Barn

Ours was a quiet, small town community in Iowa. In the summer times and half of a fall, we attracted tourists and excitement and adventure. From the later half of a fall through the spring, we attracted nothing. See, that was just fine for the grownups in our community. We kids liked adventure.

The grownups didn’t take too kindly to us bicycling around and looking for adventure. Our folks kind of tolerated us, so long as the neighbors weren’t ratting on us for bad behavior that may or may not have been intended. Most of the time, I in particular fixed to be good; but good gets mighty boring mighty quickly. Besides, to fit in with the boys, sometimes you’ve got to be the one to go along with it and catch the blame when things go south. It keeps you well liked amongst your fellow kids; and, in our community, we have to be the ones to stick together.

That must’ve been what led us five to the woods just outside of Farmer McCreggor’s homestead one mid-October afternoon. If the grownups didn’t much care for us in the community, then Farmer McCreggor had to be the orneriest cuss of them all. He was a neighbor to Brady Battland, the biggest, strongest, and loudest of us boys, and his family. Ol’ Farmer McCreggor never did take much of a shine to Brady or to any of us, in fact. Then again, Mr. Battland, no real fan of our idea of fun, didn’t much care for Farmer McCreggor neither. To use the father’s own words, and I repeat, straight from Brady himself: “There’s keeping an eye out on the community. There’s even watching one another’s children for us. But that George McCreggor is something else yet!”

Maybe that was why Brady, in particular, never liked Farmer McCreggor; even more than he hated most grownups. Anyway, one mid-October afternoon, there were Brady, Jonny, Dano, Les, and I (Mach), sitting there in the woods on our bikes, each munching an apple from one of the trees and all watching Farmer McCreggor’s truck. He got out of his rig, slammed its door, and kicked the fender for good measure. We got a good laugh out of the old man’s frustration with his truck. Brady even kicked his bike tire to make fun of it. That escalated our laughter to louder where the farmer might have heard us and suspected prowlers. Instead, we piped down in time to catch as Farmer McCreggor’s old hound dog came to greet him home from work. He kicked the poor dog away from him next as though his sweet old pooch were the truck. We didn’t take too kindly to that sight at all.

“Hey; I feed that dog!” Brady protested.

“I give him used juice boxes to chew upon!” Dano added.

Les sometimes snuck the dog off of the property to play with it. Jonny sometimes “gave it more water” by spraying it in the face with the hose while his and Brady’s pop wasn’t around. I felt the need to add something.

“I scratched old Hermes’s head once while Farmer McCreggor had him out for a walk in town.” I offered. “I asked permission n’ everything. He told me okay; and he still didn’t like it!”

“The dog or Ol’ Man McCreggor?” Brady demanded.

“The dog took a liking to the attention just fine.” I amended. “My pa was there too; I did nothing wrong!”

“You asked Farmer McCreggor permission for something?” Brady spat.

I could feel the other boys beginning to turn on me.

“I was being respectful-like about it.” I amended with a timid shrug.

“You think that Famer McCreggor cares about how polite you are anyways?” Brady snorted. “We’re kids!”

The other boys nodded. Even I had to admit that they were right. I turned beet red for having fessed up to the offense of trying to be respectful to an old guy who’d never return the favor to me.

Farmer McCreggor stomped into his house. Hermes was closed out onto the porch to whimper and scratch at the door. It had just been stunned by being kicked for being the one life form in town with any interest in seeing the farmer home from the fields; now it was being shunned for its troubles.

Suddenly, Brady got really quiet, like the wheels in his head were turning. This usually meant something temporarily fun was about to happen. I couldn’t always read Brady’s mind and know how he developed these plans against the grownups. Today, I thought I could see why.

“Let’s have some fun!” Brady promptly blurted.

We gathered our bikes ‘round one another right there in that wooded clearing for a conference. Brady was satisfied that he had our attention and he began to speak.

“Halloween’s a’coming up.” he began, glancing about to each of our eager, listening faces. “I say, that we sneak into Farmer McCreggor’s barn real quiet-like and stay the night there!”

“That’s a-trespassing, ain’t it?” Dano, usually the first one of us to go right along with a “Brady plan,” piped up.

Brady glared at me as though I had made the protest. Sometimes he was like that about me.

“I’m not saying to move into the guy’s house and take off of his table or nothing!” Brady snorted. “I said the barn! Who’re we going to trouble; the moo-cows and horses? Old Hermes?”

Halloween night in a barn; and on another guy’s property yet! What an adventure that would be to share! We’d talk about that one for ages! It was hard to argue with this Brady plan.

“What about Tricks-n-Treating that night?” Jonny asked/whined.

Brady signaled for Jonny to hush down as we were still parked in the woods just beyond Mr. McCreggor’s property line. He then glanced up and beyond his kid brother. Good; the farmer wasn’t out patrolling his property with the powder gun. We knew the woods was public land; Farmer McCreggor could be a tough man to convince. Satisfied that the farmer wouldn’t come back, Brady turned back to Jonny.

“Fine; after Trick-or-Treating, we’ll meet up with the others.” Brady reassured him. “Now, we’re going to need two lookouts and one of us to hold our position in the barn that night. Now who…?”

I was Brady’s lifelong friend and, as usual, I accepted the hard job so that no one else had to. At 5:15, just as the farmer was sitting down to his supper, I snuck into the barn with Les and Dano’s help.

“Don’t you get too scared in there now in the daylight.” Dano teased.

“Ooooooh…!” Les added.

I turned around and punched them both in their arms with a grin on my face. Scared nothing; I felt proud to participate like this! No one was going to catch me holding down the position for all of us!

“We’ll check back in with you later.” Les supplied.

“Scouts honor!” Dano added.

I nodded in reply. Les was closer to Jonny’s age than to one of ours and Dano talked big but was kind of a big chicken. I was the only one in Brady’s class with him; and Brady had to take care of Jonny. Besides, keeping out of sight and watching for trouble was really closer to Dano and Les’s speed. Therefore, I glanced out a dirty window and watched them pedal away. What I hadn’t understood was when they had wood-bolted the doors from the outside. Oh well; if it made them feel more secure that I couldn’t get caught, then who was I to argue?

Late afternoon turned to dusk. No one had checked back in with me. Furthermore, I couldn’t even see Les or Dano’s bicycles in the wooded clearing anymore. I shrugged and settled onto a haystack. They must be Trick-or-Treating too; they’d BETTER bring ME something back!

The night grew too late for Trick-or-Treating; still no other arrivals. I wasn’t scared or anything; I was mad. I’d been taken advantage of! And how was I to avoid Farmer McCreggor in the morning when he checked on his animals? Oh well; at least then I’d be able to get out behind him!

Suddenly, I heard a flapping noise. Now I was a little nervous. The horses, cows, and I weren’t as alone as I had thought!

There came a hoot and I almost blamed Les for sneaking around a window; except I wasn’t near any of the windows for it to be nearly that audible. I glanced up and found a brown barn owl silhouetted in the shadows. He and I were the only creatures awake; and we had just caught one another’s eyes. I was eleven and I was curious about this new find. I had a companion of sorts for my night journey. I’d have a mascot to boast to the other boys about when they teased me about being the patsy to fall for such a lame trick. I got up and moved cautiously through the barn until I slapped my hand on a window sill.

“C’mere, boy.” I signaled my new friend.

The barn owl looked down at me as a stranger to him, then perched himself on the newly vacated haystack. At least now, we were on one level. However, from that same level, the barn owl fluffed its feathers at me and hooted warily. It would watch me from its new safe distance and it would protect me from there; providing that I wasn’t of the mind to get much closer.

I agreed to the unspoken rule and huddled my back up against the wood wall. It felt…safer…to know that the barn owl was there with me even if my friends weren’t. After all, the owl knew this barn better than I did. In the morning, I would somehow escape the barn unnoticed and have to say farewell to my new mascot…