“One barn cat’s enough,” Ma answered. “More, they’ll steal the chicks.”

Pa fetched an old grain sack.

At the pond, he paused a moment, still as stone, before turning away. Seeing I’d followed, he squatted, blocking my view, big hands wiping my cheeks.

Then he stood. “Best milk those cows.”

Jennifer L Freed writes mostly poetry, and sometimes micro-fiction. This story previously appeared in The Binnacle’s ultra-short edition, Fall, 2016. If you’d like to know more, please visit jfreed.weebly.com.