Here our story deviates from Things Past.  Early in the twenty-first century, the Fox met another bird who stole his heart, though it took nearly a century for him to admit it. 

It began with a hotel bar and a wounded boy.

If the Fox could tell the story now, he would embellish it and make it out to be a heroic rescue.  It was, instead, a set of random chances both taken and lost - if not for the specific way the evening had unfolded, no doubt the Fox would have taken what he wanted and left his prey behind. 

The boy, his nightingale, was heartsick, and the Fox picked him out of the thin bar crowd like a wolf cutting a wounded calf from the herd.  The emotionally wounded made easy prey, and he meant to simply lure the boy back to his den and take what pleasure could be had from him.  Instead, he found a bird with broken wings, fluttering helplessly and defiantly in the face of the world.  There was something in him that went beyond what the Fox thought he coveted, and though he did bring him back to his den, it was not for the carnal pleasures he thought he was after.

Instead, the very next morning, after giving the boy a couch to sleep on and ample personal space, the Fox cooked him a breakfast of eggs and left it at that.

Their story is a long one and complex, but it is founded upon that simple, uncharacteristic breakfast: a plate of eggs and a friendly smile from a Fox devoid, for once, of ulterior motives.