Farm Girl

Table of Contents

Southford, Connecticut

Friday, July 18

Saturday | July 19

August 22

Wednesday | August 27

Friday, 12 noon | August 29

Friday | 1 PM

Saturday morning

Saturday | 10 AM

Labor Day

September 2

Friday | September 5

Monday | September

Friday | September 12

September 13

September 15

September 16

September 17

The End

Southford, Connecticut

Hurry up, Ronnie, you'll be late. The bus is going to be here any minute.

Okay, Mom, I'm coming! Ten year old Veronica Ryan galloped down the stairs of the ancient farmhouse and ran for the front door.

Don't forget your lunch and your books, Matty Ryan yelled as she came back in from the rear porch, a basket of clothes in her hands. Did you finish your breakfast?

Uh, yeah, I ate all I could. Bye, Ronnie called out as she scooped up her book bag and lunch. She bolted for the road, little puffs of dust kicking up from her feet in the dry July air. School normally ended in June, but the previous winter had blasted the state with several blizzards, necessitating an extended term.  Matty put the basket down and went to the door, watching her daughter  until the bus came. Southford, Connecticut was hardly a crime ridden place, but there had been reports of a strange car with Kansas plates cruising the area, and Matty Ryan didn't take chances.

The school bus arrived minutes later, and Ronnie waved to her mother as she scampered aboard. The driver, a long legged blonde with an exceptional chest, waved as well. Matty smiled and waved, then turned back to her kitchen. Pete would have loved to get his hands on that school bus driver. Maybe he did.....he had gotten his hands on half the female population of Connecticut.  She pushed the thoughts of her dead philandering ex-husband  from her mind and sat down at the table. Ronnie had left about half  her cereal.

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Good kid, Matty smiled as she picked up a spoon. She was nearly finished when she noticed that their Cocker Spaniel puppy was pawing at her chair. The dog had been an extravagance she could ill afford, but the joy the little creature brought into their lives made the extra expense inconsequential. Here you go, you little cootie head, she smiled, and set the dish in front of the dog, who practically climbed inside it. Pig, she muttered, and got up to get ready for work.

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At 32, Matty Ryan's employment opportunities were limited by her abilities; her particular skills were not in big demand any more. Rural Southford was rapidly becoming corporate Southford, and farm land was being converted to  closely clipped lawns  in front of huge homes  faster than the few remaining farmers could haul  their next load of vegetables to market. The price was better, too.....seven more farms had been sold in the past year. Stuck in an eighteenth century time warp, Matty had watched her entire way of life and everything she had ever known become worthless overnight, voided by the stroke of a pen held by Dimmick Tucker, local banker and real estate developer.

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Rotten bastard, Matty  muttered as she ascended the creaking stairs of the old house.

Her thoughts often drifted to Tucker; he hung over her land and that of the remaining holdouts like a vulture of progress waiting for the inevitable death throes of his prey to begin. So far, she had managed to stave off his onslaught; she didn't know how long she could continue. Things just weren't going her way.

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Two terrible years in a row had wiped out her bank account and her hopes of ever making a success of farming her fifty acres. Drought had wiped her out the first year, and endless rain had rotted her first planting the year after. She had spent the last of her money to replant, and had watched in utter despair as blistering heat and a horde of insects the likes of which she had never seen before destroyed her last chance at financial freedom. Broke and disillusioned, she had taken a job running a roadside stand for the Kaechele farm down the road.

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Matty had long ago given up on finding a man to help her out of her predicament. The local farms produced losers who were worse off than her, and corporate America viewed people like her with curious disdain. Feed us, yes; climb into our beds, no, I don't think so. Tall and beautiful with flowing dark hair and piercing gray eyes, Matty was unable to get so much as a second glance from the curious breed of snooty executives who now built 5,000 square foot houses on what were once corn fields. It seemed that nobody wanted a farm girl.

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Matty showered and put on a tee shirt and overalls; she put her hair up in a pony tail and stepped back from the mirror. You look like a complete asshole, she laughed. Goddamned Farmer Brown's daughter, is what you are. But you're a good one. Don't ever forget that, she muttered softly, and headed downstairs.

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The Kaecheles were one of the few remaining farm families who were successful. They owed their financial well being to a fortuitous move by old Duke Kaechele, who had bought a 200 acre  plot of land on Route 7 back when it was a horse path. Now over five thousand cars streamed past the Kaecheles' farm stand  daily, draining their bins and baskets as fast as they could fill them. But behind the scenes, things were not so rosy; the younger Kaecheles had gotten into real estate speculation and had lost a great deal of money. They were looking to flush out even, and the extra two hundred acres of arable land the Kaecheles owned could provide a landslide profit.

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Marie and Walter Kaechele still worked the fields, as their ancestors had done for over a hundred years; each morning at sunrise they could be seen shuffling slowly off to the barn  like aged zombies who had been programmed to drive tractors and till soil. Here they would select whatever piece of equipment they would use that day and trudge off to whatever acre needed their attention, never giving any thought at all to the fact that they were both over sixty years old and barely able to do half of what they had been able to do ten years earlier. Today was no different; as Matty prepared to leave for the stand, the elder Kaecheles were working on their second planting of yellow wax beans. Their good for nothing children watched from the house as the John Deere tractor glistened in the sunlight a quarter mile away.

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Jesus, how do they do it? Jason Kaechele shook his head in amazement as he watched the diesel smoke curl up from the tractor's exhaust stack. They've been out there since five o'clock. The slim, blond Jason, at twenty-nine, had never held a regular job in his life and had no plans to do so. His parents had put him through business school and had turned the family finances over to him; it was a mistake the magnitude of which they could never have imagined. The farm was now teetering on the verge of insolvency, thanks to Jason's  duplicitous management skills. Eventually, as Jason  knew, the 200  acres of prime real estate the Kaecheles owned would have to be sold, leaving them with  the original fifty acre homestead and no farm stand. When that day came, Jason would collect a huge kickback from Dimmick Tucker, who had several projects in mind for the area. Farms were not included in those plans.

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They're nuts, twenty-four year old John Kaechele said as he poured himself a cup of coffee. He tossed his shoulder length hair back out of his eyes and slumped into a chair at the kitchen table. Fucking cow shit ate their brains away. John, who fancied himself a rock musician, yawned and picked up a copy of Rock Parade  magazine to see if anyone wanted a bass guitar player who couldn't read music.

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Where's Mary Ann? Jason asked curiously. I didn't hear her come in last night.

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She didn't, John grinned. She's banging some football player from the community college.

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Oh, Jason said offhandedly. Mom will love that if she finds out.

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She won't, John said. Not from us, anyway. Mare knows about our little meeting with Tucker, so keep your mouth shut about her new hobby.

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What happened to that little whore from Summerfield you  were porking? Jason grinned. I haven't seen her around lately.

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Bitch gave me the clap, John spat. I had to get another bootleg prescription from Doc Manson so Pop wouldn't find out. Cost me a hundred bucks.

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Where the hell did you get a hundred bucks? Jason scoffed. You haven't had a job in six months.

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Pop's strong box, John grinned. He never counts it anyway. Hey, I can't run around with my dick on fire, can I?

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Go stick it in the ice woman, Jason laughed. That'll fix it. Damn thing will freeze solid and fall off.

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Ryan? Are you crazy? You remember what she did to me. I'm not going within a hundred yards of her.

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In one of his more amorous moods earlier that year, John had made a very obscene suggestion to Matty, who had then knocked him unconscious with a zucchini squash. He'd had headaches and dizzy spells off and on ever since.

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Yeah, she clocked you a good one, didn't she, Jason smiled.

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I'll get even with her, John shrugged. When we dump this place she'll be out of a job. God knows she can't do anything else, the dumb farm bitch. Watch her squirm then.

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Yeah, Jason mused aloud as he turned back to the pastoral scene in the distance, where his parents labored in the sweltering July  weather. Hey, you wanna go help them out?

Nah, John waved him off. That's Ryan's job. Let her help them.

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For now, it is, Jason grinned. Wonder where she is.

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She was under the hood of her car. After locking up, Matty  had put the key into the ignition of her 1958  Chrysler 300D convertible and had been greeted by a weak moaning noise, then a sick clicking sound. Damn battery, she muttered as she attached a volt meter to the terminals. It read a lethargic four volts instead of the required eleven or twelve. The car had been plagued with electrical problems since the day it was made; today was no different. Something was draining the battery down, but she hadn't had time to analyze the problem. She put the meter away and trotted over to the main barn, where all of her uncle's old equipment was. She kept a fully charged battery on a hand truck for such occasions.

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Matty's Uncle Rob had been in the excavation and demolition business until the death of Matty's father.  Ed Ryan had died of a heart attack six years after the death of his wife June,  who had been killed when she fell asleep at the wheel of the family tractor. Matty had been pregnant with Ronnie when Ed passed away, and Rob had come to live with her until she could get back on her feet. He had helped her with the farm, and she had helped him by learning how to operate, maintain, and repair every piece of equipment he owned. Two years later, Rob was killed in a dynamite accident.

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Matty quickly changed the battery and  turned the key. The big hemi engine groaned, then roared to life. The needle slowly swung over to the good side of the gauge, indicating that the car's generator was functioning. Thank God, she muttered as she hauled the battery cart back to the barn. Had it been the generator, she would have  to dig through several million tons of crap in the barn to find the boxes of Chrysler parts she knew were buried there. The car had been Rob's pride and joy; but now, with over a hundred and ninety thousand miles on it,  it had become Matty's worst nightmare, despite the fact that it  was worth a small fortune as a collector's item.

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This is the fun part, she grinned as she pulled the big convertible onto Judd Road. She mashed the gas pedal to the floor, and the monstrous car launched itself crazily down the road  gulping air through its twin four barrel  carburetors, two long black lines following it as the remains of her tires billowed from the wheel wells. Even at its advanced age, the Chrysler could still outperform most of the new high performance trash Detroit was turning out.

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Good girl, she whispered, patting the dash board. What the hell......there were five or six sets of tires in the barn, too. Five minutes later she was pulling into the parking lot behind the Kaechele Farm Stand. Walter Kaechele was in from the field now, unloading twenty bushel baskets of produce from his wagon. He looked up with his usual silly grin.

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Car trouble again?

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You look up car trouble in the dictionary, and you'll find a picture of that old pig, Matty laughed, pointing at the Chrysler. Here, let me help you with those.

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Why don't you get something newer? Walter asked. You could sell that thing to Jenrette's Antique Auto for the price of a new Cadillac.

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I know, she sighed, but it's all I have to remember my uncle by. That car was his baby. If I sold it, he'd haunt me to my grave. Besides, you should talk, Matty smiled, pointing to Walter's daily transportation, a black 1956 Chevrolet panel truck.

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Hell, that thing only has ten thousand miles on it, he grinned. It's as good as the day I bought it. Not like that gas hog of yours. What's that got on it, a million miles by now?

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Two million, she said defiantly. Where's Marie? she asked, wiping the sweat from her brow. It was going to be another scorcher; her mind drifted to the air conditioner in her bedroom, which she turned on only after six o'clock. Ronnie and the dog slept in her room when it was this hot, so she knew she could look forward to another night of  howling and barking, and the wonderful odor of dog shit courtesy of the puppy, whose favorite pastime was dumping the contents of his guts onto her floor at three AM.

She'll be along shortly, Walter said. She's bringing some tomatoes. They got blight this year......better raise the price.

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Okay, Matty sighed, and made a notation on a chalkboard that tomatoes would now cost a dollar fifty a pound. Not that anyone would notice; they yuppie scum that lived nearby didn’t know what anything was supposed to cost anyway, unless it was cocaine.

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Nice Bibs, Walter grinned, knowing that Matty hated wearing overalls in the heat.

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Bite me, Walter, she said sweetly, and took the last of the baskets off the trailer. Now go get me some butterwax beans. Put some Epsom salts on the new lettuce, too. It looks a little pale.

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Will do, he said, and shuffled off to his tractor. Two customers pulled in, and Matty looked at her watch.

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Shit, quarter to eight and they're here already. It's gonna be a long one.

It's quarter to eight, Tuck! Angela Tucker screamed. Breakfast is getting cold.

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I'll be right down, Dimmick Tucker snapped irritably. Goddamn pain in the ass, he muttered as he finished making the knot in his hundred dollar silk tie. Goddamned breakfast probably sucks anyway. He stepped back from the mirror and frowned......there was a loose thread on his slacks. Incompetent sons of bitches, he spat. Twenty five hundred dollars for a suit, and look at this shit. They'll hear about this, damn them.

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Come on, Tuck, Angela bellowed. You want cold pancakes? If he didn't hurry, she'd call him Dimmick. That would get him going. He hated his first name, and those who dared to use it were either fired, punched, or in her case, threatened with divorce. The quirky name had been his grandmother's maiden name, and his parents had apparently thought it would be a neat thing to saddle their son with, the humorless bastards. Nowadays, though, he was either Tuck or Mr. Tucker, and those who called him anything else would soon know the reason why.

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All right, for chrissakes! Tucker yelled. I heard you the first time. And you can stick your pancakes up your cute little liposuctioned  ass for all I care.  He took the stairs two at a time and strode purposefully through his 12,000 square foot domain towards the dining room, his beady eyes searching for any imperfection in the cleanliness, neatness, or content of his palatial five million dollar abode. A towel lying across the back of a two thousand dollar chair caught his eye and he stopped dead.

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Consuela! he bellowed. Come here! The maid scurried over to where he was standing, his perfectly manicured finger indicating the direction of the infraction. What the hell is that?

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A towel, Senor Tucker, she said, and quickly ran to fetch the  offending piece of millinery. Master Terry leave here. I take care of it.

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Jesus Christ, Tucker muttered as he turned for the dining room. I don't know why I bother paying these people. Might as well live outside like animals."

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What's wrong now? Angela grumbled as she sat down at the table. Their cook, Sheila, gave Tucker a dirty look and began to pour coffee.

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That famous son of yours is what's wrong, Tucker growled. It was always her son when he did something wrong. Twenty-five years old, and he leaves towels all over the place. What does he do, shower in the living room?

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He was in the pool, Angela said, her pale blue eyes snapping beneath five hundred dollars' worth of perfectly coifed bleach blond hair.

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I spent fifty thousand dollars for a cabana, and he has to drag his towels in here, Tucker sighed as he speared one of the pancakes Sheila had made. He covered it with syrup and took a bite. Jesus Christ! he exclaimed. What the fuck did she make these with, rubber? My God, Angie, that broad has to go. She can't cook worth a shit.

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Oh, put a sock in it, Tuck. She graduated from Julliard cooking school, for goodness sake. She can make anything you can name. And watch your language.

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She can't make fucking pancakes, Tucker muttered as he threw his fork down. This is like easting a pot holder. I'll get some decent food on the way to the bank, he said, gulping down his coffee.  And tell her to buy a different brand of coffee. This  tastes like cat piss.

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You should know, Angela mumbled. You big pussy.

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I heard that, Tucker snarled. Jesus, Angie, I'm fifty years old and I make twenty million dollars a year. Why can't I have a decent cup of coffee in the morning? Is that asking too much?

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Obviously, Angela smirked. Make thirty, and we'll talk.

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You're real funny, you know, Tucker said. You should be on television.

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Sure. I'll do the Folger's commercials. Would you like that?

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I'm leaving, Tucker said as he stood. I suppose my driver isn't here yet, either.

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He's here. Is Terry going in today?

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If he can get his ass out of bed, yes. Tell him I need him this afternoon.

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All right, Angela sighed. I guess I'll go shopping. I don't have anything else to do around here.

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Tucker put his suit coat on and pointed a warning finger at his wife. Watch the spending, he said evenly. You're killing me with those credit cards of yours. Money doesn't grow on trees, Angie. I have to earn it before you can spend it. Angela gave him the finger and went back to her pancakes.

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Crazy woman, Tucker muttered as he turned to go. I married a crazy woman.

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You love it, Angela laughed as he headed for the foyer, where his driver was waiting. Artie Gamble grinned as the financier appeared.

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She giving you a hard time, Boss?

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Mind your own business, Gamble, or I'll have you deported.

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I was born here, Boss, Gamble said defensively.

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I'll have you deported anyway, Tucker scoffed. I know people.

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Gamble opened the door of the Rolls Royce Hooper limousine and Tucker got in. Once they were on their way, he picked up the car phone and called his office. I'm on my way, he said when his secretary answered. Call the attorney for that stiff out on Judd Road. The Bonner farm......yes, that's the one. I want to foreclose on him by the end of the week. You have that shyster in my office by ten o'clock tomorrow. He put the phone back and settled into the comfort of his seat. Now we'll see, he muttered to himself. Fucking farmers.

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Tucker arrived at his Southford Bank and Trust at eight thirty. He took his private elevator to the suite of offices on the top floor and made his entrance. Tucker liked to make entrances......he wanted to make sure everybody knew that he had arrived, and that it was time to go to work.

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