After He is Gone

Kara dialed the number to her Aunt Sherry. Before the first ring finished she was already lost in thought about the phone call that changed her life.

It had only been a week since she found out that her husband of 15 years was dead. She remembered exactly what it felt like when the voice on the other end of the line said, “I’m afraid Richard is gone.”

She had felt her breath leave her body as she sank to the floor. She opened her mouth but couldn’t force any vibration through her vocal cords. There were no words. There were no sounds. There was only her breath and the breath of the officer mirroring each other through the phone.

Kara was startled back to the present when her Aunty Sherry picked up. “Heyo kiddo,” she said with the cheerful tone she always had. She reminded Kara of the brightest and biggest flower in the patch, she was always bringing joy. That was the main reason Kara had called her.

“I think I need to get away for a bit” Kara announced, cutting straight through the small talk.

Sherry had been hoping Kara would call. She knew that Kara needed someone around her that wasn’t going to treat her like a fragile vase that will break if you look at it too long. Ever since Richard had been in that horrible accident everyone was tip-toeing around Kara and Sherry had known that she wouldn’t be able to handle it for long.

“Everyone around here is making it harder for me to work through the grief,” Kara explained.

“Yea - I figured you’d need a getaway” affirmed her Aunt Sherry. She thought Kara might have called her to ask if she could come to visit but she didn’t want to seem pushy with her invite. Kara deserved to take any vacation she wanted to anywhere she wanted and Sherry didn’t want to make it seem like she expected her to come there.

Kara stayed silent. She wanted her aunt to invite her to stay there. She wanted to feel like she had somewhere to go to, somewhere that she was wanted.

She had felt unwanted and like a burden since the whole thing happened. Everyone was always watching over her and treating her like they couldn’t talk if she was in the room. They all stared at her without saying a word like she was a ticking time bomb. She desperately wanted someone to want to be there for her and not the her that just lost a husband but the her that she had always been.

Sensing the silence and the sadness, Sherry knew that she would have to give Kara the green light to visit her because it was obvious she wasn’t going to say she wanted to drop by. “Well, I have tons of space here on the farm if that’s the kind of getaway you want,” she said.

Holding in her sigh of relief, Kara lied to save face. “Oh, I didn’t think of that. That would be lovely,” she confirmed in a gracious tone.

Aunt Sherry wasn’t one to sugarcoat or baby her so she was excited to be around her and the animals. Aunt Sherry didn’t just have a farm, she owned an animal sanctuary and every one of her animals had gone through something. Kara had just gone through something too and she was hoping that these animals may help her work through it.

She and Aunt Sherry chit-chatted for a couple of more minutes before they hung up. Her bag was already packed so she’d be on the road in no time. She grabbed her purse, the duffel bag, and some snacks before she headed out to the car. She hopped on the freeway and set the cruise control. It was 4 hours to her Aunt Sherry’s and she’d be there by dinner time.

As the lines passed under the car, Kara began to think about her late husband. He had been so supportive and she had only ever been impatient and angry. She was stubborn and needed to be right. Looking back she could see that she would lash out at him and she was ashamed at how often it happened. She wondered how he had put up with her for so long and vowed to make this next chapter of her life about becoming someone new.

After making that pact with herself her thoughts began to wander to the day of the accident. She couldn’t imagine how he must have felt right before it happened. He had to have known that he was about to die. Did his life flash before his eyes? Did he think about her and the future they wouldn’t get to have?

She had gone over these questions in her mind a thousand times since that day. She had pictured the seconds before his life was taken over and over. She didn’t want to but her brain wouldn’t stop torturing her with the image of him laying under a tree begging for his life as people tried to roll the trunk off his torso. She thought about what he must have said before his body went limp. She hoped it wasn’t as tragic as she pictured but she knew that it probably was.

She felt a tear fall down her face. It was followed by another as she thought the most horrific thought she could imagine. What if he had been under the tree on purpose? He had been cutting trees his whole life and knew he shouldn’t have been standing where he was. What if he took his own life? What if it was because of how I treated him? Her eyes blurred as her brain ran wild with the idea.

“Take Exit 264 toward West Virginia Highway 65,” said the voice on the GPS.

It shocked her back to reality. Alarmed that she had already arrived and didn’t remember any of the drive, Kara took the exit and turned left at the bottom of the ramp. It was only 5 more miles to Aunt Sherry’s farm and she couldn’t wait to get there. She knew it would help her put down her thoughts for just a moment.

Kara’s car eased down the long dirt driveway. It was bumpy and the rainwater had washed away a lot of the gravel. Her knuckles tightly gripped the steering wheel and she prayed to all the Gods she could think of to please not let her car slip off the road and down the side of the mountain. When she finally saw the cabin, she let out a joy-filled shriek.

Her Aunt Sherry was out front and it appeared that she was getting a new animal. Two men were standing at the back of a livestock trailer talking to her when Kara walked up.

“He’s not exactly the friendliest animal. He’s quite ill-tempered and stubborn. Good luck getting him to do anything. I wouldn’t even try to rehabilitate him. He’s too far gone.” said one of the men.

“Eh, we’ve seen ‘em like that before” Sherry replied nonchalantly.

“Alright. Where you want him?” asked the other man.

“Just over there in the pin with the big Oak tree, it’s got the strongest fencing” directed Sherry.

Kara felt a little scared. She hadn’t been around big animals in a while and had never been around any with such a reputation. She watched as one man unlatched the door on the livestock trailer.

A huge snort came from inside and the biggest Bull she’d ever seen emerged. “Brutus,” her aunt said almost immediately. “We’re calling him Brutus.”

It took all 4 of them, 2 in front and 2 behind, just to get Brutus into his new pin. He bucked, stomped, snorted, and even charged at them. Kara couldn’t believe he was putting up such a fuss. Couldn’t Brutus see they were helping him?

Kara and her Aunt Sherry discussed Brutus and his display over dinner. Kara was worried he would hurt someone but her Aunt Sherry wasn’t. “He wouldn’t hurt us, he’s just acting like that because he thinks we are going to hurt him,” she said.

Kara hadn’t ever thought of it that way. What if he wasn’t a big, bad, scary bull after all? What if he was just scared? What if he wasn’t stubborn and ill-tempered but instead just worried something bad was about to happen? Suddenly, she felt compelled to take on caring for the bull.

“I think I’d like to try to take care of him,” Kara said directly.

Her Aunt Sherry looked up from her green beans and smiled. She gave Kara one single nod to acknowledge she was ok with it. Kara smiled back.

The next morning Kara approached Brutus with his food. She was careful and slow but Brutus still charged at her. She dropped the pitchfork and ran. Brutus let out a growl and snort that shook Kara to the bone. He didn’t seem to care that the food didn’t make it into his pin. He was only concerned about not letting Kara get too close.

Kara wanted to be mad that Brutus had tried to hurt her but she could only think about what her Aunt Sherry had said. Brutus was afraid she was going to hurt him. She knew the only way to get close to him would be to gain his trust.

After dinner that night, she went down the path to his pin. She walked until he lifted his head and noticed. She was about 25 feet away but she stopped anyway. He stared at her but didn’t move because she didn’t move. Kara sat down and began to talk to Brutus.

She told him about how frustrated she was with him and that led to her talking about how frustrated she was with everything. She confided in Brutus that the world had shown her a frustration like she had never known before. She cried as she picked at pieces of grass around her.

At dawn, Kara felt sure she was closer to Brutus but as she walked toward his pin he proved that he didn’t feel the same way. Stomping and snorting, he got into position to charge. Unsure what to do, Kara stopped dead in her tracks.

She looked around her and noticed she was closer than she had been yesterday. Not wanting to push his boundaries, she sat down. After a few moments, Brutus lay down. He kept his eyes on her but he seemed to relax.

Kara couldn’t take the silence and started talking to Brutus.

She told him about losing Richard. She told him about the affair Richard had and the affair she had to get back at him. Brutus just stared, seemingly listening as she talked. She had been all alone with what was happening and hadn’t talked to anyone about it. She felt like her stories were helping them both so she just kept talking.

Kara continued to visit Brutus a few times a day. Each day she inched closer to his pin and each day she talked to him like he was her only friend. She told him about what was going on around the farm and inside her heart. She shared some of her deepest secrets and some of her most joyous laughs. She shared her regrets and her woes. She admitted to him that she had been a horrible wife and her bitterness had eaten her alive. Kara’s talks with Brutus went on for nearly a week before she could get close enough to feed him.

By then, Brutus didn’t seem to mind her at all. Kara swore he was even happy to see her. She started to feel connected to Brutus and continued to inch closer and closer. She was sure that one day, she would be able to pet him.

Weeks went by and Kara was finally able to enter his pin. He had learned to trust her and that had allowed their relationship to blossom. His stubbornness had turned to softness over the 3 weeks they spent together.

A few days before Kara was set to head home, she fed Brutus and sat down in her usual place to talk to him. The shade of the old Oak tree in his pin spread over the top of Brutus, Kara, and the few feet between them. She began to talk to him like she usually did but this time Brutus started to grunt.

When Kara didn’t respond, Brutus grew impatient. He stood to his feet and stomped. Continuing to grunt, he stared straight at Kara as his hooves pounded the ground.

Scared, she started to back away. Brutus didn’t like that and began to walk toward her. Kara thought it would be wise to leave the pin but something told her that Brutus wasn’t trying to be aggressive. She stood still.

Brutus approached but slowly. Kara’s voice was shaking as she said, “It’s ok Brutus.” She was still unsure of what was going to happen. Brutus turned sideways when he got close. His body brushed against Kara as he lay down next to her.

Kara couldn’t believe it. She touched her hand to his side and felt the texture of his coat. She rubbed his side slowly as she thanked him for trusting her.

Laying down next to him, she put her head on his belly and cried. She never thought anyone would be able to trust her. As she lay there she realized she had lost trust in herself. She had lost trust in her ability to love and care for herself. She opened up and came clean about it all to Brutus. The closeness of their relationship enabled Kara to tell him about all of her fears, including those about her husband’s death and how much she resented herself for how she had treated him.

Kara revealed her soul to Brutus and also to herself. She felt lighter and free.

Days later, she closed the trunk of her car and approached Brutus for the last time to say goodbye. As she got close to his pin, he ran toward her and nuzzled her shoulder through the fence. She nuzzled him back and felt a softness inside her she had never felt before.

Kara kissed Brutus on the snout. She knew that without taming Brutus the Bull she would have never been able to tame the bull inside herself.