Clay’s jaw was working, like he was gearing himself up for the worst thing of all, the thing he never wanted anyone to know.
“You hang the moon for me too, you know? For me and Brody both.” Tears glinted in his eyes and he scrubbed at them hard with his fingers. “I keep thinking, I can do that, I can be like Leland. But then you went and—well, you messed up, Leland. Messed up bad. Jamie doesn’t deserve it, and I—I know you’re human. People make mistakes. But I’m following your lead here, and I don’t want to cut out of line just because you’re behaving like an asshat. People depend on you. I depend on you.” Clay pointed at himself with a hard stab. “Don’t fuck it up, Leland.”
Then Clay marched off, going along the path and under the trees, dripping with rain. Leaving Leland in that spot, staring after him. His mouth was open, and he breathed the cool, rain-drenched air.
A thousand ideas whirled in the air around him, startling him with icy cold dots as they touched his face. But that was the rain. The hard rain that came in early summer, cool at first, then shockingly cold. He turned his face up into it and blinked his eyes closed. And imagined that somehow, he could be washed clean. That he could make all of this right.
28
Jamie
By the time Jamie made it to the dining hall, it was raining hard. Inside, the guests were talking in excited voices as they stood in the buffet line, going over the afternoon’s trail ride, and the excitement about the weather, the slickers. The fact that the foreman had gone on the ride with them.
Jamie grabbed a tray and got at the back of the buffet line, and did not join in the general admiration of how good Mr. Tate looked on horseback. If he did, he would most certainly have to agree, and then he would start rethinking his decision to leave the ranch.
“Hey, Jamie.”
Jamie looked up. Brody was already at one of the long tables, waving him over. Jamie got his food and went to sit across from Brody. He took a bite of his meatloaf and mashed potatoes, but they didn’t seem to want to go down, so he gulped on his iced tea and tried not to let his looming departure wash over him.
“Great trail ride, yeah?” asked Brody, his mouth full as he shoveled it in. “Man, Leland was perfect, wasn’t he?Better bring out those yellow slickers, Mr. Calhoooooooooun. Gah.” Brody shook his head and scrubbed at his mouth with a paper napkin. “Nobody puts on a show better than he does.”
“I guess not,” said Jamie.
“Just the right amount of drama, you know? Just to make it perfect for the guests, gives them a story to take with them.”
“Yeah,” said Jamie, because that part was true. He had a story to take with him too, except that it had a sad ending, rather than a happy one. “Hey, do you know how late Greyhound stays open?”
“Greyhound?” asked Brody, blinking at Jamie as though Jamie had just woken him up from a very pleasant dream.
“Yeah, when does the bus leave?”
“Um.” Brody looked at him for a minute, then shrugged, as if he’d decided not to ask why Jamie wanted to know. “The bus goes Monday, Wednesdays, and Fridays. Around three, I think.”
“Oh.”
Friday was the day before payday. He could take the bus then, sure. But if he waited till Saturday, he’d have more money in his pockets. If he could figure out a way to cash the check Maddy was going to give him, he’d be able to show ranch and Leland his heels. Be his own man.
“You thinking of leaving?” asked Brody, finally.
“Maybe not till next week,” said Jamie. He scrubbed at the back of his neck and told himself he was not scanning the dining hall for signs of Leland. “Maybe not till Monday. Maybe.”
After packing and unpacking his duffle bag at least twice, Jamie tossed on his single bed and watched the curtains drifting in the soft, damp breeze from the open window. In the morning, when he stepped out of the staff quarters, the rain had cleared and the skies overhead were blue.
The scent of pine followed him in the cool air as he scooted along the path to the dining hall. From the propped-open doors he could smell bacon frying and pancakes and coffee brewing and sugar melting in butter. All those things swirled around him in the crisp morning air, and his stomach grumbled for him to hurry up.
The dining hall was lively and full of people talking and walking around the tables with their trays. Tomorrow would be their last day before they went home, and they were talking and looking and smiling, as though trying to absorb every detail before their real lives made the ranch just a memory.
Tomorrow would be Jamie’s last day, too. He didn’t want to imagine what his life would be away from the ranch, when he didn’t have a steady income and a roof over his head. When he’d have to resort to working in a meat packing plant in the middle of nowhere. He wanted to stay but didn’t think he could. Didn’t think he should.
The best thing for him to do was to eat as much as he could, work one last day, and pick up his pay in the morning. After that, his future stretched out like an empty hallway that went on forever.
As he ate his breakfast, a pile of pancakes and a pile of bacon, he looked for Leland, for his tall frame, listened for his steady walk. All the while, he told himself not to. It was stupid. It was hopeless.
Maybe being with him hadn’t been good for Leland. Or maybe Leland was afraid Jamie might talk about it or brag that he was sleeping with the boss. He didn’t know. What he did know was that inside of him was a huge gash, like Leland had taken a knife and slashed him open, rough, jiggling that knife around to do the most damage. He was stupid to have let Leland get that close in the first place, stupid.
Someone came up behind him and his whole body stiffened, but when he saw it was Clay, he let out a whoosh of air.
“Hey,” Jamie said as Clay sat down opposite him with his tray of food.
