Creatures of the Night, Cloaked in Black
I was sitting in the backyard just now, when I heard the clickity, clickity, clickity of little clawed feet. Who should come around the half-barrel planter and onto the patio to join me? You’re probably thinking, “A raccoon!” I was certainly expecting a raccoon. But instead, it turned out to be an honest-to-goodness skunk!
It took me a second to recognize the creature’s true form. I’m unaccustomed to seeing skunks wandering the streets at night. When it finally registered, I experienced delayed enstartlement and nearly about hopped out of my chair with a shout. That would have been exactly the wrong thing to do. Instead, I gave out a frightened grunt and flailed around a bit. Also wrong.
We took a moment to settle ourselves and de-escalate the situation. The skunk lowered his weapons, and I whispered, “Go that way,” as I pointed to the fence. Seeing the wisdom in my plan, the skunk shuffled off across the patio with a clickity, clickity, clickity, and disappeared underneath the fence into the neighbor’s yard.