Page 11 of The Goat Next Door

“And you,” I say, stepping closer to the rail and pointing my pen at his nose. “You are Tom Ford. Sleek, authoritative, slightly intimidating, but ultimately a classic.”

Tom Ford does not move. He lets out a low, wet snort.

“Come here, Tom,” I coo, reaching my hand out over the wooden rail, palm up, the way the internet told me to approach animals. “Come on, boy.”

The goat doesn’t budge.

Behind him, Vivienne and Gucci are currently engaged in a violent wrestling match over a dead thistle, but Tom Ford remains a monument of cream-colored spite.

From the road behind me, the distant rumble of an engine catches my attention.

I look over my shoulder, half-expecting to see Brooks’s heavy white truck returning to check on me—or more likely, to hand me an invoice for his mailbox.

But the driveway is empty.

The lane leading past my house toward his property is quiet.

He’s probably in town, doing heroic fire chief things or organizing his feelings into a neatly categorized list.

I turn back to the fence. “Alright, Tom. Let’s try this again. Chanel! Prada! Tom Ford!”

None of them look up. Valentino is currently trying to eat a piece of loose bark off the fence.

I sigh, leaning my chin on my hands. “Come on, guys. I paid like a million dollars for this lifestyle. The least you could do is acknowledge the hierarchy.”

A soft, raspy voice cuts through the wind from the direction of the road. “He don’t answer to that.”

I jump, my boots sliding in the mud as I spin around.

Standing on the grassy shoulder just outside the fence line is an elderly man.

He’s wearing a pair of faded overalls that look like they’ve been washed approximately four thousand times, a stained John Deere cap, and he’s leaning on a wooden walking stick that is carved to look like a snake.

“Oh! Hello,” I say, recovering my posture and wiping a bit of mud off my sleeve. “I’m Emmy. I just bought the—”

“I know,” the old man interrupts. “You’re the city girl. Arthur’s real estate man said you had purple hair on the internet.”

“It was temporary,” I clarify, clicking my pen. “Are you a neighbor?”

He ignores the question entirely, pointing his carved snake stick at the massive goat. “That one there. He don’t know who Tom Ford is. He don’t care about no high-street designers.”

“What does he answer to?”

“Kevis,” the old man grunts.

I blink. “Kevis? Like… Kevin with an ‘S’?”

“Kevis,” he repeats. “Arthur named him after his cousin who got kicked out of the county fair for rigging the pumpkin weigh-in. He only listens to Kevis. And he only likes stale saltine crackers.”

I turn back to the fence, skeptical. I clear my throat, leaning over the rail toward the giant animal. “Kevis?”

The goat’s ears instantly twitch. His head snaps up, his rectangular eyes locking onto mine with a sudden, terrifying intensity. He lets out a loud, eager BARRRRRHM and trots over to the fence, shoving his nose directly against my jumpsuit sleeve.

“Oh,” I say, taking a step back as Kevis tries to nibble on my zipper. “Well. That is… confusing for the brand, but we can work with it. Kevis it is.”

I look back to the road to thank the old man for the tip, but he’s already shuffling down the asphalt, his walking stick clicking against the ground. He doesn’t look back once.

“Great,” I mutter, checking my watch. It’s nearly noon. “You know what? Keep your original names. Apparently I’m the only one here who cares about aesthetics. Kevis the goat. Sure. Why not.”