Chapter Nineteen
Chapter
Nineteen
“We can give it a try,” the woman said, her
dark brown eyes focused on Lucas’s. “That’s all. Just a try. If
you’re useful, and if you’re good with the animals, I can probably
find work for you. But if you’re more trouble than you’re worth,
you won’t be around for long. You understand?”
“Absolutely. Yes.”
“I didn’t ask Father Groban what you were in
jail for, and I don’t want to know. He wouldn’t send you out here
if it was cruelty to animals, and anything other than that can be
forgiven. You understand?”
Understanding wasn’t the same as agreeing, so
Lucas nodded. “Yes ma’am.”
“I don’t like being called ‘ma’am’. You can
call me Elise. If we get along, I don’t mind you using my first
name, and if we don’t get along, you won’t be around long enough to
call me anything. At least not to my face.”
“Okay.”
She looked at him as if she suspected him of
being insincere, then turned abruptly and stalked off toward the
barn. Her hair was brown with only a few strands of grey, and it
waved behind her in a long, thick ponytail. If Father Groban hadn’t
spilled the beans, Lucas would have believed that the woman was in
her fifties, or maybe even her forties. Her face was creased, sure,
but it seemed reasonable to believe that the lines were from
spending long days in the sun rather than from age. And her worn
jeans and flannel shirt seemed to be covering a body that was
working better than most people’s of any age.
“Are you coming?” She’d stopped walking and
was staring back at him like he was just as defective as she’d
suspected. Damn.
“Sorry.” He jogged to catch up and tried to
focus on what she was saying. He needed this chance.
Luckily, she didn’t seem too put out. “My
other helper will be here a bit late this morning. I don’t pay him,
so I’m more flexible about his hours. He’s thinking about being a
vet, so he wanted to get some experience with animals. And he
needed to find a place to work for a co-op credit at school, or
something.”
Father Groban had been right, apparently. It
was easier for Elise to accept help if she thought she was helping
out in return.
“He’ll show you the ropes, in terms of basic
jobs—the animals in that shed there are seriously ill and we have
to be really careful with them, so I’ll take care of that. You’ll
work in the main barn, the fields, and the other out-buildings,
with the animals that are healthier.”
“You keep healthy animals here?”
“We try not to. The ultimate goal is to get
the wild animals back in the wild, and to find homes for the
domestic animals. But some of the wild animals are hurt too badly
to be completely rehabilitated, so it would be a death sentence to
release them. And some of the domestic animals are hard to adopt
out—too ugly, or too old or disabled. So we try to make them happy
here.”
“That’s nice,” Lucas said without
thinking.
Elise frowned at him. “This isn’t a
fairytale. A lot of the animals die. A lot of the ones we manage to
keep alive never really adjust to captivity. Some of them…” She
shook her head. “Some of them would probably be better off
dead.”
Lucas had no idea how to respond to that.
Likely best to just keep his mouth shut, but apparently his mouth
didn’t agree with that strategy. “It’s too bad we can’t find a way
to let them talk. So they could tell us.”
She gave him a look that was hard to read,
then pushed the barn door open. They stepped into the dark interior
and paused. The air was pungent. It didn’t smell bad, exactly, just
unfamiliar and richly organic. Then Elise flipped the light switch
on and Lucas stopped thinking about the smell.
The brightly lit barn was full of creatures,
like Noah’s Ark with a slightly less efficient counting system. One
side of the space seemed to be for larger animals—a few deer and a
sway-backed horse shared a pen, and there was something shuffling
around in the enclosure next to them that looked a lot like a
porcupine. The middle section was lined with wire cages large
enough for a person to stand in, and Lucas could see a raccoon in
the closest one. On the far wall a screened-in aviary extended the
entire length of the barn, with a handful of small birds perched
and watching the visitors and something larger, maybe a wild
turkey, huddled in the corner.
“Normally they’d be outside by now. I kept
them in so you could see how we do things. You should come earlier
tomorrow. We need to keep them in at night because of predators,
but the more time they spend outside, the better. Get here at
dawn.” She gave him a moment to object, then said, “This is the
feed room, over here. Everyone in this barn is an herbivore or an
omnivore. It’s easier for them to recover if they aren’t smelling a
predator in the cage next door.”
“But you keep carnivores too?”
“In the outbuildings.” There was a certain
satisfaction in her voice as she said, “The predators are my
favorites.” A pause, then, “But we’ll start you in here. It’s a bit
safer.”
“That porcupine doesn’t look too safe.”
“He’s not for petting. And watch his hind
leg—he got hit by a car, and it’s broken.”
“Somebody carried an injured porcupine in
here to get help?”
“Somebody called me after seeing him by the
side of the road, and I carried him in. He was in bad shape when I
got there, so it wasn’t too tricky. Could be interesting getting
him back out when he’s healthy, though.” She sounded like she was
looking forward to the excitement.
The rest of the tour was conducted in a
similar style. Elise was never friendly, exactly, but she had a
clear enthusiasm for her work and compassion for the animals in her
care, and Lucas found himself feeling almost hopeful for the first
time in a very long time. Maybe there was a place for him here.
Maybe Father Groban hadn’t been crazy with his talk about finding a
job that was rewarding, doing work that really meant something.
Maybe Lucas could have that. Maybe he could find a way to
contribute, and to start earning his way back into society.
An hour or so later he was crouched on the
gravel driveway scrubbing water buckets, his fingers numb from the
cold well water, when he heard Elise call his name.
He looked up to see her walking toward him
with a dark-haired teenage boy. The kid was wearing a pair of
overalls with no shirt underneath. It wasn’t clear whether the
outfit was meant to be a parody of a stereotypical hillbilly or
whether the kid was sincere.
Elise didn’t seem to care. “Alex, this is
Lucas. He’s maybe going to be working here.” She looked around at
the clean buckets drying in the sun and nodded grudgingly before
turning back to Alex. “Not too much more to do with these. Help him
finish up and then throw down some hay. Then show him how to
measure the feed for the barn animals. And don’t teach him your
tricks—no special treats. Follow the list.”
Alex grinned at her, then leaned around and
grabbed one of the dirty buckets. “I hate this part of the job,” he
said quietly to Lucas. “I’m glad you’re almost done!”
“It’s not bad today,” Lucas said, “But I bet
it’s rough in the winter.”
“In the winter, she lets you use warm water!
It’s actually better, because it thaws out your hands.” They worked
in silence for a while as Elise headed off to whatever tasks were
keeping her busy, and then Alex said, “So, you’re doing this as,
like, a job? For good?”
“I don’t know. Maybe.” Lucas let the
“hopefully” go unsaid. No point in exposing himself to this kid, as
nice as he seemed.
“You totally should.” Alex sounded as if he
thought the choice was Lucas’s. “I guess it might not pay much, but
it’s a great spot. Elise is crusty, but she’s a softy underneath it
all.” He rinsed the last bucket and placed it in the row. “I’m in a
youth group. It’s kind of with a church, but it’s not really
church-y, you know? Anyway, I’m trying to get Elise to let us have
an end-of-school barbeque out here. I want everyone else to see how
cool it is. And she’s going to let me, I’m pretty sure. She’ll
bitch about it, but she’ll go along in the end.”
Apparently Alex liked to chat, and Lucas
didn’t object. But he didn’t have a whole lot to contribute,
either. Still, Alex probably only needed a few prompts to keep
going. “Father Groban’s church?” Lucas put his own clean bucket in
the row and stood, stretching his creaking back.
Alex nodded. “His church. But he’s not the
priest for the youth group. Another guy’s in charge of that. He’s
pretty cool, really. Father Webber. Do you know him?”
Three years of prison had perfected Lucas’s
already solid abilities to keep his emotions from showing on his
face. So he was pretty sure Alex didn’t notice his reaction. “Not
really,” he said after a brief moment. Then, because he needed to
have as much warning as possible, he casually asked, “Does he come
out here to check on you?”
“He did once. But he’s not even working right
now. Some family emergency.” Alex shrugged as if family emergencies
were a sad fact of life, then started toward the barn. “Come on.
I’ll show you how to do the hay. It sucks, too, but in a totally
different way than washing the water buckets.”
Lucas followed obediently and tried to
marshal his racing thoughts. The priest had only been out to the
farm once. It didn’t mean anything. It wasn’t the end. Not for
sure. This could still work out. It was an unpleasant reminder of
the past, but that was good, because it was what Lucas deserved. He
had been starting to forget.
He’d been thinking about a future for
himself, and forgetting about the man whose future he’d taken
away.