I Read Stories: Fox Song

 

Fox Song by Fija Callaghan in Corvid Queen

Back a long time ago, before Betty became grandmother, she worked in the copy room of a newspaper. She had to come home late. This was after the war when there were more jobs than men. She spent her first pay packet on some red shoes.

On her way home late at night she comes across three men. (She doesn’t tell the worst in her stories). They threaten her, want her shoes. Want more when she won’t give them to them.

She’s saved by a fox and then the fox becomes a woman, a princess, who walks her home. And there Grandmother ends the story.

But that’s not quite how it happened.

Read This: An old folk story moved into recent history; and a modern one moved back to meet it
Don’t Read This: You can love a fox woman but you have to stay in the closet