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Questionable Sanctuary

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Literature Text

Questionable Sanctuary
as told by Fox Tayle

San Francisco - 9:32 AM, December 29, 2005

For the time being, we were safe. Diana and I had successfully evaded the FBI agents in their black SUVs and now we sat parked in my truck on the street in front of a cafe. And she was kissing me. It was a not-so-subtle answer to my unasked question of whether or not she loved me. I was embarrassed, partly because this was my first kiss and also because this was happening in public -- inter-species relationships tend to make the news.
"Mmm!" I uttered, in a hope that she'd come up for air. She did.
"Oh! Sorry, Fox...I guess I got a bit carried away," Diana said, leaning back up to driving position.
"Yes, yes I think you did," I said.
I buckled my seat belt and Diana started up my El Camino. We pulled back out into traffic and continued on our way. I pondered what I was going to do next. We couldn't go back to the ASPCA; the FBI was already there and they certainly weren't going to let me waltz in there, collect my stuff, and waltz back out. I'd be shot on sight! I had to do something; not even a fox is accustomed to living completely out in the cold. Diana drove along the streets and I stared out the window, wondering what to do next. I watched as store fronts went by. Happy Dragon Chinese Restaurant. Patelco Credit Union. Starbucks. Tony's Watch Repair. Another Starbucks. Each filled with people blissfully ignorant of the creature in their midst who had become a concern of national security. Me. It was as though it was illegal for me to be alive. Someone high up in the government wanted me dead.
"Fox! I have an idea!" Diana shocked me suddenly out of my thoughts. "I have some friends in Berkeley that you can stay with."
"Berkeley?" I said incredulously, "Your friends aren't...hippies...are they?"
"They used to be," Diana said, chuckling. "The Sixties weren't kind to them. If it wasn't the drugs it was all the exhaust from that old VW Bus they drove around."
Dear God, I thought. I'm going to be living with a bunch of dirty hippies?!
Diana sensed my discomfort and added, "It's okay, they're harmless."
I hardly doubted that. They would probably be too stoned to even notice me, and if they did, nobody would believe them. Perhaps this would be all right after all.

We drove for a while before reaching Diana's friends' apartment, several blocks from the UC Berkeley university campus. In front of their apartment was a brown '80s Volkswagen Vanagon Westfalia pop-up camper van. Some things never change. Diana parked behind the Vanagon and got out. I stayed in the truck. She climbed the steps and rang the doorbell. Diana waited on the step for about twenty seconds before someone answered it. A man with a thin, graying goatee and short-cropped salt-and-pepper hair, wearing a blue shirt and black jeans, greeted her and they hugged. I saw them discussing something but I couldn't quite hear what they were saying. An AC Transit bus stopped right next to my truck and the rumbling sound of its diesel engine kept me from hearing their discussion. When Diana motioned in my direction I realized that they were talking about me. I rolled down my window and peeked out. The goateed man put on his glasses and looked at me from his front step. His smile never faded. A blond woman who looked to be about the same age as Randy, in a pastel flowered shirt and baggy magenta capris, (whom I guessed was his wife) came out of the apartment and said hello to Diana. The goateed man tapped her on the shoulder and pointed to me. The woman took one look at me and ran down the sidewalk to meet me. "Hi! Mr......"
"...Call me Fox. Fox Tayle," I said, opening my door. No sooner had I gotten out of the truck then she gave me a tight bear hug and I just about passed out.
"Diana told us about you, but we didn't know you'd be coming here!" she said excitedly. "My name's Carly."
"And I can't breathe," I said, gasping for air.
"Oh, I'm sorry!" Carly said. "I guess I just didn't know my own strength."
The man with the goatee came up behind her to shake my hand. "Hi, I'm Randy. Nice to meet you. Diana tells me you've never been to Berkeley."
"Yeah..." I said, "I've kind of never needed or wanted to go to Berkeley before." I was tempted to call it Berserkley.
"I see your position," Randy said. "They don't call it the People's Republic of Berkeley for nothing. Hey Carly, we used to be hippies ourselves, weren't we?"
"Yeah," Carly said, "We made some mistakes back then, but we've cleaned up our lives a lot."
"Later, I'd like to show you the van," Randy said. "It's been converted to burn fry grease!"
That was when I realized that they weren't hippies. Oh no, it was much worse. They were environmentalists! Now don't get me wrong, I don't want to see the environment destroyed, but some people go a bit far in trying to protect it.
Now Carly chimed in with another statement. "If you want, you can come with us to the anti-war protest this afternoon. We have extra signs. And there's another one tomorrow against drilling for oil in Alaska."
This was not the way I wanted to spend my day. These people were nice enough, but I have no use for a vehicle that looks like it would blow over in the wind on a calm day, or spending my days chanting, waving signs, and blocking traffic! "Umm..." I said, unsure of how to continue, "How about we just go inside? I'd really appreciate that."
I didn't want to be seen, for more ways than one. One was for my own safety. The other was because, though these people were hardly the worst couple in town, they were weird enough for me. "Tell you what, I can just stay here while you go to the protest later."
"Oh, come on Fox, it'll be fun for you!" Carly said. "Think about it, you've been cooped up in a building for four months."
"Really, I'm fine," I said. I'd seen a number of protests broken up by police on the news, and I hardly needed to be seen by the police again.

Fast forward a few hours. We'd had lunch and a room had been made up for me to sleep in. There was even a beanbag chair. It wasn't the same type as the one I'd had at the SPCA, but it would suffice. It was half past one in the afternoon. Randy and Carly were getting ready for the protest march at three. Randy took a break from organizing the signs and offered to show me his van. I agreed, mostly because I was bored.
"So you see, this van has a diesel engine, but it also runs on grease from french fryers. We get our fuel free from McDonald's! Isn't that sweet, Fox?" Randy was very proud of his dorkmobile.
"Umm...yeah, sweet," I said, a bit unsure of what he meant by "sweet".
I put up with him until he was done explaining the rolling science project. When Randy and I went back into the apartment I snooped around until I found some whitewash and a paint spray gun that Carly sad was left over from an art project she did last year. I also borrowed a roll of masking tape and then waited until 2:30, when Randy and Carly left for the anti-war protest. Diana went with them because she had nothing else to do.
Having the apartment all to myself gave me the opportunity to disguise my truck. I took the spray gun, whitewash, tape, some butcher paper, and a screwdriver downstairs to the street. I then masked off the windows and trim on my truck with the paper and tape. Next, I filled up the paint sprayer with watered-down whitewash and sprayed a coat on the yellow El Camino. I was sad to have to do this, but a bright yellow truck fairly screams "Look at me, officer!". I hoped it would only be temporary and I would be able to get it off sometime.
I spent a fair amount of time painting the truck. To finish the disguise, I removed a pair of license plates from the wall in Randy and Carly's den and switched them with mine. If only they had the proper tags, then the effect would be complete. All I had to do was keep the truck dry for a while and try not to be seen with illegal plates.
I cleaned up the mess and went back into the apartment. I turned on the TV and watched news coverage of the protest on the KRON Channel 4 news. I thought for a second that I saw Randy, Carly, and Diana in the crowd. I was so glad that I hadn't gone with them. If I saw them on TV, for sure other people would have seen me. And that would have been very bad indeed.
Another installment in the "Adventures of Fox Tayle" series.
This will make so much more sense if you are familiar with the series and the character.
© 2006 - 2024 wannabemustangjockey
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Dogman15's avatar
New cars:
1980 Volkswagen Vanagon Westfalia Type 2 T3: :star::star::star:
2003 Ford Taurus :star::star-half:

New characters:
Randy
Carly (last names?)

Companies/Products/Brand Names: KRON Channel 4 News