Dirty Chick by Antonia Murphy Page B

life on a farm. Also, we did stupid things like keep alpacas for fun.
    Hamish’s skepticism about our credentials was perfectly fair. Farming was his livelihood, and we thought it was some kind of a lark. You don’t see dairy farmers moving to the city with big ideas about being cardiologists for fun. “How hard could it be?” they might chortle, spitting tobacco and hitching up their jeans. “I’ll just git me a book from the library.”
    Which is more or less what we were doing. Playing at being in the country, like those eighteenth-century oil paintings of Marie Antoinette herding sheep. Not that we were French nobility. We were just another couple of hyper-entitled Americans with liberal arts degrees and a farm dream.
    Clearly, I had no credibility with the locals. And for the first time since middle school, I actually wanted to fit in. I liked thesefriendly people with their backyard sheep and their kids, their easy discussion of chicken bowels and the slime coat on an eel. I didn’t understand Hamish, but I respected him. I wanted to learn some of his skills.
    â€œMaybe we should get a real animal,” Peter suggested. “We might redeem ourselves that way.”
    â€œWhat about a goat?” I replied. “Amanda said we could just
have
Pearl. We wouldn’t need to pay for her or anything.” I left out the part about goats being a lot of work, because that seemed like a minor detail.
    â€œA goat, huh?” Peter looked skeptical. “What do you get from a goat?”
    â€œCheese, of course! Delicious cheese!”
    â€œ
Cheese!
” Silas yelled, jumping over to his father. He was wearing a matching red shirt and sweatpants. Hopping up and down with excitement, he looked like a demented elf. “Cheese, peese!” he hollered.
    Then he reached out a hand and tried to touch Peter’s computer. Peter
hates
this. Children who touch his computer pop letters off the keyboard and smear greasy handprints on the monitor. “Stop it, Silas!” Peter snapped. “That’s Papa’s computer!”
    Silas found this hilarious, and resumed hopping. He pulled a tiny car out of his pocket and then tried to touch Peter’s computer with the car.
    â€œ
Ha!
” Peter barked. “Not even with the car, Silas!” He put up his hand. “
Stop
.”
    Miranda made her entrance then, sporting a purple feather wig and a rainbow bathing suit. As usual, she wore her shiny black gumboots. “Papa!” She strode to her father.
    â€œYes?” he asked, turning away from Silas, who immediately started pounding the computer.
    â€œDo you want to smell my finger?”
    â€œNo.”
    â€œIt smells like poop!” She placed her finger to her nose, inhaling as though sniffing a fine wine.
    Peter looked at me wearily. “What were we talking about?”
    â€œBeats the hell out of me.”
    â€œGoats,” he said, sighing. “We’re getting a goat. I guess we’ll call Amanda in the morning.”
    Eventually we calmed the children down. I washed Miranda’s hands and pulled off her gumboots, convincing her that cotton pajamas were more suitable sleepwear than a feathered wig. We tucked in the kids and read them a story, then checked on the alpacas and put the chickens on their roosts. Finally, we lay down to sleep. Our bed was situated beneath a large picture window, and on clear nights we could see thousands of stars, just above our heads.
    Peter kissed my neck and reached for my hand in the dark. “Don’t worry,” he soothed. “We’ll find our place here.”
    â€œAre you sure? What about Silas?”
    â€œHe’ll find his place, too. It’s good for him out here. Chasing chickens, petting his dog.”
    I sat up. “Wait a minute. What’s that?”
    â€œWhat’s what?”
    â€œThere’s an alpaca nose on my leg.”
    Peter pulled me to him. “No, baby.