Vitamin C & Concrete Foxes

The orange bottle sat on my bathroom counter like a judgmental totem. Vitamin D supplements—the ones my mom said would help with my "mood" during sophomore year. Because obviously, a daily gel capsule could fix three months of ghosting my friends and eating lunch in the library.

I swallowed one dry, gagging slightly. Friday night and instead of being at Maya's party (the one everyone was posting about on Insta), I was sneaking out my back door with a pouch of tuna.

The alley behind our apartment complex wasn't exactly magical. It smelled like dumpster juice and regret. But that's where I'd been feeding the stray cat for two weeks. A scrawny, gray tabby with a chip on her shoulder and one ear that refused to stand up. She reminded me of, well, me.

"Here, kitty," I whispered, shaking the tuna.

But tonight, the cat wasn't alone.

A fox—an actual, rusty-orange, ridiculously beautiful fox—was sitting three feet away, watching me with eyes that seemed uncomfortably intelligent. The cat was eating calmly beside it, like they'd reached some sort of interspecies treaty.

I froze. Foxes weren't supposed to be in Chicago alleys. This wasn't a freaking Disney movie.

"What are you doing here?" I asked, feeling ridiculous for talking to wildlife.

The fox tilted its head. Then, with a casual flick of its tail, it padded toward me. I should have been scared. Instead, I was weirdly comforted. This fox, this cat—they didn't care that I'd ghosted Maya. They didn't know I'd spent three months overanalyzing a text I never sent. They just wanted tuna.

I sat down on the concrete, right there in my ripped jeans and oversized hoodie, and fed them both. The fox's fur was softer than I imagined when it cautiously brushed my hand.

My phone buzzed in my pocket. A text from Maya: "party sucks, wish you were here."

I looked at the fox, now cleaning its face with graceful dignity. The cat was curled near my knee, purring like a tiny engine.

Maybe Monday I'd text Maya back. Maybe I'd stop pretending to be someone I wasn't. Maybe these creatures in the alley knew something about survival—about being yourself even when you're stray, even when you don't belong anywhere.

The fox met my eyes one last time before slipping into the shadows. The cat stayed until I stood up, knees aching from the cold concrete.

I walked home with tuna on my fingers and something else in my chest. Not a vitamin-cured mood, just... lighter. Wild things can survive anywhere. Maybe I could too.