Chapter 1 -- Ivy
The blind in my bedroom window is not the best. It hangs a little crooked and the bottom three slats are bent slightly. In the morning, the sun shines right through that gap and hits me square in the face. I stopped using an alarm clock. Now I just get up when the sun does.
I know it sounds early, but I live on a farm and everything you've ever heard about a farm is true, including that farm life always starts early.
That morning, I got up even before the sun reached the hole in the blinds. I don't know why, probably nerves. I hadn't slept well. I never did the first night Dad was gone.
I liked having the place to myself. I mean, I liked being able to whatever I wanted whenever I wanted. But the giant house felt even bigger when it was just me.
I wasn't afraid. No, living out in the middle of nowhere, on a farm almost no one even knew existed, teaches you that there isn't much to be afraid of. Not out here.
No, being alone in the house, it just felt empty. A house needs more than one person. Deserves it. Especially a place as big as our house.
So, instead of tossing and turning, lying in bed just waiting for the sun to reach my face, I got up, got dressed, and made some breakfast. I didn't bother with pajama bottoms or a shirt though. As soon as I got out of the shower I just walked straight to the kitchen for a cup of coffee, naked as the day I was born.
I poured a little cream into my coffee and watched as the clouds of white liquid swirled through the black, blossoming to the top. Then I saw dad's note sitting by the loaf of bread.
Don't forget the Kurtalium. Twice a day with the new stock! Morning and evening. Aunt Jessica won't be coming to check on you this trip, she is already in San Fran. to meet your brother. Should have plenty of everything, if not, order whatever you need. Back as soon as everything is settled. - Love, Dad.
Short and sweet, just the way dad liked. I knew about the Kurtalium, didn't know about Jessica.
The day before he had left, dad had quizzed me twice on the daily routine I had been living through for years. You would have thought it was the first time I had ever been home alone before. Yet, here was a note, going over the details, one more time.
Morning and night. Don't forget. It's really important.
It had taken everything I had not to roll my eyes while he told me for the umpteenth time.
This season is going to be a good one, Ivy.
He had been so optimistic when the latest herd had arrived a few days ago.
It was the same thing he had been saying since we had started the farm, back when we could only afford two, back when we worked a wheat crop in addition to the stable.
Now we had four and dad was working on a new building that would give us space to take on boarders, something dad wanted to do to expand.
I walked around the house naked while I drank my coffee. I hated the fact that everyone got to go to Gavin's graduation and placement except me. I didn't really care much about the graduation, except for the parties Gavin told me they were going to have afterwards.
The thing I was really interested in, the real reason I wanted to go, was because I had never been any further away from the farm than Denby or Lentin, the little crap towns out here in the middle of nowhere, forty minutes from everywhere. You know just far enough away to be inconvenient.
I had never been to a city where there were buildings that were so tall they looked like they disappeared in the clouds. A real city where people didn't wear boots all day and there were restaurants and saloons. Out here, in the country, when you stepped out the front door, you couldn't see another house. I had only heard stories of a restaurants and department stores. On the radio I listened to Macy's day parade and dreamed of New York.
I walked to the back of the house and looked out toward the barn. The sun was just cresting the horizon, the slanted light fell across the grass and the dew looked like a field of diamonds.
Our barn was a simple thing. It was a two-story building, the bottom half was still the original stone, then there was wood and aluminium where it had been enlarged. The front had two big doors that slid open wide enough to allow tractors and farm equipment inside.
I have always liked the old barn. The stone my great grandfather used, matches the house. Big, grey stones mortared into a wall ten feet tall. The rest of the barn and the house were built on top of the stone.
Nothing else on the property matched. Everything was built at different times and with different materials. The utility/office building my grandfather had built when he was in his twenties was made of corrugated steel and had two windows. He had built it as the family's first real office. A place he could work on the paperwork and finances of running a farm.
Now it was the place we used to store some of the more expensive equipment and supplies because it was just ahead of the stalls.
The quick paint job dad & Gavin had given it a couple of summers back was starting to fade. The hopeful bright blue starting to shift into a darker shade as the years passed.
I looked down at the hard-packed earth between the house and the barn and thought of all the people, all the family that had crossed back and forth, morning, noon, and night for over a hundred and fifty years.
Dad used to say the land and our family had worked together so long that we were kin.
I walked out onto the big, back porch and looked out over our land. It was a beautiful thing to watch the dawning sun peak over the horizon beside the big barn. The wide sliver of golden light catching in the hay loft underneath the arched roof line as it climbed higher in the sky.
Even though I knew it wasn't true, it all seemed so still. The breeze barely moved the golden wheat fields that stretched away in every direction.
I laid my hand on the cool stone and looked through the window at the picture of my great grandfather and grandmother standing in front of the house. He had paid for the one level ranch home to be built when he settled with his blushing new bride in the area little more than a century ago. My grandfather, Steven had built the simple home to make room for the family he and Beth knew they would have.
The house expanded during his lifetime. He and his two sons made additions as needed and money allowed.
Then the war came. My great uncle died on a hill in Europe. His brother returned to the farm and with far more modest aims, worked the land and took on a little livestock. Before he died, and left the farm to his only son, my dad. He had doubled the amount of acreage we had.
Coffee in hand I did a couple fancy pirouettes on the covered wooden porch that wrapped around the rear of the house without spilling a drop. A ballerina I wasn't but I carried myself with more than a little grace.
The rooster, Henry, crowed from along the northern retaining wall. It was getting late. With a heavy sigh, I retreated into the house to get dressed.
The bedrooms in the house were all down one hallway. Gav's was first, then mine, and dads was on the end. His was the only one with a little en suite bathroom in the bedroom. The other bathroom was just after Gav's room on the opposite side of the hall.
Nostalgia, however brief, caused me to peek in for a heartbeat.
The room was just the way he had left it when he went back to university for the holiday. The bed had been hastily made, the blanket barely tossed up toward the pillow - messy. It made me smile, I missed him.
It seemed so weird that I would probably never see him again. Even before graduation, Gav had been contracted by one of the bigger mining companies. Geology was hot everywhere, especially in the rings and outer belts.
Dad and my Aunt would get to see him and the following morning, he was supposed to board a transport.
He had left me a letter after the last visit. We had said our goodbyes the night before and he had slipped it under my door. He had said that he loved me and that he would miss me.
It was strange sharing a life with someone for so long and then they just go, disappear into a life somewhere else.
I smiled when I saw the loose clothes piled rudely into a corner. Gav had never been the neatest person, smart but messy and his hurried simplicity made me smile.
I missed him.
My room told a slightly different story. Gav and dad were simplistic, minimalists. They were rugged and practical. They both liked both clean and dirty clothes in piles rather than hanging in a closet. They hardly ever made their beds and shoes stayed where they were kicked off.
Modern and simple were more my speed. Not quite what you would call girly, not quite tomboyish, but I liked colour and order. The wall behind my bed was painted a deep green. I had a painting I had bought in Denby hanging over my headboard, a landscape with rolling hills and cotton ball clouds. It was simple and peaceful.
Another major difference was the long mirror hanging on the wall beside my dresser. My reflection caught my eye for a moment and I paused.
My smile became a frown.
I hate the way I look. I always have. I'm not quite rail thin, but I'm real close - one of the wider fence posts on the edge of the property could give me a run for my money. It can never be said that I lack curves, they're just sparing. My bust, though pleasing, was just large enough to consider wearing a bra on a good day. Needless to say, I went without unless I was made to dress civilized -- mostly just funerals and weddings. Sometimes we would go to church, but I think that had less to do with God and more to do with Stacey Middleton, Stephanie's widowed mother.
I did a little turn in front of the mirror.
My butt was tight but just as unflattering. Every other woman I've met has been more pronounced, more feminine than me. A silhouette that made it clear they were women.
The up side was I was taller than normal for my age. Always had been.
Both my dad & aunt Jessica said I took after my mother in that department. That I get my brown hair & green eyes from her along with my silly giggle.
She died a day or two after I was born. Labour hadn't gone smoothly. Apparently, I hadn't been excited to exit the womb.
Every time dad mentions her he looks a little sad.
