A Horse's Tale, Chapter 38

A Horse's Tale, Chapter 38, Plastic Bags and Rocks

Steph and Rob are all comfy on their couch and chair, watching TV, during a commercial break, Steph turns to Rob, "Have you noticed that the horses have been pretty calm since Annie's arrival, no late night knocks on the door." Rob turns, "Yeah that is pretty strange, they must be planning something." Steph sits up, "What do you mean?" Rob looks over to Steph, "Well think about the time of year." Steph thinks a bit, "Well its spring time, the trees are budding, its coming up on Easter, but the horses aren't going to celebrate Easter." Rob butts in, "Well not our Easter, but theirs, it’s the start of foiling season." Steph looks back at Rob, "You know you are right, but what could they be planning?" Rob settles back into his chair, "I have no idea, they are horses, they do some dumb things."

Steph wakes up, rolls over, Rob is sound asleep, she carefully gets up, not sure how they both made it to the bed last night, the last thing Steph remembered was watching some educational show, ahhh, 'Baywatch versus the Swamp loggers' or something like that. Steph grabs her robe, walks to the front of the house to make some coffee, after she starts the coffee, she looks around at the dogs, all are sound asleep, except for two, seems Truffles and Bruno are missing from the piles of dogs. "I wonder what they are up to this early in the morning?" As the smell of coffee fills the kitchen, Steph pours a cup, and sits at her desk, and looks out towards Annie in the Maternity Ward, she is messing about sniffing the ground for bits of hay from last night. Then out of nowhere, she see's Bruno run by Annie, in her pen, followed a few paces, well actually a fair distance behind Truffles running as fast as she can. A moment later, Bruno bursts through the doggy door, and heads right to his bed. He drops a something on his bed, he lays down very carefully and starts fiddling with looks to be plastic bags. Truffles finally makes it into the house, she is carrying something but seems to be fighting it more than carrying it, she walks up to Bruno, and drops the remains of a plastic bag by his side. Bruno looks down and turns to Truffles and says "Dumb dog." and proceeds to bite her on the ear. Steph sits up, "Bruno, don't bite her." Bruno looks over to Steph not noticing her before, "She ruined it, it won't work now." Steph gets up and walks over to Bruno, "Ruined what?" Bruno, looks up at Steph, "The basket, they need to be perfect." Steph looks at the pile of plastic bags that Bruno is fiddling with, "Baskets, they are plastic bags." Bruno looks up again from his work of smoothing out the bags, "I know that, you know that," he looks at Truffles "Most of us know that, but the horses are calling them baskets."

Steph walks back over to the desk, sits down and takes a drink of coffee, "So why are you collecting baskets for the horses?" Bruno finishes folding the last of the plastic bags he brought in, he stands up picks up the remains of what Truffles brought in and carries it to the trash can, pushes the little lever at the bottom, and drops the remains of the plastic bag in the trash. He turns to Steph, "Well Dublin asked me to do a mission. It was to get 179 plastic, ahhh, baskets for the horses, Dublin said a dozen dozen baskets, and that they needed them by the end of the moon." Steph sits back, "Ahh, you mean by the end of the month?" Bruno sits down knowing this may turn into a long conversation, "ahh, horses measure time by the moon, you measure time by the month, dogs measure time by what’s on the TV, so its all different." Steph nods, "Did he tell you why they needed the plastic... ahhh Baskets?" Bruno thinks awhile, "Nope just said the horses needed them." Steph nods, "Why are you doing a mission for the horses, seems like a lot of work?" Bruno starts waggin his tail, "Oh it is, the plastic bags only come by when the wind is blowing, and I have to run the fence line to find them." Steph nods again, 'yeah, seems like a lot of things blow by in the wind.' "So how many more do you need to collect?" Bruno looks back at the stack of plastic bags, "Ahhh, I think maybe 250 or so, considering the help I have." Again he gives Truffles a strong look, and turns back to Steph, "Oh, they also want some rocks." Steph looks at him, "Rocks? Bruno looks at Steph as if she didn't understand, which she didn't "Yes rocks about the size of chicken eggs from what I understand, and colorful. You know red, green, blue, yellow ones." Steph sits back and takes another drink of coffee, "You know Bruno those might be pretty hard to find around here." Bruno nods, "I know, but we are looking as best we can. we may have to come up with an alternative." Steph leans back, "Bruno, why are you doing a mission for the horses, I thought only the horses did missions?"

Bruno looks around at the sleeping dogs, "Well Fred met with Dublin a few days ago, and he asked if we could help out. And Fred told us, and only me and Truffles agreed to help, well to admit, we were the only dogs awake when Fred came by, but we accepted." Steph smiles, "Well normally you dogs don't do things, unless a treat is involved, or a lot of barking, so what was the deal?" Bruno turns and walks very quietly back to his bed, he messes about under his bed for a bit, then drags out a bag, and walks over to Steph, "Beggin Strips, 128 bags if we get it all done." Steph reaches down and takes the bag, "Yeap the real thing, 128 bags is a lot." Bruno nods, "yep I know, but I also know that horse's can't count, so I am hope’n for 8 or 9 one for each of the dogs, except for maybe," He looks over his shoulder at Truffles, "But we will work it out."

Bruno takes the bag of Beggin Strips back from Steph and puts it under his bed, "oh oh, the wind is picking up, more baskets, and he and Truffles run for the doggy door. Steph leans back, takes another sip of coffee just as Rob enters the room, "Is the coffee ready?" Steph looks up, "Oh yes, it’s ready, and it tastes great. Oh you were right."

Rob fills his mug up with fresh coffee, "Right about what, I am normally wrong about most things?"

To Be Continued
Author: Samm