by Lexi Whitlow
My heifer was about to give birth.
I went over to her and put her head on my lap, and by the way she was panting, I realized she’d probably been in labor for the majority of the morning. I felt around on her stomach and sighed with relief when I felt the calf moving around inside, but I knew that calf wasn’t gonna be alive much longer if that vet didn’t get her. She mooed out in her pain and nuzzled into my chest, and for the first time in years, I started crying with one of my animals.
Julie would’ve loved to have been here in this moment. She was always so attentive to animal’s needs, and I knew if she were here she’d know exactly what to do. I could feed ‘em and train ‘em and keep ‘em healthy, but I didn’t know shit about my female animals giving birth.
It was my downfall, but it was one of Julie’s strengths.
That was the thing about Julie and I, what I was shit in she was great at. And, what she was shit at I was wonderful in. When put together, we were one well-rounded human being who actually knew how to function, but apart we were just floating and stumbling around, trying to make the best of things.
Was that what Paris was like for her? Lots of stumbling?
“Alright, alright. I’m here,” the vet said pulling me from my thoughts.
“Thanks for comin’,” I murmured.
“Alright, lemme take a look.”
The vet got down onto her level and didn’t seem happy that she was laying down.
“You know when she lied down?” he asked.
“She was lyin’ down when I came in here.”
“Shit, alright.”
“What’s wrong?” I asked.
“Lyin’ down means she’s tired, and if she’s tired it means she’s probably been in labor all night.”
“God, I think I would’ve heard her if she had been mooin’ all night.”
“You’d be surprised. If the contractions were really far apart, the mooin’ she would’ve been doing would’ve sounded completely normal because she wouldn’t have been tired yet.”
“Shit,” I breathed.
I watched him pop on a glove that went all the way up to his shoulder before he spread Vaseline on himself. I bent over and pressed a kiss to my cow before he shoved his hand deep into her body, and it killed me to see the pain and fear wash over my animal’s eyes. She was so frightened, and I was so clueless, and I made a mental note to take some classes somewhere on how to deal with this next time.
How to be more prepared.
“Alright. I’m gonna have to intervene. Otherwise we’re gonna end up with a stillborn. Scoot me my bag.”
I jutted my leg out and scooted it towards him, and all I tried to do was keep her distracted. Sweat was rollin’ down my face, and she kept trying to kick the man with the intrusion in her body, but when I looked back up, I saw the calf’s back legs dangling on the ground.
“I’ve almost got it. Keep her still,” he grunted.
Before I knew it, a calf in a fluid sac came spilling out from my heifer, and she finally relaxed with relief. She panted onto my lap and her eyes slowly closed, and the vet got to work and getting the calf out of the sac.
“Keep that heifer awake. Alright?” he commanded.
I slowly tapped her face, but I couldn’t get her to open her eyes. I tapped a bit harder and saw them open for a split second, but they were glassy and unfocused.
“Doc, I think we got a problem,” I said lowly. I heard a tear before a large amount of fluid spilled around us, and the doctor was helping the calf onto its feet.
“Tap as hard as you can, but you gotta keep that momma awake!” he yelled.
I tapped harder and harder, but when her eyes closed, they didn’t open. Her breathing was short and labored, and tears rose to my eyes when I realized what was happening.
“Please don’t leave me, too,” I breathed.
“Come on, momma,” the vet purred, “you gotta stay alive and get this youngin’ fed.” The calf was slowly gaining its balance in the corner and looked to be the very essence of new life itself, but my tears fell onto my heifer’s face when I realized she wasn’t gonna wake up.
“Not you, too. Please,” I whispered.
I watched her breathing slowly come to a stop, and I felt like I was gonna vomit. Her teats were leaking milk that her calf needed desperately, almost like her body was trying to reach out one last time. I pried one of her eyes open in an attempt to find hope, to find something or someone that wasn’t gonna leave me today.
But all I was met with was an empty, glassy stare.
Just like my empty, glassy house.
“I’m so sorry, Axel,” the vet murmured.
I slowly laid her head down onto the straw and sat back in the corner. My watery gaze panned up to the baby calf jumping around in the corner, and I heard one of my cows begin to moo up a storm in the barn.
“You got another momma in here producing milk?” he asked.
“They all do,” I breathed.
“Come here, little one,” the vet cooed. He led the stumbling calf out of the barn, and pretty soon the mooing cow stopped with her noises, and the suckling sounds of a hungry calf began to fill the barn.
“It’s a girl,” the vet came around the corner and smiled. But, all I could do was mindlessly pet the head of the dead cow lying beside me.
“I don’t know what your protocol is around here for your animals. You obviously loved her, and she obviously trusted you.”
“Yeah…” I trailed off.
I didn’t give a shit about the tears runnin’ down my face. I’d just taken Julie to the airport and left one of my beloved heifers to suffer in her labor, and now she was gone. I let go of one woman I loved only to come back and have another one leave me unwillingly.
“Axel?” the vet called behind him.
“Yeah doc?” I called back.
“Quit mopin’ and go get her if ya love her so much.”
I sighed heavily while the doctor retreated from the barn, and I actually started turning the thought around in my head. I don’t know how long I sat there, debating on whether or not to actually do it.
I’d left my heifer behind for something I thought I was supposed to do, and it ended up killing her. I’d sent Julie off and stayed behind for something I thought I was supposed to do, and the idea of that having some sort of traumatic effect on her made my head spin.
So, I took out my phone and placed a phone call to Bradley.
Julie
Julie - Chapter Twenty
I sat on my couch in my Paris apartment and stared at a blank television screen. I’d ordered myself some food from up the road and was patiently waiting for it to arrive while procrastinating altering the styles in all the ways my boss wanted me to. I wanted to bring a little bit of country chic to the streets of Paris ever since I’d gone home, so I plotted some fantastic designs that I thought would be absolutely beautiful in the store and on the runway. He didn’t seem the least bit impressed, mumbling shit about where my other designs were, but when he got to take a look at a few of them, he ended up jotting down some notes. He told me to make some of these changes and change up the colors a bit, then come back and talk to him.
Then he told me that if I didn’t want to wear my own designs, to not create them. I told him I would wear all the shit I drew any day of the week, and I guess he sort of took that as a challenge. He told me to make the edits and come back in, and we would make a few of the outfits to put on me.
Great.
I stared at the television before taking in all the red ink on my paper, and I realized that by the time I made all these changes the entire purpose of the outfits would be gone. I sighed and leaned back into the couch. Why the fuck did I have to bring this shit back with me to Paris!? I should’ve just cut shit off with Axel at the airport when he kissed me and fucking came back a rejuvenated and healed woman ready to get to work on my own fashion show.
Now, I looked like a bumbling idiot who’d lost the whole of her memory
in a fucking horse accident.
The thunderous knock roared out into my apartment, and I thanked my stars that food was here. Food always helped me to become creative, and maybe eating from that wonderful place down the street would help to get my creative juices flowing.
After all, a little butter on a steaming hot croissant never hurt anyone anyway.
I threw the door open and started rummaging around in my pocket for the money for the delivery man, but when I looked up, I dropped all the money I had in my hand to the floor.
It wasn’t the fucking delivery man.
It was Axel.
He was standing there with my food in his hand, and when he held up the bag, I slowly stepped off to the side. He walked into my apartment with a suitcase in one hand and my food in the other, but when I shut the door, I felt his hands on my hips. I whipped around and felt his lips crash onto mine, and the only thing I could do was run my fingers through his hair. Never in my life did I ever think Axel would ever leave the state of Oklahoma, much less find himself in Paris, but the moment his lips descended onto mine I knew exactly why I’d kissed him in that airport and left with things in the air.
Because I loved him, and I wanted any part of him I could get.
“You are the only one for me, Julie,” he rumbled into my lips. I pulled back and set my feet back onto the ground, and when my eyes focused back onto his face, he continued.
“I don’t want anyone but you. Ever. And no matter what I have to do, where I have to go, or what I have to give up, I’ll do it. Julie, I’ll never keep you from your dream, but I can’t stay away from you any longer. I already lost you once because of that damn horse accident, and I’m not willing to lose you again.”
“Wh-... but-... I-... Axel! You’re in Paris! I didn’t even know you had a passport!”
“There’s a lot you don’t know about me, woman,” he smirked. I wrapped my arms tightly around him, and he pulled me to his strong, broad chest, and the only thing I could do was smile and sigh deep into his body.
“What in the hell are you gonna do in Paris, Axel?” I whispered.
“I’ll figure it out.”
“And what about your animals!?” I breathed.
“One call to my ranch hand, and it’s taken care of. Julie, don’t worry about me. I will find something to do. But, I can’t be apart from you. Not any longer. Not after this past month. Not after everything that happened. Everything we felt. Everything we admitted.”
I felt my body beginning to tremble into his, and he swooped me off my feet without a second thought. He panned me around and found my bedroom door hanging open, and before I could even suggest the thought of food, I was being lowered onto my bed. The darkness of my apartment played well upon his sharp features, and the moment Axel began to unbutton his shirt I scrambled to my knees and planted my hands onto his rippling muscles.
His shirt dropped to the floor, and I leaned in to kiss his chest, and I could feel how hot his body was heating. He crawled onto the bed and knelt down in front of me, and his fingertips played at the hem of my shirt. I raised my arms and shivered in anticipation at what was to come, and when he reached around and freed my breasts from the confines of my bra, he latched his lips directly onto one of my swollen nipples as we both sunk into the bed.
His mouth felt so good against my body, and his skin melted perfectly into mine, and when his lips trailed further and further down, I knew I was about to meet my demise. His hands made quick work of getting me out of my jean shorts, and he groaned when he realized I wasn’t wearing any underwear.
“Such a naughty woman,” he murmured.
He dipped between my legs and flung them over his shoulders, and when his tongue jutted out, he lapped a thick stripe up my slit that shook my body to its core. My hands gripped the sheets beside me as my bare body shook for Axel, and when his tongue dipped itself into my core, I couldn’t help but call out into the room.
“God, Axel. Yes. Please. Like that. Right there.”
I rolled my hips into his tongue, begging it to be in one specific place, but all he did was dance around it. My legs trembled and my back arched, and at one point in time, I started banging my fists in frustration on the bed.
“Damn it, Axel, come on,” I whined.
But all he did was chuckle into my pussy.
I dug my heels into his back and rocked my hips into his face. His stubble massaged me in all the right places, and his hands kept holding my hips to the floor. My swollen clit was throbbing with desperation, and his tongue kept skirting the outside of its folds, and when tears finally rose to my eyes, he had mercy on my soul.
“Oh, Axel. Yes,” I choked out.
Tears ricocheted down the sides of my cheeks as his tongue flattened out on my clit, and that was all it took. My body threw itself over the edge while his tongue flicked and sucked at my pulsing nub, and when my back arched and my walls fluttered with my first orgasm, Axel buried his face into my pussy and chased my second. His tongue drank up everything I had to offer and by clit bobbed and weaved under his assault, and when my body fell off the edge for my second orgasm, he pulled back and watched me writhe on top of my sheets in my bedroom in the middle of Paris.
He stood up and got himself out of his pants, and when he sat up against the headboard, he reached over and slowly pulled me into his lap. My body was limp against his, and I could feel his thick dick pressed against my thigh, but when I slid myself forward and teased him with my dripping wet entrance, he popped right into me without a second thought.
“Shit,” he bit. His teeth grazed the pulse point on my neck, and my hands flew into his thick head of hair, and when his sinewy arms wrapped me in their tight, protective hold, I slowly began to rock back and forth in his lap. His dick filled me in a way no other man had when I was younger, and it reminded me of why I’d never tried to find anyone who could fill me the way he could since them. He pressed up against all the right places and stretched me in ways I never thought possible, and when his hands dropped to my ass to help me roll into him, I bit down into the meat of his shoulder and heard him growl in my ear.
“Holy fuck, Julie. You feel so good.”
“I love you, Axel,” I breathed into his skin.
Before I knew it, I was rolled over onto my back. I was sprawled out on my bed, and my arms were clinging onto the meat of Axel’s back, and when his eyes hooked onto mine, I swore I could see a glimmer of a tear brewing right behind them.
“And I love you, too, Julie. So fucking much.”
He rolled his hips into mine, and I locked my legs around his calves. I kept my eyes hooked onto his until he dipped his face into the crook of my neck, and I knew the moment he picked up his pace that I was done for. His hips slammed into mine, and his dick continuously filled me to the brim, and when his balls began to smack against the crack of my ass, I laid my teeth into his neck.
I moaned, and I whimpered into his skin as his dick grew thicker inside of me, and when I felt myself on the brink of bursting Axel reared up and threw my legs over his shoulders.
“Oh, fuck! Axel. Yes! Right there! Holy… Shit!”
My back arched and my fingernails dug into his thighs, and my pussy began to clench down onto Axel and milk him for all he was worth. My body shook in his wake while his hips continued their endless assault, and when he finally plowed one last time into my body and stilled himself, I could feel him pumping his essence deep into the pits of my body. I shook with each throb his dick pulsed as I heaved to catch my breath, and when Axel’s body dropped down onto mine, I wrapped my arms and legs around him to get him as close as I could get him.
“Don’t leave,” I whispered. “Please, don’t leave.”
“I had no intention of doing anything of the sort,” Axel panted into my ear.
“I’ll do anything. Just don’t leave me, please.”
Tears crested my eyes, and I cried lightly into the crook of his neck, and when I felt him slowly slide out of me, our juices soaked
up into the sheets underneath my body. He pulled me close to him, cradling me in his arms, and when he finally got my comforter up and over our bodies, my crying had already stopped.
“You don’t have to do anything but be the wonderful woman I fell in love with,” he whispered.
And my eyes fluttered shut as the warmth and protection of his body lulled me off to sleep.
Julie
Julie - Chapter Twenty-One
Axel and I toasted a celebration to him being in Paris for two months. It started off rocky, with me going into work and him not knowing what the fuck to do around the apartment, but ultimately it worked out for the better. I’d made reservations at a restaurant that wasn’t afraid to cook with grease and Axel really enjoyed the steak they made there. He enjoyed it when the waiter came out with half of the cheese wheel and melted cheese right on top of the steak, and he was all about it. Turned out he liked French food.
“To two months in Paris!” I smiled.
“Here here!” Axel exclaimed.
We clinked our wine glasses, but I didn’t drink, over the luscious food sitting in front of us, and then we began to devour it. Axel had found an actual rodeo that took place just outside of the city, and he started riding again. He entered himself as a newbie into some of the competitions, but then one of the regular riders recognized him and put him straight into the professional circuit. He traveled a bit with them around the country, but mostly he stayed just outside of Paris. He rode when he could and, when the rodeo wasn’t in town, he was hired as a contractor to help train other riders and help with other people’s ranches.
He had found his niche, and it wasn’t too far off from what he was doing back in Oklahoma.
“Has Bradley called you lately?” I asked.
