The Foxes of Norfolk
We came from a triangulation of high schools: Ellie from Crawford, Daniella from Ridgemont, and me from Seaside, and we found out about each other from his Insta account: the foxes of Norfolk. You know how there’s this idea of doppelgangers, and how we’re all supposed to have doubles of us walking the earth? It’s kind of like that with the three of us. I mean, we don’t look exactly alike, but we are all vulpine: red hair, slight builds, and pointy faces.
We found out about the account from his cousin, Trevor, who swore he would never tell, but I guess he decided that the sleaze factor crossed some kind of arbitrary line drawn in the sand of dude solidarity. Remind me to blow Trevor someday. Ha ha. Anyway, it’s rich because Carter was sanctimonious as fuck about our own Insta accounts—how it was so childish and such a waste of one’s precious time to curate an Insta account—while all the while he would take pictures of us sleeping and post them, then ask followers which fox they would like to catch. Or skin. Or stuff and hang on their walls. He’d make up stories about us or talk about how we were in bed. One picture was of scratches on his shoulder that I left, and he wrote: Amber is vicious and needs to be dominated completely or she will rip you to shreds. #vixen
We—well, I—invited him to my house while my parents were out of town. Every year they head up to Freeport, Maine to shop for Christmas, and every year I get a new fleece from L.L. Bean. Anyway, he came over and we ate pizza, drank Sprite, and had sundaes for dessert. Then I asked him if he ever wanted to try X. He and I talked about these things before. You know—the weird stuff we want to do to each other. I told him I had a fantasy of taking X, tying him up, and inviting my friends over to triple-team him. I guess he assumed I meant Jessie and Bianca. I told him tonight is the night. Oh my god, the way his expression changed. Have you seen this before? How a guy can let the mask slip a bit and you see the second guy underneath powering the motor of his creepitude? I saw him. He was hella ugly.
I had him secured to my bed with police-grade handcuffs. I used soft cuffs for his ankles. I said a thank you prayer to Jeff Bezos. I gave him three pills to swallow. I turned the lights down and asked if he was ready. He said, oh, god, yes. Moaned it. Gross. Then I called Ellie and Daniella and asked them to come over. He didn’t know who I was calling until they walked in. In my mind, when revenge was still hot, it was amorphous violence. We’re reading Dante’s Inferno in AP Lit, so in the beginning, vengeance looked like that—circle upon circle, every torture worse and always ending in his immolation. But, what? I can’t set every man on fire.
When they walked in, I turned the lights all the way up. Way, way up. He freaked the fuck out. Then we got our phones out and started filming. The first thing I did was cut his clothes off him. He cried like a baby. My mom bought me these jeans. Amber, please let me go. I said, foxes are sly, Carter. Ellie said, Foxes are not to be trifled with, Carter. Daniella said, the foxes of Norfolk must take their revenge, Carter.
Once he was naked, I put him in a costume diaper, like the kind you buy from the party store to dress as a giant baby for Halloween. What were you expecting? Knives? Electric probes? That we were going to choke him with a piano wire? That we were going to pluck every hair off his body with tweezers? That we were going to waterboard him? That we were going to wax his balls? That we were going to pour hot tar on his junk? That we were going to rape him with my mother’s rolling pin? That we were going to burn him with cigarettes? That we were going to slowly peel the skin from his belly in narrow, bloody strips? He tried kicking at me, but he couldn’t get a foot up. You can’t fend someone off with your knees only.
The pizza and sundae were laced with laxatives. The Sprite was spiked with mag citrate. The three hits of ecstasy (never actually take three hits of Ecstasy) were just stool softeners. We waited, ignoring him. We put on music and posted videos of ourselves doing silly dances around the bed, and it started to feel like a party. Hey Alexa, play “Respect”! Hey Alexa, play “You Oughta Know”! Hey Alexa, play “I Will Survive”! Hey Alexa, play “Before He Cheats”! Hey Alexa, play “No Scrubs”! We kept our phones trained on him like they were sniper scopes. He began shitting himself a couple hours later.
When the party was over and Daniella and Ellie had to get home before curfew, I could tell he thought we were done with our retribution. Carter, I said, don’t you know that revenge is best served cold? I waved goodbye to Ellie and Daniella at the front door, and outside, illuminated by the porch light, the first snow of the season darted through to pretty up the darkness. My parents weren’t back from Freeport until Sunday night. It was only Friday night. More pizza, Carter? Aren’t you thirsty, Carter?
On Monday morning, right before school, we posted the videos on our Insta accounts.
Sonia Greenfield is the author of two full-length collections of poetry, Letdown (White Pine Press, 2020) and Boy with a Halo at the Farmer's Market, (Codhill Poetry Prize, 2015). Her chapbook, American Parable, won the 2017 Autumn House Press chapbook prize. Her poetry and prose have appeared in the 2018 and 2010 Best American Poetry, PANK, Washington Post, Willow Springs, diode, and elsewhere. She lives with her family in Minneapolis where she teaches at Normandale College, edits the Rise Up Review, and advocates for both neurodiversity and the decentering of the cis/het white hegemony. More at soniagreenfield.com.