BEEP . . . BEEP . . . BEEP!!!

“Ugh . . . It’s your turn. I just went.” Missy said as she pushed her husband, Leonard, out of bed. His body was hot. He groaned but got up. She snuggled down into the warm spot he left behind. Leonard went to the porch and put on a tan pair of Carhearts and went out to the big green Ford. His dark eyes were bleary, it didn’t seem like his turn. His breath and body heat fogged the windows in the truck, and he turned the defroster on full.

It was calving season, and he drove to the old place to check on the cows. The gray cow was in a pen by herself. She was special because she had been Missy’s 4-H project in high school.

Leonard crawled back in bed with his wife. She tucked her warm feet in close to his cold ones.

“You took a long time, what happened?” Missy asked.

“The gray cow had her calf.”

“A heifer?” Missy asked.

“Yea, pretty little heifer. I had to help a bit, but she’s fine.” Leonard said before he began snoring softly.

BEEP . . . BEEP . . . BEEP!!!

“Get up. It’s your turn.” Missy said. She pushed him to get out of bed.

“No. It’s your turn,” said Leonard. “Remember, the gray cow had . . .”

“Oh, yea . . . yea . . .” Missy crawled over her husband, put on the Carhearts and went to check on the cows. She was actually excited to see the gray cow’s calf. She hopped out of the Ford, leaving it running. She sprinted to the corral, where the gray cow was, and shone the flashlight all around, but there was no calf. She looked all around, but there were no calf tracks in the snow around the coral. Then she shone the beam back onto the gray cow. Her stomach was still full, she hadn’t calved at all.

“You son-of-a-bitch! Are you even checking cows?” said Missy, when she got home.

“Yea, I told you . . . the gray cow just had that calf and I had to pull it,” said Leonard.

“Did not,” said Missy.

“Did too, I was there,” said Leonard. Missy knew that her husband believed that he had checked the cows, and that the gray cow had her calf. He wasn’t the sort to lie. Leonard could describe every detail of that night. He must have fallen asleep in the Ford and had a dream that was so real that he believed it was true. Leonard was astonished in the morning when he saw the gray cow, still holding her calf inside. He leaned on the fence and looked at her for an hour.

“It was so real” he said again, not for the last time.