It had been two days since Bainne had been bought. Since she was very small, for a milk cow, and the chicken coop more of a large shed, she was kept there for the time being.
It was just a few days before Anne's favorite childhood holiday- St. Patrick's Day. In Ireland, even as poor as they were, the MacEilans had celebrated the day with zest and zeal, and they always had enough food that day- St. Patrick's and Christmas, reminisced Anne, those were the days that they had three assured meals. Their mother's Irish roots ran too deep to forget March 17th's special meaning, but this year, the thought of the coming Friday made her sadden. This year, as she had taken on every household responsibility and thus become, in her mother's memory, a woman, she missed her mother more than ever. She had died so soon after they came over the wide Atlantic, and she had died before their farm really started to do well and they always, now, had enough to eat. Just thinking of all the memories, happy and sad, that her mother had made with her made Anne want to break down crying there in front of the wood pile. She held herself together though, until she had everyone awake, the porridge made and eaten, and was braiding her long hair.
Anne's hair was a lighter color than the other MacEilan's- more of a golden-red color, like their mother's had been, and when unbraided, it fell just past her waist in shining waves. Anne would braid it every morning into two long, shimmering braids and would pin them to her head in one large knot. It was as her deft fingers braided the strands together that Iain was getting ready to go back to Denver for the week that he stopped lacing his boots and looked at her, tears beginning to cloud his jade eyes as her fingers twisted the pieces of hair.
"Ye look like Mum," he whispered, just barely with enough volume for her to hear across the one-room cottage. Mary hadn't yet gone out of doors and looked at Anne.
"Aye, that she does," Mary replied to him. A mist had formed over her eyes, a mist of unshed tears, but she shook it off."Ye shouldn't be wearing it like that until yer fifteen, Anne."
"Considering ye'd still wear it in two tails if ye could get away with it and ye are eighteen, someone has to wear it up, willingly, " retorted Anne, tying off the braid and starting on the other one. "Besides, my hair's too long to wear in two loose braids."
Emma looked up from where she was about to start braiding little Maria's short brown hair. Sighing at her twin, she parted the lass's hair right down the middle with a practiced hand. It seemed to Anne that Emma had long since given up on having Anne act her age instead of two years older. That suited Anne just fine. She liked acting older.
Iain finished lacing up his boots. He kissed his sisters goodbye, and Anne handed him a half loaf of bread and meat. The tears had cleared from his green eyes.
"God be with ye," he called, crunching over the frosting if snow on the ridge. "I shall come back on Friday evening!" He waved at the girls, and they bid farewell back as best they could: Mary waving her hand normally, Emma calling "goodbye " as her hands were otherwise occupied with Maria's thick, dark hair. The two older Jones girls waved happily in the crisp March air, and Anne lifted one hand from her long braids to wave.
"Well, he's gone for another long while," Mary sighed. Â "I wonder why he even bothers to come in the first place." She harrumphed and her thin shoulders dropped.
"Oh, Mary, stop being such a pessimist," Emma begged. "We had such a lovely visit while it lasted. Besides, he's always able to write us."
Anne stuck the long metal hairpins in her braids, to keep them in their heavy knot at the nape of her neck. "We've done fine without him, and he can't afford a train ticket very often. He's not paid all that much."
"He doesn't need a train ticket, Anne," said Mary almost bitterly. "He's not all that far away."
"That's true," Anne acknowledged. "But ten miles is much too far to walk. Iain had to hitch a ride with someone going this way."
"But-" Mary tried to begin
"Oh, for heaven's sake, Mary, just enjoy what you've got." Emma broke in. "We see Iain more often in the past few years then we've seen our father in the past few years."
An air of bitterness hung in the air. Anne hadn't noticed little Jane leave the situation and go inside, but when she walked inside the little house, she saw Jane picking up the near- empty water bucket. Emma and Mary filed inside and sat down- Mary to sulk a bit in the corner, and Emma by the small fire to sew.
"Where are you going off to, lassie? " asked Anne as Jane started to go outdoors with the water bucket.
"To milk the cow," replied the little girl confidently.
Anne laughed. "Not yet," she laughed. "That won't be your job for a few more years yet." She scooped up the squealing seven year old playfully, tickling the girl's belly. Emma, who sat sewing by the fire, laughed as Jane giggled, one of her hands going to her mouth while the other kept a hold on the needle. Maria tried to laugh, but came up coughing instead.
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