That night after milking, the absence of it ached. It just ached. We hug our parents and friends, we hold and stroke our children, we even comfort hurting strangers with the assurance of body-to-body contact. Feeling another person’s heartbeat, just opposite your own heart, says You aren’t alone. I hadn’t felt a moment of such contact since Cat’s visit and the hugs we’d exchanged.
But if you’re attracted to someone and feel the tug, and you enter the orbit, that swirl spins gently and then inevitably and then urgently around sex, the most intimate and surrendered of physical contacts. When the inward spiral has been graceful, unforced, and without pretense, conjoining in sex is its fulfillment, and it’s wonderful.
That night I tried to persuade myself that all I really yearned for was the deep assurance of the mammal pile. But I knew I ached for the whole deal. And there was nothing I could do about it.
Chapter 25
Feb. 27
Earnest returned today as I headed into my apartment to make lunch. I was startled to see him after so long. He waved to me as he went up the steps into the house, I waved back.
I have to confess I’ve been wondering about his romantic life—perhaps because there’s so little to occupy my poor brain. Winter gets wearying out here in the sticks. I guess I’d never thought of it, being a child of the city. We’re a long way from any kind of diversion, no movie theaters within thirty miles, no restaurants—and no money to treat oneself to a fancy meal. No malls to stroll, no urban bustle outside the windows, no choice of twenty radio stations—no radio at all, because the reception here between the hills is at best intermittent and full of static. I tend to avoid driving, because the roads are often tricky and my snow tires aren’t great. There’s farmwork; books from the Montpelier library; still somewhat strained dealings with Diz, who’s extra crabby because of her back pain and, I suspect, a secret shame that she’s not “pulling her weight.” Brassard himself is hardly what one would call a big socializer.
A few pleasant visits with Will, yes, and some fun conversations with Lynn. A week ago I had dinner with her and Theo at their place, a warm and fun evening in their cozy house, a glass of wine. Theo’s younger sister Robin was visiting, a sweet, forthright young woman full of tales of college life. That event has lingered in recent memory like a sunny island in a gray sea. Spring is theoretically approaching but is hardly around the proverbial corner. I am desperately looking forward to a release from the clench of cold and the winter routine.
So I was pleased when, after about an hour inside, Earnest came out to see me in my chicken coop abode. He came in, took off his snow-covered boots, gave me a quick bear hug, and agreed readily when I offered to make some tea. When I asked him how he’d been, he tilted his hand side to side, his face saying maybe less than so-so. In fact, I thought he looked a little careworn. As I filled the teakettle, he sat at the counter, fiddling distractedly with the egg timer.
“Rumor has it you’ve been fanning an old flame up in Burlington,” I said.
“‘Flame’ is a little strong. She and I lived together for a few years, then broke it off. But we kept in touch. A good person. We got talking a bit when I was down south this fall. You know.”
I found mugs and my honey bear and a couple of spoons, then presented him with a few boxes of my tea stash. “Peppermint, black, jasmine, hibiscus—name your poison.”
“Black.”
I decided to be bold: “How’s it been going?”
He grinned—a little sadly, I thought. “Kind of like this.” He held up the egg timer, the round, retro-styled, hand-winding type.
He gave the knob a halfhearted little twist and set it ticking on the counter. For several seconds I looked at it, at him, puzzled, and then it went “Ding!”
Then I understood: It was done, very short but not unexpectedly so. I wanted to ask more: What didn’t work? How did you decide that it had ended? How are you doing with it? Part of me wanted to assure him that she wasn’t good enough for him anyway—absurd since I knew nothing about her, not even her name.
Instead, I nodded and said nothing. He seemed grateful for my restraint. He commented on the field guide he’d given me and seemed glad to see that I’d kept it close at hand. Then we talked about other things, more easily now, for another fifteen minutes, until I had to get back to chores.
Chapter 26
When spring came, I moved back up the hill at the earliest opportunity—which meant I took the tractor up with my stuff as soon as the soil dried out. I raked leaves and twigs off my platform and out of the fire pit, reconnoitered, set up the tent. One of my first acts was to double the number of no trespassing signs all along my uphill border, facing the Goslants, and around the western property line—yellow plastic-paper signs stapled to virtually every tree.
By the time my first anniversary on Brassard’s farm came around, I had fallen in love with my land and had in some inexplicable way invested myself in the farm and its well-being. I’d learned a little about the woods, a middling amount about myself, and a lot about hard work. I still counted the days until the end of my servitude, one more year, but not so often anymore.
For the Brassards, it had been a difficult year, and the coming year promised to be harder. Jim’s joints just got worse, and the pain really began to slow him down. When I first came, he had occasionally smoked a pipe, outside, but by
