The lithe woman in a flowery muslin dress attacks her Olympia typewriter on her timeworn desk. Near an open window, a Fendt tractor rattles. The engine’s tack tack tack travels into the county office on a hot breeze. Dark eyes aglow, she says to the other typist, “I want to be a farmer. I want to have hens, pigs, and cows. I want to tend fields of barley and wheat and attend the harvest festival in autumn with my family.”
***
The woman in bib overall steers the Ford tractor along the muddy, rutted track in the darkening November drizzle. Several more wagon loads of sugar beets to go. Downpour looms. She’ll visit her husband in the hospital tomorrow. Her five-year-old sons, identical twins, ride on precarious seats above the tires. They have her eyes, but her husband’s solid frame. Gripping the steering wheel with callused hands, she reminds them over the engine’s ruckus, “Hold on, will you.” They need reminding more often than their cousins.
***
The woman in black mourner’s garb, clasps hands of well-wishers at the open grave. Late spring winds chase wads of clouds. Her husband beside her, white-faced. Funerals are hard on him since his kidney transplant. Soil clatters onto the polished oaken coffin. Children throw forget-me-nots. Family friends murmur condolences, “He was a sweet boy. You did all you could. He’s with God now.” She thanks them, dry-eyed, without flinching. They don’t inquire about his eleven-year-old twin brother. She left him at home with her mother to keep him safe.
***
The woman in cut-off jeans and John Deere cap sweeps the empty stables in the autumn afternoon sunshine. The air lingers with dried grass and her vegetables’ bouquet. She rehearses what she wants to say to her forty-nine-year-old son, the twin without a twin. She wants to tell him in a way that he might understand, “You’ll like it there. I’ll visit you, and I’ll always take you home on weekends.” The broom rests. She walks into the house to wash up. The ambulance takes him to the care-home. She persuades the arthritic Mercedes to start and follows to get her son settled. She’ll visit her husband’s grave on the way home.
***
The woman in her woolen coat pushes her walker along the snowy paved lane that leads toward her farm. She steps aside and lifts her mittened hand in greeting at the family friend, who works the fields now. He approaches with the McCormick X5 hauling a load of logs. He stops, turns off the engine, and asks her about the weather for the next few days. “It’ll stay cold and dry,” she says. Enough to finish logging. He nods and starts the tractor.
Because of her love for stories from communities around the world, Petra Meindl-Andrews studied cultural anthropology at the University of Vienna. To become a storyteller, she attended workshops in Washington DC and at Gotham Writers in New York. She continues to further her craft—a lifelong path. In 2021, she participated in Writing Circle, the year-long education program run by One Story magazine. Her flash fiction has appeared in Gargoyle Magazine and 3:AM Magazine. She lives in Basel, Switzerland with her husband.
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