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That said, I felt as if I needed to officially document the incident. I was looking up the phone number for the property agent when I heard a vehicle approaching. To my relief, it was the orange El Camino that the groundskeeper Kelly drove.
The car came to a stop and Kelly leaned over to wave through the passenger side window.
“Is the graveyard gate unlocked?”
“Yes.”
“I’ll mow there first, then I’ll come back to mow your grass and clean the coop.”
“Okay. Oh, by the way—”
But Kelly was already gone, kicking up dust as the car sped toward the graveyard. I assumed she’d see the stone and could advise me on what to do, if anything.
I finished eating my eggs, then decided to walk down to the cemetery to get Kelly’s take on things. I had walked a few yards when I saw the El Camino tearing toward me at a frightening speed. I jumped into the ditch to get out of the way. The car screeched to a halt next to me. Kelly’s eyes bulged. “I’m outta here. Sorry, but you need to find someone to replace me.”
My pulse blipped with alarm. “What? Why?”
“I don’t mess with witchcraft. People told me this place was cursed, but I took a chance since Rose is gone.”
“Kelly, please—I need your help.”
Kelly barked out a dry laugh. “You need more help than I can offer. Good luck.” The car-with-a-truckbed tore away in a cloud of dust, with the mower in the back bouncing up and down.
“Wait!” I shouted, waving my arms and coughing. “Come back!” But she didn’t, of course.
A sense of déjà vu washed over me, and I stopped. I’d said those exact words as Curtis had fled in the new SUV I had purchased, stuffed with clothes and furniture I also had purchased. His betrayal had led me to come to this remote place to write a romance novel that would reclaim my reputation, career, and financial security.
Instead, one month in I had a fried laptop, a dirty chicken coop, and a hungry goat on my hands, plus shin-deep grass around the house, a cemetery that needed to be mowed… and possibly an escaped witch.
August 3, Saturday
I APPROACHED the chicken coop with trepidation, wearing rubber gloves, my sturdy boots, and a kitchen towel tied around my nose and mouth like a bandanna. I pushed a wheelbarrow full of straw I’d found in the barn and was armed with a pitchfork. Here is where I should say that until now, I’d only seen these items in pictures and on television, but I was coming around to how useful they could be.
I opened the side door of the chicken coop and recoiled from the unholy odor that pierced my makeshift filter. The two hens that had been nesting squawked and flew the coop. (I now realized where the idiom I’d been using in my books for years came from). Then as instructed in various YouTube videos, I systematically removed the filthy top layer of straw on the nests and on the floor and replaced it with fragrant new straw, then stood back and surveyed my work with a strange sense of accomplishment I hadn’t felt in a while.
I wheeled the soiled straw to the tree line and to my delight, found evidence of previous batches of the straw being scattered on the ground. I added my contribution and spread it out, as if I knew what I was doing.
I was feeling smug when I walked back to the barn, but the angry bleating of Satan the penned goat brought me back to reality. The container of goat food pellets was empty and he’d eaten the grass in the pen practically down to the dirt. I stopped and stared at him through the wire fencing. “What am I going to do with you?”
He bleated at me, pawing at the fencing.
I angled my head. He was kind of cute… when he wasn’t devouring everything in sight.
Then a crazy thought slid into my head. I turned back to study the tall grass around the house, then turned back to look at Satan.
“You’re hungry, and the grass needs to be mowed. I wonder…”
I returned the wheelbarrow to the barn and rummaged through tables of piled up tools and materials until I found a metal stake, a hammer, and a coiled length of rope. Then I waded to the center of the grass, pounded the stake into the ground (harder than it sounds). I backtracked to the pen, opened the gate, and approached the goat warily. But he loped up to me and nudged my hand, seemingly in search of attention. It occurred to me that he had been Rose’s goat and probably had run away when she died.
I gave his long white ears a scratch, then looped the rope around his neck and tied it off. He followed me out of the pen willingly enough and I secured the other end of the rope to the stake. I stepped back, gratified to see him already munching on the grass. If my scheme worked, Satan would graze in the circle around the stake, then I’d move the stake.
Goats were nature’s lawnmower.
A rumbling noise sounded from the road. I looked up to see a familiar black pickup rolling toward me. I waved, and the truck slowed. I walked over, feeling self-conscious about my getup—and the stench I’d acquired—then decided it was what it was.
“Hi,” Sawyer said with an amused smile. “You’re starting to look like a local.”
I smirked. “The groundskeeper quit.”
