By the time it hits ten, I've downed a second beer and I'm ready for bed. I lock the main door and double check the balcony door before heading to the bedroom. It's basic, with a queen size bed, a dresser, and night table. The black out curtains over the two windows are the only decorations I have in here. I've lived here for two years and have bought all the furniture I want, made the rooms comfortable, but there is nothing on my walls. I don't know what to add.
Pictures of my family are out of the question. I would rather not remember them. Not with the way we ended things. Stock photos seem weird and pictures of animals seem… Off. I'm not sure. I flip the light off and pull down the blanket. Another Friday night sleeping alone.
Chapter Two
"Fuck,Charlie."Ispinaround and drop my hands, not sure what else to do. "Why would you sign something like that?"
I stare down my older brother. He's nearing fifty and looks every bit the age. He's sitting behind his desk, with papers spread across the top, like a fucking showcase of all the mistakes he's made in the last four months. I knew after the first time he came to me that I'd need to find something else. He signed a contract, there's no backing out. By the end of the harvest season this year, I'm out of a job. I'm out of a home. The only home I've known my entire life and the only fucking job I've done since I was twelve and old enough to learn to drive the tractor.
"He didn't tell me all of that was in the contract," Charlie says. His voice is gruff, deep, like he's defending his actions. "He said this would help us."
"You sold the farm, Char!" I know my voice is carrying through the whole house. I'm sure Joyce can hear me in the kitchen. She's making supper tonight for us, one of the last we'll havehere. "You sold our cattle, our pigs, and all but the land around your damn house. You sold my house!"
My blood is boiling. Charlie loved the farm as much as I did growing up and I was more than happy for him to take over when our Daddy retired. I don't mind working for him. Most of the time, he runs decisions by me, but this one… I fall into the seat, hearing it creak under my weight. It's an old chair and I've kept my six-foot-two ass in shape with all the work around here.
"I've called them for another meeting, Nelson." I can see that my words are finally sinking in for him. I don't know what this guy came in and said to Charlie, but it sure as hell couldn't have been 'Hey, let us buy everything and ruin your brother's whole livelihood'. "I'm going to try and negotiate."
"You can't negotiate after you sign the documents," I say.
"You know you can stay here," Charlie says.
"I'm not moving in with my brother at forty-years-old." I run my hand down my face and sigh. Charlie, for what it's worth, does look regretful. He signed the contract without telling me, without even discussing it with me. I think that's what hurts the most is he did this behind my back. "I knew things were tight, but why didn't you tell me you were selling? I think I, of all people, deserved to know that."
"I thought it was just a section, on the back end." Charlie leans forward, shuffling the papers. He taps one of them, where his signature is plain as day.
I slide the paper off the desk and look at it once again. Not that I need to. I know what it says. Five hundred acres. Sold to a corporation that will most likely plow it over and build some hotel or tourist attraction for the rich to pretend they are living in the country side. He sold five hundred acres of our five hundred and fifty acre farm. The same farm land that's been in our family for six generations now. It's all I've ever known.
The paper slips from my fingers as I drop it back to the desk.
"I'm going to fix this, Nel." Charlie sounds convinced, but I'm not. When I got the notice— a man knocking on my door at six in the morning telling me I'd be homeless by the end of October— I thought it was a joke at first. Until I saw Charlie's face. He wouldn't look me in the eyes. I didn't know what else to do. I barely graduated high school over twenty years ago. I don't have any skills that would make it in an office job. I need something physical to do, but most jobs today require certification or a degree. A friend of a friend is looking to hire a construction manager in the fall when his retires, but I need updated credits under my belt to qualify with the licensing.
So, on top of everything going on, I'm taking a summer class at the local college.
Nelson Hargraves, forty-year-old single man, going back to college.
Oh, and I'm gay. Not that that makes any difference about my situation, but it's just a fact. Well, it could explain why I'm single. Most gay men in this area see a guy like me at the bar and assume I'll top them. I can, and on the rare occasion I do, but my preference definitely lies in the other direction. They assume and it's always an awkward explanation. Especially if we've already made it to the bathroom or outside. Most nights end up with me still going home alone.
"I've gotta get ready for tomorrow," I say and stand up. I don't wait for anymore explanations or excuses.
I nod at Joyce as I walk through the kitchen and to the front door. My house is on the property, about a five minute drive further off the road. I love the privacy of the house. It was my parents', our family home growing up. My grandparents lived in the house my brother is in now. The one that they are able to keep after everything is sold and shut down.
I kick off my boots before stepping into the house. There are so many memories in this house that I don't want to part with.The photos of our family from when myself and my brother were kids. Our parents are still alive, but they've moved to some retirement community up North. It was part of Mom's deal with Dad. She grew up on the farm, was fine with helping out, played the dutiful wife for Dad. Raised the two of us on the farm. She learned how to wrangle a snake out of the house, helped with the chores on occasion. When they got to retirement age, her and Dad made a pact. When one of us kids was good and ready to take over, they'd move away and enjoy their later years. I visit them as often as I can and they do still come to the farm several times a year. Mom loves having Dad to herself though. She would always joke that his first wife was the farm, even though I knew Dad would do anything for our Mom.
Dad talks about the yard improvements he's done every time we're on the phone. I get my work ethic from him; he can't stay still to save his life. Seventy-years-old and he can still run circles around Charlie and myself.
My first stop is the bedroom to strip out of my clothes. I'm sweaty from driving the tractor today in this heat. The summer isn't going to be kind, weather wise. More than just the weather now, I think as I slump down on the edge of my bed, jeans around my ankles. My fingers undo each button slowly of my shirt before I shrug out of it and pull off the white undershirt as well.
I go through the motions of showering and dressing back into some casual clothes for the night. My mind is swirling between the contract, finding a new place to live, and class that starts tomorrow. It's my first class, Introduction to Business, in decades and I'm nervous. I know I've probably annoyed the teaching — professor? — already with my emails. I'm just nervous. I tend to overexplain.
I don't know how to feel about the backpack sitting on the dining table. It has two notebooks and a mix of pencils and pens.I don't have a laptop or the textbook, but I've ordered both and they should be here within the week. Not that I know how to use the laptop, but I'm sure I could get my nephew to show me. Charlie and Joyce's boy is smart as a whistle when it comes to technology.
It's only nine when I finish eating a dinner for one and move to sit on the front porch. My favorite rocking chair sits along the left edge of the porch, angled to overlook the pasture where the cows graze. We have a decent herd, definitely not the largest in the state, that we sell for both meat and use for dairy. The last of the babies were born at the end of May and the area we keep them in, I can monitor from my porch. I see a few of them running around. One headbutts another and it makes me laugh. I know that the majority of our cows are sold for meat every few years, a fact of life for farmers, but they're cute to watch when they're little.
The sun sets behind the mountains thirty minutes later and I head inside before the mosquitos get too bad. The house is two levels, big enough to fit a family of four when we were growing up. It's big for just one person, half the rooms are barely touched. I always pictured having my own family here, teaching my kids to be gentle to animals, how life on the farm works, taking them to the creek to splash and play around in the water.
I hug the extra pillow tight to my chest and close my eyes, hoping to fall asleep quickly.
Chapter Three
