The Fox and the Grapes

It was the hottest afternoon of the summer, and the Fox was thirsty. He had been trotting through the vineyard for nearly an hour, nose working overtime, when he rounded a corner and stopped dead in his tracks.

There, hanging from a high wooden trellis above him, was the most magnificent cluster of grapes he had ever seen. Deep purple, round as jewels, plump with juice — they swayed gently in the warm breeze, practically glowing in the afternoon sun.

Fox sat beneath them and licked his lips. He had never wanted anything so badly in his life.

"Simple enough," he said aloud. He backed up a few paces, got a running start, and leapt.

His paws swiped through empty air. The grapes hung, untouched, a finger's length above him.

---

He tried again. He ran faster, jumped higher. Still just out of reach.

He tried from different angles. He gathered himself and leapt straight up. He backed further and sprinted harder. He stacked two fallen branches and balanced on top of them. He tried standing on the very tips of his claws.

The grapes didn't care. They hung there, beautiful and unreachable, swaying softly in the breeze.

The sun moved lower in the sky. Fox's legs ached. His pride ached worse. He sat under the vine, panting, staring up at those wretched, gorgeous grapes.

---

After a long pause, the Fox rose. He dusted himself off. He lifted his nose, straightened his tail, and turned away from the vine with an air of elegant indifference.

"Well," he said, loudly enough for anyone nearby to hear — though there was no one nearby — "I wouldn't want them anyway. They're clearly not ripe yet. Probably sour. Terribly sour, by the look of them. I certainly wouldn't enjoy those grapes." He flicked his tail. "Not at all."

And with that, he walked away through the vineyard, head high, trying his best to look like a fox who had made a perfectly sensible decision.

---

Above him, a small yellow bird on a fence post had watched the whole thing. She waited until the Fox had rounded the corner and disappeared.

Then she hopped down, pecked at a grape that had fallen to the ground, and ate it.

It was the sweetest thing she had tasted all summer.

The grapes, it turned out, were not sour at all. But the Fox would never know that. And that, in the end, was the real price of pretending.