Dead of Winter: A Christmas short story from Cork writer Billy O'Callaghan

The Cork author writes exclusively for Irish Examiner readers, evoking a harsh winter on the farm, and the warmth of love and longing

Pic: iStock

The stream skirting the far edge of Michael Dwyer's bottom field had been thickened by the recent torrents and turned to slop, and early on the Tuesday, the shortest day of the year, one of the heifers had waded in and become mired. 

Michael heard her bleating from the top of the incline, the sound shrill and full of despair in the lingering dark, but because the bank on that side had no hope of bearing the tractor's heft he'd lost nearly the entire morning to the ordeal of standing knee-deep in a slime of mud and water, stripped to his shirtsleeves for ease of movement but cold to his very bones, coaxing and dragging and, for the sake of solid footing, trying to floor the stream bed with rocks and off-cuts of timber until finally, after what had felt like hours, he'd calmed the beast enough to be able to drive her free.