It was bad. Very bad. Aunt Brat touched my shoulder and whispered, “Are you all right, here?”
I think I nodded. I might have said yes. But mostly, I stared.
The two small goats lay close together, their chins on the floor. They were mostly white with spots of brown. At first I couldn’t see what was wrong, but then, I couldn’t not see it. Their legs were tucked partway underneath them as if they were trying to hide what had been taken—or protect what had been left behind. Curls of bloodstained bandages lay on the straw, having unraveled from at least one hind foot. The ears were just as Eileen had said, three of four gone—sliced away, leaving a raw red circle of folds. I could see partway into the tunnel of an ear—a place I was not meant to see.
The pale curly coats of both goats looked clean. Had someone tended the wounds? Maybe Barley?
The little goats looked back at me through their weird, sage-yellow eyes with the pupils like thick hyphen dashes. Their gazes seemed to reveal no shock—unless that was exactly what they were revealing. What did I know of goats? I only knew that I felt sick, and embarrassed to be a human—the same species that had done to them what had been done.
I lifted my trembling chin. I swallowed. I nearly stumbled stepping backward away from the makeshift pen. “Th-they look like babies,” I said.
“They do,” said Eileen. “I haven’t looked at the teeth—I just can’t—but I’m guessing just weeks old.”
That seemed like an interesting thing for Eileen to know. When I turned she closed her eyes and tears streamed over her round cheeks.
“Dear God,” Aunt Brat muttered again as she, too, came away from the goats. Her tone thickened with outrage. “What possible reason could there be for such a vicious act? What is wrong with people? And I suppose someone dropped them here at the Feed so someone would find them.”
“Animals have been left before,” Barley said. “But not like this.”
Eileen caught her breath. “But Brat, if the vet can fix them up enough . . . somehow . . . if she says she can treat them then we should take—”
“No. No.” Aunt Brat shook her head—adamant little shakes. “I sincerely hope she can help them, Eileen. But you can’t.” She leaned toward her and whispered, “This is not for you. You’ll suffer again. You can’t. And I can’t.” Aunt Brat held her and whispered, “You know I’m right.”
I stood alone. My cold fingers held my other cold fingers.
What did suffer again mean? There was much more to know about this—about goats and about Eileen, I thought. I looked down, I toed the floor.
“I should go home,” Eileen said. “I barely made it this long.” She choked back another sob. “Sorry for dragging you here. And Lydia too. I needed you, Brat,” she said, though barely above a whisper.
“Of course you did. I’m glad you called.” Aunt Brat turned to Barley.
“Yeah, yeah. Go,” he said. “Eileen, take the rest of today and wait for me to call you back in. Let me get the vet here, and get this figured out.”
Outside, I opened the car door for Eileen. “Thank you so much, Lydia,” Aunt Brat said. We stood together watching Eileen settle onto the front seat. When we shut the door, she let her head drop against the window. It was a strange sight. Ever since I’d arrived to Chelmsford, Eileen had been jovial—Pinnacle Hill’s own comedian.
Through the evening, Eileen sat wrapped in a blanket on the couch. She sipped the tea Aunt Brat brought to her. Elloroy had been told, and he sat with one arm around Eileen’s shoulder. Soonie nestled on her other side and put her head in Eileen’s lap. Eileen stroked her over and over again. Even wild Guffer seemed to pick up on the mood. He settled on the rug with a humph of a sigh and laid his chin on one paw. None of us humans wanted much supper. Aunt Brat and I made up little plates of leftovers and brought them into the living room.
I needed to be out of the way. There was a thing in the room, and if they weren’t going to talk to me about it, I might as well help us all and get out. It seemed almost right when Guffer rose, circled, and took his evening squat over the rug. I jumped to my feet. I took the dogs to the fenced pasture and wandered along the rail while they did their thing: Guffer pursuing Soonie, Soonie avoiding Guffer, night falling. I looked back at the house, windows glowing pumpkin gold. I thought about the little goats—the damage—and then tried not to.
I took my pose facing northwest, and sweet old Soonie came alongside of me. She was funny that way, such a stand-beside-you dog. I offered her my gloved hand to rest her chin in. She took me up on that. Guffer stood, or rather sat, his ground, being his serious, south-facing self.
27
Another Hard Story
I know that Aunt Brat would have knocked on my door if it had been closed. She was good about that. But the door was open so she brushed her knuckles on it, then entered. Only a minute before, I’d secured the sheep poster back on the wall over the hole. Two minutes before that, I’d had my head in there.
How lucky that she hadn’t caught me. However, she did see that I had the box out, the one I kept the goddesses in. The dreadful afternoon had brought me to them. Objects could be places of comfort—especially these objects. There needed to be a Goddess of the Goats. But they probably weren’t going to get one from me. I hadn’t made anything since the She-Janus. Nothing since coming here. But I had braided some yarn and I’d started tying it to the goddesses—something to hang them up by.
Now, I tried to be nonchalant about sliding the box back under the bed. Aunt Brat’s eyes darted from me to the spot where it’d disappeared and back to me again.
“Sorry,” she said.
“How’s Eileen?” I asked.
“A little better. She’ll be okay. I want to talk to you about that.” Aunt Brat parked herself on the bed and I joined her. “She knows I’m up here. We agreed that we need to share some history with you. But it’s too hard for Eileen to talk about, so you have me.” She pressed her hands on her knees and spoke slowly. “I think it doesn’t feel right to keep secrets from people you live with, Lydia—”
Whoa. Uh-oh.
I felt my heart bang against my ribs. What secrets did she mean?
“—and I didn’t mean to do that.” She went on. “We didn’t mean to.”
“Is this about the goats?”
“Yes. I’m sure you could tell that something was wrong—I mean something besides the obvious. And I am so sorry you saw that. I should have protected you. Just because I needed to see, doesn’t mean you needed to. You’ve been through so much. I know that you’re grieving, and you haven’t said a lot, and that’s okay. I respect that. Silence is one way to feel strong, especially when something is so new.” She pressed her knuckles up under her nose. “I hate to burden you with another hard story.” She paused and gazed at me until I had to look away.
“Aunt Brat, I’m all right. You can tell me,” I said.
She nodded. “So . . . one of the reasons Eileen and I came here to Elloroy’s place is that she wanted to start a business. She wanted to manage a small herd of goats.”
“Of goats? Ohh . . .”
“Everything she needed was here: pasture and barns. We were both excited—and Elloroy was too. Eileen had visited other goat farms. She’d done all her research, had a meticulous plan for building a small herd. She took out a loan for repairs and new fencing. Along the way we learned about leasing as a side business,” she explained. “People will actually rent goats to control vegetation—they’re like a team of environmentally friendly lawn mowers. The state was interested.”
“The state government?”
“Yes. For tending public lands. Eileen won a nice contract. She worked to the point of exhaustion, but she loved it. She did everything right. She got rolls of special fencing. She took the very best care of the animals, but it did mean installing them at various sites for days at a time. And Eileen always went with them. Believe it or not she pulled a tiny camper behind that old truck of hers.” Aunt Brat laughed a tiny
laugh. “But then one evening, she was on a site not too far from home and she started to feel sick—so sick. She drove herself home—barely—and we took her to the hospital, they rushed her into surgery and removed her appendix.”
“Oh my gosh, Aunt Brat.”
“Yes. So scary. And poor Eileen, she’d barely been awake when we got the most horrific news. Vandals had trashed the trailer and cut down the fences—”
I gasped. I clapped my hand over my mouth.
Aunt Brat shook her head. “The herd got loose—or was chased—onto a highway. Every animal was lost.”
“Lost?”
“Either struck and killed, or just never recovered from injuries. Four were brought here, and we tried to nurse them back to health.” Aunt Brat shook her head. “They didn’t survive.”
“Oh, poor Eileen,” I whispered. “And the animals . . .” I balled my hands into a knot.
“She was devastated. And full of guilt. They were like pets to her. It turns out goats can be very affectionate.” Aunt Brat gave a little sigh. “Eileen felt conflicted about making money off them. It’s one of the toughest things about animal husbandry, at least from what I have observed,” she said. “I think of the farms around here . . .” She shook her head. “Anyway, all those feelings compounded the loss and—”
“And then today happened,” I said. “Oh, Aunt Brat, it’s terrible.”
“Exactly—and goats, of all things!” Aunt Brat looked at me intently. “So you can see, it’s salt in the wound. Eileen and I didn’t mean to leave you in the dark. This story just hadn’t come up yet here at home, but honestly, I would’ve hesitated to tell you if it had, Lyddie.”
Lyddie. That was Mom’s name for me.
“But after today, how could I not tell you?” she said.
“I’m glad you did,” I said. “Are you sure that Eileen can’t have the goats from today? Shouldn’t have them?” If they’re still alive, I thought.
“Oh, Lydia. I am so sure,” Aunt Brat said. “The damage looks serious—and that’s just what we can see. There could be infection. That lethargy worries me. Their heads should be up. Then there’s the question of how they get along from here, the treatment. If we brought them home Eileen would become invested. And then, if they didn’t make it, well, I love Eileen too much to watch her lose like that again.” Aunt Brat’s voice cracked as she finished.
We sat in the quiet. I was trying to accept what my aunt said. But I wondered if it wouldn’t somehow help Eileen to be a part of giving the goats a chance. But maybe that was just it: it was goats. Again.
“Aunt Brat, you should go back down and be with her,” I said.
“Are you all right? Want to come?”
“Well, I’m sure it’s you she really wants.”
Aunt Brat reached forward and covered my hands with both of hers. Then, in a warm sort of whisper, she said, “In this house, we all need each other.”
28
The Word at School
On Sunday afternoon Aunt Brat took a phone call from Barley. She went outside for a better signal. (So it was up on Pinnacle Hill; cell phones worked in my room, at the kitchen window, or outdoors.) She paced back and forth for what seemed like forever. Finally, she came in to say, “The goats have been placed, and the vet said there was hope.” It was vague news, but good news.
“Sheesh! Took Barley long enough to spit that out,” Eileen said. “You looked like you were doing a five-miler out there, Brat.” (I was glad to hear her make a joke.) She followed with a big sigh of relief, which I know was for those little goats.
Eileen went back to work on Monday. But there remained a sort of gentleness at home—and zero talk of the incident. It wasn’t until late that week that I heard Eileen sounding like her jovial self again.
Meanwhile, the kids at school had heard the story: two maimed goats left at the Feed, and since not much happens in Chelmsford (their words, not mine) it was the topic of the morning. Everyone was indignant—so much so, I felt a sense of kinship. But accounts of the incident were different from what I knew to be true.
Someone had heard all four ears were gone; someone else thought all eight hooves had been cut. I listened. I remembered the bandages, the raw circle around the three ears. I pictured the goats with the hyphen pupils in their eyes, the way they’d looked back at me and how unreadable I thought they were. But I was sure that no one at school had actually seen the animals. Nobody except me.
“Hey, Lydia,” Raya said, “your aunt’s wife works at the Feed, right? What did she say?” Then rather grimly she added, “Did she see them?”
“She was super sad,” I said, and that was all I said. I was feeling protective of Eileen.
Everyone believed that the goats had been brought from outside of town. “Yeah, because who has pygmies right now?” Someone asked the question, and I could see everyone mentally counting up their neighbors’ livestock. “Nobody, right?”
They speculated as to what had happened: It was a tractor accident. A cult thing. Wild dogs.
I heard two true things: the vet had seen them, and a farm had agreed to take them in.
“Sorry to say it, but it’s not practical,” Axel said. “If they heal, they’re going to need fake footsies—”
“Prostheses.” Charlotte supplied the word.
“Right. And you can’t just walk into a farm store and buy that like you’d buy a bottle of caprine vitamins. That has to be custom. Probably need a 3-D printer.”
He couldn’t possibly know it, but that actually gave me hope.
“Who has that kind of cash? And who’d spend it on that if they did?”
“That would be expensive?” I asked. Every head turned.
Quiet girl talking.
“So expensive!” Axel said. “You could get a new goat for a lot less.”
“Not the point,” Raya spoke up.
“Exactly,” Charlotte added. “The idea is to heal them.” This was the girl who wanted to restore a barn, I reminded myself. I rather admired her.
“I’m just saying, it gets expensive,” Axel pressed. “Whoever took them in, they probably can’t afford to keep them—not indefinitely.”
At home, I waited to be alone with Aunt Brat. I told her what I had heard. “Do you think the kids are right? It will cost a lot?”
“I imagine,” she said. “There might be an animal rights group that could help, and I gave Barley something for the vet’s bill.”
“Oh, Aunt Brat, that’s so good of you.”
“I had to,” she said. She gave me a thoughtful look. “Did the kids say anything about who took the goats in?” she asked.
“I don’t think anyone knows. In fact, now that you ask, there seems to be a little mystery about that. The kids would have said if they’d known. They don’t have any secrets.”
“You seem to know your classmates well,” she said, and she smiled. “Do you feel like you are finding friends at the school?”
Segue! The friend thing. . . . Oh, darn. . . .
“Sure. I mean, this town—the kids are all nice. Nobody gets left out because it’s so small. They’ve even said it. They have to get along.” We laughed about that. The trouble with Aunt Brat’s question was that she was asking it of me. How could I tell her? If I didn’t have friends, it was because I didn’t feel like I could let my insides out here. I was catching up on schoolwork, being in a new home, managing the unruly Guffer, getting used to Aunt Brat and her people.
Trying to hang on to my mother. . . .
“Raya and Sari sure seem like sweet girls.”
“The sweetest,” I said.
It was true. They’d been tireless, at school, and on another weekend hike. (I’d discovered that doubling my socks inside the ugly brown boots solved the fit.) Raya and Sari had been my escorts all across Chelmsford’s acres. I’d been to their houses. I knew the place where the six roads came together. I’d sat on the cold hearth of the first chimney in town. It was all that was left of the very first
house in Chelmsford, and it jutted up out of the ground like a freestanding monument. They called it the Soldier’s Chimney because the place had belonged to a Union soldier who never made it home from war.
Raya and Sari talked and talked and always tried to include me. I knew, and I felt bad, that I didn’t offer much back.
Funny thing: when I did talk, it was mostly about Guffer. “The troublesome yellow dog,” I called him, as if that were his title, which made Raya and Sari laugh. “Three weeks and he’s still not house-trained,” I’d say.
They knew he was quirky. He still greeted them rudely, racing up and then drawing back, barking.
One day, Raya (who tended to touch things, I had noticed) picked up the handles of a wheelbarrow that’d been sitting in the yard for at least as long as I’d been in Chelmsford. She pushed it forward all of five feet and Guffer went batty, leaping away and circling back. He barked wildly, and all the while he kept his eyes trained on that small black wheel. “Wow,” Raya said. She let the wheelbarrow down. “He doesn’t like that.”
“He barks at wheels,” said Sari, which sounded funny.
“Yeah, he’s kind of slinky all around, huh?” said Raya. We watched Guffer as he skimmed his body along the fence. Every so often he’d look over and stare at us as if we were a trio of goblins about to do him harm.
All I could do was shrug and say, “Yeah, he’s weird.”
He’s a dog with an unknown past.
29
A Gallery
Lydia Bratches-Kemp, you are dirt.
That’s the thought I had as I pulled myself, and my armload of goddesses, into the space behind the chimney. I was going to turn the crawl into a gallery of goddesses.
What about your new adults? The kind, kind people. . . .
“There won’t be any damage,” I whispered. Well, no further damage. All my cleaning must count for something, and I was making sure that no harm would be done to Elloroy’s ancient brick chimney.
A Home for Goddesses and Dogs Page 10