R. C. Smith — Short Stories and Vignettes

The Mountain Farm

Audio read by RC (16:29)

I have seen the farm, from the distance, on one of my mountain hikes. I could have gone there, walking down on one side of the valley, crossing the brook at its bottom, climbing up the slope on the other side — the border is not guarded, it is hardly marked, I could have gone there and been back and still reached my destination long before dark, but what would have been the use?

I took the the water bottle and a piece of bread out of my back pack, sat down on the trunk of a conveniently fallen tree, and took in the view.

The landscape was the same as on this side of the valley, hilly and wooded, with large grass-covered clearings. The high mountains were some distance off, but already here the slopes were so steep that the only feasible kind of husbandry was raising livestock.

My resting place was a few hundred feet higher than the farm, so I looked down upon it, across the valley. Had I not broken my binoculars the day before, I could have seen more clearly, but even so it was obvious that it was still the same idyllic place that it must have been those years ago. I saw the main building, the stables, the sheds, and the dozen or so one-room cabins which they rented out to tourists. I could not see the chickens and the pigs, but I made out the sheep, and the cows, peacefully grazing on the steep meadows, lazily letting their calves nurse from their udders. I also saw the humans, tiny distant naked figures, their genders just discernible, busily going about their chores.

I have never stayed at that farm, nor at any other one of its kind. This is another man’s story, not mine. Or you might say it is the girl’s story.

~

She wasn’t his type at all. A strangely shapeless chubby body, with a pinkish complexion, hardly a waistline, and a vulva that seemed nothing more than a short and narrow groove disappearing between her thighs. Drooping breasts, with large pale areolas and flat, barely visible nipples. Short hair, of a nondescript brownish shade. A nice face, though, with round eyes and soft lips.

He could have asked for another girl to do his room, a girl more to his tastes. Slim, petite, bronze-skinned, black-haired, with an enticing mons, perky little breasts, and readily erect dark nipples. They had one at the farm, he had seen her when he arrived, working in the vegetable garden. He had seen others, too, whom he had found attractive. He didn’t feel it was worth the effort, though. And besides, the girl was clean, soft and warm, smelled good, talked little, and, as he had heard that all farm girls did, she knew how to please a man with her fingers and her mouth. Or with her mouth only, when he tied her wrists behind her back, or to the bedposts, which he always did when he wanted to use her vagina.

She probably knew how to please women, too. She even offered to teach him, in case there was a woman in his life, or there might be one later, whom he wanted to please. He hadn’t come to learn, though, he had come to forget.

He usually saw her in the mornings, when she brought his breakfast to his room. All home-made stuff, organically grown, this was one of the farm’s main attractions — there were others, too, of course. None of them particularly appealed to him, for him it was the remoteness of this place, and the surroundings, the solitude he found there, which had brought him here. He took his time eating — the bread, the butter, the ham, the sausages, the cheese, the eggs — a copious meal that had to last him through the day. She waited, standing, silent and naked, until he had finished, when he either sent her away, or used her mouth, breasts or vagina for his satisfaction, sometimes hurting her, but never badly.

After breakfast and sex he cleaned himself, got dressed, and then he left, for his long solitary mountain hikes. That summer was an endless stretch of warm and sunny days, but I think he would have gone in the cold, rain, and storm, too. His breakfast, plus whatever fruits of the wood he came by, sustained him, and springs were easily found where he could refill his water bottle. He never took part in any of the activities on the farm, not in the ones for children, of course, but also not in the other ones. He almost never returned before nightfall, soon after his arrival able to walk the paths back to the farm even in the dark, and immediately went to his cottage.

Dinner waited for him in his room — bread and meat from the farm, only the wine was brought in from a warmer province. The meals were cold, but he didn’t mind. Pork, lamb, poultry, and, occasionally, that other meat. He didn’t pay much attention to what he ate, he ate for nourishment, not for culinary delight.

Usually he ate alone, but on some days he called for the girl. One day his money would run out, but for now he could still afford the little extra fee. When he sought company, it was always she he asked for. He liked her silent unexciting naked presence.

When she was there, he always took off his clothes, though he did not always touch her. Sometimes he masturbated while eating, slowly, without even looking at her, not even calling her to clean him when he was done.

He never offered her any of his food — I do not know if he would have done it had she been hungry, but she was obviously fed well enough. For a reason, he thought as he looked at the curves and folds of her meaty body, his gaze finally coming to rest on the narrow slit between her thighs.

She read his mind, or maybe she just read his gaze, which wasn’t that hard to read.

“Maybe I will live,” she said.

Life on the farm was idyllic. Death, for a farm girl, was not, and still isn’t. What they call a “traditional feast” goes on for hours, and she stays alive through most of them.

There had already been two or three feasts while he had stayed at the farm, and he had been invited to join, for tradition has it that feasts at a farm are open to all the guests. He had declined politely, but curtly. He had no intention to mingle, neither with the farmer family nor with the tourists. And besides, these were not his feasts, he had nothing to celebrate, and taking part would only have rubbed that in. On the nights of the feasts, he stayed off the farm until the screams of the girl and soon afterwards the laughter of the guests that rang over the hills had fallen silent.

To his own surprise, he had been glad each time when the girl brought him his breakfast on the mornings after the feasts, so that he knew it hadn’t been she who had died, and that the slice of leftover meat on the breakfast tray wasn’t from her.

Looking at the slit between her thighs now, he could not help thinking about the spit, though.

“Maybe I will live,” she said. The farmer couple liked her, and their children liked her, too. Next year, she was to start breeding. There wasn’t much breeding done on the farm, it wasn’t efficient, it was cheaper to buy farm girls at the market, but a traditional farm needed some kids. They had good lives, and played with the farmers’ children, and with those of the tourists. Then, as long as she worked hard and well, she’d be allowed to stay with her kid until its third birthday, and by then, she might easily have another one, and then a next one. One day, she knew, she wouldn’t be useful anymore, but that day might still be a long time off, and then, many years from now, death would be painless and quick, without the hours of agony that it needed for a farm girl to die at a feast. It was the advantage of looking plain, of not attracting the attention of the guests.

He did not reply, but he kissed her on the mouth, and, surprised at the intensity of his arousal, relieved himself into her vagina.

It was the first time she had spoken about herself or about the farm, the first time she had said anything to him but wishing him a good morning, asking for his requests, or thanking him for allowing her to serve him. It would remain the only time.

For him, as for her, life went on as before, only that the days slowly grew shorter, and week by week more guests left the farm than new ones arrived. His daily wanderings still took him to the woods, the hilltops, the mountain peaks …

There was a particular peak, not too far from the farm, which he visited often. From an exposed rock, it offered a magnificent view over a seemingly endless, sparsely inhabited countryside. Next to this rock, a perpendicular precipice fell down several hundred feet, to a bed of large broken boulders at its bottom. Sometimes he sat there for hours, before he got up and returned to the farm.

The nights were getting longer, and colder. Was it for warmth, or for company, that often now he kept her in his bed when he went to sleep? A soft plush toy offering comfort, her regular breathing soothing him into sleep, her hand warm and gentle on his spent penis.

But how long could he go on like that? He had gone to the farm as a temporary refuge — it was not a place where he could possibly stay, even if there was no place that he wanted to go to.

He returned late that evening, from the lofty vantage point above the precipice.

She was waiting for him, warm, naked and quiet, with his dinner and with a letter that had arrived for him during the day. He opened it after he had undressed, and eaten his meal.

It was from a friend — a friend he hadn’t thought he still had. I cannot go into details here — these are his private affairs, and they have to stay private — but there had been a quarrel, or a misunderstanding, which had set him apart from his friends, and now they wanted to apologize, and to make up. Yes, there also was a woman involved, and she wanted to make up, too. Hadn’t he had his birthday a few weeks ago? They wanted to see him, to give a feast for him, and wasn’t he staying at a perfect place for a feast?

It was Thursday evening now. His friends would arrive late on Friday evening, not to the farm, but to a mountain inn an hour and a half away. The woman would be with them. They’d be at the farm at noon, for the feast to begin, and return to their inn before dark. On Sunday, if he wanted to, he could join them for their trip back home.

He had tears in his eyes when he had read the letter.

“Yes,” he said, though they couldn’t hear him, only the girl heard him.

He didn’t care for the feast, it was they who wanted it, not him, but it was for him, and he accepted it gladly.

They would pay for it, they had written. The farm, he knew, had all they needed, even on a short notice — he’d tell the farmer couple the next morning.

All he had to do was to choose a girl who would die.

She looked at him, and they both knew.

~

This, basically, is the end of the story. If you want to know how she died, read one of the many accounts of traditional farm feasts in books and stories — being strong and healthy, she lasted long.

That evening, she walked out of his cabin, and he didn’t try to hold her back. Next morning, with eyes red and swollen, she brought him his breakfast and served him with her mouth. It was the last time they were together — he walked over to the inn in the evening, to greet his friends, and stayed there for the night. When they arrived at the farm, Saturday noon, she had already been made ready for the feast, and it were other farm girls, pretty and skilled, who took care of the diners’ needs.

But, as I have said, I have not been there, not then, and not since. I have only sat on the trunk of a fallen tree, many years later, eating my bread, looking over to the other side of the valley, and enjoying the scenery, its beauty, its tranquility, and the tales it has to tell.

(07/2012, minor edits 09/2020)

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