Page 102 of Salty Pickle

“It’s the same kind we had delivered a few days ago. They’ve been good about sticking to the approved list.”

Lucy reaches out her hand to stroke the goat’s head, but Matilda backs up. She races around the coffee table and leaps onto the sofa.

I’m about to bail, not wanting my usual head-butting treatment, but Matilda sits right next to me and presses her nose under my arm.

“You think she finally likes me?” I ask. “You do like me, don’t you, Matilda?”

“So, now she has a name!” Lucy says with a laugh.

“She does if she likes me.” I pat her belly.

Lucy comes to pet her, but Matilda tenses and lowers her head.

“What’s going on?” I ask. “Why is she acting like you’re me?”

Now Lucy looks worried. “I’ve seen this behavior in BeeBee’s goats. Let me feel her belly.”

She reaches out, but Matilda lets out a low warning bellow.

“Matilda!” I say. “That’s Lucy! Your mom!”

But Matilda is unfazed, snapping at Lucy each time she reaches for her.

“Let me get some carrots.” Lucy heads to the kitchen and returns with an entire bunch. “Would you like a treat, Matilda?”

Matilda presses more tightly to me, as if Lucy is offering her poison.

“Here, you give them to her.” Lucy passes the carrots to me.

I hold them in my lap, and Matilda immediately begins chomping on the ends.

Lucy sneaks up and presses her hands on the goat’s belly. “Oh, no.”

“Oh, no, what?”

“She’s pregnant.”

I almost jump up but catch myself before dislodging the goat.

“How?”

Lucy sits on the coffee table. “Probably at the farm. I let her wander. Maybe she found a roving uncut male.”

“That place is the gift that keeps on giving. How did you know she was pregnant from her behavior?”

“It’s a common trait in a female goat to completely flip their personality when the hormones hit.” Her eyebrows draw together in concern. “I’m afraid our time here is limited.”

Everything in me goes still. “What do you mean?”

“It’s already been too long for Matilda to be on a balcony in the city. The building is on to us. And now she’ll have a kid? We can’t do this to her or her baby. They need space. The baby needs to learn to forage and jump on heights and protect itself.”

“How long is a goat pregnant?”

“About twenty weeks.”

That’s a good amount of time. “We have five months to figure this out.”

But Lucy shakes her head. “She needs better nutrition.”

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