A small cottage of gray bricks and a roof dotted with moss, deep enough in the woods to escape the din of civilization.*
In front of the cottage, a garden. Fragrant white roses, always in bloom, and grass that never grows wild with weeds.
Inside, a man and woman.† They are in love—the greatest miracle we could arrange for.
A barn of spruce wood, built by the man. Two lost goats to fill it, procured by us and found by the woman as she foraged for porcini mushrooms.
After some trial and error, goat cheese: the food of the lucky.‡
A child, surely, to be expected soon. Though the woman refuses the man’s touch in bed, she loves him wholeheartedly.§
The unhurried march of the seasons, trailing their many-colored fingers upon the land like lighthearted painters.
Birds warbling among the trees. Fruit ripening in its own blushing skin. And droves of leaves, waltzing in their red and gold spirals. A snow fight peppered by fleeting laughter.
Then, the smear of frost clinging to the woman’s tears. “I am a man,” her tender voice says.¶
Support and acceptance from the man—unclear why. Their voices flutter through the snow-muffled silence all night, speaking of nonsense scenarios. Transitions, new names, trips to the shopping mall for a wardrobe change.#
A car, which we did not arrange for. Phones, too, and trepidation as the first doctor appointment is booked.‖
The inexorable knock of society at the cottage door, despite the intended nature of this very project. The failed woman grows happier and rosier, and her garden explodes in a jungle of nettle, henbit, and nasty ragweed. She does not seem to care.**
A name, chosen.
And at the end of it all, as if to mock us, a different sort of kid. A young goat, with a thistle bloom sticking out of its mouth. Two idiotically happy people snap a ridiculous amount of pictures and wonder about framing them.
* Furnished with all necessary amenities, of course. Here at DreamEasier we pride ourselves on our superior attention to detail when crafting accessible dream bundles for all to experience.
† Caucasian, able-bodied. Customers who purchase the Minor Miracles of the Pastoral Life bundle will of course be able to customize their own avatars, but we like to work with quality material during the initial in loco data harvesting.
‡ And raspberry jam, and roasted wild pigeon, and honey at the cost of a few stings on the man’s arm. The woods we chose are generous with their bounty.
§ Strange glitch, this one, but production hiccups plague even the most airtight projects. I believe we can scrub this initial reticence from the finished dream bundle, anyway.
¶ Which makes no sense, because she’s a woman. All volunteers at DreamEasier undergo a rigorous screening process when they agree to be dream models. There’s a folder on my desktop computer with pictures of her full, naked body, archived together with her psychological evaluation. Our psychiatrists detected no signs of mental illness.
# None of this goes against the dream model contract, somehow. Goes to show just how reliable lawyers can be.
‖ Head of Legal got back to me: apparently, stopping our volunteers from pursuing changes in their quality of life puts us at risk of being sued, even when said changes disrupt the simulation I have so carefully put together.
** And neither do I, at this point. This iteration of the Pastoral Life bundle is compromised beyond recovery. I’ll arrange for a new cottage, a new couple, and sheep. Maybe this time we’ll get enough clean data to actually turn it into a finished product.
© 2026 Wren Douglas
Wren Douglas is an SFF author from Italy, where they live with their devilish cats and an even more devilish dog. Their work has been featured in Strange Horizons, Kaleidotrope, and the Lambda finalist anthology Xenocultivars: Stories of Queer Growth, among other venues. They're @awritingwren on Bluesky.