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With a crisp snap, Nicole cut through the wire of the fence on either side of the cow, who was still on her side, her pregnant belly swollen and weighing her down. Then, quick as a jackrabbit, Nicole got to the cow’s side and started unwrapping the wire from the back leg.
“Here!” she called, and Brendan was by her side in a flash, trying hard to keep out of the way of the cow’s hooves. “Take the wire as I unwrap it.”
They worked in tandem as quickly as possible, dodging a kick or two, the cow’s distressed cries louder than Brendan thought it was possible for an animal to be. But with a final twang, the last of the wire came loose, Nicole nearly falling backwards into the mud as she tugged it off. Now free, the animal was starting to rock side to side to get enough momentum to stand up.
“Out of the way,” said Nicole, pushing Brendan ahead of her as the cow stood up, continuing to bellow out dramatically, getting onto all four feet and giving herself a mighty shake.
“Youabsolutedrama queen,” said Nicole, sounding like a schoolteacher scolding a kid for being a tattletale. “Anyone would think you were dying — and it didn’t even cut through the skin! You’re a pain in the butt, the lot of you. Tell me whose idea it was to domesticate cattle, because they clearly didn’t understand how stupid you creatures are, good God.”
Continuing to mutter under her breath while Brendan looked on, not much use to her, she crouched down and carefully eyed the cow’s legs, making sure that there really wasn’t any serious injury. It must have been fine because she stood up, sighed, and brushed her hands off on her jeans.
“Useless, every single last one of you,” she said, shaking her head in dismay at the herd which were now going back to grazing like nothing had happened. Brendan rolled up the loose strand of wire, hooking it over the handle of the ATV and out of the way. His hands were shaking a little, he noticed. Maybe it was just adrenaline, or the exertion of it, the excitement. But Nicole seemed perfectly relaxed, staring at the now destroyed fence with her hands on her hips and a frown on her face.
“Well, we can add that to the to-do list,” she sighed. “Fix fence. I don’t know if I even have enough wire, so there’s another trip to town…”
Brendan knew he should be listening to her, that he should probably be taking notes, even. But he was overrun with a sudden sense of dread as he felt a familiar tightness in his chest, a shortness of breath.No, no, no. He was fine, this wasn’t another heart attack, he wasfine.
Brendan took a deep breath, the deepest he could manage, and stood as tall as he could, as if that would somehow help his blood flow better, his heart beat slower. They had pulled her out, the wire was gone, it was fine, everything was fine…
Turning away from Nicole so she wouldn’t see, Brendan put two fingers to the pulse point on his wrist to measure how fast his pulse actually was. Not that he really needed to; he could feel his heart thrumming away in his chest at a dangerous speed and now he wasn’t entirely sure if the cold sweat over his face was from the exertion of rescuing the cow or from his heart working harder than it was meant to.
“You okay?” asked Nicole, forcing him to turn to answer her. She was looking at him worriedly as he stood there, still breathing hard while she seemed completely fine, as if they’d done nothing more strenuous than take a brisk walk.
“Fine,” he lied. “I’m fine.”
It was pretty obvious she didn’t believe him. “How about we go back to the house for lunch,” she said, hoisting up the bolt cutters that were nearly as long as she was tall and walking back to the ATV.
She knew. Of course she knew; she was far too observant not to figure out what was going on, between his shallow breaths and the panic that was probably spread all over his face. And she was proud enough herself to understand that sometimes acknowledging that something was wrong only made things ten times worse, that pretending it was all okay was the only way to calm things down.
Something else spiked through his chest at the realization that she was taking care of him. A warmth directed solely at Nicole.
“Yeah,” he said, relieved when his voice came out even and solid. “Yeah, let’s get back.”
He drove, with Nicole once more in charge of wrangling the bolt cutters across her lap, and now that they weren’t racing across the farm at breakneck speed, it gave Brendan some time to think. He had been wrong to call this “the simple life.” No wonder Nicole had sneered at him when he’d referred to living on a farm assimple. It was the hardest he’d ever worked in his life — and looking back to when he’d thought sitting at a desk, sifting through emails and contracts had beenhard workfilled him with embarrassment. Not to mention getting the cow out of that mangled fence just now proved that it wasn’t just hard; it was dangerous. If Nicole had been on her own, Brendan wasn’t sure how she’d have managed.
Him on the other hand? Not a chance. He would have probably ended up hurting himself, or hurting the animal even more, or most likely hurting them both at the same time.
Brendan had known for a while now that he’d underestimated how difficult it was to run a farm, even a “small” one like this, but it was only now, with his pulse thumping in his throat and his hands still trembling just a little too much, that he realized how severe that misunderstanding had been. Not only that, but how catastrophic the consequences could have been because he hadn’t had any idea of what he was doing.
No wonder Nicole had given him the cold shoulder, acting like he was a little kid under her feet. That’s exactly what he had been. And no wonder she still gave him those hard, judgmental looks sometimes when he said something that had her wondering why he’d ever thought buying a farm was a good idea.
He had always liked her, to some degree at least, but he’d also always thought she was frigid and bitter. But really, now, looking back, he couldn’t blame her for reacting the way she had. She must have thought he was so stupid… and she wouldn’t have been wrong either.
By the time they got back to the house, the bolt cutters returned to their designated spot, the tightness in Brendan’s chest had loosened enough that he was able to push away the panic that had been creeping up on him. Nicole still hadn’t said anything about his clammy appearance, but she had walked a little slower than usual, talking the whole time about how she was tired today and wanted an extra-long lunch where she could sit and relax for a bit. It was enough to calm Brendan down somewhat, leaving him searching for ways to thank her.
* * *
After the chaos of getting the cow out of the tangle of wire fencing, they were running behind with the rest of the day’s tasks.
Brendan tried to turn his brain off and just focus on the tasks immediately in front of him. But as the sun set and they continued working in the milking shed, lit up only by the fluorescent lights above, every now and then a shadow of a twinge would pass through his chest.
He convinced himself he was just being paranoid; he was panicking about nothing making it worse.
Apparently he wasn’t very good at hiding it, though. Nicole didn’t outright ask if something was wrong, that wasn’t really her style, but she kept throwing him concerned glances when she thought he wouldn’t notice. That helped him more than anything, knowing that she was aware something was off, that he was thinking too hard on something and maybe his hand drifted to his chest more often than it normally would. Nicole wasn’t exactly cuddly, but it eased the sharpness around his thoughts to know that if he wanted to, he could probably tell her something was wrong, that he needed help, and she wouldn’t completely brush him off.
Maybe that was just wishful thinking, though. She no longer cursed the ground he walked on, and hewantedto be her friend, but he could never really get a handle on what she was thinking. If he was being honest with himself, friendship wasn’t the first thing that sprung to mind when he considered the position Nicole now held in his life… but he didn’t feel like being honest with himself right now.
Brendan was broken out of his reverie by a string of swearing behind him. He turned to see Nicole kicking a footstool away in frustration.
