasn’t much bigger than the bathroom, just an old, half-finished (and sadly, unused) nursery room with faded “duckies riding shooting stars” wallpaper running up one side of the room and down the other around a single window looking out over the town’s main street.

“Of course, ol’ Travis was scared to death with her daddy playing chaperone everywhere they went, but he took a chance and kissed her on the cheek as she was getting back into her daddy’s old Mali-moo and that was that! They’ve been like two peas in a pod ever since!” Four bare spots showed where once a crib had once been placed against the far wall, its weight sinking heavily into the faded, blue-and-pink striped carpet below, but it must have been removed long ago by the pangolin couple who lived there before Gideon. Somehow seeing that empty spot against the far wall made Sharla’s heart ache for their dreams that never came true.

“And where does ‘the dragon,’ come into this equation?” Sharla found herself asking the question more to distract herself from her sudden sympathies for the previous owners of this building than any real curiosity. Everybody in town knew how notoriously difficult dealing with the sainted ‘McPhearson’ family could be any time they decided to pop over from their farm on the outskirts of Deerbrook County. The ‘McPhearson Family Tabernacle’ had been a big hit on the televangelism circuit ever since the first tent revivals had reached Podunk, making their modern descendants the closest thing Deerbrook county had to celebrities.

Then again, for all his newfound nervousness around her, Gideon seemed happiest when he had a story to tell, and Sharla found her own worries lifting just a bit whenever she listened to the charming fox’s rumbling voice as he rambled on. “Oh, you mean Ms. Hattie —shoot, that’s just a name me and Travis made up for her when we used to swipe watermelons off her daddy’s farm. She’d be out there guarding the watermelon patch every Sunday night after services, carrying her daddy’s scattergun and hollering like a hurricane every time she found out that we’d snuck another big one out, right under her nose.”

“See, my Uncle Rufus told tall tales better than anyone you ever saw, and one day he convinced us boys that watermelons were actually ‘dragon eggs’ (on account of how weirdly striped they was) and that he could hatch one for us if we just let ‘em warm up in the summer sun for a spell before sneaking a couple of them home to Rufus to make his sweet watermelon wine out of ‘em…” Sharla could almost see it too: Travis making birdcalls or some other noise to draw a young(er) Ms. Hattie away from her midnight vigil while Gideon cut the vine and hauled their ‘treasure’ away in the dead of night, a big goofy grin on his face, just like the one he was wearing right now.

“Anyways, when me and Travis figured out what they actually were, and how yummy they were, we’d swipe a couple more every few days, right out from under ol’ Ms. Hattie’s nose and boy didn’t that make her madder than any dragon I ever heard about!” Looking out the small room’s lone window to distract herself from giggling outright at Gideon’s boyhood antics, Sharla could see half of Main Street, from the feed-and-seed store on the corner all the way out to the main steps of the Bunnyburrow train station with their ridiculous ‘gag’ sign out front, listing an exponentially growing bunny population to amuse/alarm the tourists who came out to visit the quaint little country town every other weekend.

“And let me tell you, she raised cane with my momma something fierce when she saw the mountain of watermelon husks out back of our shack because after my daddy tanned both of our hides so bad, we couldn’t walk upright for a week —and that ol’ rascal, Rufus wasn’t let within a country mile of either of us boys until we were both eighteen and not so durn gullible anymore!” Gideon brought his story to a close with a chagrined smile that almost lit up the room, but Sharla found herself fighting to keep her own smile from fading. He’d told the story with delightful irony and a boyish charm that was impossible not to relish, but there were other things weighing on the sheep’s mind, right now.

“Gideon, w-would it be okay if I put up a few posters or something to liven this place up a little while I am staying here… And maybe got a real bed to go in that corner against the wall?” Seeing that ridiculous sign off in the distance just made the empty spot where the crib used to be look even more barren and the half-finished wallpaper of shooting stars and little duckies look even more heartbreaking. Staring down at her feet, Sharla couldn’t help feeling that Gideon was lucky to not be seeing the whole picture here today.

“It wouldn’t be all at once, or even permanent, if you don’t want it to be…” They always said that ‘ignorance was bliss’ when she was growing up in this tiny little town, but they’d never taught the smart little sheep that intelligence might come with such a hefty price tag, either. Listening to Gideon ramble on, oblivious to the reasons behind this room’s unfinished state almost made Sharla envy the poor country fox just a little for his innate ability to miss out on the finer details of the world around him. “…we could even work out a payment plan to cover the rent and groceries once I’m officially working here if that’s okay with you?”  

Grabbing her shoulder with her opposite paw, Sharla kept her eyes pinned to the floor, hoping that this whole social experiment of working and living with a fox wasn’t going to blow up in her face. She knew that Gideon wouldn’t hurt a fly these days, let alone her, but there were a dozen ways that ‘arrangement’ of theirs could fall apart and she just wanted to get the ‘ground rules’ laid out in advance, just to make sure that neither one of them were expecting more from the other than they could honestly give. It’d be like trying to harvest a crop of alfalfa with a heavy storm cloud just hanging over your head the whole time threatening to wash everything away the moment that you held it in your own two hands.

Seconds passed like hours in the sudden silence between them, but all that Sharla could hear was the nervous shuffling of Gideon’s feat and a few half-hearted attempts to speak that died before they ever reached his lips. It wasn’t until Sharla finally looked up to meet the poor fox’s confused stare that she realized just how much she might have misjudged Gideon Grey today. With his fluffy red tail carefully tucked in between two nervous paws and a bewildered line creasing his broad brow, Gideon tilted his face to the side as if he wasn’t sure who he was talking to for a minute, but when he finally found the words to speak, there was no hiding the hurt from his voice.

“I-I-Irene was right; I ain’t the world’s best business mammal… Mah figures don’t always add up right, and sometimes I forget to pay bills when I oughta…”  Gideon wiped the back of one big paw against the running nose at the end of his long snout self-consciously, hating how the confused gesture always made him feel like a little kid again. “B-b-but even I know that you don’t charge a friend ‘rent and groceries’ when she’s helping you out of a jam, much less trying to be a partner.” His footsteps falling heavier than they had been all day since they had met out in that bar in Podunk, Gideon turned and walked towards the door before his sudden disappointment could lead him to say something uncharitable at the moment about thinking that she knew him better than that by now.

“Far as I’m concerned, this room is yours, now to do with as you wish… for as long as you want or need it to be, anyhow.” Crossing the threshold of her room without so much as a backward glance, Gideon turned towards the stairs heading back down into the bakery, his shoulders stooped and his tail dragging almost to the ground as he called back to a dumbstruck Sharla. “You go ahead and get freshened up. I’ll go see if I can rescue Trevor from dealing with Ms. Hattie, so him and Irene don’t completely miss out on their picnic!”