A HERO APPEARS!
THE COUNTRY FAIR
That morning every animal on Patch of Heaven were excited by the country fair: the colors, the people, the food… and especially the "Farmer of the Year" contest; farmers from across the country will participate showing their best farm animals on several contests: weight, milk quality, and other kind of contests, but the best one was the "Animal Farm" contest; which was only granted to the most beautiful animal on a farm. In the last years Pearl's cows: Maggie and Mrs. Calloway participated but they always lose against the O'Hara farmer and his bull, Aldebaran. This bull has been wining this competition for 3 years, and now it was Grace's turn to be part of the contest.
"Make us feel proud Grace" said Mrs. Calloway who was wearing her purple hat.
"C'mon Mrs. C, we all know she will make us feel proud, just be yourself and remember always to smile" Maggie was speaking with a lazy voice, she was half – awake.
"Thanks girls, I'll win the contest and Pearl will be so proud of me"
With those words Grace climbed Pearl's truck and left to the country fair, all the way Grace was thinking about the people there: youngsters, farmers and other animals, they arrived twenty minutes after. The person in charge of assigning the pace where the animals were displayed was already there and assigned Peal the stall number 4; Pearl parked behind the stall and opened the truck door.
"Come on darling" Pearl says as she led Grace into the cozy stall filled with fresh hay and water.
Five minutes later the stall's door number 5 opened, showing a huge bull and his owner.
"Howdy Pearl, ready to lose the "Animal Farm" award of this year?" the farmer said as he laughed.
Pear pretended she wasn't hearing "this man needs to learn manners" she thought. So she and the farmer met the other farmers and the judge to decide in which contest they will participate. The judge was taking note about that; on a piece of paper was written the name of the animal, the owner and the contest. On a sheet of paper appeared:
Number 5: Grace – Pearl – Milk Quality and Farm Animal
Number 6: Aldebaran – O'Hara – Weight and Farm Animal
"So… you're participating on "Farm Animal" too, uh?" O'Hara said on a tone more sarcastic than interested.
"Yes, and this time I pretend to win" Pearl said while she was walking to see her charming Grace.
On her stall Grace was enjoying the hay when a voice from the next stall spoke.
"Hey! You must be a new challenger! And I bet you're here to win the "Farm Animal" award of this year" the bull said.
"Yup, also my owner enrolled me in the "Milk Quality" contest, and you?" Grace said with a smile.
"I will participate in the "Weight" contest, the name's Aldebaran; what's yours beauty?"
"I'm Grace, nice too meet you" Grace said, and she thought that his owner was mean but the bull was nice, both animals only chatted for a few minutes; then Pearl and the Judge appeared. Pearl opened the stall door; she was walking inside with a stool and a bucket. Pearl washed Grace's udders and dried them with a soft flannel, after the wash; she milked Grace and gave the milk to the judge, the judge looked at the milk then he sank the finger on the bucket and tasted the milk; then he looked at Grace and smiling said "I guess we have a winner here" the judge winked at Pearl and continued walking to the other stalls.
When the judge left, Pearl hugged Grace and kissed her head "You're going to win sweetie, I know you're going to win"
Another judge came closer and asked O'Hara to take his bull outside to the place where the "Weight" contest will take place, Pearl and Grace waited for an eternity for the judge who was grading the milk quality from the other cows appeared and said
"Congrats Pearl, your cow Grace; won the "Milk Quality" contest"
The judge gave Pearl a blue ribbon who says "Milk Quality, 1st. Place" ten minutes later O'Hara appeared with a blue ribbon who says "Weight, 1st. Place" now both farmers were waiting for the big contest, the last contest would take place within two hours because the other judges were still judging other animals. Pearl stayed with Grace for long time, she and Grace began to feel hungry; Pearl went out to find something to eat while Grace started to eat hay.
While Pearl & the O'Hara farmer where outside, Aldebaran were flirting and telling silly jokes to the other cows that where next and at the front of his stall; then, he looked at Grace when she laughed due Aldebaran's jokes.
"Hey, that's a nice voice! I bet you could sing very well!" he said with a smile on his face while the other cows were still laughing.
"Um, thanks" Grace said with a shy smile
"Why don't you sing for all of us?"
"Really? Do you want to hear me singing?"
"Of course" Aldebaran was staring at Grace with an interested look on his face
Suddenly, Grace started to sing with her voice and all the animals started to hide their heads underwater or under the hay
"Ok, that's was something interesting…" Aldebaran said with only one of his eyes opened
"Did you enjoy it?" Grace was smiling and staring at Aldebaran with a happy look
"Yeah, yeah, um, if you excuse me, I guess my ears are bleeding" he leaned back on the wooden floor and leaned his head on the hay
Pearl returned half hour later, O'Hara retuned five minutes before, and right now he was pampering his huge bull. Both pretended the other wasn't there, time passed and a judge entered into the tent and said
"Ok everyone, this is it; the "Animal Farm" contest is about to start, please take your animal and go to the blue tent; once there, we will start the contest"
About fifteen farmers were there with their animals: ducks, pigs, hens, goats, cows and bulls, all of them looked healthy with shinning fur and feathers; there was a huge table with five judges on it. They were calling every farmer one by one, every farmer had a number: Pearl was the number 5 and O'Hara the number 6. When Pearl's turn came she took Grace to the center and the judges started to write on their notebooks, the next and the last one was O'Hara's bull: Aldebaran, he knew his bull was a winner and he will win the "Animal Farm" award again like he always has been doing.
After a long deliberation the judges had the results…
"First of all, I want to thank you all for participating on the country fair; we have seen beautiful animals, but only one animal can win the big price and after a long wait we have the results. And now the moment you've all been waiting. The winner of this year is…"
This is my first Home on the Range fic. I hope all of you are enjoying it so far; if you want to know who wins the "Animal Farm" contest wait for the next chapter, it will be entitled "Unknown Farm". Oh, I want to thank to Bovine Beauty for her help and ideas for this story, also I promised her that if I use some of the characters from her previous fics, I'll give her credit, so maybe on further chapters you will see a character that belongs to Bovine Beauty.