“Is that allowed?” He smoothly slid the sandwich onto a plate, the plate onto the breakfast bar in front of me, and he went back to the stove to make another.
“Thank you.” I took a bite. It wasn’t bad. “So, do you think Mom would mind if I left early?”
“She already thought you would. Why do you think she took the whole day off yesterday? She would have gone straight back to work after the ceremony if you weren’t here. Thank you, by the way.”
“For what?”
“You know, for not busting my chops over everything. You know, Hannah. For not hating Hailey.” I looked over at the slobbery mess. “I wish you were around more, actually. I think Hannah could learn a lot from you.”
“Well, I don’t know … Maybe she just needs more time? She’s only …?”
“Nineteen. Well, she’s been in and out of rehab since she was seventeen. She was only straight during, unh-unh,” he pointed his head towards Hailey, “because her mother basically locked her in her room for nine months. Her last stunt almost landed her in jail. I may not like her mom, but Hannah has been pure frustration since she hit puberty. She was finishing her GED and gearing up for community college, and she blew it.”
“That sucks.”
“Anyway.” He sat down with his sandwich and started eating. Still chewing, he said, “A non-stop flight leaves around midnight and gets there around 3:30 in the morning, but if we get you to the gates by twelve or so today, you can get a connecting flight in Salt Lake and be there around six tonight.”
I gaped at him.
“What? Your mother had me check all the options as soon as she found out you were coming.” He finished the last bite of his sandwich and dusted his hands over the plate.
It was overcast when my plane touched down at the Boise airport. All I could see upon approach in the dusk blue sky were the lights from the state prison, twinkling golden in the frosty night. From the lobby, I texted Liv I was back early. She said I was welcome for dinner, but I told her I was in a hurry to get home. She offered to bring Frodo back over the weekend, and I was grateful for one less thing to worry about. I texted Jodie I had made it to Boise and would see her in the morning, or the next time she made it out to the place, but I didn’t get a reply. Probably a reception issue.
As I paid for parking, another plane taxied down the runway and soared up in a straight line, heading west, before disappearing into the clouds. The car radio sounded harsh on my ears, even when I turned it down low, so I drove back to Milepost listening to the slush and ice whoosh under the tires. The last bit of orange stretched to the edge of the skyline and melted into a pale gray, then gravel, then slate. It was pitch dark when I got to the farm, but a light was on in the goat barn. I went in the house and made two hot chocolates for Elliot and me, before I changed into my work clothes and coat and headed out to the barn.
March 12, 2013
Last night, I finally made it home and headed out to the barn to see what I needed to do and hopefully let Elliot go home. As I walked around the corner of the barn, I began apologizing. “Sorry, Elliot, I got here as quickly as I could, but I …” and my eyes landed on the most beautiful face I’ve ever seen. Her hair was trailing out of her pony tail, and her eyes drooped slightly, as she sat up on her bale of hay to stretch, yawn, and pull stray bits of straw from her clothes. She was gorgeous.
“Sorry, no Elliot. I’ll have to do for now.” I recovered enough to push one of the mugs towards her. “Oh, this is just what I wanted!” She tested the cocoa and took a long drink.
I glanced around the barn, and there were two fluffy kids nuzzling their mother, one of them still a little damp. Two pregnant goats stood in one corner away from the family.
“The other babies are out in the loafing sheds with their moms. I think that about six or seven have freshened. I got here just in time for this one.” She pointed to a kid in the corner. “So far, all females but one.”
“That’s good, right?”
“That depends.” My brain was on overload, so I let that one go.
“Okay, so what’s the plan?”
“Well, Elliot showed me the routine, shots and dip, etcetera, on the last one, so we can do it for the next, if there is one tonight, as long as there aren’t any problems.” She got up, dusted off her pants, and grabbed a bottle from the top of the barn wall. “Want to help me dip him?”
I wasn’t sure what she meant, but I went over to the kid and stood against the side opposite Jodie. She unscrewed the top off the bottle and pushed it over the kid’s umbilical cord.
“Did you cut the cord?”
“No, either it pulled loose or momma goat chewed it. But I got some clippers to do it if it’s needed.”
Her comment from a minute ago finally caught up with me. “What kind of problems?”
She screwed the lid onto the bottle and put in back on the shelf. “Well, ones we can deal with, just normal stuff like helping her or turning them. Anything we can’t handle,
