Shearers

Chapter 1

Shearers

By Wayne Mansfield

It was hard, back-breaking work in the shearing shed. No-one had it easy. The three shearers in their navy blue singlets—referred to as ‘wife-beaters’—and thick, navy work jeans spent the day dragging sheep from the pen and shearing them as fast as they could, each of them keeping count of how many they’d done. After every inch of wool had been shorn off, the bewildered creatures, stark white and some with crimson lines where the shearer’s blade had shaved a little too close, were sent sliding down a chute into an outdoor pen.

I had barely turned eighteen. I was a pale, skinny boy. All c**k and ribs. And while I wouldn’t win any muscle man competitions I was, if I say so myself, very good looking. My black hair, pale skin and deep blue eyes had garnered for me many invitations to dinner and to dances. The only problem was that these invitations were invariably from girls, dewy-eyed females who had fallen for my exotic looks and sensitive personality. Sometimes their enthusiasm scared me.

My Uncle Jack had contacted my mother to ask if I wanted to earn a bit of extra money during the term break. I was a first-year university student and even though I’d rather have spent the month sleeping in and watching television, the lure of several hundred extra dollars was too much to pass up. I’d agreed to help out in the shearing shed, though I wasn’t sure what I’d be doing. I knew nothing about shearing sheep and not much else about any other farm-related chore.

Uncle Jack got me out on the farm the day before the shearers arrived, showed me around the shed, and informed me I’d be rousabouting. Sounded fun. Didn’t know what it was but my opinion changed the minute Uncle Jack had finished explaining it to me. I had to skirt the fleeces, which basically meant pulling all the s**t and prickles off the outside of the fleece before sorting it according to the fibre of the wool and tossing the bundled fleece into the right bin. In between I was supposed to get handy with a broom and sweep up all the strands of stray fleece, and any sheep s**t that had spilled from nervous animals. I was half expecting my uncle to tell me I had to mop the shearers’ brows while they worked.

If that wasn’t enough to send a sensitive young boy driving at high speed back to his mother in town, my uncle told me that while I’d be spending that night with the family in the farmhouse, for the rest of my stay on the farm I’d be sharing the shearers’ quarters with the men. At that point my anal sphincter clenched tight to the point where even a trained surgeon would have been unable to pry it open.

“What?” I’d exclaimed.

My uncle slapped me on the back and told me it would do me good. “Make a man out of you,” he’d said.

This piece of character building had my parents’ fingerprints all over it. I felt sick. Why had I ever agreed to this when I could have had a relaxing four weeks on the family couch?

* * * *

So it was my first day. I met the shearers as they arrived in their utes. There was Tank, a thirty-five year old. He was stocky, had a thickly-haired chest, and was already grey. He wore a neatly trimmed moustache and despite his bulk seemed rather gentle. The second shearer I met was Matt. He was around thirty, muscular but lean, and had tattoos covering almost every inch of his bare arms. He was tanned and rugged looking. I couldn’t look him in the eye for fear that he would see in mine the desire I had for him. Finally, there was Baz, who looked to be in his early thirties. He was tall and also muscular. I guess it went with the territory. A guy had to be strong to do what they did. He had sandy blonde hair and his jaw and top lip were thick with bristles.

I would have gladly wiped the brows of all three.