The Perfect Cast

by T. K. Chapin

  Chapter 11 ~ Jess

  Blinking open her eyes, Jess pulled her cell phone out from underneath her pillow. Glancing at the time, she saw it was just a few minutes after noon. Seventy-nine more days. Letting out a sigh, she rolled over and fell back asleep.

  Opening her eyes again, she glared at her phone as it read one-thirty. Pushing the sheet off, she stood up and turned off the box fan. The heat was intolerable, especially the upstairs of the farmhouse at mid-day. Sweat drenched every piece of fabric that was on her. Quickly she went downstairs and opened up the fridge.

  Letting her head hang into the open fridge caused a smile to creep onto her face as the super chilly air engulfed her and made the moment a little more tolerable. Seeing the carton of orange juice in front of her she snagged it, and took a gulp as she turned around to look out the kitchen windows.

  She saw someone out beyond the trees that lined the front yard as they were heading towards the barn. She suspected it was Levi, but couldn’t get a clear enough view to verify. Curious if he had been lying about drinking, she took her carton of orange juice and went outside to investigate to see if he was hung over. Shoeless, and nothing but a tank top and pajama shorts, she ventured down the hot sidewalk from the farmhouse out towards the garage.

  At the end of the sidewalk, where the cement met the gravel, she leaned out to see around the trees towards the barn. Peering down at the gravel, she was hesitant to proceed barefoot.

  Suddenly a cow let out a horrific moo and startled Jess. Quickly and delicately she made her way across the gravel and up to the barn doors. Shielding her eyes from the sun, she looked in and could see Levi in the back corner. The top of his head was only visible for a moment and then ducked back down behind the stall. The cow let out another moo, followed by heavy panting and Jess was sure Levi had to be torturing the animal for it to make such sad sounds. Hurrying across the mixture of dirt, straw and animal droppings, Jess worried what he was up to with the cow.

  “Who the heck do you think you are? Just coming to my Grandpa’s farm and hurting his cows-” she demanded as she came up to the stall.

  Levi interrupted her as he stood up, trying to get her to be quiet. “Shhh…”

  Looking over the stall, Jess could see the cow panting and lying on its side as a baby calf was being born. She hadn’t ever seen a cow give birth and was slightly grossed out, forcing her to turn away.

  Levi grabbed her hand that sat on the edge of the stall and she could feel the spark again. Jess opened her eyes and looked as Levi said, “It’s the miracle of birth.”

  “It’s the grossest, most beautiful thing ever.” The momma cow began cleaning her calf by licking her.

  Levi dropped a knee next to the momma cow’s head and patted her. “She’s a good mother; I wasn’t even needed, though we like someone to be here just in case something goes wrong.” Looking over at the calf, Levi smiled. He seemed so amazed and touched to be part of the whole experience, and Jess found it adorable. Adjusting her footing, she stepped in a pile of cow manure.

  “Yuck!” she shouted. Pulling her foot from the poop, she jumped backwards. The manure was between her toes, and covering her foot entirely. “Ummm… I have to go…”

  Jess hurried out of the barn, walking on her heel with the foot she had stepped in the manure with. She was embarrassed, and beet red as she made her way across the gravel. Hurrying up the sidewalk, she cut across the yard to the water spigot that shot up from the ground.

  As she pulled up on the red handle, water rushed out and she cleaned her foot off, shaking her head in embarrassment. Glancing over towards the barn she thought, He probably thinks I’m a moron for going out there with no shoes. She was no stranger to piles of manure on the farm. When she was just ten years old, she face planted in the stuff after getting her boots stuck.

  Going back inside the farmhouse, she found a comfortable spot at the kitchen table that was in the direct path of the oscillating fan that sat in the corner near the microwave. The breeze from the fan provided much relief from the heat.

  “What am I going to do all day, and every day for the next few months?” She said sitting her head against the table in defeat. “I don’t think I can make it.”

  Suddenly the door that led into the porch from outside opened and startled her. Opening the door that led from the kitchen into the porch, she peeked out and saw it was Levi. He was kicking his boots off as he looked up at her with a smile.

  “What are you doing?” she asked.

  Coming in from the porch, he slid by her. “I wanted to come in and get a drink of water and let you know the calf is having issues feeding.”

  “Oh.” She took a seat back at the table. Watching as Levi washed his hands in the sink; she couldn’t help but steal glances of his muscles as they bulged from his white shirt. He had a pair of jeans that complimented his white v-neck shirt nicely. “So… what do we do about the calf?” she asked, trying to divert her attention.

  Levi laughed, looking up through the window that was above the sink that overlooked the patio. “For having a grandpa that’s lived on the farm all his life, you sure don’t know much about cows.”

  “You’re right… he’s lived on a farm all his life, not me.”

  “That was rude of me. I’m sorry.” Levi dried his hands on a towel that hung on the cabinet below the sink before taking a seat at the table. “Since the calf isn’t eating, I just need to feed her a bottle.”

  “Is that something I can do?” Jess asked, eager to help. She was extremely bored and her date with Clint wasn’t until later that evening.

  “Sure, you can try... The milk replacer is in a bag out in the barn, next to the fridge.”

  “How do I do it?”

  “Just follow the directions.”

  “Seems easy enough… I’ve bottle fed cousins before.”

  “Sounds like you have it covered. She needs to be fed three times a day. ” Levi laughed as he stood up. “Oh, and I’m sorry about last night… I just don’t like it when people think they know me. You really don’t know me at all and you assumed a lot.”

  “I’m sorry…” Jess looked out the window of the kitchen before continuing. “I was super-embarrassed when I heard about my Grandpa’s reputation around here and… I just assumed… like you said.”

  “And you thought I was drinking.”

  “In my defense, you smelled extremely boozed.”

  “But I wasn’t staggering or anything…”

  “It doesn’t matter. Haven’t you ever heard of birds of a feather, flock together?”

  Levi began to laugh. “What?”

  Jess began laughing. “It’s a saying that my Dad said all the time.”

  “Where’s your Dad? I didn’t see him with your Mom.”

  “He’s back in Seattle. He had to work.” She lied, she figured he didn’t need the details.

  Levi nodded. “I best get going. If you have troubles, Roy has my number on the cork board above the phone.”

  Jess nodded and got up to open the porch door for Levi. “Thanks for coming over and helping that cow give birth.”

  “It’s my job. And you mean Betsy.”

  “What?” Jess asked.

  “Betsy, that’s the cow’s name.”

  “Oh. Alright…” Jess smiled.

  Levi smiled, and going out into the porch, he began getting his boots on. Jess thought about the cow he called Betsy. That was the name of her imaginary friend that she had when she was younger. Did her grandpa know about that imaginary friend? That wasn’t possible; she only talked to Betsy when she was alone.

  “See ya later,” Levi said on his way out.

  Jess went back upstairs to her room and changed into jeans and put a pair of socks on. Going out to the porch, she dug in the closet for a pair of boots that would fit. Finding a worn-out pair of cowboy boots that were a little too big for her, she slipped them on. Strutting across the floor, she swayed her hips.

  “These will work.” Jess wen
t out on the front porch, then headed back out to the barn.

  Chapter 12 ~ Roy

  “Good to go,” Roy said, climbing back into the suburban.

  “That was so fun, Grandpa!” Henry said. Leaning over the center console into the back, Henry pulled up the cooler lid. “Three fish! I wish I could have caught that last one though…”

  “Two’s pretty good for your first time out on the lake, Henry. That’s something to be proud of.”

  “Thanks,” Henry said sitting back down and buckling up his seat belt. “I’m starving, can we go eat?”

  “Yep, we’ll grab a bite from the deli at the grocery store.”

  Henry peered out the window as Roy pulled forward. Henry spotted swings and a slide over at a play area.

  Noticing Henry, Roy spoke up. “Maybe we can talk Jess into coming with us before summer’s end and we can do a picnic out here.”

  “Ha – yeah right, like she’d ever go for that.” Henry looked over at Roy. “Do you think my Dad might get back with my mother? I keep thinking they might…”

  Roy didn’t want to get into the details with Henry. He knew first-hand that his daughter Tiffany had left Brandon because of an affair he was having with his barista. Tiffany knew how much the kids loved Brandon and hoped that he’d break up with the fling by the end of summer and come back to Seattle to his family.

  “You know Henry…” Roy was lost for words; he didn’t want to lie to the poor kid and didn’t feel it was his place to reveal the truth. “I don’t know about your Mom and Dad, but I do know about God.”

  “What do you mean? You think God will fix their marriage?”

  Henry’s words rang true through Roy’s ears loudly as he recounted his troubles within his own marriage to Lucille years ago. There were some dark and lonely nights in Roy’s past, in which he and Lucille had sketched out on a piece of notebook paper their entire life, divided neatly in two columns. They penciled who would get the farm all the way down to the salt and pepper shakers that sat next to the toaster on the counter. He hated those memories and didn’t touch on them very often, but Henry’s words ‘God will fix their marriage,’ prompted his mind to revisit the past.

  “God can fix marriages, yes, but that’s not always a sure thing. Enough about your parents, the fact is, He can help you.”

  “Help me?” Henry shook his head. “I’m just a kid Grandpa… Hey look! Is that the grocery store we are going to get some food at?” Henry tapped on the window pointing to the Suncrest Grocery Store.

  “Yep… sure is.”

  Coming out of the grocery store with bags of groceries stuffed in the cart, Henry skipped as he held on to the side. “Jess is going to be happy we got Pepsi; she loves that.”

  “Good,” Roy replied as he smiled deeply. The sun was warm and the suburban’s windows were up while they were inside, leaving the cab extremely heated. Henry began loading the groceries into the seats behind the front, but Roy stopped him. “Just put them in through the back.”

  “Okay Grandpa.” Henry couldn’t quite reach over through the back window, so he climbed in the back and Roy handed them to him to organize. “This is so much better than Seattle.”

  “Oh yeah?”

  “Yeah, totally. We have our groceries delivered to our door once a week. Mom says it’s easier that way.”

  “I’m sure it’s easier on her that way now-a-days,” Roy said.

  “Because of my Dad not being around…”

  “Well yeah, that and the fact you live in the city and she’s working full time. I can’t imagine how she even has the time to do anything.”

  “Yeah,” Henry said shortly.

  “What?” Roy asked.

  “Nothing.”

  “You’ve been yipping almost constantly on the trip, but you just got quiet. What’s the matter?”

  “Nothing, Grandpa!” Henry said, climbing out of the back of the suburban. “Don’t worry about it…” He climbed into the passenger door and slammed the door.

  Roy was taken back and scratched his head as he got back into the suburban. Wonder where that came from? Roy thought to himself as he glanced over at Henry, who sat leaning away from Roy with his eyes glued outside his window. “You sure seem upset. You can talk to me.”

  Looking back over at Roy, Henry was about to cry, but held the tears back. “Things just changed a lot when we moved into the city… Mom started working a ton and Dad…”

  Roy replied with a nod. He knew that the city changed Tiffany. It had the same effect on his sister when she moved away from the farm and into the city of Spokane. Her visits were frequent at first, but then became less and less, until ultimately only visiting on the major holidays. His Winnie had fallen victim to the fast-paced city life, and he felt bad for the after effects on his grandson Henry. Hoping to change the direction of the conversation, Roy changed the subject as he turned onto Swenson-Williams Valley Road, back towards Chattaroy. “Think Jess will be happy about those tofu burgers?”

  “I’m sure she won’t care,” Henry laughed. “She’ll eat them, I know that. We… I mean Mom… has been keeping them in stock ever since Jess went all ‘vegetarian.’ ”

  “As long as she’s eating I suppose.”

  “Can we go fishing again?”

  “Probably not for a while, Levi and I are redoing the barn roof this coming up weekend.”

  “Oh…”

  Roy could tell Henry was disappointed. Turning off onto Glen Grove Staley Road, he said, “We have weeks until you leave. We’ll go again, don’t worry.”

  Henry smiled. “You are right. I’ll just help you and Levi with the roof… if that’s okay.”

  “We’d love the extra hand.” Roy knew Henry wouldn’t be much help with the roofing, but he loved his eagerness to lend a helping hand. It reminded him of himself when he was younger. Between fishing again and the ant hill burnout, Roy was feeling younger and more alive than ever, and he thanked God for it.

  Chapter 13 ~ Jess

  Turning on the bathtub faucet, Jess filled the five-gallon bucket to the half-way point with warm water. The directions said five gallons for five servings, but she had already lost an entire bucket of water and wasn’t willing to make it half way to the barn again, only to risk spilling it again.

  Turning off the water, she sighed heavily and hoisted up the bucket by the handle with both hands. Puffing, she pulled it up and over the side of the bathtub. Speedily and awkwardly, she quickly made her way through the farmhouse and outside. As she hurried down the sidewalk, sweat was beading quickly on her forehead as the sun beat down on her.

  Getting into the barn, she carried the bucket up to the fridge, where the powdered milk replacer was sitting. Opening up the bag, she scooped out two and a half servings and dumped them into the bucket. Grabbing the wood spoon from atop the fridge, she began to stir the mixture as she caught her breath.

  Standing up from the bucket, she used the shoulder of her tank top to get the sweat from her forehead. The heat was like nothing she had experienced over in Seattle. She was lucky to see a day in the high seventies in the summer, never anything above eighty. Grabbing the bottle and special nipple for it, she filled it up with the warm mixture and headed into the stall to feed the calf.

  Holding the bottle up to the calf, as it lay on the ground, she realized it wasn’t going to be that easy. The calf turned its head away from her.

  “Ugh!”

  “Come on, just eat, cow!” Jess pushed the nipple into the lips of the calf, and it jumped up and walked away. “Please just drink this bottle,” she pleaded with the calf, coming around to the front of it. Putting it up to the calf’s lips again, she was rejected when the calf turned away. “Do you want to die? Cause if you don’t eat that’ll happen.”

  Placing her arm around the calf’s neck firmly, she held it still while she shoved the bottle into the calf’s mouth. The calf began to drink. “Finally!” she said with a smile. Suddenly the calf jerked hard knocking Jess over into a p
ile of straw bedding. “Ugh! It’s no use…”

  “Is it warm?” Levi said hopping into the stall.

  “I think so,” she said looking over at the bottle that was lying next to the calf.

  Levi walked up to the bottle and picked it up. Squeezing it, the liquid sprayed onto his hand. “It’s not warm enough.”

  “Great. Well I don’t know if I can lug more water from the farmhouse…”

  Levi smiled. Turning around towards the fridge, he glanced at the wall, then back at her. “Did you try the immersion heater?”

  “The what?”

  Levi jumped out of the stall and Jess ran over to see what he was doing. He pulled down a metal coiled contraption with a plug-in attached to it. He hooked it into a nearby extension cord and then dropped the coiled part into the bucket mixture and turned it on. “It heats water… or liquid. We use it primarily during the winter to heat the drinking water for the cows.”

  “That would have been nice to know about…”

  “You said you had it handled.” Levi grinned.

  “Yeah, well I did… kinda.”

  “You did pretty good for not knowing what you were doing.” Levi’s smile grew, revealing his pearly-white teeth. Jess smiled back at him partially in embarrassment, and partially because she felt butterflies in her stomach every time he came near her.

  “Thanks,” Jess said.

  Jumping back over the stall, Levi held the calf in place with one of his arms while he used his other to feed the calf. His muscles bulged from his sleeve and flexed as the calf tried to wiggle free before finally calming down.

  Jess joined Levi’s side and began to pet the calf. “That’s a good girl.”

  After they finished, Jess let out a sigh of relief. “Glad that’s done.”

  “Just need to feed her again in a few hours.” Levi set the bottle down next to the stall’s wall.

  “I’m not going to be here… Is there any way you could feed her then?”