Free Linked Through Time by Jessica Tornese Page A

word, but I was surprised to find it was my father, Dean. He leaned on the worn planks, frowning at my crumpled form. Without a word, he retrieved the bucket and stool that lay turned on their sides. I sat motionless, watching my father, a kid who should be climbing trees and playing make-believe, but instead worked twelve to sixteen hour days like some sort of horrid sweatshop story. He placed the leg chains on the cow’s back legs and tied a brick to the cow’s tail; my understanding coming full circle for the use of the restraints.
    “You can shovel the gutters and throw down clean hay. I’ll milk the cows,” Dean said, looking at me as though he sympathized with my distress. His eight-year-old body, wise beyond its years, splattered milk into the pail easily. “You better hurry, or there won’t be any breakfast left,” he warned.
    My heart twisted and I gave his head a rub of gratitude. My throat felt like I had swallowed a baseball and no words could express what I felt at his presence. I grabbed a pitchfork and climbed the ladder to the loft above.
    Chills raced up my spine when I spied the open hatch. I considered jumping through to chance the miraculous time travel, but I was too afraid of falling flat on my face. Deciding against the risk, I pitched hay down to the cows below.
    Shoveling the gutters was harder that I thought and it required breathing through my shirt to help disguise the smells. Each stall had to be cleaned and I dreaded getting close to the moody cows, afraid they would smell my fear and lash out with their sharp hoofs.
    Dean finished long before me and helped throw the collected piles of manure onto the spreader parked just outside the barn doors. I hurried out into the sunshine, gulping the fresh air as though I had been submerged in an actual sea of stagnant smells.
    “Thanks,” I said throwing my arm around my father’s bony shoulders. “I guess I owe you. What do you want?”
    “Can you pick ditches for me? Dad said I have to help in the woods today and I won’t have time,” he said sadly.
    Confused, I came to a stop. “Pick ditches? Why?”
    “For the bottles. The fair is coming up and dad says we don’t have enough money for tickets this year. If I can find ten bottles, that’s fifty cents, and then I can ride the Tilt-A-Whirl.” His voice went up in pitch as he described his wish of riding the rides at the fair.
    I felt my throat close tight again, and I rolled my eyes to the sky. Jeez, what was wrong with me? Everything my father said made me want to cry like a baby. His loyalty to me, his innocence, his rough life… I was a royal bitch to him every day of my teenage life and he deserved none of it. I wanted to make it up to him. I would pick a thousand ditches if it meant some small retribution for my behavior. 
    “I’ll do better than ten bottles,” I promised, ruffling his hair again.
    Dean’s eyes lit up and he jumped up and down in his baggy overalls and oversized boots. He just wants to be a kid, I thought, and he can’t. There’s no time to be a kid here. Before I leave, I’m going to make sure his room is lined with bottles, I vowed.
    After breakfast, I snuck away from Louise and spent a majority of the morning crawling the highway ditches in search of littered bottles. My skin itched from waist-high weeds, mosquitoes buzzed incessantly in my ear, and sweat trickled from my neck, down my chest and pooled in what little cleavage I had.
    Blowing out a frustrated sigh, I wiped my brow. I had eight bottles. I needed help if I was going to make good on my promise to Dean. Heading back, I passed the gravel drive leading to the farm and walked to Slater’s farm store, hoping to catch a glimpse of Dave. I spotted him immediately on the roof of the store, fixing the shingles - shirtless and extremely masculine in his tool belt and tight jeans. My heart skipped and danced at the thought of running my hands over his bare, muscled chest.
    Dave chose that moment to