As she approached, Luke laughed at something Dad had said.
Winona saw her dad smile and it actually brought her to a stop. It was like seeing the ocean turn suddenly red, or the moon go green. “Hey, guys,” she said, stepping up onto the porch’s bottom step. The old wood buckled beneath her weight, reminding her simultaneously that she was fat and the steps needed repair.
Luke reached out and put an arm around her, pulling her into a side embrace, out of which she stumbled a moment later feeling dazed. “If it weren’t for Winona here,” he said to Dad, “I never would have become a vet. She did most of my English homework in high school.”
“Yeah, she’s a brainy one, all right. Her latest big idea was for me to sell the land my family homesteaded.”
Winona couldn’t believe he’d bring that up in front of Luke. “I was just trying to protect your future.”
Dad ignored her and looked at Luke. “When Abelard left Wales he had fourteen dollars in his pocket.”
“Come on, Dad. No one wants to hear the old stories—”
“And Elijah lost his leg in the war and then came back to a dead wife and a dying son and land too wet to grow anything in, but he still managed to hang on to every acre through the Depression. He left his son every damned acre he’d inherited.”
“Those were different times, Dad. We know that. We don’t care if you leave us the same amount of land you inherited.”
“How did I know you’d say that?”
“I didn’t mean that. I just meant we want you to be comfortable. That’s what matters.”
“You can’t understand loving this land like Vivi and I do. It ain’t in you.”
How easily he culled her from the herd and set her aside.
“The place looks great, Henry,” Luke said into the awkward silence that followed. “Just like I remember. And I want to thank you for maintaining the fence. I’d like to pay you for that, by the way. Somehow Mom and I forgot to keep up on it.”
Dad nodded. “I wouldn’t take a dime from you, son. That’s what neighbors do.”
Son
.
It was a tiny slice of pain, the way her father included Luke so easily, like sticking your hand in soapy water and finding a sharp knife blade. You didn’t even realize you’d been cut until you drew back and saw the bead of blood on your skin.
“It’s Vivi Ann who done most of it, anyway; her and whatever hand she’s found to help her around here. This land is her soul.” Dad looked at Winona when he said that.
“I hear she’s a fine barrel racer.”
“Best in the state,” Dad said.
“I’m hardly surprised. I don’t think I ever saw her when she wasn’t on that mare of Donna’s, riding at the speed of sound.”
“Yeah,” Dad said. “She and Clem are quite a team.”
Winona held her tongue while Dad went on and on about Vivi Ann. What a great horsewoman she was, how everyone came to her for help, how men lined up to date her but she hadn’t found the right fella yet.
Finally, Winona couldn’t take it anymore. She actually interrupted the conversation to say, “I better go. I just came by to—”
“Oh, no, you don’t,” Luke said, taking her arm. “I want to treat you and Henry to dinner in town.”
“I can’t,” Henry said. “I’m meetin’ some of the boys down at the Eagles. But thanks.”
Luke turned. “Winona?”
Don’t think anything of it. He asked your dad, too
. The advice rang clear in her head, but when she looked up at him, it left in a rush, and the worst emotion swept in to replace it: hope.
“Sure.”
“Where should we go?” he asked.
“The Waves is good. On the corner of First and Shore Drive.”
“Let’s go.” Luke reached out and shook Dad’s hand. “Thanks again for everything, Henry. And don’t forget my offer: if you ever need to use my pasture, just say so.”
Henry nodded and went back into the house, closing the door solidly behind him.
“Asshole,” Winona muttered.
Luke grinned down at her. “You used to call him a jerk.”
“I’ve improved my vocabulary. I could think of a few more choice words, if you’d like.” Smiling, she walked across the front yard and got into the passenger side of his big truck. The minute the engine turned over, the stereo came on loudly. “Stairway to Heaven” was playing.
She looked at him and knew they were remembering the same thing: the two of them at the Sadie Hawkins Dance, moving together—or trying to—beneath a silvery disco ball.
“We sure showed those popular kids how to dance, didn’t we?” he said.
She felt a smile start. Somehow, in the flurry of his return, she’d forgotten how they’d come together in that first year after her mother’s death—a fat, quiet fifteen-year-old girl who lived in her own head and a gawky boy with a bad complexion who’d lost his father in a boating accident nearly a decade before.
It gets easier
. That was the first thing he said to her that she really noticed. Before that, he’d been just the son of her mom’s best friend.
After that, for two years, almost everything he’d said had been right. Then he moved away, without ever even kissing her, and he hadn’t called. They’d written back and forth for a while, but then that had been lost, too.
He pulled up in front of the Waves Restaurant and parked along the curb. A spotlight near the front door illuminated a yard full of ceramic gnomes that looked cute in the summer sun and oddly macabre on this winter evening. She led the way into the Victorian-home-turned-restaurant. On this evening, they were the only people under sixty in the whole restaurant, and the hostess led them to a corner table overlooking the Canal. Below, a discolored bulkhead held the water back, revealing a stretch of gray sand that was covered with broken white oyster shells and strands of bronze kelp. A tangle of harbor seals lay on the restaurant’s wooden dock.
In moments, they had their drinks—him a beer, and her a margarita.
“To old friends,” he said.
“To old friends.”
Then he said, “Did you get a chance to look over the paperwork?”
“I did. As your lawyer, I’ll tell you that everything looks to be in order. I’d make a few changes, but nothing major.” She looked across the table at him and lowered her voice. “But as your friend, I’d tell you that Moorman doesn’t have the best reputation. He’s struggled with a serious drinking problem for years; well, actually, he hasn’t struggled with it. Mostly he’s given in to it. A few years ago he brought in a young vet to be his partner and word is that he screwed the kid pretty badly.”
“Really?”
“Honestly, Luke, I think you’d do better to open your own practice. People around here would welcome you with open arms. You could set up an office in your house and fix up that four-stall barn on the property. Then, in a few years, maybe you’ll be ready to build a new facility.”
Luke sat back. “That’s disappointing.”
“I’m sorry. You asked for my opinion.”
“Sorry? Are you kidding? I’ve always loved your mind. And I know I can trust you. Thanks.”
She didn’t hear anything after the word
loved
.
Vivi Ann was in the staging area, waiting her turn in the short round. There were only fourteen girls and women around her, all on horseback, who had also made the top fifteen. Run times were blaring through the PA system; tabulations were under way, starting with the slowest time and working to the top. She’d been in Texas for almost a week, and it had been one of the best rodeos in her life.
She leaned down and stroked the mare’s sweaty neck. “Hey, girl,” she said. “You ready to win this thing?”
The mare’s heart was pounding like a jackhammer. Clem was ready.
Moments later, Vivi Ann heard her name through the giant black speakers and a jolt of adrenaline coursed through her, erasing everything from her mind but this moment.
Vivi Ann pulled her hat down low on her forehead. Clem leaped forward, bounding toward the gate. Vivi Ann tightened the reins, holding the mare back until they were positioned correctly for the first barrel.
Then she leaned forward and released Clem, and they were off, heads down, racing forward into the arena so fast that everything around them was a blur of sound and color. All Vivi Ann saw were the three barrels waiting for them in the dirt, set up in a bright yellow triangle. All the way through the pattern, around the barrels, she was kicking Clem’s sides and urging her to go faster. The seconds passed with frightening speed, but Vivi Ann experienced it in a kind of slow motion—the way Clem snaked around the first barrel and then the second, and then they were hurtling forward for the last barrel, sliding sinuously around it and running back down the arena. When they passed the timer, Vivi Ann gently pulled back on the reins, bringing Clem to a bouncing trot.
She heard their time announced through the speakers and she grinned, then laughed.
14.09.
It would be a tough time to beat. She tried to do the math in her head, to see if she would win the average, but it was too difficult. She’d already won one of the two prior rounds. Only a couple of women even had a chance to beat her, and even so, it was unlikely. She had just run very close to a new arena record.
“Good job, Clem,” she said, leaning forward to stroke the mare’s neck. She slid out of the saddle and led the way back to the trailer. Giving Clem a bucket of water and some molasses-soaked oats, she unsaddled the mare and tied her to the side of the rusted old trailer.
Smiling, practically running, she headed up into the stands. Some of the other contestants were already there, especially those who had not made the top fifteen this time. Pam. Red. Amy.
“Nice run, Vivi,” said Holly Bruhn, scooting sideways to make room.
Vivi Ann smiled. “Clem was hot for an old broad, wasn’t she?”
“She sure was.” Holly reached down into the ice chest beside her and produced a cold beer. “Here. But you can only drink it if your time holds.”
“Ha!” Vivi Ann took the beer and tilted it to her lips.
Holly handed Vivi Ann a piece of paper. “This is for you.”
Vivi Ann looked down at the flyer in her hands. It was the sort of thing she’d seen a hundred times in her life, maybe more. A list of barrel-racing events. The only new twist was that it was for a series of weekends, with a high-point money winner at the end.
“We’re trying out a winter series,” Holly said. “Now that the barn is up and running, we need to start generating some income. I’d love it if you’d come. Tell your 4-H girls.”
And there it was: the idea. It came to her fully formed, so obvious a solution she couldn’t imagine why she hadn’t seen it before. “How many people have signed up?”
“So far we have about ninety. You can see the different fee schedules. And divisions for the kids, too. You have to attend four of the eight to be eligible for prizes, so you’ll have to make all of the next events to qualify—since you’d be starting late, I mean.”
“You’re giving away money and prizes?”
Holly nodded. “Prizes at the end, money along the way.”
“And you’re still doing the team penning and roping jackpots?”
“Every Friday. It’s starting slow—people are just discovering the arena—but every week is better than the one before.”
From that moment on, Vivi Ann could hardly think of anything else. Even that afternoon, when she picked up the saddle and prize money she’d won, she was too distracted to say much. Instead of hurrying out with her friends, maybe line-dancing down at the local roadhouse, she loaded Clem into the trailer and headed for home. On the long drive up from Texas, while Garth Brooks sang to her, she looked at the idea from every angle, trying to find a flaw in her reasoning. But there wasn’t one. She had finally come up with the answer her father needed.
She
had come up with it. That made her smile almost every time she thought it.
Oh, she knew what people thought of her. Even her sisters, who loved her, saw her as a pretty decoration who could ride a horse like the wind but wasn’t good at the heavy lifting in life.
Now, finally, she could show everyone that she was more than just a pretty face.
That thought, that hope, accompanied her on the lonely drive home. When she finally pulled into Water’s Edge at midnight on Saturday, she’d corralled all her ideas and figured out how to present them to the family.
She couldn’t wait. They would all be so proud of her.
Pulling up to the parking area, she turned off the truck’s engine and climbed out of the driver’s seat, then went around to open the trailer door.
“Hey, Clemmie,” she said, patting the mare’s big hindquarters. “Are you as tired as I am, girl?”
Clem turned and nuzzled her side, nickering quietly.
Vivi Ann snapped the lead rope onto Clem’s nylon halter and backed her out of the trailer. “No more stall for you,” she said, leading her horse to the pasture and unhooking the halter. After smacking the quarter horse’s butt, she watched Clem bolt away. Within seconds, the big mare was rolling in the grass.
Leaving the trailer to be swept out tomorrow, she closed the door and started toward the house, until she noticed that someone had left the barn door open.
She went inside, just to make sure everything was okay, and found a mess. The stalls were filthy and several horses were out of water.
Vivi Ann cursed beneath her breath and walked up the dirt and grass driveway toward her grandparents’ old cottage. For years it had been used as a bunkhouse—for the men they hired to help out around the place. She knocked several times and got no answer, so she opened the door.
Inside, she found an even bigger disaster than had been in the barn. The small kitchen was piled high with dirty dishes and pans layered with drying food. Empty pizza boxes and beer cans covered the tables, and clothes lay across the sofa and chair.
She could hear a man snoring in the bedroom. Charging through the small living area, she shoved open the bedroom door and turned on the light.
Travis lay sprawled across the brass bed, asleep in his clothes. He hadn’t even bothered to take off his cowboy boots, so there was dirt smeared on her grandmother’s chenille bedspread.
“Travis,” she snapped. “Wake up.”
She had to say his name several more times before he rolled over and looked at her through bleary, bloodshot eyes.