“So.” Zeke turned and tipped his hat brim back, a signal that he was open and willing to listen. “Are you willing to learn if I teach you?” Zeke waited a beat and then added, “I can get you up to speed in a few days, so we can start riding lessons for the others around mid-week.”
He kept his gaze on Cal and waited.
“What about—” Cal drew a sharp breath between his teeth, his eyes searching Zeke’s face as if looking for what his reaction might be. Not what was, whatmightbe.
Cal was living in a world ofmaybesandperhaps, and it seemed like he’d lived that way for a while. And maybe, at least in Cal’s mind, every step was off a sheer cliff.
“What about after that?” asked Zeke. When Cal nodded, a short nod, Zeke said, “I’ll keep teaching you. You’re smart. I’veseen your file. Stay sharp when we’re giving a lesson and take your cues from me.”
It was opportunity and absolution all in one. From the expression on Cal’s face, the ease of the hardness of his jaw, the widening of his blue eyes, he understood it for exactly what it was. Zeke had a feeling that Cal was going to make the most of the opportunity given to him.
Beyond Cal’s seeming willingness, there lingered some shadows of doubt and fear, but Zeke would work on that in time. For now, he would begin the lesson, starting with how to tie the right kind of knot that would allow a rider to tie a horse up to a railing, but in a way that if the horse needed to pull free, it could.
“This is the first lesson, a quick-release knot,” said Zeke, watching Cal watch his hands. “It’s to tie up your horse in a way so you can easily untie him.”
He tied and untied the knot two more times, then handed the lead to the halter to Cal.
“You try.”
Cal was a fast learner, his fingers agile on the rope, going slowly at first, and then quickly. He gave Bolt a slow pet after he undid the lead and handed it back to Zeke.
“Good.” Zeke tied Bolt back up again. “Grab that bucket of grooming tools over there, and I’ll show you what’s next.”
They spent the morning going over the basics, what each grooming tool did, how to use the tool, what order to groom in, nose to tail.
All the while, as the morning turned gently to mist, they were shoulder to shoulder, focused on the task in a silence that connected them rather than separated them. And all the while, Zeke kept his gaze on Cal, on his profile, the way his long eyelashes flicked between Bolt and Zeke.
When they were finished with Bolt, Zeke showed Cal how to hold a horse cookie in the flat of his palm and give it to Bolt.
“Always guide and reward,” said Zeke. “Never punish. Never strike.”
Together they put Bolt back in the pasture. Then Zeke showed Cal how to catch a haltered horse without startling the herd. It was good to see that the horses didn’t run off, but rather gravitated toward them both, even toward Cal, who was wide-eyed to be surrounded by rain-speckled horses.
“They can hear your heartbeat from four feet away,” said Zeke, softly shouldering one animal out of Cal’s way. “If you feel safe, your heartbeat is slow. If your heartbeat is slow, horses know it’s safe. Thatyouare safe to be around. Take deep breaths. These are good horses.”
By lunchtime they’d groomed half a dozen other horses, including some that had been un-haltered, but that was an opportunity to show Cal how to put on and take off a halter.
“We’ll do some riding this afternoon,” Zeke said. “Let’s clean up for lunch and take a break.”
Zeke knew they smelled like dust and horse, but there wasn’t time for a full shower, so he took Cal with him to the facilities and washed up with him, as though it was an ordinary morning, and not one of the most pleasant that Zeke had experienced in a good long while.
“That was hard work,” said Cal as they walked to the mess tent.
“You’ll get used to it,” said Zeke. “But we need to feed you up. You’re as skinny as a cricket.”
“Too much junk food,” said Cal with a self-disparaging smile that seemed to invite Zeke to malign his eating habits.
But Zeke knew that just as he would always reward a horse for trying, even when it didn’t fully succeed, it was key for Cal as well.
“Nothing wrong with junk food,” said Zeke, though he didn’t addIn moderationbecause he knew Cal already knew that.“I’m a fan of Snickers myself. Sometimes.” Back when he’d been riding broncs, he’d had to keep his weight to a certain limit and ate mostly protein and veggies, so Snickers had seldom been on the menu.
“Oh.”
Zeke had a feeling Cal was taking notes like he was studying Zeke, as though at the end of the week he would have to take a test and ace it or die.
It was like that at rodeos and fairs, where new bronc riders would hang around the more experienced ones and soak it all up like a sponge. You had to stay on your toes.
Cal was so on his toes he was about to spring into the rafters. So, as they got to the mess tent, Zeke paused and touched Cal’s shoulder, which brought him instantly to attention.
