Outside Looking In: A Browerton University Book

by Truman, A. J.

  “What do you want, Callum?”

  “Feisty Piglet,” Callum said defensively, which he did whenever Liam pushed back the slightest bit. “I have a tantalizing offer for you.”

  “What kind of offer?”

  “A friend of mine is a real estate developer. He wants to buy our plots of land. Wellington is running out of housing!”

  Liam had heard about some farmers selling their land to real estate developers who were building planned communities, but he didn’t expect the building boom to reach this far out of the city.

  “Real estate developer? He wants to build houses here?” Liam glanced out his window at the beautiful rolling hills and mountains in the distance. It was nature unbridled.

  “It’s going to be a mix of houses, townhomes, and condominiums. There will be three pools and a tennis court. He showed me the plans he drew up. It took my breath away.”

  Callum wanted to turn his birthright into suburban sprawl.

  “What about the farmers you’re currently renting your land to?”

  “It’s peanuts compared to what we can get paid. This developer, Harold Grates, has fantastic plans for state-of-the-art suburban communities.”

  “He asked you to talk to me…are you getting a cut?”

  “A fee for facilitating, yes.” Classic Callum. He didn’t help people unless there was a cash incentive. He was the one who convinced James and Oliver to rent their land eight years ago. “And you, Piglet, you would be swimming in heaps of money. Your piece of land has some of the best topography and views.”

  Callum gave him an estimated offer. Liam had to take a seat. Holy shit. He’d never imagined so many zeroes before.

  “Still there?” Callum asked.

  “What did Mark say?”

  “We haven’t told him yet, but I know if you sold, he wouldn’t hold out. He and the kids are practically screaming for a better, more modern house. He’d only be holding on so you wouldn’t be alone out here.”

  Mark was living out here for years before Liam came back. But it was no use calling his brother out on his bullshit.

  “Mum and Dad would roll over in their graves if their land was turned into cul-de-sacs.”

  “That’s a bit much, Piglet.”

  “Can you please call me Liam?”

  “So touchy.” Liam knew it was no use, but at least he tried. “Mum and Dad would be proud of you for being entrepreneurial and taking advantage of a prime opportunity rather than playing farmer.”

  “I’m not playing farmer. I have almost forty sheep, and I’m going to have more soon.”

  “And very soon, you’re going to be in over your head. Let’s be real here. Brother to brother. You wanted to live life off the grid for a bit, go retro with farming and growing your mountain man beard. But do you expect to do this for the rest of your life?” Callum chuckled to himself. “I love you, Liam, but you are no farmer.”

  Liam heard the faint baaa’s of his sheep. He tried focusing on their sounds rather than the words of his own brother.

  “Think about it, Piglet.”

  Nathan

  While Liam was talking on the phone, Nathan’s own phone buzzed unexpectedly. Most of the field was a dead zone, but there were tiny pockets of good reception that Nathan happened to stumble into by accident.

  Just got home from Hawaii. Are you still on holiday?

  Nathan and his parents treated their apartment like they were all guests in a hotel who came and went as they pleased. Nathan would go out partying for a weekend and come back two days with nary a peep from his dad or stepmum. It surprised him that his dad considered his whereabouts.

  But Nathan didn’t dare tell him the truth.

  I’m visiting friends in Lisbon. Hope you had a nice trip.

  He thought that was the end of things, but the three text bubbles jiggled at the bottom of his screen.

  When will you be back?

  “What the hell is going on?” Nathan said to the screen. Did his dad get hypnotized at a luau?

  I don’t know. Is everything okay?

  Yes. I wanted to make sure you were doing all right and staying “on the wagon.”

  Nathan rolled his eyes at the quotation marks around that phrase, but he couldn’t deny a weird emotion blooming in his chest.

  I’ve been thinking about you. Maybe when you get home, we could talk, his dad texted.

  It was most alarming to Nathan, and if anything, it made him extra grateful to be a few oceans away from his father. Nathan had watched cute father/son scenes in television shows. He didn’t need them in his real life. And what made him start thinking about me now? he thought.

  Sure, Nathan texted. He wanted things as vague as possible.

  See you in a few days?

  Probably a few weeks.

  Liam returned to the hoof house, and Nathan welcomed the distraction and the dead zone.

  “Everything good?” Nathan asked him.

  “Yeah. That was…” Liam nodded behind him at the house. “That was nothing. Someone trying to sell me something I didn’t need. You good?”

  Nathan tucked his phone back in his pocket. “Couldn’t be better.”

  Chapter 14

  Nathan

  The next morning, Nathan was up early. He beat his alarm clock by fifteen minutes. And it wasn’t because he was hung over or going through withdrawal or some other type of turmoil. His biological clock had shifted back a few hours. He might never wake up after nine again. What have I become?

  He went to the barn and checked on Tilly. A thought had sat on his mind all night and he had to get it out. Fortunately, Tilly was always in the same spot. Like any quality therapist, she was always available. No absconding to Brighton for a beach vacation without telling her clients.

  “Tilly, y’alright?” Tilly lay on her side. She only acknowledged Nathan with a head turn. “You’re trying to conserve your energy. I get it.”

  Nathan put a fresh clump of hay under her head. “I’m glad I didn’t wake you. Can we chat?”

  She let out a baaaa then turned her head to look at the wall. Nathan figured that was a green light. He petted her wool softly, letting it bristle through his fingers.

  “I am here on a mission. I am here to find out about my mum and who she was and to get to know my new family, even if they don’t know we’re family. I am not here to have sex with anyone. Especially Liam. Even if I want to.” Nathan squatted beside her. “This conversation is confidential, correct? I understand there’s a conflict of interest since you depend on Liam for food, water, and shelter.”

  Nathan got up. He had to pace. He hadn’t felt this way in a long time, not since his last boyfriend Eamonn. And that relationship imploded thanks to Nathan.

  “Am I crazy for liking him? If he found out the truth about me and what I’m doing here, none of them would ever talk to me again. I have to resist until I figure out how to best tell them.” He kicked pieces of hay aside. “He’s probably not interested in me. I’m a liar and a bad influence.”

  Tilly emitted a loud bleat.

  “Thanks, Tilly. I’m glad you like me.”

  She emitted another louder, and longer, bleat that echoed in the barn. Nathan wanted to cover his ears. Tilly wiggled in the hay and kept making noises.

  “Till?”

  She wouldn’t stop. Nathan got on his knees and looked into her crotched area. He hadn’t observed many vaginas up close, but he knew right away what he was looking at.

  “Fuck.”

  Liam

  It was time. He blinked awake as soon as he heard Tilly’s familiar bleats of labor. There was no turning back. Lambing season had arrived. He put on his clothes and raced to the barn with a bucket of water.

  Nathan had beat him to it. He knelt beside Tilly and cleared away the area beside her for delivery.

  “Liam!” He stood up, all business. “She’s past the first phase of labor. She discharged the amniotic fluid a few minutes ago.”

  “How do you know
about that?” He pulled a box of plastic gloves from his bag.

  “I read about it online.” Nathan held up his phone. “I think she’s about ready to blow. You know what I mean.”

  The guy had done better than Liam expected. He knelt beside Tilly and checked out how dilated she was. Nathan was right. She was ready to deliver. Liam prepped the area, while Tilly wailed away.

  “Do they make epidurals for sheep?” Nathan asked. He had rolled up his sleeves and put on a pair of gloves.

  “No.”

  “So what do we do?”

  “We supervise,” Liam said.

  “So we’re just going to watch HOLY BLOODY FUCK!” Nathan stumbled back. Tilly’s first lamb breached the surface still encased in the amniotic sac. “I feel like Sigourney Weaver in Alien!”

  “Okay Tilly. I need one more good push from you,” Liam told her. He liked to think she sort of understand that and appreciated the encouragement. It wasn’t as if any of the rams who impregnated these ewes were helping. They hung out in a separate shed.

  The lamb broke free of its amniotic confines, causing Nathan to jolt back again. It amazed Liam how in an hour or two, the lamb would be walking around, while it took humans years.

  “It’s beautiful,” Liam said.

  “It’s a bit graphic.”

  “If you’re going to vomit, please do it outside.”

  Nathan held his hand over his mouth. “I think I’m going to be all right.”

  “Great. Because we got one more coming.”

  “Twins?”

  “Her breed can birth up to three lambs per litter.”

  Nathan knelt beside Tilly and patted her head. “And here I thought you were just super bloated.”

  Groans and loud bleats from the far end of barn made their way to Liam and Nathan. Just like with last year, Tilly was the catalyst that started the chain reaction.

  “I hope you like this,” Liam said. “This is going to be our life for the next few weeks.”

  “This?” Nathan pointed at Tilly, who was thrashing around on the hay, bleating for all to hear.

  “Over and over again.”

  “Can I go back to shoveling shit?”

  Liam laughed and was about to slap Nathan on the back, but remembered what was on his hands. He gave Nathan instructions for observing Tilly, then jogged to the far end of the barn where another ewe lay on her side. Her bleating sounded more desperate. Liam watched her carefully and checked her out, but fortunately, everything seemed to be going fine.

  “It’s your first time as a mum. Excited?” Liam wondered aloud. He had only been sheep farming on his own, but all of his memories from working with his mum and dad during lambing season rushed back to him. He found himself missing them so much in this moment, wishing they could see him.

  The ewe groaned and bleated with desperation as she pushed out her lamb. Liam once thought he would be in this position with Kelly in a few years. They both very much wanted children, and Liam prepared to attend lamaze classes and be one of those hands-on fathers. He still wanted that, no matter which gender he wound up with.

  He shook out of his thoughts when he heard his name being screamed from the other end of the barn.

  Chapter 15

  Nathan

  “There’s a problem. Something’s wrong,” Nathan said as soon as Liam came over. Panic and concern took over Liam’s face. “She started making these noises, not the ones she had been making.”

  Tilly emitted a groan of pain that sounded almost humanlike.

  “Like that?” Liam asked.

  Nathan nodded yes. “I peeked inside and it didn’t look right. Like the lamb was stuck or something.”

  “Is it breech?”

  “No. I see the head. It’s not coming out.” Nathan’s first thought was that he screwed something up. Maybe instead of chatting with Tilly, he should’ve been checking on her more, perhaps massaging her stomach to make sure all the lambs just slid out like her womb was a laundry chute.

  “Let’s take a look.” If Liam was scared, he didn’t show it. He knelt down and examined Tilly, all while petting her to keep her calm.

  “What do you see?” Nathan paced behind him. Tilly caught his eye and held contact. He saw the pain and worry reflected back at him, which might have been his own reflection. He put on a hopeful smile, like a parent does for a kid about to go into surgery, but inside the scene tore him up more than he expected. Nathan was not one for emotions, except the fun ones like anger and jealousy.

  “The lamb’s shoulder is out. It’s too wide for the opening. The lamb is like this.” Liam demonstrated by sticking his elbows out like a chicken. “We need it like this.” He held his arms at his sides.

  “Can we tell it that?”

  “Nah yeah. A newborn lamb speaks fluent English.”

  Nathan shot him a look. Desperate bleats came from the far end of the barn.

  “Shit. That’s my other ewe who’s in labor. I need you to check on her,” Liam said.

  “No.” Nathan said it without thinking. It was compulsory. “I’m not leaving Tilly.”

  “Nathan, this is serious.”

  “I know.” Nathan didn’t budge. His heart was telling him to stay.

  “Fine. Then you need to do this.” Liam looked over his shoulder, to the sounds of the other lamb bleating in labor.

  “By myself?” Nathan said.

  “Yes.”

  What had Nathan gotten himself into? The only thing he’d ever delivered was dialogue. Fear seized his body, but the confident smolder of Liam gave him hope. It shook sense into him.

  “All right,” Nathan said.

  Liam gave him a sturdy head nod. “You have to reach inside Tilly and push the lamb’s shoulders in.” Liam demonstrated with his hands at his sides. “Once you do that, the lamb should come right out.”

  Fear ripped through Nathan. “I—can I practice on you?”

  Liam tipped his head to the side like seriously.

  “Just once.”

  Liam held his elbows out chicken-style. Nathan tried to push them down, but Liam flexed those arm muscles to make this more of a challenge. Now was so not the time to admire those muscles. Nathan managed to shove them down.

  “The sheep won’t put up nearly the resistance.” Liam put his hands on Nathan’s shoulders. Those dark eyes penetrated the most scared parts of him. “You can do this, Nathan. I trust you. Tilly trusts you.”

  Nathan thought of the lamb and the mother who needed his help, and that need overrode his trepidation.

  “I can do this,” Nathan said.

  Liam nodded and ran off to tend to the other sheep.

  Tilly wailed.

  “You can do this,” Nathan said to himself. “I mean, we can do this, Tilly.”

  All I have to do is push its shoulders in. He took a huge, deep breath and squatted down. Adrenaline shoved aside his squeamishness.

  I’m doing this. I’m doing this. This is really happening. His fingers and hands squished through until he felt something firm. A head. A lamb head. He could feel it pulse and breathe.

  “There you are.” His fingers traveled down the head and yes! The shoulders. Tilly wailed in pain and kicked her legs out. He bet this was unpleasant for her. A lover had tried to fist Nathan once; he did not like it either.

  Tilly’s bleats hit a fever pitch.

  “We’re almost done!”

  He counted to three and pushed the lamb’s shoulders down. He held them down for a second to make sure they wouldn’t pop up again, but the lamb did not put up a fight.

  “How’s it going?” Liam yelled to him from across the barn.

  “I think…” Nathan gave the lamb a slight nudge before he removed his hands. He checked inside, and the lamb inched closer to the outside. “I think it’s working!”

  Tilly let out another groan. The lamb’s head came closer and closer to the world.

  “Holy shit, Tilly. You’re giving birth.” It was a duh statement, but it hit Natha
n so profoundly. This is that miracle of life shit parents were always talking about.

  The lamb slid out. Its legs touched the floor. Nathan’s shirt and pants were covered with fluid he didn’t want to think about.

  Liam ran over. “Did it work?”

  But his question didn’t need to be answered.

  “You did it.”

  “I…” Nathan was a storm of emotions. He wasn’t the one who gave birth, so he didn’t know why he had trouble speaking.

  “Sweet as,” Liam said in a whisper, in just as much as awe as Nathan.

  Tilly got up, went to Nathan, and began eating what just came out of her like she was a sheep zombie.

  “What the hell is she doing?” Nathan asked.

  “She’s eating her placenta. It’s instinct. She does that to remove any extra evidence of her birth so that predators don’t find her lambs. She doesn’t think it’s gross. Right now, all she’s thinking about is keeping her babies safe.”

  Nathan and Liam gave her space. Her lambs worked on walking. They stumbled around the barn, and Tilly watched them with a trained eye, like she was a helicopter parent with her kids at the playground.

  She lay back down, and the lambs nuzzled up to her for their first feeding. Lambs didn’t smile, but she seemed at absolute peace with her children. Nathan had trouble breathing. His lungs were clogged with some type of emotion he couldn’t decipher, but it felt like jealousy. And not the fun kind. The sad type of envy when you know someone has something you never will have.

  “This is so important right now,” Liam said. “This is when mother and lambs bond.”

  “Excuse me. I need…fresh air.” Nathan left the barn. It had begun to rain, but he didn’t care about getting wet. Raindrops thwacked against his clothes, quickly soaking through his shirt. Water cascaded over his hair strands and onto his face. They hid the tears that sprung from his eyes. He thought of Tilly feeding her lambs, Tilly nuzzling them to sleep, Tilly protecting them from potential threats, Tilly licking dirt off their wool—those precious, intimate moments that mothers had with their children, the ones that made people feel safe even as adults. Tilly and her lambs, and every ewe in this hoof house, would have a bond Nathan never had. There was no nuzzling, no protective instinct for him. His mother dumped him as soon as he was born. How could a person ever recover from not having that bonding time? It left him with a missing piece that he would never replace. He was damaged goods, permanently.