MOOSE

Taylor and I are sprawled on a sea of wax paper in our parlor. We are covered in icing and graham cracker crumbs. We are spending the afternoon, as one does, creating sculptures of our beloved music director and his baby grand piano out of egg glue and cheap snacks from the dollar store. And of course, love. Lots of love.
I hop up and am en route to the kitchen to examine the rotted clementine peels for potential usage as epaulets for our model music director's costume when I happen to glance out our front window. I note a large rock at the base of our apple tree. I slow my step and furrow my brow. I am fairly sure I have not noticed a rock there before. Then the rock's ear twitches. The rock's two-an-a-half foot brown hairy ear.
OMG. A dream is actively coming true.
"Taylor! TAYLOR!" I hiss. "Get up. Get up and come to the window RIGHT NOW."
Taylor, deeply invested in applying intricate icing detail to the licorice sliver representing F#7, doesn't leap to his feet immediately, so I persist.
"TAYLOR. YOU HAVE TO GET UP AND QUIETLY COME TO THIS WINDOW RIGHT NOW TO SEE WHAT'S IN OUR YARD!"
Instantly on high alert, Taylor springs to his feet and, turning to me wild eyed, gasps "Is it the Thai Food guy?!?"
I consider for a moment how very disconcerting it would be were that the case. But back to the matter at hand.
"No, no, no! Come look!"
Taylor tiptoes to my side. I gaze meaningfully into his eyes: "Taylor. It's happening."
We turn as one to rest our eyes upon the MOOSE IN OUR FRONT YARD. The moose casually napping. Under our apple tree. Ten feet from our window.
There is squealing. Quiet squealing, of course. Frantic cursing and silent scrambling for dead cell phones and phone chargers.
I critically evaluate this moose with my utterly untrained eye.
Obviously a baby, I think, as it is not the size of a Forerunner. Also lacks antlers.
We take hundreds of zoomed in photos on our phones. Unsatisfactory. I want to pet it.
I squint. Approximately the size of an adolescent stegosaurus. Nothing to be intimidated by.
"Taylor," I announce in tones muted and deadly serious, "I think we should go outside."
[It should be noted here that we absolutely should NOT go outside. Moose do not have a history of being lap animals. And, I have since learned, can be quite violent. But I'll be buggered if I'm going to bypass the opportunity to snuggle a baby moose who has wandered onto my front porch.]
We scramble quietly for out boots. We gather in the foyer. I peep through the lace covering the cold glass of the front door. Still there. Still asleep. Taylor expresses mild concern about what we are about to do. I huff and scoff and say something very confidently and entirely untrue about how I'm sure we'll be just fine. Taylor lifts his phone, aims it at the door, and presses record.
I turn the key in the lock. So quietly. Our door is thankfully silent as it opens. I step onto the porch; Taylor follows.
In a voice suddenly three octaves higher, I address the creature.
"Hi, Moose!"
Nothing.
"Hello, Moose!"
Utter stillness.
"Here, Moose Moose Moose!"
I turn to Taylor and his camera, unable to keep an enormous grin from my face. "There is a moose! Right there!"
I decide to approach. Taylor, in turn, decides to retreat to the kitchen to hunt for apples or spinach or candy corn or something with which to entice our new pet.
I step boldly off the porch and directly into a four foot snow drift. Well. This will never do. Being hip deep in snow four feet from a moose- while absolutely awesome- will not serve me well should he fall into an ill temper and decide to gore me to death. I decide to use reason.
"Moose?" I trill. "Are you a vegetarian?" He lifts his head. Yes! Progress.
He blinks tennis ball sized eyes at me. Having read many, many books wherein people meet tragic ends by fiddling around with the offspring of  violent wildlife, I feel it prudent to inquire:
"Where is your mom? Your dad?"
He continues to stare. I stare back. Three minutes pass and  those three minutes may have easily turned into three hours had I not become suddenly and painfully aware of the late-stage gangrene rotting my left leg up to the knee. I remove myself from the snowdrift and retreat to the porch.
Taylor returns. "Do you think it would like peppers?" I am not sure whether or not moose like peppers, but I have become sure, while standing and thawing my shin out, that if we advance down our sidewalk and then along the fence on the front of our yard, we will then be only two feet from the moose. Which is much better than four.
We tiptoe down the walk- darting glances left and right in search of parental moose units.
Success! We are standing, near disbelievingly, two feet from a moose! And we are safe! There is, after all, a twelve-inch antique wrought iron fence serving as a barrier betwixt us. We feel confident in attempting a selfie. I scoot my icy boots six inches closer to our new moose and am turning to face Taylor with a cheek-splitting grin-- but those six inches. Those six inches were the straw that uncomfortably invaded the moose's comfort zone, as the old saying goes. He lurches to his feet and trots toward our house. I am miffed. Hands on hips. The moose turns to us. Levels his gaze. Lowers his head and takes a step in our direction.
"Audra?" Taylor is backing slowly up into the street. "I don't think he's very afraid of us right now."
I feel that I must appear brave. "Oh, I don't think he's going to hurt us," I announce confidently.
Immediately following this announcement I think, "Why did I just announce that? I know nothing about moose. Is it meese? Oh dear." I decide appearing confident will be the best course of action. Unless of course moose are like bears and want you to act submissive. But I really don't think I want to lie down in the snow right now. Yes. I'm sure I don't want to lie down in the snow. I'll take my chances.
Taylor whispers to me that he thinks we should go around back of the house and let ourselves in that way. We glance back at our new moose. He is busy eating sticks off a bush.
"Ok," I say. "I'll go around back and you stay safely out here on the other side of the fence to distract him."
I tromp quickly to the back of the house, all the while envisioning myself astride our new moose. Up the ramp to the door. Door is locked. Well.
I'm going to have to go in the front door. And our moose, when last I saw him, was chewing on a tree less than six inches from the front porch.
[I am secretly nervous for three seconds. Don't let it smell your fear, Audra, don't let it smell your fear. I can't not go in the house, after all. My warm blue socks are in the house. And all my faux fur hats from Albertson's.]
I spit pine needles out of my face from the low-hanging branch just outside our dining room and peek around the front corner of the house. The moose has not budged. Taylor holds his post in the street.
"Taylor? The back door is locked. We are going to have to go in the front."
I make this announcement with a very confident tone as well, hoping this will translate to Taylor as well as to the moose, and that any thoughts he may have of crossing me will evaporate immediately. The moose. Not Taylor. Taylor may still get back at me for insisting that we go outside.
Well. This is it. I might die now. And miss the 7PM show. Are moose teeth sharp? I'd be kind of embarrassed if I died by moose. I decide instantly to stop thinking about that and instead start walking boldly forward.
"Moose," I say sternly as I walk, "we have locked ourselves out of the back door and have to go in the front and you are going to stay right there." I can't make eye contact. Probably best. Deep breath in, eight steps, up the stairs, into the house.
Yes! I turn immediately to survey the hostage situation in the front yard. The moose, obviously intimidated by my confidence and domineering presence, has turned tail and is all but trotting around the side of the house. Taylor nips up the sidewalk and into the foyer behind me. We run to the windows to track the progress of our moose and follow him with our eyes as he moves like an exceptionally leggy giraffe through liquid caramel along the snowy drifts behind the house and down the alley. He heads back to the mountains.
Later tonight at the theater, I excitedly show our director the first photos of our new moose. He smiles and shakes his head- "Very cool. I'm just so glad you guys stayed inside the house."