Everything I have ever written and everything I will ever write is garbage compared to this headline. ht @ErrorJustin pic.twitter.com/kD9V0JnFpL
— Saladin Ahmed (@saladinahmed) November 20, 2014
How I imagine this went down.
******
I'd been working the local beat for two weeks when I got the call from my editor.
"Goat on a roof. East side. Might be a good human interest story."
"I don't know how many humans are interested in goats, Bob."
Bob sighed melodramatically. "Just go check it out. It's a slow day anyway."
On scene were two uniformed cops, facing off with the goat at them from his perch on the roof, scampering angrily to the edge and back to bleat at them defiantly.
"Maybe we should mace the thing," said cop one.
"Really Johnson? You want to be known as the guy who maced a goat off a roof?" Cop two was arching his eyebrow at his partner.
"Nah man, I'm just tired of taking this goat's crap," Kowalksi whined, before dodging the stream of urine now gently arcing over the edge of the roof in their general direction. "Motherfucker!" he cried, scrabbling at his belt for something violent.
Cop two reached out and put his hand on Johnson's heaving outrage in a placating gesture. "Johnson, let's take a moment and see if we can't think of a response somewhere in between doing nothing and tasing a goat, shall we?"
I wandered over to the elderly lady watching the spectacle in her bathrobe from over the fence. "It's so sad to see it come to this." she said. Mrs. Katsch had been neighbors to the indignant goat and her owner for 5 years. "She was always such a good kidd." She said, her eyes brimming. "But she was never the same after the war."
"The war?" I asked incredulously. Although I was not surprised that the afternoon would choose to double down on weird.
"Oh yes, she and good old Colonel Hastings worked together in one of those gulf thingies." She said, waving in the general direction of war thingies in the Gulf of Somewhere Else. "They were part of an elite bomb-sniffing unit or some other crazy thing. Had some hard times don't you know." Mrs. Katsch leaned over the fence and whispered loudly but conspiratorially to me, "Word is, they killed a few people. Or saw a few people die. Or something just horrible like that. But they never talk about it. And after the war, they couldn't stay together for the memories, you know." Mrs. Katsch was tearing up again. "So Colonel Hastings gave her to good old Mr. Newton here, but he's never been able to keep up with the mood swings and the PTSD that poor little thing came back with after the war. That goat only respects one man." And then louder, to the officers still discussing the best way to get the goat off the roof that wouldn't go viral from dashboard cam footage, "That goat only respects one man!"
"And where is Mr. Newton now?" I asked, in what I thought was a very professional tone given the circumstances.
"Oh, he went off to get ... oh here he is now!" she said, waving at the old beat-up pick-up that had just pulled up, with what I presumed was Mr. Newton in the driver's seat.
"Oh thank goodness you're back!" shouted Mrs. Katsch, "the poor dear's just out of control!"
Newton nodded briefly, but not unkindly to Mrs. Katsch while on his way to unload his passenger, a slightly older gentleman with gray in the temple, a cane for walking and a slight limp. After extricating himself from Mr. Newton's assistance, Mr. Hastings set his gaze on the unfolding scene and marched over to the house.
The goat noticed him about half-way over and sat down and watched him with unreadable eyes.
By the time Mr. Hastings arrived at the edge of the lawn where the officers were standing, the scene had gone quiet, pregnant with expectation. He planted himself, looked up and said, "Hello Billy Jean."
The Goat bleated softly.
Mr. Hastings locked eyes with Billy Jean and then asked quietly, but sternly, "Do you want to tell me what's going on here, soldier?"
Billy got up and walked to the edge and bleated at the police. Looked over her shoulder at Mr. Hastings, and then walked back over to him, bleating plaintively.
"Billy Jean, I didn't ask for excuses, I asked what was going on here." Colonel Hastings was having none of it. "Why don't we ignore these fine gentlemen for now and you just come on down here. So we can talk."
Billy Jean looked down uncertainly and at Officer Johnson suspiciously. Billy bleated once.
"Yes, that was an order." said Mr. Hastings in reply.
Billy Jean trotted up the roof and disappeared over the other side. Whatever goat magic she worked to get back down remains unclear, but within moments she appeared around the other side and approached Mr. Hastings almost shyly before stopping just in front of him.
Slowly, awkwardly, Mr. Hasting's knelt, bad leg and all, and put his face close to Billy Jean and talked quietly to her for several minutes, his gaze never leaving her eyes and his hand gently turning her head back to him when she looked away. It ended, to my surprise, with a gentle kiss to her furry nose.
He stood up, and looked directly at Mr. Newton. "Next time Sam, call me before it gets this bad." He walked stiffly back to the car.
"Absolutely Colonel Hastings," said Newton, hurrying around to open the door for a man he clearly admired and maybe feared the tiniest bit.
Colonel Hastings looked back once at Billy Jean and nodded, his face a mask of professionalism, his eyes watering, before Mr. Newton sped him away. Whatever history had made this moment of shared peace possible also making it impossible to stay.
The officers were leaving, Cop Two laughing at Officer Johnson's blustering excuses. Mrs. Katsch walked back inside, "Such a good man," she said.
Billy Jean watched the truck drive away until it was long out of sight. And then looked up at the stars starting to poke through the evening twilight, chewing grass quietly. Momentarily sheltered from the storms of the past by the kind words and steady friendship of the only man she would ever trust.
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