Fifty Bales of Hay (16 page)

Hamish hopped out of his ute to see an elegant woman in a pretty, blue summer dress laughing to herself. He smoothed down his shirt and walked to her. Edith saw a handsome man in a smart pair of shorts and on the back of the truck a brand-new shiny red Cox.

‘How lucky are you, Mrs Carter? The gods were smiling on you today. It’s amazing I happened to be in the area. Rarely get out this way. But here I am!’ He extended his hand. ‘Hamish Redpath, your ride-on Cox serviceman.’

Edith took his hand and shook it warmly. ‘
Friendly
Cox serviceman! Call me Edith,’ she said, taking in the neatly clipped grey hair that shone handsomely bright next to his
outdoorsy skin tones of summer brown. He had green eyes, the same colour as her lawn, and his body was long and lean. Fit like a racehorse’s form.

‘So, you’re the lady with the overexcessively vibrating Cox.’

‘How did you know?’ Edith said, unable to stop the guilty gesture of her hand flying to her throat and her cheeks colouring.

‘Your husband comes in from time to time. He mentions it, but he never seems to bring the mower in for us to service. Shall we take a look?’

They walked in the summer sun towards the mower. Hamish lifted the bonnet and inspected what lay within. He um’d and ah’d a little as Edith folded her arms across her chest as if waiting for a diagnosis from a doctor about one of her children.

‘It’s an old model, Mrs Carter. A Cox 50. I’ve got one trick up my sleeve. If it works, he’ll be up and revving, but if not, he may not be worth fixing. I’ve a new one on the back. Perhaps you’d like a demo? It’s a beautiful unit.’

Edith shook her head. ‘Please call me Edith. And no. I don’t want a new one. I like this mower.’

‘Okay. You’re not the first person to get attached to their old Cox. But there comes a time when you have to let go of them.’

Edith nodded sadly and Hamish gave her a sympathetic pat on her arm. ‘I’ll get my toolbox, Edith.’

She watched the way his long legs ate up the distance between the mower and his truck, his boots landing
solidly on the lawn. Nothing gay about that man’s walk, she thought to herself, thinking of Malcolm and his lack of courage in everything. Hamish was honest. Edith could
feel
he was an honest man. Then she bit her lip. A Cox ride-on serviceman. It sounded idyllic. She didn’t avert her eyes, nor disguise her admiration for him as he strode back towards her, toolbox in hand. He smiled back at her, equally as unashamed in his attraction to her.

‘This may take a little time and tinkering, Edith. Why don’t you take a seat?’ He gestured to Randy’s seat and took her hand, helping her on. His touch felt like the first drops of welcome rain on a parched landscape.

‘Why thank you,’ she said, squeezing his hand a little before he released his grip.

Hamish didn’t miss the fact that she lifted her blue skirt quite high to sit astride the mower. He took in her nice, long, tanned legs. Still beautiful, she knew, for a woman of her age.

‘Tell me, Hamish, are you single?’ she said, curling a wisp of her fair hair around her index finger.

‘As a matter of fact, I am. Divorced. Five years this summer.’

He opened up his toolbox and selected the items he needed. There was something definite and assured about the way he moved, she thought. He tinkered inside Randy, moving a small shifter this way and that. Then he took out a seal and blew on it a few times.

‘It was the worst thing at the time. You see, my wife decided, quite late in life, she wanted to bat for the other
team. If you know what I mean. She took off with the girls’ music teacher, Ms Finnighan. So it’s just me and the girls at home now. We manage and we’re happy enough. Although I’m not much chop in helping them with the girlie things they need to learn. That’s when it’s hardest. They get a bit angry with their dad at times. I suppose it’s only natural for girls that age.’

Edith listened and nodded, amazed at what she was hearing. She plucked at her dress and looked down at her lap.

‘It’s been the same for me,’ Edith said. ‘Malcolm, as it turns out, is just the same as your wife, although he hasn’t been brave enough to leave.’ She said the words quietly, but the relief in sharing the information about Malcolm, albeit briefly, felt like a shout to the stars. Edith felt the alleviation in pressure wash through her taut body. It was as if chains had snapped and a gateway had flung open. She now felt truly emancipated. It was time to move on, she realised. Now was the time.

Hamish glanced up sharply, unable to disguise the look of shock on his face. Mr Malcolm Carter? Then he hastily buried his shock and bit his bottom lip, and delivered her up a sad smile.

‘I feel for you. It’s crushing.’ He blew out a breath. ‘But each to their own,’ he said, waving the shifter. ‘It’s healthiest if you don’t see yourself as a victim. That you forgive and forget as best you can. But let me tell you, it’s a shame people get hurt in the process of another not being honest about themselves. I guess it makes us look deep
inside ourselves though … like we’re looking into this here mower. You have to go within, under the bonnet, into the engine, to find the faults to fix. Same as ourselves.’

Edith nodded just as he set the engine cover of Randy down.

‘Give him a go,’ Hamish said cheerfully. ‘See if that’s done the trick.’

Edith felt a buzz of anticipation run through her as she began to turn the key. Randy gave one hopeful chug, but then fell silent. Hamish hmm’d thoughtfully.

‘Please don’t tell me he’s done for,’ Edith said, a frown creasing her high elegant brow.

Deep in thought, Hamish waggled his finger at her. ‘Never give up, Edith. Never, ever give up. There’s one other trick that can assist the starting mechanism to fire.’

Edith looked up at Hamish from where she sat on Randy, hope written on her face.

‘This is one of the very first models to have an operator presence sensing switch, isn’t it?’

Edith looked blankly at him.

‘I’ll explain … if you don’t set the park brake and you get off the mower, the engine cuts out and stops, right? It’s a safety feature.’

Edith nodded, not sure where Hamish’s line of thinking was leading them.

‘There’s a sensor switch under the seat. Rider gets off, mower turns off. Got it? But this old man may have an issue with his switch. One of my little tricks is to add extra weight to the sensing switch. You’re just a slip of a girl and the
seat might need more weight. That factor, combined with a lifetime of heavy vibrational action, means the sensing switch may need recalibration back at the shop.’

The word ‘vibrational’ coming from Hamish’s sexy, sincere mouth brought a flicker of desire to Edith. She wished he’d say the word again.

‘So you can fix him?’

Hamish pulled a ‘not so sure’ face. ‘We can test my theory by putting more weight on the seat, if you are in agreement?’

‘I’ll try anything!’ said Edith.

‘Okay. Hop off for a sec.’ Edith obeyed and watched as Hamish flicked his lithe brown leg across the mower and sat upright on it. Gripping the steering wheel with lovely manly hands, he tried the engine. A slight tremor ran through the mower, but nothing else happened.

‘More weight,’ Hamish said. ‘If you are game, you can sit on my lap. You are as light as a feather, Edith, but the extra kilos of both you and me combined could do the trick. The old boy will soon let us know if it’s his sensor switch.’

She shrugged and opened her palms to the sky. ‘I have nothing to lose, Hamish. Nothing at all to lose!’ And with that she moved over to him, swung her leg across the mower and settled her bottom into his lap. She drank in the closeness of him. The smell of him. Lawn clippings and motor oil.

A flashback memory of her teenage years came tumbling into her mind. A summer’s day at her Sydney
boarding school. She the only boarder not allowed home for the weekend as her parents were abroad. Lying on her belly in a bikini out on the hot lawn, on a scratchy boarding-house blanket of grey with white stitching. The young man with the push mower coming ever so nearer, the rhythmic drone of the engine louder each pass. The glances between them. The small talk when the boy had helped her to move her book and blanket to a freshly mown patch so he could continue on with his work. The way he had raised one eyebrow and read the title of her book out loud.

‘
Lady Chatterley’s Lover
,’ the beautiful mower boy had said. They had exchanged a glance and gentle smiles when they saw the school’s housemistress disappear into her private residency, drawn away by a phone’s shrill ring. The boy had come to sit beside her, leaving his mower idling so the mistress would not notice the suspicious silence.

‘And how is your Lady Jane?’ he said, eyeing her bikini bottoms, and with that question, Edith had lost all sense of herself. She and the boy had come together in a joining of mouths, a melding of sweat, a tangling of limbs and a sudden burst of adolescent summer heat. Sliding aside the crutch of her bikini bottoms, the boy had taken her. Edith’s virginity blazed into the summer sky with a rushing of hormones more powerful than the pull of the moon. When they were done, she thanked the boy and caressed him down there and said tenderly, ‘Thank you, John Thomas,’ to his fading penis. Gently the boy had used the corner of the boarding-house blanket of coarse grey wool to swipe away the blood and semen from her inner thighs. Then he
had pulled up his shorts and kissed her again, sweetly, on the lips.

‘
Mow
we meet again,’ she had said, and she and the boy had laughed.

Then the sun had gone behind a cloud, the housemistress reappeared, and the mower boy took the mower to its shed, packed up his things and left.

Now Edith sat with Hamish beneath her on the ride-on, her senses filled to the brim with the aromas of summer-cut grass and mower fumes, and smiled as she felt Hamish’s hand move to her waist.

‘Crank him over,’ Hamish instructed. ‘Give the old boy a go.’

Edith reached, turned the key and, with a solid rev, Randy fired up in an instant. Both of them whooped and Edith swivelled around to high-five Hamish.

‘Told you!’ Hamish yelled, his green eyes twinkling. ‘But, jeez, he’s got a bit much vibration in him!’

‘I know,’ said Edith with a big smile. ‘That’s what I like about him!’ She delivered him the cheeky grin she had given the boy at boarding school. The sun was dipping now in the sky and casting a sweeping orange glow over the garden. Hamish took in the shine of Edith’s even white teeth framed by her lovely smile, and the scent of her, moist and sweet like the fragrance of jasmine and moss, the undertones of her sex carrying a note he couldn’t resist.

Beneath her pale blue dress, Edith could feel Hamish’s erection nudging her buttock, while the resonating thrum of the mower continued to tremor and vibrate
through both their bodies. She saw him resolutely reach for the park brake. She spun around, standing with her feet either side of the mower platform, her pointed nipples and her breasts almost brushing his face. She reached for the belt of his shorts and stooped to kiss him as she began to drag his shorts and underpants down, the thrum and zing of the mower and the smell of petrol fuelling her desire. She saw his erection, as if sculpted in beautiful pale pink, emerging from a tangle of male hair and she gasped.

Sliding her panties to one side, she sat directly onto his penis, her ready vagina taking him in easily. Together, joined, united, they felt the mower’s quivering and wavering jolt through them. When Edith began to move her hips, the feeling of Hamish in her, along with Randy shuddering beneath them, was beyond the realms of her belief. She cried out above the noise of the mower in an instant orgasm that wavered on and on until she could bear it no longer. She had to lift herself up slightly from Hamish to relieve the sensitivity of her sex, so raw and on fire. Hamish held fast to her hips and began moving her up and down along the long pole of his cock, the shaft glistening in the sunlight. She cast her arms about his broad shoulders and plunged up and down, rocking, rolling, pounding on him as the buzz ran through them. Then she felt his hands press deep into the flesh of her buttocks and as he pulled her firmly onto his lap, he gave way with a throb and a shudder, spurting deep within her. Just as he did, Randy coughed and the engine shut down.

Edith settled her weight down upon Hamish, his penis still nicely hard inside her, and rested her head upon his shoulder, immersing herself in the silence and the stillness, save for their ragged breath and the song of magpies making ready for bed. She giggled a little.

‘Has poor Randy died on us?’

‘No,’ Hamish said, his hands gently roving up either side of her back and beginning to massage her shoulders a little, ‘he’s just out of fuel.’

She laughed and pulled back from him, kissing him tenderly on the lips. ‘Thank you,’ she said.

‘For what?’

‘For really good service.’

‘My pleasure, madam.’

‘
Mow
we meet again,’ she said and smiled at him a little sadly.

He laughed and kissed her lightly on her nose. ‘Don’t look so sad, Edith. We shall meet again. From the
mow
ment I saw you, I knew I had to become your exclusive ride-on serviceman. Now, let’s get this old boy onto my truck. I can deliver him back to you by…’ He paused, a cheeky look on his face. ‘Let’s see … lunchtime tomorrow. If that suits?’

Edith had a quick think. Malcolm had a Rotary meeting in town. He’d be out until evening.

‘Yes,’ Edith said, ‘that would be
mow
-st kind of you. I’ll even have a nice bottle of
Mow
-selle chilled for us.’

‘Really?’ Hamish said with a wide handsome smile. ‘That sounds
mow
-st fun!’

‘And please, Hamish, if you wouldn’t mind, don’t worry about fixing the mower’s vibrations this time. We can do that on your next service visit.’

‘Of course, madam. I am at your service.’

Together they climbed from the lawnmower and walked hand in hand up to the garden shed in search of more fuel for Randy.

Rachael Treasure lives in southern rural Tasmania with her two young children and an extended family of kelpies, chooks, horses, sheep and a time-share Jack Russell. She is passionate about encouraging non-readers to read, as well as inspiring both farmers to consider regenerative agricultural practices and animal handlers to better understand their dogs and livestock. Rachael is the proud patron of Agfest, Tasmania’s world-class agricultural field day run by Rural Youth volunteers.

Rachael’s first novel,
Jillaroo
, published in 2002, was a bestseller and has become one of Australia’s iconic works of fiction, inspiring other country women to contribute to the genre of contemporary rural literature. She has gone on to write three other bestselling novels and a collection of short stories.
Fifty Bales of Hay
is her first foray into erotica after being inspired by her very naughty farming friends and talk that spread like wildfire in her country district about a certain book that came in a shade of grey. Her new novel,
The Farmer’s Wife
, is coming out in April 2013.

Rachael Treasure

@rachaeltreasure