Luke reaches out and grips his clenched fist.
“Again.”
Rex pulls his hand away and shoves both hands through his long hair, pushing it back from his face.
“We went for a ride just the two of us. Everything was fine, good. We talked about her birthday and the plans to go out to the lake to party. I teased her about her present when she wanted a hint at what it was. Bugged her about picking me. I took the horses to the stalls and she went to both of you.”
I took up the story.
“I saw you guys from the barn loft. She was out there standing on Maple’s back like a fucking cowgirl ballerina. God, she was so fearless back then. It always scared the hell out of me.”
A small proud grin tugs at Rex’s harshly set lips as memories of the shit Rain would do with no fear dances through my head.
“Of course, I gave her hell for it. She sassed me back like she always did and then we just hung out. She was on my lap with her feet up on Luke’s and we were both giving her a hard time about choosing one of us on her birthday.” I scrub at my mouth and shake my head. “I can’t believe that’s why she ran. Not like that, without a word. Rainy was always a fighter. She would have fought with us about it, not run.”
Luke starts nodding. “But that’s not how it ended. Your father came in, remember? He gave us hell about the back fence that need to be run and told her to get home to her own chores.”
Rex frowns. “She always stood up to him. It made me nervous whenever she did. She told him she’d be on her way as soon as she brushed Maple down. We all left, told her we’d see her later and that was it.”
I tilt my glass in a circle as I work through it like I have so many times before but now I’m seeing the possibility of something else, something I missed before.
“We all left…but did he?”
Rex’s hard, scared hands grip the edge of the table but it’s Luke’s next words that have me surging to my feet.
“She said, ‘Run out of town with just a pack on her back.’ What if it wasn’t that she’d ran away but that she wasrunout of town instead?”
I swipe the keys from the counter and bark, “Get in the truck! It’s visiting hours.”
The truck cab is full of silent tension as we drive toward town. I can’t help but think back to the call that came just before my law school graduation that brought me back to the farm. My father had a stroke when he was out in the field. Apparently, he had laid out there for a good thirty hours, all alone, unable to move until one of the hired farmhands found him and called an ambulance. I remember cursing that he hadn’t died out there at the time. I came back and made him sign everything over to us. Threatened to move him into a crappy, underfunded state home if he didn’t. The bastard got to stay here in town at the small private facility and in exchange, Rex, Luke and I got the property and all the money he had.
Some people might think that was harsh, basically extortion, and they’d be right but there’s not one ounce of guilt in me for doing it. Not once in my life did he have a kind word to say to us, a comforting hand, a word of encouragement, or any kind of love. He was a tyrant that drove our mother away and all three of us lived under his rule, took his harsh criticism, and more than once were on the receiving end of a closed fist for too long to have any kind of compassion for him now.
The three of us file into his room and line up behind the wheelchair he sits in as he stares out at the early morning light. He’s a sad, fragile shell of the man that used to stand above us with clenched fists ready to strike. It’s hard to believe we were ever afraid of him. I finally step forward and grab a hold of the handles of his chair and pull him around to face into the room, face us. The right side of his face droops and his right arm curls in against his chest from the damage the stroke did and I imagine the long hours it was left untreated. I see his good eye widen in surprise at the sight of all three of us here at once. Something that has never happened before. I don’t think either Rex or Luke have even come here to see him once.
“Morning, Dad. Thought we’d swing by for a visit. Catch you up on what’s happening around the county. Not sure if anyone’s told you, but Charlie Rawlins passed away.”
He lets out a grunt and swipes at the air in his way of telling me he couldn’t give a damn.
I chuckle darkly, “Yeah, I know you weren’t that fond of him. Come to think of it, you didn’t really like anyone, did you? Anyway, his daughter…you remember, Rain, don’t you?”
His one good eye narrows at me and flashes to the others.
“Yeah, she came back for his funeral. Brought up a whole lot of memories from when we all used to be thick as thieves and it got us thinking. It never really quite sat right the way she took off without a word to us. Not even a goodbye. Especially when we always thought one of us would end up married to her.”
The expression on his stroke-damaged face is unreadable but I can see the anger building behind the eye that he is staring at us with. It bulges out of his head with the strain of trying to communicate and he snarls out a single slurred word.
“Wh-ore!”
I blink and find myself lunging across the space at him until I have a hand wrapped around his neck and my face inches from his with my teeth bared because that’s all the confirmation I need. That fucking word! Her reaction to that word and her telling me I was just like him tells me she heard it from him first.
“What…did…you…do?”
I snarl at him but he bats at my arm with his one weak hand.
“What did you do to make her leave? What did you threaten her with?”
Fear creeps into that eye as it flashes past me to Luke and the final puzzle piece slots into place. Of course! Of course, it was Luke. Rain would have done anything to protect him back then, all of us would have.
