[ There's a certain way that Clark can light up, not like the noon sun, but like the morning, something soft and almost glowing. It fills his eyes, the way he smiles as he opens his mouth to start, the way he settles into his seat and his shoulders relax. Maybe some part of him is sure that By will try and use this against him, given the way their discussion ended, but most of him, most of him can't be anything but genuine about home. ]

The farm came from my father's side, passed onto him from his father. Funny enough, my mother's father's farm is just over the fence on the north side, and he raised cattle, so I grew up with fields and fields to run through when the urge came over me. Of course, when I was very little, I was afraid of the cows, so I'd get scared off, but when I was older, it was fun to go and visit.

We kept a dog most of the time, ratter more than anything, though there was a couple of years where we took in a few lambs after a lambing season was a little too successful at the Henderson's two farms over. Shelby wasn't much of a sheep dog but she tried.

I did my chores before school and after school, before my homework unless I had a heavy load. When I wasn't working with my dad on one of the machines or repairing the fences, I was with my mother in the kitchen, learning how to cook and bake anything I could.

My father believed that feeding people was one of the noblest professions a man could have.