Lettuces and Cream

by John Evans

  ‘You know what its like around here, there’s the postman, then Ann and her gang, could be anyone. Perhaps Keith said something.’

  ‘Yeah suppose so, okay, I’m back out, the rain has eased so I’m going to mark out the field ready for the next batch of tunnels. Be in for elevenses.’

  Joshua, Josh the pig man, had reached home, home by name, but not by nature. His aged mother met him at the door, her face well lined with misery. ‘About time, where the hell have you been? Those bloody pigs of yours are shouting their bloody heads off. Should have been fed hours ago. Been up to your old tricks have you? Stupid man, sniffing around those new English people like an old dog. I don’t know why you bother with them, English-uh. Stupid man. Why don’t you get married and bugger off, and take your pigs with you?’

  Josh said nothing. He just stared at the floor and listened to his mothers’ familiar tirade. He had always been a loner, and his insulated rural existence had aided and abetted the process. After his father had committed suicide, Josh had been about twelve years at the time; his mother had sold the large farm for a good price and bought an old house in the village. With his mother financially independent, he eventually had gone his own way, using the ample buildings around the house for the pig enterprise. Most of the locals considered him to be the village freak, however he was no fool and made a good living from his animals.

  ‘Yes, bugger off that’s what you should do,’ She turned and shuffled off back to the kitchen sink.

  Out in the shed he started the belated feeding routine to a cacophony of squeals and grunts. Some of the sows were jumping up at the pen gates with open salivating mouths.

  ‘Get down you bastard.’ Josh growled and lashed out unnecessarily at the hungry and agitated animals with a length of hard rubber pipe he kept for the purpose. He had a vicious streak borne out of anger and hate; sometimes he hated his self –but mostly, just about everyone else…

  Mike was in the house finishing his usual elevenses, when the phone rang. They both were startled by the sound, as it was the first time they had received a call.

  ‘Hello, 622, Oh, hello Mr Williams - no I wasn’t expecting you today -yes they say tomorrow is going to be dry - Okay see you in the morning - Bye.’

  ‘Huh, our first call, great isn’t?’

  ‘I never thought we would be so excited about a telephone, but it’s going to be a big help Mike, it’ll save a lot of driving around the countryside just to pass messages.’

  ‘Yeah, it’s going to be a big help - ah, well,’ Mike sighed, ‘can’t stay in here enjoying myself, back to it,’ and with that he returned to his labours.

  Across the valley, Keith was cleaning out their cattle yards and sheds ready for bringing them in for the winter months. However, unlike Mike and his wheelbarrow and shovel, their sheds were big enough to be cleaned by machine. They were still not on full speaking terms, so the fact they we working on separate jobs suited them both. Chris was putting fresh straw in their extensive calves housing - and thinking. She was now bored with Janice, and her innocent, compliant manner. Come to that she was bored with Keith too. He seemed to be a million miles away these days. Chris’s sexual curiosity had been sated and her seduction of Jan was complete, so now she was thinking of new challenges. She had men in tow, as Mike had unfortunately seen, but perhaps another woman ‘friend’ was on the cards.

  Jan for her part had successfully reciprocated after Chris had been between her thighs. She had stepped over a line that she thought she never would, but licking, touching and gently nibbling such intimate parts had been immensely thrilling. Another erotic episode occurred when, after a pause in the proceedings, she had followed Chris’s lead, and they had watched each other excite themselves to yet another orgasm. Chris gained a vindictive sense of satisfaction from the realisation that Jan was thoroughly confused by their relationship, and she enjoyed having such an effect on people. Indeed, poor Jan’s head was bursting, once again, with broken ethical values and ideals, whereas Chris was devoid of such troublesome considerations. But Jan pondered, where would it all end?

  SEVENTEEN

  ‘That’s another month gone, first of November today.’

  ‘I know, the weeks go by so quickly, and Christmas is getting close now.’

  We’ll have to start thinking about the kids’ presents soon.’ Jan was splashing about washing dishes at the old kitchen sink on stilts, and Mike was still chewing the remnants of his lunch of scrambled eggs on toast.

  ‘Yeah suppose so, although I expect my mother and sister will spoil them rotten as usual. They’re supposed to be phoning us tonight, I’ve got the feeling that they want to come for a weekend.’

  ‘Oh dear, really?’ Jan’s face wrinkled in a grimace.

  ‘Aw, come on, love, they haven’t seen the kids for months,’ Mike said defensively.

  ‘It’s not that I don’t want to see them, it’s the expense of the extra food.’

  ‘You can always give them chicken pies,’ Mike said with mock seriousness.

  Jan was, as he expected, horrified at the idea, ‘God I can’t give them chicken pies for every meal.’

  Mike grinned, happy at her response to his nonsense, ‘I’m sure you’ll cope sweetheart-you always do - anyway, knowing them, they’ll probably bring a car full of supplies with them.’

  ‘Yeah, I suppose you’re right, I’ll think of something.’

  ‘Are you at rehearsals tonight?’

  ‘Yeah, Monday and Tuesdays from now, perhaps more later on. It’s actually taking shape at last.’

  At the mention of Am Dram, Jan made an involuntary pause with the washing up as an image of Chris leapt into her view. She still tingled from the memory of a week ago, although since then Chris had been rather distant, which Jan found a bit odd. But then again, Chris was always so matter of fact. Even in between their intimate moments their conversation was extremely bland. They were no closer as friends, and Chris was still very much a stranger.

  ‘The kids are looking forward to seeing you on stage again.’

  ‘It’s been a long time, I’m getting a bit nervous now.’

  Mike laughed, ‘you always say that.’

  Their chat was broken by a knock on the front door. Mikes chair gave a tooth jarring screech as he pushed it back and he headed for the door.

  ‘The roof is all done, do you want to take a look?’

  ‘Oh, yeah, sure, that’s great, I’ll just get my wellies on.’

  Across the yard Mike stood looking at the replaced roof.

  ‘Looks good to me, Mr Williams.’

  ‘Oh yes, should last another hundred years,’ he smiled, ‘no good for business though is it?’

  They both laughed at the notion that good workmanship didn’t pay.

  ‘Now, what about the house, when can you make a start on that?’

  ‘Soon as you like, but you’ll need planning for the extension but we can make a start on it. The planning isn’t a problem out here, so we could get the digger up here and start clearing away the soil behind the house ready for the foundations.’

  ‘Okay, I’ll leave that to you, and I’ll sort the planning out.’

  ‘Righto, but we’ve some work to do with the cattle back home on the farm tomorrow, so we’ll be back here on Thursday, okay?’

  ‘Yeah, that’s great, see you, thanks,’ Mike shook Mr William’s hand and gave a wave to his son who had already started up the lorry. They pulled away and the yard was silent once again. Mike strolled about looking at the new roof from all angles, smiling as he did so, pleased at another bit of progress. Things are definitely looking up, he thought contentedly.

  ‘Roof looks great, Jan,’ Mike was back in the kitchen finishing off his lunchtime coffee and rolling up a ciggy.

  ‘I’ll have a look later I’m busy at the minute. Did he give you a bill?’

  ‘He said he’ll bring it when he comes back to start the foundations. Any way, what the heck are you up to now?’

  Ja
n was pouring pints of rich milk into an old cast iron pot on top of the Rayburn.’Well, this is the first batch of clotted cream. Ann told me what to do and lent me this old pan. It just has to simmer slowly then let it cool, then skim off the clotted cream.’

  ‘Hey, about that, we now have lettuces, and cream. Oo, bloody great stuff.’ Mike licked his lips.

  ‘Do you know, you’re swearing a lot these days?’

  ‘Am I ? The stress of country living I expect.’

  ‘Go on, get out to work, you naughty boy,’ Jan chided cheerfully.

  The new pig pen was nearly complete and Mike began measuring out the sand for mixing the last bit of mortar. Humming, as he often did, one of his a nondescript tunes, he turned to reach for the shovel and tripped over the bag of cement. His hands flailed about trying to save himself. He slipped again which sent him staggering into the stack of unused concrete blocks. The stack wavered for a moment as though they were thinking about it, and then decided to give way and tumble down, trapping his left leg. He gasped with a sudden sharp pain as the weight of the blocks pinned his leg to the floor. He new instinctively that something really bad had happened. Damn, blast, bugger and shit, he swore at his carelessness. Now what was he going to do? Calling out would be a waste of time; Jan wouldn’t hear him from inside the house, especially if she had the radio on. He would have to help himself – somehow. He began slowly lifting the blocks from off his leg wincing has he did so. It was a slow job, the blocks were heavy and from a lying down position he didn’t have the same strength of leverage. Twenty minutes later he was free, but now he had to get back to the house. Using the shovel as a crutch he slowly and carefully limped crossed the yard towards the house.

  Opening the front door he called out, ‘Jan, Jan could you come here. I’ve had a bit of an accident,’ deliberately understating the situation so as not to panic her.

  ‘What have you done now,’ Jan called back relatively cheerfully as she was well used to his frequent minor cuts and injuries. Reaching the doorway could see the pained look on Mikes face.

  ‘What’s wrong?’

  ‘I had a fall and somehow the stack of blocks fell on my leg - I think it’s broken.’

  ‘Oh, Mike, love, it must hurt.’

  ‘Does a bit, I don’t think we can patch this one ourselves, I’m really sorry, Darl, but we’ve got to get to the hospital.’

  ‘All that way to Abersoch, we’ve got the phone now, should we call an ambulance?’

  ‘God, no, an ambulance out here-it wouldn’t get down the track? No, it will be quicker if you drive me up.’

  ‘What about the kids?’

  ‘They won’t be home for another couple of hours we should be back by then.’

  ‘Okay, stay there, I’ll get my coat and the car keys’

  The drive to the hospital wasn’t a comfortable one for Mike, and between his oh’s and ah’s of discomfort, he cursed him self for being so stupid. Just as things seemed to be improving for them, this had to happen, and he was beginning to believe his fanciful idea that the place was cursed. How the hell were they going to cope now?

  Later that afternoon they were back from the hospital, and Mike was dosed up with painkillers and sitting by the Rayburn.

  ‘Oh that’s great Keith I’m a quick learner so we won’t bother you for long. Thanks again, Keith.’ Jan put down the phone and went to tell Mike the news ‘There we are, I know you didn’t want me to ring him but I was pretty sure he’d help us out for a day or two. Actually we were lucky he was home today.’

  ‘That’s great, but I could have managed to do the milking.’

  ‘Stop worrying love, Keith’s going to teach me how milk so that won’t be a problem now will it? And he said he’d lay the last few blocks on the new pen so that will be done as well. And he’s bringing over a couple of bales of hay that you asked for. It was an accident, not your fault; so stop beating yourself about it. Just take it easy for a couple of days until the swelling goes down and it stops hurting so much.’

  ‘Yeah you’re right. I suppose we were lucky he was at home’ Mike hadn’t wanted to ask Keith but Jan had insisted they had to ask someone for help. It made Mike feel very foolish and inadequate.

  ‘Apparently he goes up North less and less now. His dad is much is so much better, he can cope on his own.

  ‘There’s so much to do here though. The next lot of tunnels will be here next week,’ Mike said gloomily.

  ‘I know, but I expect we will survive, cheer up.’

  At this moment Mike wasn’t to sure about that. The setbacks and delays were mounting. ‘When trouble starts, it never knows when to stop,’ as Mikes dear old Grandmother used to say. How right she appeared to be.

  When the children came home from school they were immensely intrigued, but not particularly sympathetic, by the lump of plaster on their fathers leg. And David wanted to decorate the virgin white surface in typical schoolboy manner. He remembered a couple of years back when he had broken his arm whilst pretending to be Superman. By the time the plaster was due to come off it was covered in graffiti. Mandy and David were determined their father would fare no better, and that evening by the fireside, Mike allowed them a happy half hour with their felt pens. Not that he was feeling very cheerful. He couldn’t believe what had happened, such a simple accident. But his tenacity to his aims gave him the optimistic thought that when he got the hang of not bending one leg, he would be able to get around and get some jobs done. However, some would have to wait.

  Next morning they were awakened by Keith’s early arrival in the yard. Jan dressed in a rush and dashed downstairs to the door.

  ‘Keith, you’re early.’

  He smiled ‘Well aye man, real farmers are up at dawn.’ He sounded cheerful but a little embarrassed with his teaching role, and looked at the ground and brushed his large fat fingered hand through his mop of curly black hair.

  At this point Mike appeared at the bedroom window and he struggled to slide the old sash window open.

  ‘Hi Keith thanks for coming over,’ Mike called down.

  ‘How’s the leg, man?’

  ‘Oh okay, mind you it’s like sleeping with half a ton of concrete in the bed with you’

  ‘Aye, that will keep you out of mischief,’ Keith responded, unsmilingly.

  ‘I’ll be down in a minute.’

  ‘Lets have a go with this milking shall we, Jan? ‘

  ‘I’m ready I hope I can do it.’

  ‘It’s easy,’ Keith replied.

  Mike found dressing a bit of a chore and couldn’t get into his usual jeans so opted for a set of baggy overalls. After encouraging the kiddiwinks to rise and shine, he set off across the yard on his crutches to join the milking tutorial.

  ‘That wasn’t so bad; I think I did very well for the first time.’

  ‘You did great,’ Mike said proudly.

  ‘It’s hard on the hands though. My hands are so small compared with you men.’

  ‘You’ll have hands like Keith by the end of the week.’

  ‘God,I hope not,’ Jan chortled, ‘they would look a bit silly on me.’

  ‘He wasn’t his usual self was he, not very talkative?’ Mike said thoughtfully.

  ‘I thought that too,’ Jan’s brow furrowed and she wondered what the problem was. Had he found out about the man that Mike saw, or what else? Surely nothing to do with her and Chris otherwise he would have said something -wouldn’t he?

  ‘I’m going have clotted cream on my cornflakes this morning to build myself up a bit.’ Mike placed a dish on the table and limped to the fridge for the milk and cream.

  ‘You don’t need excuses to eat cream.’

  ‘Well I would like to be a bit heavier - a bit fatter.’ If it was Jan’s wish to be thinner, it was Mikes to be more muscular, like Keith.

  ‘Huh, that’ll be the day sweetheart,’ Jan said, sardonically, jealous of the fact he never did get fat.

  Mike changed the subject, ‘Mr Williams is due bac
k today to start the foundations for the extension. Seeing I can’t do anything else today I’ll get on with filling in those planning forms that came the other day. Then we can send them off as soon as poss. You know what councils are like, it could take ages to get them passed.’

  ‘Good idea. While you’re doing that I’ll go and see to the animals, and muck out.’

  ‘I’m sorry love, I wish I could do it myself.’

  ‘Stop worrying’ Jan scolded as she put on her wellies and coat, ‘I’ve told you before, it’s not your fault and I can do it easily enough.’ And with that she was gone.

  His breakfast over and the kids off to school, Mike sat at the kitchen table smoking and chewing the end of his Biro. He had decided to try and draw up the plans himself, after all the design of the new rooms were basic enough, so why pay someone to draw them. Mike intended to do a lot of the work himself especially the inside stuff, but he was also pretty good at laying blocks – and lying under them. The idea was that he would work with Mr Williams as a labourer to keep the costs down, when his leg would allow that is. Mike sighed, he hated paperwork and forms, and he would have preferred to be mucking out the animals.

  Jan was finding the simple task difficult. Firstly because she was shorter than Mike, the large wheelbarrow was unwieldy. She was too short to allow her to lift the barrow high enough, so the wheelbarrow legs dragged on the floor. The huge mucking out fork was also too big for her. She solved this by finding a small garden fork and lifting the straw and muck with that.

  This job was going to take much longer than she first anticipated, but she persevered. And like Mike, when he was doing what he called, non-thinking jobs, her head too became filled with various mental ramblings. But for once Chris wasn’t foremost in her mind, though of course she was still in there, somewhere, lurking amongst her brain cells. The pantomime wasn’t top priority either, nor the busy social life she had back home, but a rather general view of their situation. Even though the house wasn’t as they would like it, they were both falling in love with the place. Perhaps the ancient walls were exuding some sort of influence over them because despite the problems, sitting by the fire on a winters night, gave them a sense of sanctuary. To leave it and go back to town would be a deep loss. Overall she was still optimistic and happy with their new life, every day was an adventure, and they never knew what was coming next. It could be something really nice, like seeing and hearing the ghostly white barn owls hunting for mice around the yard at night. Or a beautiful cloud formation in the sky. But something shitty like a big fat electric bill, or the relentless mortgage would pull her back to earth. In fact it was essential bills such as these, which sadly, they couldn’t control. They had to have electricity, and a roof over their head, and coal for the Rayburn and it all needed money. Indeed there were very few expenses that they could control. Food was another obvious essential but Jan was a resourceful mother and housewife and could perform miracles with a can of beans and some odds and ends – not forgetting the ubiquitous chicken pies. When Mike got the fruit and vegetable garden going she could do even better. It was the same with the kids’s clothes. To save money she made as many of them that she could. Luckily, the children who had never been particularly demanding, were even less so now they were away from the influence of the town. But Jan still had fond memories of Mike’s regular big monthly pay check, and wondered just how many lettuce and pigs one had to sell to bring it up to that sort of money. This would be a great life if we had enough money she decided. She was disturbed from these somewhat maudlin machinations by a low rumbling noise from the track –Mr Williams and his JCB were approaching. Oh dear, she sighed, more expense.