The Country Girl
by Jon
I meet Sarah.


"Is there anywhere I can repair my car?" I asked as I approached the farm..

"Sure," the tall, rawboned blonde in jeans and denim shirt said. "When I ride
into town tomorrow, I'll tell Abe, and he'll come out and give you a tow."

"What will I do till tomorrow?" I asked.

"I could use some help. You can say here the night, but you'll have to help me
out until supper."

I agreed, following her into the large barn. She was a tall country girl in
her late twenties, the same height as me at six feet, but thin and rangy where
I was more heavily built at 200 pounds. Her face was long and good looking,
burned brown by the wind and sun. "My name's Sarah," she said.

"I'm Henry," I responded.

"Well, Henry, You can help me shift this feed," she nodded to about forty
sacks of meal that lay near the doorway. "I've just had a delivery. It needs
to go up top." She pointed up a stairway to a platform fifteen feet above us.
"You better take off your jacket."

I put the jacket in one corner, took off my tie, and began to work in my
shirtsleeves, bending to pick up the first sack. It was hard to lift. 100
awkward pounds - which had to be hefted onto my shoulder. With some difficulty
I managed to balance the heavy sack over my right shoulder and began to carry
it up the steps. When I reached the top, I was surprised to see Sarah right
behind me with a similar sack of meal over her shoulder. She looked quite
comfortable beneath the heavy load as she stepped ahead of me and threw it
down in one corner.

"Stack them up here," she said.

"Are you sure you can manage those?" I asked.

"We have to work hard in the country," she said, turning back down the steps.

I followed her, watching, impressed as she bent, briskly hefted one of the
hundred pound sacks up across her shoulder and strode back toward the steps.
She moved fast. This girl was getting ahead of me. I went to the pile an
hefted another sack up to my shoulder. It took some effort. It wasn't getting
any easier. I found myself gasping for breath as I straightened beneath the
weight and turned. I was annoyed that I couldn't do it with the same smooth
fluidness of the girl. By the time I got to the steps, Sarah was already on
her way back down. I tried to speed up as she passed me, but I was feeling hot
and short of breath. Already I was beginning to sweat.

I got to the top of the steps, unloaded my burden and turned to see the girl
slam another heavy sack down beside mine. Already she'd done three full sacks
to my two, and she was ahead of me again going back down the steps. What's
more, she didn't look the least tired or even sweaty. Gasping for breath, I
followed her back down.

Ten minutes later I was carrying my ninth sack up that terrible stairway. I
was pouring with sweat, my face burning, moving very slowly, every muscle in
my body blazing with pain. I had really struggled hard to get this last sack
up on my shoulder, dropping it twice, my arms burning with the effort. What
was worse, I was nowhere near keeping pace with this girl barely two thirds my
weight. I watched as she swung sack number twenty up onto her rangy shoulder
as if it was full of feathers, not a hundred pounds of grain. Again she turned
and strode up past me to the top.

I reached the upper level gasping for air, dropping my sack before I got to
the pile. Sarah just grabbed it and tossed it up to the top of the pile in her
long, rangy arms. And she hadn't even broken sweat. She'd carried twice as
much as me, and she still looked fresh!

"How do you do that?" I gasped, feeling humiliated that I, a strong man,
wasn't able to keep up with her.

"You're not used to heavy work like I am," she said. "I do it every day."

"I'm so hot," I gasped, wiping the streaming sweat from my face and neck. I've
got to take a rest."

"You're right. It is hot work," Sarah said, taking off her blue denim shirt to
reveal just a white brassiere underneath. I could see the muscles on her rangy
frame now. They were spare and hard. There were squared washboard abdominals,
flaring deltoids at her shoulders, and long, rounded biceps that balled into
small boulders as her arms flexed. I watched the muscles snake and ripple
across her tanned upper body as she went back down the steps.

"Aren't you going to take a break?" I asked.

"I haven't time," she said bending to toss another big sack over her shoulder.
There were only seven left now. "I have to cook a meal after this."

She almost ran up the steps and dumped the sack on the stack. I tried to get
back up, but was too exhausted to stand. "You've done okay," Sarah said. "I
can manage the rest. This is how I normally do it."

I watched astonished as she bent, and this time took one sack over each
shoulder, straightening under the 200 pound weight with only the softest grunt
of effort, then she turned and carried both sacks back up the stairway to
where I sat.

"Stop," I said, as she went back down and did the same again. I couldn't watch
this, and staggering to my feet, I went down the steps and tried to do as she
did. But there was no way I could get both heavy sacks up onto my shoulders.
Both went only half way up before crashing heavily to the ground.

"Don't try it," Sarah said, behind me. "It takes practice."

Settling for one sack, I made my way back up the steps. It felt like I was
carrying the world on my shoulders. I stumbled and nearly fell twice, but
finally made it to the top with my sack, sweating and gasping for air. I
slumped to the floor as the girl came up behind me with the last two sacks and
lowered them onto the pile.

"There. Job done," she said, grinning. She still wasn't sweating, just glowing
beneath her tan, her muscles flickering gently as she moved. Through her tight
jeans I could see her hard, pumped, leg muscles pressing against the fabric.
"Right let's get up to the farmhouse."

I tried to stand, but my legs were unsteady, my muscles still trying to
recover from the effort they had put in. I had to prop myself up against a
post.

"All right, city boy," Sarah said, "perhaps you need a bit of help from a
plain old country girl." With that she seized my arm, bent, and sent her right
arm between my knees. Then she straightened to lift me right up off the floor
across her shoulders!

"Put me down!" I yelled, feeling her hard shoulders digging into my chest and
stomach as she turned for the stairs.

"Now why should I do that?" she said playfully, her arms pinning me firmly
across her shoulders so I couldn't escape. She spun me round, enjoying her
power over me.

"We'll fall!"

"No we won't, lover boy." She began to walk down the steps. "I'm good and
strong."

So it proved as she carried my 200 pounds effortlessly down the steps, out of
the barn and up toward the farm house. She moved fast, her long legs carrying
us the hundred and fifty yards up to the house in moments. I felt totally
humiliated. I was being carried across this girl's shoulders like a sack of
grain, and I could do nothing to free myself. I gazed helplessly at the yard
and the outbuildings as she took us up the steps, and then through the
flyscreen into the house kitchen.

"Hi mom. Who's the guy?"

That was when I saw the two kids drawing at the table. I felt even more
humiliated as I looked down at them from where I was pinned six feet up across
Sarah's shoulders.

"Oh. He's a friend. He got tired helping me with the feed delivery so I gave
him a lift up here. You know your mom's real strong. Oh." She said to me,
turning me round so I could see them. "These are my two kids, Earl is five,
and Dottie is six. Their dad went off four years ago."

"Hi mister," Earl said.

"Hi," I answered.

"What are you going to do with him, Mom?"

"Oh. I'll take him upstairs so he can get a bath."

"You can put me down now," I said.

"Not quite yet," She said. "Us country girls don't tire easy." She turned and
carried me into the hall, then up a steep flight of steps to a small bedroom.
Then she slipped me off her shoulders and lowered me back to my feet. She
stood back. Her face was slightly flushed, but otherwise she didn't look
affected by her effort in carrying me here.

"You're some woman," I said.

"Sure am," she smiled. "Now I'll just go down and start supper. You take your
bath. Or do you want me to put you in?"

"Put me in?"

"Yes. Why not?" With that she scooped me up in her arms in a smooth cradle
carry. She seemed to carry my two hundred pounds easily in her muscular arms.
Walking across to the bathroom, she lowered me, clothes and all, into the
empty bathtub. "You'll have to run your own water," she said as she left me to
go downstairs.

I had my bath. As I was towelling down I realized that I was hearing voices
outside. I went to the window to see that there was a truck in the yard. Sarah
was talking to the driver. He could take me to town, I realized. I threw on my
clothes and rushed downstairs. When I got back to the kitchen Sarah was just
coming in.

"That man," I said. "He could take me in to town now. I could get my car fixed
tonight! Did you tell him about me?"

"No.," Sarah said. "It's best you go in the morning like I said."

"But I can save a whole day."

"I don't want him to know you're here," she said. "Talk will get around."

"That doesn't matter!" I pressed toward the kitchen door. "I'll explain
everything to him. Hey!" I shouted. "Stop!"

I felt a tap on my shoulder. I turned round to see Sarah one step behind me.
She was frowning. Then I saw this blur as her right arm sped up toward me.

There was a sudden huge blaze of pain in the left side of my jaw. I felt
myself falling backward... The room spinning... Then nothing.

I opened my eyes to find myself lying on a couch with Sarah on the far side of
the kitchen preparing a meal. I sat up slowly, my head throbbing, wondering
where the truck and its driver were, and how I got on this couch. I felt my
jaw, and winced with pain. It was badly bruised. My lip was cut.

"What happened?" I asked, my voice sounding slurred. It hurt to speak.
"Where's the truck driver?"

"He left over an hour ago," Sarah said. "I sold him some seed, we had a
coffee, and he left."

"An hour ago?" I repeated in disbelief, beginning to remember. "You.. hit
me.."

"Yeah!" young Earl said. "Mom knocked you out cold! Whack! One good punch, and
you went down."

"One punch?" I sat bewildered, feeling my injured jaw.

"Yeah," said the little girl, Dottie, "You just lay there and didn't move. Mom
picked you up and carried you over to that couch. Then she went out to finish
her business. You've been lying there grunting for over an hour."

"I always could hit pretty hard." Sarah brought the potatoes to the table.
"That was a pretty good punch, though I don't think I broke your jaw or
anything. Now come and eat your supper. And don't give me any more trouble or
I might just have to lay you out again."

I realized I'd have to watch out for Sarah.