Or just plain stupid.
“You won’t even know they’re there; Eddie and I will look after them, won’t we, Eddie?” I say.
Eddie bounces on the spot. “Yes. I promise,” he stammers, barely able to get the words out through his excitement.
Christopher fakes a smile.
I giggle. “He’s a bit too citified, Keith. This is his first farm and we’ve got to train him up.”
“I am not citified.” Christopher gasps, indignant.
I hold my fingers up to symbolize a pinch. “Little bit.”
“Okay Eddie, pick two, one boy and one girl.” I smile.
Eddie’s eyes widen with excitement. “Are you serious?”
“Aha.”
Eddie drops to his knee and gets to work playing with the pups, while he works out which ones he wants. “This one’s a girl.” I point to the little one in the corner.
“No, she’s too timid, she won’t be a good worker,” says Keith. “Get the naughty ones, they’re the best.”
“Timid works for me,” Christopher whispers with an elbow.
“Come, I’ll show you something else,” Jane smiles to me.
She takes me around the corner into another set of sheds. “Look at these ones.” She opens the door and there are kittens as far as you can see, there must be twenty.
“We had two girls get pregnant before they could get desexed, you can have these for free.”
My eyes widen. Kittens. Christopher really is going to go postal.
His words come back to me: This is your farm, you can do whatever you want to run it and make it feel like home.
“Okay, I’ll take two.” I smile. “Another boy and a girl.”
“Which ones do you want, love?”
I look them over, they’re all pretty similar. The two mothers are sisters, gray and black, there’s a few tortoiseshells and one ginger.
“I’ll have the ginger, if he’s a boy.”
“Yes, I think so, let me check.”
“And the girls, are they ready to go now?”
“Yes, nine weeks old, we really want them to go to a good home. I would be grateful if you take them.”
“Okay, how about this little gray one here.” I pick it up and turn it over, oh, it’s another boy. I put him back down.
A little darker gray one comes over to me and I pick it up and roll it over. “This is a girl.”
“Yeah, she’s cute, that one, real mischievous.”
“I like her already, we’ll take this one too.”
“Let me put them in a box for you, I’ll go inside and get one,” says Jane. She disappears inside and I walk back out to find Christopher and Eddie on their knees surrounded in puppies.
“Do these dogs eat shoes?” Christopher asks.
“If you leave them out they will,” Keith replies dryly.
Christopher twists his lips, unimpressed.
“Do they eat much?”
“They will eat whatever you give them.” Keith frowns over at Christopher. “You’ve never had a dog before?”
Christopher straightens his shirt as if annoyed. “I come from New York, we didn’t have animals growing up.”
“What the hell did you move out here for, then?”
I roll my lips to hide my smile, Christopher must be asking himself the same question. “I fell in love with a country girl and I’m trying to make her happy so I’m learning how to be a farmer now.”
Keith smiles and then chuckles. “You got a big learning curve coming for you, boy, especially if she’s a cowgirl.”
Christopher stays silent as the puppies circle him “I kind of like this little one with sticking-up ears,” he says.
“That’s a girl.”
“Which one do you like, Eddie?” I ask.
“I like this little one here.” There’s a little puppy chewing on his hand.
“Is that a boy?” He turns it round. “Yep, looks like it.”
“So shall we take those two?” I ask.
Christopher drags his hand down his face and I can see that he’s regretting this already. “I guess.”
Eddie is beside himself and almost skips back to the car holding his two puppies.
Me too, I can hardly contain my excitement.
“I’ll have to drop the money back to you, Keith, I don’t have my wallet with me.”
“That’s alright, love, whenever you get to it.”
We head back out toward the car and see Jane standing waiting with the box. “Here you go, love, they will need their injections, they’ve only had their first ones.”
“Thanks, Jane.” I take the box from her.
Christopher’s eyes hold mine. “What’s in the box?”
“Kittens.”
His eyes widen. “As in plural?”
“As in two.”
“I know what cats do in houses and gym bags, Hayden. I did not sign up for this.”
Keith and Jane laugh and so do I.
Christopher fakes a smile and I know he’s literally on the verge of a mental breakdown. We climb into the car and put the puppies in the back seat with Eddie. The two kittens are in the box in the front on my lap. “Nice to meet you.” Keith smiles.
“I wish I could say the same thing,” Christopher mutters under his breath.
I giggle, this is truly hilarious.
The car is silent as we drive down the driveway and I know Christopher is holding his tongue with all of his might, he glances over at me. “Was this your plan all along?” he asks.
Totally.
“What do you mean?” I act innocent.
“Do you mind telling me how on earth we go to meet the neighbors and come home with two dogs and two cats?”
“Farms need animals.”
“Cows, Hayden, they need cows.”
“Trust me, they need cats and dogs too.”
He rolls his eyes.
“Do you want a mice and rat plague, Christopher?”
He glances over at me.
“Yeah that’s right, mice and rats have lice and lice get under your skin and eat you from the inside out.”
“Is that a joke?” he gasps, horrified.
“No, I’m deadly serious. Once you have a lice plague in your home you cannot get rid of them. You have to literally burn the house down to kill them. Cats keep rodents and pests under control, they are the epicenter for a clean and well-kept farm.”
“Well why did you only get two? We should have got four of the fuckers,”
Eddie starts to giggle in the back seat and I turn around to see the two puppies jumping up licking his face, killing him with kindness. “I think he likes you, baby.” I smile.
Christopher’s eyes rise to the rearview mirror and he smirks, even he can’t deny how fun this is. “Relax, dog, you start your wolf kill training as soon as we get home.”
“Who’s going to train him?” I ask.
Christopher widens his eyes. “Hayden Whitmore.”
“So what do I say again?” Christopher asks.
“Say that you need five rolls of chicken wire with the largest thread that they have.”
“But why do I need chicken wire when it’s for dog fences?”
“It’s just called chicken wire but it’s not just for chickens.”