Much of Trevor's morning went fairly well as he he'd gotten up to a new day and holding the knowledge that things in his own life would be different. It was a difference in a good way as thoughts of Melissa Jenkins flashed off and on through his mind. Scenes of her dancing at the Halloween Dance with him were, along with the occasional flashes of seeing her smile at school, before the memories of her cuddled against him in her new fursona from the previous night after the dance finished them off. Everything about new Moon Lake resident from Michigan had just seemed perfect to him. Even before the Halloween Dance, a part of him was really growing to love her and even hoped that they'd be together forever.
"So... Anna Bell says you turned your girlfriend last night," Clint said to his older brother from across the breakfast table as the Tysons went about their own breakfast.
"He did, and if you hadn't slept through it like a rock you would have heard it," Anna Bell commented while poking her younger brother in the shoulder.
Trevor did his best not to choke on the toast he was presently chewing on as he looked to his younger siblings and did manage a small blush, as it did bring him out of some of his reminiscing on the moments he'd had with Melissa up to the present point. Meeting her at school and seeing her lost and a bit anxious, in need of a friend, which he offered and then seeing it grow into something more.
"Is that a problem, Clint?" Trevor asked back.
"Not... not really," Clint said slowly, "but... why would you want to be with a girl? Girls are... bleh."
"Mom's a girl," Anna Bel pointed out.
"Mom is mom," Clint countered.
"Your thoughts may change on that sort of thing when you get older," Jacob Tyson spoke from the head of the table while glancing to his wife who was finishing up her breakfast at the stove for the moment and then looking over to his children eating their breakfast, noting the redness in his eldest son's cheeks.
It reminded him a bit of what Trevor had mentioned to him the previous night and how serious his eldest son seemed to be about the girl. He was well aware on how fleeting liaisons between weres could be. With as high as a were's libido could be, sometimes just having another were present could be enough to inspire some amorous attention. He could remember that at first his own feelings toward Erma Mayweather had been the same, one upon a time. But after turning her and some more formal dates through high school and college later, he and Erma found themselves inseparable. Which in turn lead to marriage and then the children whom he loved and would protect for as long as he was able. From what Jacob could tell from talking with Trevor, it seemed like Trevor's relationship with Melissa was a bit different in that Trevor had seemed to fall in love first and then turned Melissa, but it still seemed that the relationship was just as deep. It was something that made him fairly interested in meeting Melissa's family later that evening, even the unit appeared to be just Melissa and her father, for the moment. After all if what Erma told him was right and that Trevor and Melissa might one day become Mr. and Mrs. Trevor Tyson, it'd make sense to meet with those who would be joining the family.
"And I can't wait to meet her," Anna Bell added, "Trevor gets her in all his classes and I don't have her in any of mine."
"We don't share every class," Trevor blushed harder, only earning giggles from Anna Bell.
"And Trevor and Melissa are in the same grade," Erma reminded Anna Bell as she came over to sit down opposite her husband, "So it'd make sense that Trevor and Melissa would share more classes together."
"I still can't wait to meet her..." Anna Bell replied while then shoveling a forkful of eggs into her mouth.
"I'm sure we all will," Jacob commented, given that his interactions with Melissa were a bit limited. All he really knew was that Trevor liked her and that she'd come to Moon Lake from Michigan. "In the meantime there will still be some work that needs to be done."
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And there were plenty of things that were to be done that were part of the day to day life of running the farm. The area where the Tyson farm was wasn't perfectly flat and in some places it did give a gentle rise in slope toward the mountain that was northeast of the town, but the land area was large enough to allow for a fairly decent operation. The Tysons had enough areas cleared of trees that they could provide hay for the dairy cattle that they raised, and it was in one of those hay fields where Trevor and Melissa had had their moment together. The mundane cattle might be allowed to range into those areas during the late fall and winter months, as the growth of grass was lower, even with Washington state's rainy climate. There might be enough for them to graze on during the day, but the herd they had was actually small enough that they wouldn't kill the grass that was there either.
However, there were still potential issues with mundane bears and mountain lions, and even wolves on occasion, to say nothing of some were thinking pranking the Tyson's cattle was a good thing, and as such they were kept in a couple of decent sized barns behind the Tyson home in order to keep predators and predatory weres out. The cattle were also kept there when it was cold or there was a heavy snow, in order to keep them warmer and provide access to food for them. The only animals that were more "free range" were the White Tail and Mule Deer that the Tysons' also raised as stock for Moon Lake's predatory weres. They were kept securely in a series of pens toward the back portions of the property and secured behind high chain-link fences with sturdy metal posts.
These deer pens actually took up the largest amounts of land area on the farm and also was more forested than the rest of the area. The only things that broke them up were a series of gates and latches that were designed to keep the bucks and does separate outside of the fall rut. This let the does raise their fawns in safety and allow for yearlings to get some space to mature as well. The system was designed to preserve as much of their wild behavior as possible in order to when necessary release some deer into the area around Moon Lake so that predatory weres would have something to hunt. Managing them was always difficult and the paperwork that had to be filled out to raise the deer as farm stock was extensive, but it had been something that the Tysons had done fairly well with.
Though, after breakfast, Trevor's chores took him more to the barn area where the cattle normally were. The main barn had lone center aisle to walk through with two large sliding doors on both sides. The wood floor on this aisle area was clear and was very firm. To his right was one row of firm fencing. When the barn was first built, it was wooden, but now it was a strong steel, which wouldn't splinter as easy and was firm enough to hold the six cows that were on that side. Trevor heard a series of moos come from that side of the barn and could six cows that were there. They were Brown Swiss and their dark brown eyes focused on him as he walked by. He noted that the walls that normally made the stalls that they used for milking were folded up against the main wall, which meant they'd probably already been milked for the morning. On the other side a deeper moo soon followed the females making Trevor look over to the left to see the lone Brown Swiss Bull that they had. His stall was fenced in the same way as the cows were, but because there was only one, the area he had was smaller, though it was enough that he could easily move about if he wanted to.
"You're already to go out, I see," Trevor said to them and then chuckled back as there came a "moo" in response
He made his way across the barn, undid the main door's latch and then slid it open as both the cows and the bull watched and seemed to follow him fairly closely. It was something that was rather amusing in how docile they were and even friendly. It was something that often went against how mundane animals and weres interacted. Mundane predators, like the bear that tried to kill him when he was a child, often chose to fight weres when interactions occurred, and even the deer that the Tyson family and the others that engaged in raising deer for the predatory weres could be feisty at times and when the buck's antlers had shed their velvet, they could be downright dangerous. But yet domesticated animals, like dogs, cats, horses, cattle, and about any animal used as a pet remained highly docile and even friendly. The Tyson's dairy cows were no exception to that.
"Okay, ladies first," Trevor spoke and then lifted another gate latch and pulled it back, opening a direct pathway to the outside for the six cows. The gate had enough length that it also crossed the aisle and could latch again on the other side preventing any of the six from going out the barn's front door and into areas where there was no fencing to keep them from wandering off the property. The bull meanwhile bellowed again from his side. "No, Victor, you know the rules. You are to be a gentleman. You'll want to set an example for your calves when they arrive."
Trevor only got a "moo" in response as the six cows made their way out. As the last one left, Trevor then shut the gate back in its original position and then repeat the same process with the gate on the bull's, Victor's, side. As the bull made his way out, Trevor soon heard a familiar voice behind him.
"I'd think if anyone was the gentleman, it'd be you," came Anna Bell's voice from behind him.
"Well... thank you for the compliment," Trevor answered as he moved to get started on the real work that he had to do, which was to clean out the old straw that was there from the previous night and put in new straw. This would serve to make sure that when the cows were brought back in before dinner and Melissa and her father's expected arrival that they would have a clean place to lay down and rest. "So what are you up to?"
"Well... I got my morning chores done and Clint's helping ma with the dishes from breakfast," Anna Bell answered, "so I thought I'd come help you."
"Because you want to talk about Melissa more?" Trevor asked remembering Anna Bell's wake up earlier in the day.
"Again... can you blame me?" Anna Bell asked, "you've talked a lot about her at dinner... and then you and her let everyone know how happy the two of you were... Like and ma and pa are together."
Trevor knew that, as there were plenty of times where he and his siblings could hear their parents enjoying each other's company and occasionally herd meetings could turn into all out orgies when everyone was together. About the only were-group that didn't have their meetings turn into that were the werefoxes, if he was to believe Megumi's reports on their group meetings being rather business-like. Though, Trevor wondered if that was just with the formal meetings that there weren't times when werefoxes let it loose elsewhere. That didn't quite mean that he was fully comfortable with his younger siblings teasing him about Melissa.
"I love her, like ma and pa love each other," Trevor answered, a bit more confident in saying that since admitting it to his father the previous night "nothin' wrong with that."
Anna Bell watched as Trevor walked across the floor and collected a wheelbarrow and a large flat shovel to scoop up the used straw and any other remains that would be taken to a manure pile that was out toward the edge of the property and closer to where the deer pens were.
"Of course, T," Anna Bell replied, "and I'm actually happy for you... I'd just like to meet her... and well... know a bit more on what'll happen with me."
Trevor looked over to his younger sister as she looked to him and managed a small sigh. He made his way into Victor's side of the barn and set to work with shoveling up the old straw, as it would be the side he could get cleaned up first. And if the Sunday forecast included a storm that might put him against the clock. If it was only rain, then the cattle would probably fine. They'd seen rain before, however, if any thunderstorm came out of it, there would be the need to get the barn clean and get the cattle back in to make sure that things like lightning wouldn't be a problem. At the same time there was the issue with the fact that he knew that Anna Bell was growing up and she'd been having some of the same dreams he'd had before his first transformation.
"I'm sure things will be fine, Anna Bell," Trevor said to her, "some of those dreams may be scary..."
"They're weird," Anna Bell spoke as she watched Trevor work and drop shovel loads into the wheelbarrow, "I'm talking to this boy at school... and then I'm in one of the stalls next to Bessie and Jessie..." Anna Bell paused after mentioning two of the cows the Tysons owned, "and I'm just like them... a mature mundane cow... and the boy is there... milking me. And I didn't even know who the boy was."
"Some of the dreams I had before my first transformation were similar," Trevor admitted, "but remember what we got from the "were" class in Middle School. A lot of that is simply going to be the sign of all the instinctive knowledge about being a were and that particular were-species starting to manifest... and that your human subconscious at that time is still wrestling with those things. Once your first transformation comes... those two will harmonize together and you'll be fine. That's what happened with me. It'll happen with you two."
Anna Bell watched Trevor finished shoveling out the old straw from Victor's stall and then moved to open gate that lead out of the central aisle toward the area on the other side of the barn. Anna Bell then grabbed the handles on the wheelbarrow and then pushed it through the gate and out the door. She heard the gate latch again while the walked out behind the barn. The area outside was fairly dry for the moment, though the grass had been worn down by the in and out traffic from the Tyson's cattle. They hadn't strayed too far from the barn at the moment with two having even decided to lay down under one of the trees. In the meantime Trevor and Anna Bell walked along one worn path that headed up toward the back area of the property near where the deer pens where and where the Tysons collected and made compost. It was something that took time, but it generally worked well and the Adaeze Floral Shop and some of the summer lawn sculpting businesses for fertilizer and good soil. The time it took to do this safely took time, but it worked.
"Yeah... but you and me are different," Anna Bell spoke, "I'll be a werecow, like ma. You're a werebull like pa. Your girlfriend's about the only one I can relate to..."
"Mel wasn't born a were, Anna Bell," Trevor reminded his sister, "In that she's more like ma than either of us. She chose to become a were and a werecow specifically. And besides you know how fickle things are. My fursona doesn't match ma's or pa's. And Melissa's doesn't match mine. Pa's matches his pa's... but then I don't match him or ma... you can't expect you to match me, pa, ma, or Mel. Your form will be who YOU are."
"I'd still like to met her and have her as a friend," Anna Bell then commented as they reached the he large outdoor box that been set up as the compost box and bin. It carried more the scent of dung than any other place on the farm but then as part of the compost process it was supposed to. "I mean... I never got to meet her at school... though I see you talking to some red headed girl in the hall. You've brought her up to the house at least twice, but either I wasn't home or busy with something else. And in the last time... it was to make love to her... and ma and pa said I couldn't come out to say hello."
"Well... I'm sure you will make good friends when she and her dad arrive for dinner," Trevor promised, "especially so long as you aren't too pushy on my time with her or anything like that."
"I'm still going to be excited," Anna Bell told him and then giggled when Trevor groaned.