“What’s this?” asked Clay. He looked at the green duffle bag just inside the door, at the fifties and hundreds flapping in the light breeze.
“I’m leaving after I help out.” Jamie held onto the doorjamb, digging his fingers in to keep himself from trembling. “I just need to find Maddy so she’ll give me my pay.”
“She’ll just deposit it to your bank.” Clay looked at him, brows furrowed.
“I don’t have a bank account,” said Jamie, for what seemed like the thousandth time.
“She could write you a paper check on Saturday.” Clay looked troubled by this idea. “At least I think she can. Anyway, thanks for helping this morning.”
Clay left, clomping in his work boots down the hall.
Jamie closed the door and got dressed, quick as he could, stopping to grab a mouthful of water from the faucet. Then he headed down the stairs to the barn, almost jogging. It was chilly, but it was going to warm up soon, so it didn’t matter that he was only wearing his t-shirt.
A flatbed truck with a flatbed trailer sat jackknifed in front of the barn, and beside it stood a red-faced truck driver wiping his forehead with the back of his forearm as he talked to Maddy. All round the truck and the trailer were bales of hay, most of which had spilled out of their bindings, leaving a snowfall of hay and hay dust on the dirt road.
Jamie coughed as he walked into the low cloud of debris to join the group of employees who were using pitchforks and wheelbarrows to gather the hay and haul it away.
He wasn’t sure what he should do, as all the tools were being used. Then Leland walked by, his arms bare as he hauled up a bale of hay with gloved hands and put it back on the trailer.
“Get those up there, Jamie,” he said, as though nothing had happened between them. As though he barely knew Jamie.
“Yes, sir,” Jamie said, shivering, shards of hurt ripping through his heart.
When he went to the first bale of hay he saw and lifted it, Leland came up behind him. He could feel Leland’s presence, even before he turned around.
“No, not that way,” Leland said. “Here, use these.”
He peeled off his gloves and handed them to Jamie, then marched off, probably to get another pair. When Jamie slid his hands inside, the canvas gloves were still warm from Leland’s skin. Jamie lifted his hands to his face and imagined that the gloves smelled like Leland, still outlined the shape of his hands. Then he jerked the gloves away from his face and started lifting hay bales from the ground and up onto the flatbed trailer.
Clay got up on the flatbed and started arranging the hay bales, and as he did this, Jamie had to throw the bales higher and higher each time, till he couldn’t throw them any higher. His arms were quivering, his shoulders sore, and he was covered with hay scratches all over.
By the time they finished the cleanup, all the hay had been removed from the ground, and the driver had driven the truck around the barn to the supply barn, it was just seven o’clock. Time for breakfast. Time for guests to get up and start their day. Time for Jamie to leave.
Jamie dusted himself off, removing as much hay as he could. He took Leland’s gloves back to the barn, where he laid them on the desk in Leland’s office. Then he went to the dining hall and had the biggest breakfast he could shove inside of him.
As he ate, Brody shook his head as he went by with his empty tray, and Jamie looked down at himself. He was sweat-stained and grubby with flecks of hay in his hair. He was right back where he’d started the day he’d arrived at the ranch. Having people look at him a certain way, think about him a certain way. Well, that was fine and too bad. He was leaving anyway.
He bussed his tray and was about to go to his room and grab his duffle bag so he could head out, but just on the front porch of the dining hall, Brody came up to him.
“Got a favor,” he said. “I’m just about to start the lesson, but Dorothy’s afraid to get on her horse. Can you help me? Maybe walk Dorothy’s horse on a lead?”
“Sure,” said Jamie, short.
“Go clean up, put on a long-sleeved shirt, and get your hat, and meet me there.”
No more lessons for him, it looked like. Instead, he was on the ground, in the dust. Well, fine, he’d earn an entire day’s pay and walk away with more money. Maybe he’d work all the way till dinner, eat that, and then head out. When did the last bus leave out of Farthing anyhow?
He raced to his room to grab his hat and long-sleeved shirt, and headed back to the corral. Even while grumbling the whole while about not being able to leave, something inside him felt like it was stepping back from a very dangerous place, from unknown prospects, from shitty bus rides to nowhere. Farthingdale Ranch was a good place, and yes, the work was hard, but everything about it—
Jamie stopped in his tracks as he came up to the corral in the blazing sunshine. Leland and Brody were inside the corral with a group of guests, talking to them about the lesson. Jamie grew hot all over and then cold.
Brody had asked him for help, and he was going to do it, but his heart was racing and his throat was dry. It might be the bravest thing he’d ever done, but he did it. Slipped through the fence rails and walked right up to the two of them. He tipped his hat at Brody, but not to Leland.
Leland had the good grace to nod, but said nothing to Jamie, and quickly turned his attention to Brody.
“Where did the fear come from?” asked Leland.
It took Jamie a second to realize he wasn’t talking to him, but to Brody, quietly, so the guests didn’t hear.
