It was easy, for every two kibble she ate, I could have one. At first, it did not seem fair, I know, but I was just starting, I had to learn the craft, and she was willing to teach me. Another reason is that I am smaller than her, I don’t need as much as she does. When the doors are closed, the cats are meowing, the sheep are under the pine trees, we hunt.
Perhaps I shouldn’t call it hunting, because what we do is move around the neighborhood, we have the houses marked with our bums. The operation is simple, identifying the houses with domestic felines, then observing the blinds closing, the wood moving and the metal clinching. Free food.
Our community isn’t aligned on how to proceed regarding feeding habits. We do have the purists, that hunt from the forest and refuse to engage with food that isn’t offered by our badger God. We, instead, are part of the devious, I don’t like the term, but it was a scholar badger that thought of this name. He was a purist, obviously. According to him, we are dirty and sold-out badgers feeding on humanity’s leftovers.
The scholar is wrong and slim, my booty is fat and I am strong. If God badger provided enough, we would never have to steal or betray our nature. With that said, I am a deviant, a nature cheater, a shame for our community.
Ah, by the way, I didn’t present her. She is my roommate, my best friend, almost adult, fox. After my mother set me free, I searched for a lair, she was my first offer, her last roommate left to mate, her lair was cub free. She had the feeding scheme ready, knew all the houses with domestic felines where to eat when they closed the doors and blinds.
I must confess, we do not only feed, but we have also been furnishing our lair, we have acquired a rope, a squishy toy, and last night we stole a fluffy bed. I know it is summer, but it will come in handy in winter. It is time to plan out biggest heist. The greatest feat, something the scholars would abominate. While I don’t hoard food for winter, she does, hence every two, I get one. Makes sense.
We have a favorite house, north of our burrow, they have three felines, all females. They have a tortoiseshell we must be careful of, she is territorial and scares us away, I have a small scar on my snout, she does not like sharing. Then they have this small black and white, with a small head. She watches us from her spot but does not like being approached. And finally, our pal, our friend, basically one of us. The gray tabby, she’s old and wise, she says so, and knows the whole neighborhood. She waits for us, she’s been to our den. She told us about the fluffy bed.
“Hey, I know one thing that might interest you.” She told us one night after we wiped out all the kibble in their bowl. “They are bringing many bags of kibble, it’s coming. The bags are half the size of a human. You could get one”, the gray tabby said facing the fox.
“Wouldn’t it leave you and the other two hungry?” The fox measured the gray tabby and noticed her relaxed demeanor.
“No, the kibble bags are infinite, this is how it works. When a bag is half empty, more bags come, inside a carboard box, the human opens the door and stores them downstairs in the pantry. Humans have the monopoly of the kibble. The bag is half empty, if you get one bag, another will arrive.”
“How can we enter the human den and steal something bigger than us both?” I asked, knowing the heist would be almost impossible to achieve with only a small badger and a fox.
“The human rests the box with kibble in this very table.” The gray tabby said sitting on top of it, looking at me and fox as if we were lesser; despite being our friend, she acted like that, while in my species I had a God, in theirs, they were God incarnated. “Then he takes it before it gets dark. He opens the box for me to look inside, he knows I like to inspect it. That is your chance.”
We played a bit, and went back to our burrow, the idea seemed enticing, however, we would have to bypass the angry tortoiseshell cat and the humans. We observed the house, they had three humans, a fat female and two skinny males. The males were always around while the female was mostly inside. The hissy tortoiseshell was out only late in the afternoon. We thought the whole day without coming to a consensus.
“Tabby, how are you helping us?”
“Humans are easy to deceive. When the kibble arrives, I will ask to check, then I will disappear for a bit and reappear limping and meowing.”
“And?” I could not understand how a fake injured tabby could help us to feed the fox in winter.
“The humans in this house worry about us when we are hurt. You will have time.”
*
The doorbell rang twice, and the tortoiseshell hid downstairs. The human took the heavy box to the table and opened it for the tabby to check. “Yours.” He patted her and let her enjoy the abundance of kibble and he went back to work. Tabby screamed, a guttural sound from her tiny throat and ran away. All the three humans in the house went in the direction of the suffering cat while the fox and the badger approached the porch. The fox used the chair to climb on the table, and the fat badger followed. The pack was heavy, but they managed to take it from the box. They were dragging the pack slowly, they could feel the scent of the fresh kibble inside it.
*
“I can’t drag it anymore, I am tired.” Fox told me out of breath, and I was exhausted too. We hadn’t left the territory of the humans, and we could hear the tortoiseshell cat hissing from above in a tree.
“The God badger will help us.”
“Bullshit, tabby is still crying, we need to cross the street and then we rest.” The fox grabbed the kibble bag with her teeth and continued to pull. But the hissy cat stopped us before we could leave her territory and confronted us.
“This bag belongs to me. Bring it back.”
“Tabby gave it to us.”
“Tabby belongs to me.” Her back was arching and her fangs showing up, she was smaller than both of us, but we knew cats were faster and we could not fight her claws. Her paws were shaking and agitating the black soil under it. Her tail tripled in size and the fur was arranged in spikes.
“Tabby said the kibble is infinite.” Fox pleaded.
“Infinite for cats. Bring it back.” She hissed and I showed my teeth, fox too.
I saw her jumping on us, fox and I ducked and protected our snouts. But the blow never reached us, it wasn’t a badger God or a cat God. It wasn’t magic, not everything is magical. It was the black and white cat, she jumped on top of the tortoiseshell, I guess they had a dispute to solve, we did not wait. The kibble bag crossed the street with us, we hid it under grass and stones to rest for the day. We made it home after we had a good rest. Winter supplies were guaranteed for her.
Apart from the tasty kibble and hazelnuts, we ate also different things. While she ate birds and eggs, I went for worms and feasted on carrots and potatoes from the plantation. I watched the humans searching for the potatoes, in vain, I had transformed the tubers into poop. Another of my favorite delicacies were the large beetle larvae, so tasty. They were easy to find too. Knowing we had kibble at home made us adventurous with hunting, I even took some classes in the badger college since we had time on our hands. Fox enjoyed getting high, she spent her day searching for mushrooms instead.
Being a devious badger did not sit right with the purist community, that composed all the scholar body. But I did not care about the attacks, the jokes about my body weight or my shiny fur. They looked exhausted, with sunken faces and smaller bums. I was glowing. Until the day I asked the real question. “Why did you divide us into purists and devious?”
“Look at us, we are old, do you see any of your kind aging?”
“I thought you were just ugly and starving.”
“We are old. Perhaps ugly too.” The den with scholars erupted laughing. “Based on your studies, are you beginning to understand our standpoint?”
“I am, it’s just…” I thought of all the kibble in our burrow. “I will study further, I am beginning to understand.” I will eat all the kibble first.
