The dawn broke with a bit of excitement. The sun seemed a little brighter, the birds in the trees seemed to chirp a little cheerier. It was as if they wanted to announce; today is going to be a big day!
In a way, it was going to be. Having made the decision to stay on the run-down old farm of the purple and white foxtaur woman Buddleia, the tall and lanky human woman Sasha had also decided to help the vixen-taur get her farm back on its feet, and today was the day they were going to make their first start with the very hard work it was going to be.
After waking up, they first went through the routine they had found themselves slipping into over the past week. Buddleia made them a filling porridge of grains, bread, milk and fruits, after the breakfast they had a wash in the pond next to the driveway, and after that the vixen-taur wrapped the faded flowery fabric back around Sasha's chest to support the ribs the human woman had broken. Having noticed it had also become a habit that she found herself liking quite a bit, Sasha did not put on any clothes after the bath in the pond and the re-wrapping of her chest. The purple and white vixen-taur went without clothes as well after all, and so naturally; and it was not like anyone was going to see either of them being naked, whether they were relaxing in the grass or doing any work.
But work did need to get done. The farm was very old, and it had fallen into a serious amount of disrepair after Buddleia had started neglecting it by lack of motivation almost half a dozen years prior. It was going to take a whole lot of very hard work to get it back into any semblance of productivity again, it was going to take a very long time, and while time was not particularly of the essence, the sooner they started the better.
The two females had taken some time to lay in the grass in the back garden so Sasha could brush Buddleia's hair and fur and her own long hair, and they could fully dry from the bath in the pond. But after several moments of content relaxation, Sasha sat up, pushed her glasses further up the bridge of her nose and smiled at Buddleia.
"Time to get to work, Leia."
"Yes," the vixen-taur nodded with a smile. "What we do first?"
"Let's first go and see if we can get those chainsaws going," Sasha smiled.
She took the toolbox that had been in the back of her wrecked Volvo station wagon and walked out of the small farmhouse and over to the rickety workshop building, of which the large door was still sitting wide open. Inside the workshop, Sasha set the toolbox down on the workbench and started looking around the workshop again, pulling out and rummaging through old boxes filled with just as old loose parts and things, and taking a bottle of oil and cans of penetrating oil and brake cleaner from one of the boxes on the sagging shelves of the tall cabinet.
She also tried the pull-cord of both old, dusty chainsaws sitting on the low cabinets next to the workbench. They both did turn over, but one was decidedly easier than the other one, so Sasha put that one on the workbench. Finding she had to lean over quite a bit towards the workbench because she was so crazily tall, she turned and smiled at Buddleia who was sitting on her haunches just inside the workshop.
"This may be a weird question, Leia, but could you lay down here in front of this workbench so I can sit on your back? If I have to lean over like this all the time, my glasses are gonna keep falling off and it's gonna murder my back and my ribs."
The vixen-taur let go a light chortle and stepped over to the workbench.
"I be comfy seat for you, Sasha," she smiled.
Sasha also chortled lightly, sitting down on the back of Buddleia's quadruped lower body as the vixen-taur lay down on the chest and tummy of her lower body in front of the workbench.
"Thank you, this is definitely a lot more comfy and a lot more easy as well."
Opening the small toolbox, the lanky human woman took some tools and started taking the plastic orange covers off the chainsaw. There were even cobwebs under those, which were brushed away as Sasha got to work. She removed the sparkplug, checked it and cleaned it with a bit of sandpaper. She checked the fuel line and the tank, and sprayed some brake cleaner into the tank to wash out a stain of dried sludge from the bottom of the tank. She loosened and removed the chain and checked it, and handed it to Buddleia to sharpen the teeth with a triangular-shaped file while she removed the bar and cleaned it with brake cleaner.
The small oil reservoir was also checked and cleaned. Finding a bottle of thicker chainsaw bar oil, Sasha oiled the bar and put it back in place. She used an old paintbrush and sprays of brake cleaner to clean off the dusty and cobwebby small engine, removed, checked and cleaned the tiny little carburetor and put it back on, filled the oil reservoir and the fuel tank and checked the flow of fuel and if there were any leaks. There were, so she also replaced the thin fuel line and gave the small clamps an extra tighten to fix the leak.
While waiting for Buddleia to finish sharpening the teeth of the chain, Sasha put the sparkplug into the wire and pulled the pull-cord to see if the plug actually sparked, letting out a soft "yesss!" under her breath when it did. She screwed it back into its hole and connected the wire, gave everything that could or would need it a drop or spritz of oil, and by the time Buddleia had sharpened all the teeth of the chain, Sasha put the chain back on the bar as well, making doubly sure to put it with the teeth facing in the proper direction and tightening it to the proper tension. Finishing up by screwing the orange plastic covers back into place, the lanky human woman smiled and pushed her glasses back onto her nose once again, standing up from Buddleia's lower back and turning a bit while offering the chainsaw.
"Give it a go, Leia. I would, but I know what kind of yanks you have to give that thing and it will hurt my ribs if I do that."
"Yes, you be careful, Sasha," Buddleia nodded with a smile. "I do it, you not hurt yourself."
She took the chainsaw, checked and set the safety, pushed the plastic bulb on the side a couple of times to prime the carburetor and pulled the pull-cord with her left paw while pushing the chainsaw down with her right paw with almost as sharp motions. The machine gave a short sputtering whirr at each pull, and once it coughed. Encouraged, Buddleia primed the carburetor again and tried again. It took several more pulls, but all of a sudden the chainsaw burst to life with an almost angry buzz.
"It works!" she said happily, squeezing the trigger a few times to rev the little engine loudly.
Sasha gave the vixen-taur a cheerful high-five.
"Leia, we're in business, baby!" She chortled softly. "And that reminds me of something I should have asked you yesterday, but I forgot."
"What that, Sasha?" Buddleia smiled while she shut off the chainsaw.
Sasha smiled.
"What is the name of your farm? You mentioned those two other farms, Cherry Blossom and Waving Grain; does your farm have a name as well?"
"Uhm..." The purple and white vixen-taur pulled a wrinkle into her forehead. "Not think so? Grandparents called it Silvercreek farm, but that not really farm name, that clan name."
"Then this will be a fun little thing to make it official," Sasha smiled, finding an old rag to clean her fingers a bit. "What would you like to call the farm?"
The wrinkle in Buddleia's forehead grew even deeper and she even squinted from the thoughtful expression she pulled her entire face into.
"Uhm... I..." She eventually closed her eyes and shook her head, then looked at Sasha with a smile. "I not know. Maybe you know something, Sasha?"
The lanky human woman put her right hand on her chin and tapped the side of her nose with her right index finger.
"Hmmm..." She looked up with a smile. "Well, your name is Buddleia; the name of the butterfly bush. And I've seen a lot of butterflies around those plants and flowers in your backyard. How about Butterfly Farm?"
Buddleia smiled so broadly both her upper and lower canine teeth and a fair amount of her dark pink tongue came on display as she nodded.
"Butterfly. I like, yes, I like very much."
Sasha smiled deeply as well and held out her right hand.
"Then it is hereby official, Leia; we are now Butterfly Farm." She let go a sudden chortle that made her wince slightly when Buddleia shook her hand. "Oh damn, and that reminds me of something else super important I should have asked you yesterday as well! You said you have a bank account; is that just for you, like a private, personal account? Or is it also a company account for your farm? And if not, is there a company account for your farm?"
"Used to be," Buddleia nodded. "Grandparents has shared company account for farm, and own account each. I closed all accounts after they die, because I thought it silly to have account for farm and account for me when just me on the farm anyway."
"Oh fuck Leia, we gotta take care of that right away!" Sasha said, shaking her head. "Step one was getting a chainsaw going, step two was going to be trying to fix that small trailer, but step two has changed. Step two is now seeing if my laptop will pick up an internet signal and get some banking shit in order."
They walked back to the small farmhouse, and Sasha took her laptop bag from her suitcase and took it out into the back garden. She set her laptop on the tree stump they had been using as a table, sat in lotus position in the grass and also set up the power bank and the solar charger to give the laptop every chance it could get. Flipping the laptop open and booting it up, the lanky human woman pushed her glasses up onto the bridge of her nose and checked the connectivity icon in the taskbar. It showed an available one-bar signal and an available two-bar signal, so she clicked to make connection with the latter, then opened the web browser.
"Ho-ly, shit, it works," she breathed. "Oh man, is that a relief. Leia, what bank do you have an account with? Oh, and does that community village you talked about have a name?"
"Yes, Rolling Hills," Buddleia nodded. "You wait, Sasha, I get card."
The vixen-taur walked around the right side of the house, returning in the back garden several moments later and handing Sasha a bank card. With the help of the information on there, the human woman found the website for the bank Buddleia had an account with and got in touch with their customer service through the on-site chat program.
Buddleia looked on with a bit of admiration at how Sasha's long, slender fingers danced over the laptop's keyboard as the human woman rapidly typed questions, requests and responses into the chat window. Every now and then Sasha asked something of the vixen-taur as well, and at one point she had Buddleia grab her wallet from the suitcase so she could take out her own bank card and type more requests and responses into the chat window. She also took a pen from the laptop bag and scribbled something on the back of her left hand. All in all, it took a little under half an hour, then Sasha leaned back a bit, took off her glasses and rubbed her eyes with the fingers of her free hand while letting go a long, low breath.
Putting her glasses back on and shutting off her laptop but leaving it connected to the power bank which was connected to the solar charger, she looked up at Buddleia with a smile.
"Oof, okay, crisis averted, Leia. We now have a shared company account in name of Butterfly Farm, and I've transferred my running account to this bank as well. They'll send confirmation and new bank cards to the post office in that little village, they should arrive there by the end of the week." She held out her left hand with a light chortle, showing the number she had jotted down on the back of it. "And this is our company account number, so we can have the money from the wood deposited into that account right away when we get to that sawmill."
"You do that so fast!" Buddleia said with an impressed smile, holding out her paws and wiggling her fingers to mimic typing. "I could never do that so fast!"
Sasha let go another chortle and shrugged lightly.
"I've been a secretary for a while and also did some bookkeeping in that job, so I learned to type pretty quickly." She rose to her feet with a very soft groan at the sting in her right side, but smiled again as she stood in front of Buddleia. "Hey, and do you know what this means, Leia? I'll say it again; we now have a shared company bank account in the name of Butterfly Farm. So now it is officially official; we are now partners in an agricultural business." She chortled softly. "No turning back anymore now, babe."
Buddleia smiled with her canines and the end of her dark pink tongue on display again.
"Thank you, Sasha. Thank you real much. I save your life, I think you saved mine too."
She leaned in and wrapped her arms around the tall human woman's lanky body in a close hug. Sasha smiled and wrapped her arms around Buddleia's upper body as well, resting her chin on the vixen-taur's shoulder and lightly running one hand up and down along the back of Buddleia's upper body. Buddleia gently petted along Sasha's long ginger hair with one paw as well, looking up as the human woman leaned back a bit and placed a hand against her cheek with a deeper smile.
"Hey... we're partners now, Leia. Seal it with a kiss?" she smiled.
She leaned back in and kept her hand on Buddleia's cheek while she pressed her lips against the vixen-taur's lips. Buddleia leaned in as well and ran the fingers of one paw through Sasha's long ginger hair with her eyes closed as she pressed into the kiss, murmuring a low, continuous sound under her breath. After several long moments, they broke apart and the vixen-taur poked out her tongue to give a light, affectionate lick over Sasha's small button nose.
"Thank you," she said simply.
Sasha smiled and gently ran her fingers along Buddleia's slender muzzle.
"Thank you too, Leia. For more than I can ever say." She laughed shortly. "I don't know if I can fit that big slobber-tongue of yours in my mouth... maybe we'll try that sometime later if we ever get to that point." She closed one grey eye in a quick, cheerful wink and playfully booped the large, cool black pad of Buddleia's nose. "And work is a harsh mistress, so I'm gonna have to be as well. If there's one thing I learned both back on the farm and in pretty much all those jobs I had, it's that slacking off gets you nowhere, so back to work it is, babe! We have a trailer to fix!"
"Yes," Buddleia nodded with a short laugh. "We work, Sasha! We work hard!"
In quite a cheerful mood, the two of them walked back around the side of the house again and down the rutted dirt driveway. At the old Chevrolet Fleetline, they disconnected the old little trailer and pushed it over to the workshop building. While Buddleia held up the trailer on one side, Sasha took off the wheels with the flat tires. She took one of them over to the wreck of her Volvo station wagon and held it against one of the large car's wheels. The Volvo's rims and tires were larger, but to Sasha's relief, she found the bolt pattern matched, so she could make it work.
The spare tire in the back and one of the tires that was not flat were removed from the wrecked station wagon and brought back over to the small trailer. Buddleia yanked off the small side fenders with minimal effort and held up the trailer again so Sasha could bolt the Volvo's wheels onto it. There was only a minimal bit of scraping as they pushed the trailer around to see if would roll properly. Well, that would self-clearance over time.
"That was easier than I thought," Sasha smiled. "Good, not everything has to be hard about this endeavor." She pointed at the dirt path running between the grassy fields on the left. "Go on and get Emmie, Leia, okay? Park her over there near those trees, and we'll hook the trailer back up and see if we can knock down one of those trees. Oh, and would you maybe have something I could sit on while riding in Emmie?"
"I find something for you," Buddleia nodded with a smile.
While the vixen-taur walked back to the old Chevrolet, Sasha walked back into the workshop to rummage through boxes of stuff. Eventually she found a number of old ratchet straps, putting those in the trailer along with the chainsaw she had gotten running, one of the metal jerrycans holding two-stroke fuel and one holding regular gasoline, and rolling the trailer over to the dip in the slope. A moment later Buddleia arrived there as well in the old beat-up Chevrolet and they connected the trailer back to the car's hitch.
"How much fuel she got left, Leia?" Sasha asked with a smile.
"About half. Is enough to get to the sawmill and back," Buddleia smiled.
"I'll still top her up," Sasha smiled. "She runs on regular gas, I take it?" She nodded as Buddleia nodded. "Good, then I'll top her up with this so this can is empty and I can use it to get the gas out of my car. That old brick holds sixteen gallons, and I filled it to the brim before I started driving down that mountain."
She opened the small door in the old Chevrolet's bulgy left rear fender, took off the fuel cap and carefully emptied the jerrycan into the car's tank. With the empty can and a length of hose, the human woman walked over to the wreck of her Volvo station wagon and started siphoning the fuel from its fuel tank, quickly kinking the hose and pulling it out of the filler neck when the jerrycan was full but the Volvo's tank was not yet empty. She left the hose and the jerrycan by the wrecked station wagon and walked back to the dip in the slope where Buddleia was sitting on her haunches.
They walked back and forth along the strip of elm trees for several moments, looking at the trees and how accessible they were. Eventually, Sasha pointed at one of the trees that was leaning a bit sideways over the edge of one of the large boulders, looking less flourishing than the other trees as it had several branches with dead ends. That was a perfect candidate, as it looked like it would need to be taken down anyway. Buddleia started the chainsaw, but handed it to Sasha once it was running.
"You saw, Sasha. I strong, I push the tree so it falls to that side."
"Alright, be careful, okay?" Sasha smiled. "You may have too many limbs, but I still wouldn't wanna cut one off by accident."
"I be careful," Buddleia chortled. "You be careful too!"
Sasha nodded with a chortle as well and knelt down near the edge of the boulder, beginning to cut a notch out of the leaning tree's trunk. She couldn't help smiling to herself as she realized how natural and normal it felt to even do this kind of rather dangerous work in the nude, and how much of absolutely not a problem at all it was to her. With the notch cut, she motioned Buddleia to step aside a bit and shuffled around a bit herself to reposition herself so she could start cutting on the opposite side of the notch. Buddleia stayed behind her and leaned way over her, putting her paws and her feral front paws against the trunk of the tree and pushing hard.
Sawdust and little chips of wood flying, the old chainsaw chewed itself through the trunk with an ease that almost looked as if the machine was happy to be in use again. Before too long, the tree started leaning more and more, creaking and groaning, until under Buddleia's pushing, it slowly keeled over with a long-drawn groaning sound and several sharp cracks. Once it was down, both women walked around to the lower side of the boulder and Sasha started cutting off all the branches, which Buddleia pulled to the side. With all the branches cut off and out of the way, the purple and white vixen-taur lifted the large trunk a little bit by one end so Sasha could cut it into chunks of by and by a little over three feet long each. All the branches were cut up as well, with a measurement taken from one of Buddleia's upper arms; wherever the branches got less thick than the vixen-taur's upper arm they were cut off, and the ends and any branches that were below that same thickness as well were collected in a heap that they would use for firewood, the rest of the thicker branches would be brought to the sawmill as well.
All in all, it took almost an hour before the tree was fully cut into manageable pieces. Sasha shut off the chainsaw and started putting the branches into the back of the beat-up old Chevrolet where the backseat used to be, noticing with a smile that Buddleia had put a plastic crate in the place of the passenger's seat and had even put one of the cushions from the heap of pillows and cushions that was her bed on top of the crate to make it more comfortable. The vixen-taur meanwhile set all the chunks of the tree trunk upright into the small trailer, and the few that didn't fit in there on the roof rack on the car's roof, lifting the large chunks with it seemed not very much effort.
When all the wood was strapped down, Sasha took off her glasses and wiped her forehead with an arm.
"Whew!" she puffed. "Been a while since I last did such physically hard work, but that went well. Heh, I even forgot to feel pain in my ribs." She pointed a finger at the purple and white vixen-taur with a chortle. "And you are stupid strong, Leia. For a moment there I thought you were going to pick up that whole tree and put it on the roof of that car."
Buddleia chortled while she wiped her forehead with a paw as well and brushed some woodchips out of her fur.
"I strong, but not that strong, Sasha. That tree too heavy to pick up in one piece."
"Yes, well, either way I think we make a very good team," Sasha smiled. "Now, a quick drink, and before we go off to that sawmill, I really should put on some clothes. I don't mind walking around in my bare skinny ass around you, but if we're going to meet other people, I want to at least have shorts and a shirt on or something."
"I put on shirt when going to village or oil mill too," Buddleia nodded with a smile.
They walked over to the small farmhouse and shook the sawdust and woodchips out of their hair - and fur, in Buddleia's case - before stepping inside. Sasha had taken a few empty plastic juice bottles from the wreck of her Volvo and filled them at the faucet, taking a few swigs from one and handing the other one to Buddleia. In the bedroom, the lanky human woman opened her suitcase and took out some clothes, putting on a pair of denim shorts, her beach sandals and a button-down lavender-colored shirt, leaving the bottom few buttons undone so her small breasts were covered but the faded flowery fabric wrapped around her chest still was free.
Looking around, she smiled at Buddleia standing by the simple tall dresser and wrestling a flannel shirt over her head and pulling it down over her fluffy white breasts. Sasha leaned over to gently pull the vixen-taur's long purple hair from under the collar of the shirt and drape it down along her back, letting go a soft giggle when Buddleia tilted her head and looked Sasha up and down, then reached into the dresser.
"You need hat," she smiled, putting a pink round sun hat with a floppy brim and a band with two pink ribbons dangling from it on Sasha's head. "There, now you proper lady farmer."
"Thanks babe, I love it," Sasha chortled.
Buddleia put on a similar hat in a faded yellow color, and they walked back outside and over to the beat-up old Chevrolet. Sasha got in on the passenger's side and sat down on the plastic crate with the cushion on it, looking aside with a smile at how Buddleia lay down on the chest and tummy of her quadruped lower body in the area where the driver's seat had been, and even partly where the backseat had been, started the engine and operated the pedals with her feral front paws while operating the column-mounted gear stick and the steering wheel with her regular paws. That was actually pretty damn clever.
The old Chevrolet groaned into motion at some coaxing from the accelerator. Buddleia drove it down the dirt path all the way to the end where she made a right turn onto the wider dirt road that ran along the side of her farm. Slowly and carefully, to make sure the car wouldn't bump and bounce too much on the uneven dirt road, the purple and white vixen-taur drove past the dirt road on the right that ran along the backside of her farm, forty minutes later straight on at the point where another dirt road crossed the one they were driving down, and slowly following the wide curves winding between the smoothly rising and falling fields and low hills covered in fresh, thick green grass dotted with numerous colorful flowers and here and there with small copses of trees or even small forests.
Another hour later, Sasha saw they were approaching a large flat open area with several buildings on it. Most prominent was an enormous overhead gantry crane jutting out from the largest building on the left side of the large dirt lot. In front of that building, near the front edge of the yard, were three more buildings, of which the middle and leftmost one looked like houses. Towards the right side of the lot were three more buildings, standing fair distances apart from each other, two of them with an open shelter attached to the side and all three of them with a long metal pipe sticking out of them from near the roof, with a downwards curve at the end. It still was another twenty minutes before Buddleia drove the car through the large, wide opening in the fence along the front of the yard, and Sasha could see the large light poles also had cameras on them, and that there was a large rectangular platform flush with the ground next to the largest building, with a yellow rectangle painted around it right onto the smooth and solid dirt. And that there was a row of power poles with wires strung along them running along the backside of the lot and stretching off into the distance to either side, with wires running towards the large building and two of the buildings on the right side of the yard.
Buddleia drove the old Chevrolet over to the large yellow rectangle and parked next to it. As she and Sasha got out of the car, a heavy-built beaver man dressed in blue denim overalls over a green plaid flannel shirt walked out of one of the buildings near the front of the yard and over to the old car.
"Fourpaws! That's been a long time!" he greeted Buddleia jovially. "We was starting to wonder if ya was still around!"
"I still here, Fred," Buddleia smiled, putting a paw on Sasha's left shoulder. "This Sasha, she my partner on the farm now."
"Holy hedgerow you're tall!" the beaver man chuckled. "Nice to meet ya, Sasha! Call me Fred!"
He gave Sasha a friendly smack on the right shoulder. It was not hard, but the human woman still winced and ducked while putting a hand on her right side.
"Oh, oww... please be careful, Fred, I have two broken ribs," she groaned.
"Oh, my, golly I'm sorry!" the beaver man apologized, pulling a bottle from his toolbelt and offering it. "Have a drink, please! Are ya okay?"
Sasha took a careful swig of what turned out to be iced tea and pulled in several slow, shallow breaths. Handing the bottle back to the beaver man, she sent him a small smile.
"I'm fine, but please don't do that again for the next several weeks at least."
"Ya betcha!" the beaver man Fred nodded, putting the bottle back in the holder on his toolbelt. "I'm so very sorry. How'd it happen if I may ask?"
Sasha stood back fully upright and breathed normally again, lightly rubbing her left hand along her right side while nodding her head towards the right.
"See that big-ass mountain over there? It has a road all along the side quite high up that I was driving on at night a little over a week ago. A truck came around a corner, sideswiped me, and fweet, off I went. Dunno how far down my car rolled, but Leia here apparently saw it happen so she ran to my aid. Or so she told me, because I can only remember going over the edge and then waking up in her bed two days later."
"Holy hedgerow ya coulda been killed!" Fred said, shaking his head. "Ya been real lucky! And Fourpaws, good on ya for saving the lady!"
Buddleia nodded with a soft smile.
"I help her, she help me too now. She very nice woman, Fred. We go make my farm work again."
"Good!" Fred smiled. "Yeah, I see ya got some bits of tree with ya! Was wondering what was with ya suddenly showing back up after, what's it been, half a decade? But that's great news! What's the plan if I may ask?"
Sasha sat down on the edge of the trailer and took a small sip from her own bottle of water.
"I've had a pretty miserable life so far, Fred. Leia not only saved it, but gave me a better one back. I grew up on a farm, but I've been living miserably in the big city for almost two decades, so when I saw how sorry her farm was looking, I suddenly knew what my purpose in life was." She smiled. "You are currently looking at the business partners of the new Butterfly Farm." Her smile turned into a slight grin. "And this partner is hoping you can cut us a deal because we're dirt broke and need to start from scratch with broken-down equipment of half a century old that needs more than just some spit shine." She thumbed at the chunks of tree in the trailer behind her. "A chainsaw is currently the only thing we have that works, so we'll be bringing you some more bits of tree because we'll need the money to fix up the other junk. What are the opening hours of this place?"
"That's a story and a half!" Fred said, slowly shaking his head again. "Holy hedgerow! But great to hear! That farm of good ol' Fourpaws here was always such a nice little place, was such a shame to see it go downhill! If we can be of any help, just give a holler, okay? And let's have a look at what you brought!" He stepped over to the trailer and looked at the chunks of wood. "Oh, that's elm! Good wood! Shame you cut it so short though. Not much we can do with this, maybe cut short boards from these bigger pieces, but the rest is only for the chipper. We'll still pay good for it, though!" He smiled at Sasha. "Here's some free advice for ya; if ya have more elm, see if ya can cut it into chunks of two meters at least, we pay top dollar for that, it makes excellent beams and planks!"
Sasha looked at Buddleia with a smile.
"What do you think, Leia? Two meters, that's a bit over twice as long as these pieces; think you can lift those?"
"Easy," Buddleia nodded with a smile. "I feel from these pieces, I can carry pieces three times this size before they get too heavy."
"Great," Sasha smiled, turning back to the beaver man. "In that case, you'll see us returning with two meter logs sometime pretty soon, Fred. We need all the cash we can scrape together."
"Good, very good!" the beaver man nodded with a smile. "We're officially open from seven to seven, but there's no gate in that fence so ya can drive in at any hour. The cameras will register ya, and ya can just dump yer loads on the scale here and drop a note in the mailbox over there," he pointed at the first of the three buildings near the front of the yard. "With how outta the way it is here, some of us practically live here so there'll always be someone, we take shifts living here ya know, so if ya bring a load after hours and leave a note, we'll weigh it first thing next morning and credit yer account."
"That's awesome, we'll probably do that because it's a two hour drive from the farm to here, and then two hours back, and it takes about two hours to get one tree down and cut up and loaded as well," Sasha smiled.
"Then let's waste no further time and get this stuff unloaded!" Fred chuckled.
He started unstrapping the chunks of wood on the trailer. Buddleia did the same with the chunks of wood on the roof rack, while Sasha took the chunks of thicker branches out of the back of the car and tossed them onto the platform in the yellow rectangle. Buddleia put all the chunks of tree trunk on the platform as well, and the beaver man Fred started pressing buttons on a panel once all the wood was on the platform.
"Nice load, ladies," he smiled. "That's a bit over two grand in wood ya got sitting here."
"Awesome," Sasha smiled again. "That's already such a help in getting some of our old equipment fixed. And speaking of old equipment; if you ever have anything around here, like an old forklift or something, we can have for cheap or maybe even for nothing, please let us know, we need all the help we can get."
"Ya got it, Sasha!" Fred nodded with a smile. "Now, follow me to the office, please, and I'll put a nice deposit in yer account."
"Hope you don't mind reading the number off my hand," Sasha chortled. "We only opened a new company account under the new name of the farm this very morning, the papers and all will only get to the post office by the end of the week."
"No problem, no problem at all!" Fred smiled, leading the way to the first of the three buildings. "If I put yer number into the computer, all stuff should come up so I can see it's legit. Besides, way out here, we gotta have some trust in one another, ya know."
"That's good to hear," Sasha smiled.
They walked into the first of the three buildings and stepped into a small office. Fred sat down behind a desk and started tapping keys on the computer that was on there, and at his request, Sasha read the account number off the back of her hand and reiterated the new name of the farm was Butterfly Farm. Fred did some more typing and clicking with the mouse, gave one very cheery last tap on the keyboard with one finger and turned to a printer behind him that started printing out a paper which he handed to Sasha.
"And there's yer receipt, farmer Farr!" he chuckled.
Sasha looked at the paper, turned to Buddleia and showed her the paper with a smile.
"Look at that, Leia. Our first earning; two thousand and twelve buckaroonies. We're now even more officially in business, babe."
"Yes!" Buddleia smiled happily. "I so happy! Thank you so much, Sasha!"
She took the tall human woman into a happy hug, which Sasha returned with a smile. Fred chuckled as he got up from behind the desk and waggled a finger back and forth between the two of them.
"Ain't really none of my business, but forgive an old wood-chewer for being curious; are the two of ya, uh..."
Buddleia sent the beaver man a slightly confused look, but Sasha curled her lips into a grin, put both her hands on Buddleia's cheeks and planted a firm kiss on the vixen-taur's lips.
"I'm not gonna make it any clearer than that, Fred."
"Fair, fair! Like I said, really ain't none of my business," Fred chuckled, holding up both his paws. "But hey, congratulations. Fourpaws here's always been a good friend of the community, it's so nice to know she's got some real good company now."
"I aim to be the best I can be," Sasha smiled, shaking the beaver man's paw. "Thank you so much, Fred, this has already been such a good help, and we'll be back with more wood soon."
"Any time, Sasha, any time!" Fred smiled. "Have a great day now, and see ya soon!"
They walked out of the building, and while the beaver man walked over to the buildings on the right side of the yard, Buddleia and Sasha got back into the old Chevrolet. Driving back towards the farm, the purple and white vixen-taur was silent for a while, but eventually looked aside at Sasha with a smile.
"Sasha... he meant lovers, yes?"
"I think he was getting at more than just business partners, yes," Sasha nodded with a light chortle. She gently patted Buddleia's right arm. "Sorry if I was presumptuous there, Leia, but that was too good an opportunity to be inappropriate to pass up."
Buddleia nodded with a smile and looked through the cracked windshield again, driving in silence for a few moments more before looking back at Sasha.
"Do... you want?"
Sasha put her hand back on Buddleia's right arm and gently stroked it with a smile.
"I'm not gonna say no, Leia. But I can understand, and it's totally okay, if it's too fast for you, or too much, or something you're not..."
"No." Buddleia stopped the car so she could turn and look at Sasha with a smile of her own, laying a paw against the human woman's cheek. "I want, Sasha. I want very much. You such pretty woman. I so happy you with me."
Sasha drew in a very deep breath and let it go in a long, happy sigh through smiling lips.
"C'mere you big fuzzbutt you."
She leaned over sideways, wrapped her arms around Buddleia's upper body and pressed her lips to the vixen-taur's lips. Buddleia let go a soft crooning sound and wrapped her arms around Sasha's slim shoulders, pressing into the kiss with her eyes closed. They sat like that for several long, happy moments, briefly touching tongues before breaking apart again and looking at each other. Before leaning back up, Buddleia gave a small, affectionate lick to Sasha's cheek.
"Thank you," she murmured.
Sasha merely brushed her fingers very gently along Buddleia's slender muzzle in response with a warm smile. The vixen-taur nuzzled Sasha's hand for a moment, then sat up straight again and set the car back in motion to drive the rest of the way back to the farm.
For the next several hours, they worked hard at selecting two more of the elm trees, cutting them down, de-limbing them and cutting the trunks into pieces of two meters long. All the chunks of the branches that had been considered thick enough were put into the back of the old beat-up Chevrolet, but only a few of the logs were loaded into the small trailer and onto the roof rack. Poor old Emmie had really had to work hard to get that first tree over to the sawmill, so they aimed to not load the car so heavily for the next trips.
That did mean that the sawmill was closed by the time they arrived there for the third time with the last logs. Buddleia put the logs onto the scale while Sasha wrote a note and dropped it in the mailbox the beaver man Fred had pointed out to her the first time. It also meant that by the time they were back at the farm, it was already quite dark. The old Chevrolet was parked in front of the front garden, the chainsaw was put away, and Sasha also got her laptop, power bank and solar charger from the back garden to put them back inside the house before taking off the clothes she was wearing and letting Buddleia undo the flowery wrap from around her chest.
Before going out to the pond to wash the sweat, grime and woodchips off themselves, Sasha did switch on her laptop for a moment to go to the bank's website and log into their account. With a smile, she turned the laptop to show Buddleia there was a grand total of $4901 in their new company account, with at least another two thousand and possibly more still to come when the last load of logs would have been weighed and processed the next morning. The purple and white vixen-taur was so happy she hugged Sasha close and almost carried the tall human woman over to the pond for their bath.
Some content time was spent in the clear water, washing the sweat and woodchips off each other by simply running their hands and paws over one another's bodies. This time, the pair of hands and the pair of soft paws ran fully over each other's front sides as well. Before getting out of the pond, they shared another kiss, touching tongues at the end for a longer time as well.
A late, simple meal of mashed potatoes with some fresh carrots and peas was had, then the purple and white vixen-taur and the tall, lanky human woman stepped into the small bedroom and got into the heap of pillows and the bed respectively, quickly falling into a well-deserved sleep.
The first steps had been made. In more directions than one.
