The Farmer's Wife

by Rachael Treasure

  Soon, though, she lost them in the crush. She didn’t really care; she was enjoying the music thrumming out from the giant speakers. She gazed up to the stage, where Nick Wolfe was looking virtually edible in a cowboy hat, worn jeans and boots, complete with his guitar. His brother, Tom, wearing a checked shirt and a cheeky grin, was wielding his guitar like a weapon. As they cranked into their hit song ‘Hi Vis Anthem’, drummer Casey and guitarist Brodie made the most of their Tassie talents, stirring the crowd to fever pitch. And Rebecca was soon lost to herself. Dancing beneath the old Akubra hat that she wore pulled down low over her brow, she felt eighteen again. And pregnant. And free. With a stick-on tattoo. How funny the world turned, she thought.

  As she danced now to the music, she felt someone tap her on the shoulder. Spinning about, she was met by the sight of a Rivermont trackrider, Joey, smiling at her.

  ‘Hi!’ Feeling a little high on life and reckless, she reached up and hugged him, taking in his manly scent of bloke’s deodorant. Joey picked her up and held her aloft in the tight squash of the crowd. Then he set her back down and leaned close to speak to her.

  ‘I’ve been looking all day for my beautiful cougar, and here you are! Yazzie said I’d find ya up front!’ he yelled.

  The band was so loud his words were lost on Rebecca, so she just nodded and smiled. She waved to the cluster of Rivermont staff: Daisy, Kealy, Steph and another trackrider, Ken. Then, as if it was the most natural thing in the world, she let Joey take her hand and together, smiling into each other’s eyes, like long-lost reunited friends, they began to dance. There were no words exchanged. Just a knowledge that they were from the same mountain, worked on the same place and hanging out together was a given.

  She could see from the grin revealed under the brim of Joey’s hat that he was genuinely pleased to see her. She also began to notice how sensual his soft lips looked, opening up to a wide white-toothed smile. So what if he was a good ten years younger or more than her and had an ego the size of Texas. He was good to be with and could dance like a dream. He had become one of her best mates at work and she was entitled to a little fun.

  She let herself feel his hands on her as he gyrated his hips and spun her about. He was flirty ahead of sleazy and funny ahead of a tosser. She knew from the Rivermont staff that he was a womaniser, but tonight, for this moment, she didn’t care.

  In between songs, he pulled her nearer and asked, ‘Where’s Gabs and Frank?’

  Bec shrugged her shoulders. Just at that moment a cheer went up when a silhouette of the giant metre-long salami was marched across the big screen that flanked the stage. Bec could make out Gabs’s head in shadow as she larked in front of the stage camera.

  ‘Ah. I think I’ve just found Gabs. And Hans.’

  ‘Who the flock is Hans?’ asked Joey.

  Rebecca could only laugh and roll her eyes as she took him by the hand and led him through the crush of people. By the time they had made it out to where the stage camera was set up, Gabs and Frank were long gone, probably ushered away by security.

  As she glanced about the people who milled in the semidarkness of the venue, Joey fished into his pockets and pulled out some drink tickets.

  ‘You and me? Bundy Bar, mademoiselle?’

  Bec grinned and nodded. She didn’t at all feel like a drink, but she certainly felt like staying near Joey. She hadn’t forgotten their first meeting at Sol’s stables. She had found him interesting and attractive then. And it was kind of cute to see the way he swam with self-confidence. Bec was happy to find that the world had not yet knocked him out of shape and bent his ways. He reminded her of herself when she was younger.

  ‘You move your hips well, woman,’ he said as he passed her a can of rum and raised his eyebrows at the same time he raised his can.

  ‘How old are you?’ Rebecca asked as she took a small swig, conscious of the baby.

  ‘How old are you?’

  ‘Too old for you.’

  ‘Perfect,’ Joey said, stepping forwards and leaning in so their hat brims touched. ‘I love older women. You know I’m going to swag you tonight.’

  ‘Cocky and cute,’ she said, flirting back. ‘But no, you won’t.’

  ‘It’s true,’ he said, staggering a little, his drunk eyes blinking slowly.

  She shook her head. ‘Not possible. I’m married. I’m the mother of two small children. And you have your beer goggles on.’ She left out the fact she was pregnant. Only Yazzie, Gabs, Frank and Evie knew that.

  Next Joey leaned so close she could feel his warm breath on her neck. ‘You and I will see the sun come up, mark my words. And I am going to make love to you under the stars.’ She could smell the booze on his breath and the bad-boy scent of cigarettes that caused a heady mix of temptation. She felt the nearness of his divine body, then the brush of his lips against hers in the lightest of lingering kisses.

  It was then Rebecca felt the world give way beneath her feet. She drew back, looked at his handsome drunken face and bit her lip, trying to hold herself back from the rush of desire that swept through her. She was being shown an open door and she wasn’t just ready to walk through it, she was ready to bolt!

  Twenty-eight

  As she lay in Joey’s swag and began to settle under the foreign touch of his hands, the sound of the drunks careening back to camp dissolved away, her mind became still and for the first time in many months she was lost in the moment. The Wolfe Brothers had finished playing, leaving room for a sprinkling of ute revs to throb out in the now chilly night air.

  Occasionally stock whips and whoops from some of the diehard party animals shattered the stillness, but mostly thousands of campers fell silent in sleep. Now all Rebecca could hear was the desire in their breath and the rustle of the canvas of the heavy swag that was pulled over them.

  Just lying beside him, Rebecca felt transformed by his youth. He was mesmerising. Unlike the landscape of Charlie’s body, his had a smoothness to it, and yet a youthful hardness ran beneath his skin. His muscles, taut from years of trackriding since his early teens. The fullness of his plush lips and the passion in his kiss were things she’d never thought she would experience again. But here he was, laid out for her to drink in, under the night sky of Deniliquin. Dead drunk though he was, he was beautiful.

  His were lips she couldn’t help but kiss. And his face was one to gaze at, gently lit as it was by the dim light of a faraway generator that thrummed on the corner of the tent city. Bec’s eyes travelled to his mouth repeatedly and she ran her fingertips over it, backwards and forwards.

  As she bent towards where he lay, his kiss sparked a primeval desire in her body, a desire that had lain dormant for what felt like an eternity. It was the bliss of one kiss. She was drunk, not on alcohol, but on the life that pulsed around her at the muster. It was the excitement of carrying a baby within. The completeness and power of being a woman.

  And Joey was part of that energy. He, young and alive, as they lay in a landscape so ancient and beautiful.

  She felt his hands roam up and over the curves of her body, cupping her singlet-clad breasts. She felt the warmth run to the crotch of her jeans, beneath the little swelling of her belly where her baby lay. Hungrily she pressed her pelvis closer to him. His hands slipped down the front of her jeans, his fingers sliding inside her, making her feel so, so good. Her hands found their way under his shirt where her touch was met by a scatter of tiny pimples, a reminder that this man was still so close to being a boy.

  Suddenly she panicked at his youth, thinking of her own boys and how it would be for her if they bedded a woman so much older? And for some reason, Sol came to her mind. What would he think? The farmer’s wife from Waters Meeting sleeping with one of his trackriders?

  She pulled away from him, muttering that they had to stop. But she felt Joey’s hand reach around the back of her head urgently and he drew her into another long and sensual kiss. Evie’s words came to her: ‘If it feels good and you aren’t hurting anyone, do it.’ An
d this felt so good. And so natural, when she shut out the thoughts that were now rampaging through her head.

  But was she hurting people? Surely she and Charlie were separated for good now? Surely he knew the inevitability of their situation?

  She looked back into Joey’s eyes, which were lit with passion but also, she realised now, a depth of drunkenness that was causing them to half close. Despite this, his hands were gently guiding her to lie on top of him. She did so, feeling the delicious warmth of his body along her torso. Slowly she began to unbuckle his jeans, desperately wanting to find pleasure from him. But as her hand slid under the elastic of his underpants, she was shocked to find his penis was flaccid. Not a single stirring of passion.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ he said, reaching for her hand and pulling it away. ‘Had a few too many,’ he slurred. ‘The old Foster’s Flop. We can have another crack a bit later.’ She could tell he wasn’t embarrassed, just utterly tanked. Bec laughed at the irony, kissed him on the temple and rolled off, snuggling beside him.

  ‘I don’t mind a bit,’ she lied.

  Rebecca settled into his arms and looked up to the sweep of the Milky Way. As she took in the darkness of the sky and the wash of stars, she realised life was all made up. All of it. From the stock market, to retirement funds, to the institution of marriage — they were all human creations from the rampage of human thought. And here she was a part of that creation. She realised if she didn’t let others’ made-up beliefs constrain her, life was now hers to savour.

  It was entirely up to her to create a life where she felt happy and free. That her life could start again. Joey, even though they hadn’t made love, had unlocked a current of passion in her, and she would refuse to feel any guilt in spending time enjoying his warmth against her in his swag. Instead she would feel reinvigorated by youth and by the wonder of life itself.

  She pressed her face against his chest and fell in line with his breathing, and soon she was deep asleep.

  Not long after, dawn light was creeping over the flat Deniliquin plains horizon. Campfires were smouldering sleepily and slowly people were stirring for another day on the booze.

  As the sun rose slowly, Joey stirred and rolled over. Rebecca had her back to him and she felt him put his strong arm around her and drag her close, spooning her from behind.

  ‘Sun’s coming up,’ he murmured, nestling his face into her neck. She could feel the scrape of his stubble and it dragged goose bumps across her skin.

  ‘Do you know what it means when the sun comes up?’ he asked, kissing her lightly on the neck and running his hand around the front of her shirt to where the pearl press-studs of her Western shirt were already undone, exposing her pink Deni singlet and the tanned domed crests of her large breasts.

  ‘No,’ she said, ‘what does it mean?’

  ‘It means my cock’s about to crow,’ he said, pressing the hardness of his morning erection contained within boxer shorts against her buttocks.

  She laughed a little. ‘You idiot.’

  ‘You love it,’ he said, pressing against her harder and running his hand up and under her singlet. ‘Hello, baby.’

  Rebecca giggled at the irony. If only he knew there was a baby. She felt a little guilty. He might not find her so desirable if he did know.

  She felt Joey nuzzle into her neck again. ‘You are so sexy,’ he said. She never thought she’d let another man near her body after she had married Charlie. Up until now, she thought she would only ever share her post-baby body and the stretch marks that lined her skin with the man who had fathered her children. To her, the scars of motherhood belonged to both her and Charlie. But now, as she felt the breath in her come quickly, she decided she just didn’t care, as Joey’s kisses on her neck became harder and his hands firmer as he searched out the buckle of her jeans.

  Just then, in the avenue of campers, a giant truck rumbled beside them and let out a noisy whoosh of airbrakes.

  ‘Geez,’ said Joey, ceasing his kissing. ‘What the fuck?’

  Out of the truck came two scraggy, dumpy men in high-vis vests, looking as if they belonged in underground houses in New Zealand on a Hobbit set. They had thick gloves on to combat the early morning cold and the fact that they were about to pump the shit out of the portable toilets parked on a semi-trailer tray a little along from where Joey and Rebecca lay.

  ‘You picked a good spot to camp!’ Bec said, chuckling.

  The men dragged concertina hoses across the short tufted grass, turned giant couplings, yanked levers, cranked over a pump and, with a roar and a giant waft of shit fumes, began draining the results of the previous night’s festivities and feasts from the sewerage tank of the toilets. The stench made its way across to Joey’s swag and drifted up to sit thickly in Bec’s nostrils.

  ‘Shit!’ she said, watching the men in disbelief.

  ‘Shit is right,’ said Joey, who lay on his back, laughing. ‘Bit of a mood killer.’ As the pump continued to thrum and the foetid stench draped itself across their swag, Bec thought back to the B&S ball where she had first kissed Charlie. Their first exquisite river kiss on day two of the partying, Charlie back then looking every bit as delicious as Joey did now. But then, as Bec recalled, the kiss of her life had been interrupted by a floating poo laid by some drunk joker upstream.

  Their first poo kiss had been a tale retold many times in the early years of their relationship. But now, lying here with Joey, Bec began to see the universe was showing her patterns. It was history repeating — and could the message be any clearer? This time, with Joey, the kiss of her mid-life was being interrupted by an entire poo truck. She looked at the men rolling the giant rings off the underplumbing of the truck, the seepage of smell as the valves released, conjuring a reek like the sewers of Ye Olde London Town.

  ‘I think I’d better go.’

  Joey groaned. ‘I think I’m gunna chuck.’

  ‘Well, I’ll leave you to it.’ She kissed him fondly on the head and rummaged her fingertips through his hair, feeling oddly maternal with the gesture.

  ‘OK,’ he said, burying his face into his grimy swag pillow. ‘See you back at the ranch, babe,’ he muffled.

  As Bec pulled on her boots, she noted the thin spread of stubble on the side of his face. God! she thought. He really is young! As she stood, she felt a sense of vertigo. It wasn’t illness, or tiredness: it was the realisation that she had her life back. In whatever way she created it.

  Eventually amidst the thousands of campers, she found the sagging tent she and Yazzie had set up so hastily next to Frank and Gabs’s. She crawled in and Yazzie greeted her sleepily. She fell face first onto her swag and groaned.

  ‘So?’ Yazzie said after a time.

  ‘You don’t want to know.’

  Yazzie smiled at her. ‘You sexy minx.’

  ‘Nah. No sexy time. He got the Foster’s Flop on me, then this morning, you wouldn’t believe … Well, it all turned to shit.’

  ‘That’s still worth a high five,’ Yazzie said, holding up her hand for Rebecca to slap. ‘At least you scored a night of pashing. You are braver than I.’

  ‘Braver or stupider? I am married and Charlie could still chuck a big ugly legal case at me. Especially if he found out.’

  ‘You are not married. You are separated, destined for divorce and you know it. You just haven’t faced it yet. You can’t go back to him, Bec. Not after all he’s done. Add it up: Janine, the accident with Archie, your dog, your horses. Walking out on you and the boys without a word. And I mean, c’mon. He hit you. That’s plain wrong. It’s time to move on.’ A small frown was lining Yazzie’s brow and there was concern and sincerity in her eyes.

  ‘I know,’ Bec said quietly.

  ‘I know you know. So who was he?’

  ‘That, you really don’t want to know!’ Bec said. ‘But you were right. My new life after last night has begun!’

  Part Three

  Twenty-nine

  The Rivermont fodder shed held a peace that Rebecca lov
ed. The sound of water being gently stirred in the nutrient tanks welcomed her as she stepped into the climate-controlled interior. Today she would have to work fast. It was Bendoorin Show day and Ben and Archie were itching to get going so they could enjoy their share of fairy floss and mechanical-bull rides with their little mates. They had already dressed Funny in a kids’ bluey singlet teamed with a red-and-navy bandana for the Pet Parade. She was sitting dolefully in the smoko room, looking utterly humiliated and humourless in regards to her attire.

  Rebecca sighed as she put on a waterproof apron and tied it at her back. She laughed as her pregnant stomach pushed the stiff heavy apron out, a little like a fat butcher’s belly. She was five and a half months along and she was grateful to have been working here throughout the winter and now into spring. The unborn child’s presence seemed to be pushing her into a growth phase, like a bulb pushing up towards the sun. She couldn’t help but feel the baby ground her and move her forwards at the same time, the unseeable but knowable forces of nature taking her with them. But there was something else that had prompted the feeling of such vitality.

  Bec realised it was Evie’s teachings and the books and CDs she fed to her that had helped the shift. Rebecca found that instead of focusing on the aches heavy farm work had inflicted on her body, she now disciplined herself to be grateful for every day given and for her health.

  She banned herself from moaning, groaning and complaining. Every ache she combated with breathing, the way Evie had shown Archie in the hospital, and every negative thought she ducked like a martial arts master, willing herself to put in place a new thought — an affirmation that supported herself.

  The shed and eccentric work family of the Rivermont staff kept her buoyant too, and was a brilliant outlet for her from the relentless work of house and farm. And for the boys the bustle and fun of the Rivermont staff seemed to shelter them a little from the fact that Charlie rarely called. Sometimes Charlie’s mother rang, on a Sunday evening, and would pass the phone onto Charlie ‘for a word with the boys’. Bec made sure Ben and Archie sent him letters and paintings, not so much for Charlie’s sake, but so the boys fostered some kind of connectedness to their dad. She had often sent him text messages, asking for at least some kind of financial support, but the messages remained unanswered. His silence spoke loudly of his stingeyness with money and his lack of care.