Looking back, I knew she hadn't just been talking about tools and halters. She'd been talking about us, the kids those two women had put back together. At the time, though, I hadn't truly understood. Combined with the bunk checks, keeping things organized became a way of life, and one that none of us seemed to be able to shake.
Since Bea had trained Luke herself, I had a funny feeling that the measuring tape would be right about...
My eyes had just found it when the barn door opened. "Faith?" That was Luke's voice.
"She's not in here," I called back.
He rounded the corner and paused. His eyes slid down my body and a little smile touched his lips. "What are you doing in my office, Cy?"
I lifted the tape measure. "Uh, trying to be sneaky. So, what's Faith doing?"
"Supposed to be putting up the horses." He turned around and closed the drive-side barn doors. "You haven't seen her at all? She's not in her room."
"I just got out here," I admitted. "Wanted to get some measurements for your stuff."
Luke gestured to the opposite set of doors. "Yeah, let me just check and see if she's out there, and then I'll come help."
Because out there was a five-acre paddock for the horses. There was another down the way, but we needed to fix those fences up a bit before we started using it. Keeping one eye on Luke, I took the measuring tape and began to get the dimensions of the work bench first. Once I had the length, I pulled out my phone to make a note of it, then measured the depth just as Luke opened the door and peeked his head out.
"Cy?" he asked, and the worry in his voice was clear.
I was headed his way before my phone was even back in my pocket. "Is she ok?"
Since Luke wasn't running, I figured she couldn't be bleeding. Maybe it was something cute? I jogged the last few steps to the door, then leaned over his shoulder to look out. There, in the last hint of twilight, I could see the young girl sitting on the edge of the hill just watching the horses graze below her.
"She cried the other night," Luke breathed. "She's trying so hard to act like all of this doesn't bother her, but it does. That bastard took videos of her, and she has no one to talk to about it."
"Yeah," I said, pushing past him, "she fucking well does." Then I paused, tossing the measuring tape at him. "Get me the rest of the dimensions for what you need."
He caught the measuring tape but didn't move. "I don't know how to fix this, Cy."
"It's called relief," I assured him. "This is my job, Luke. She's our girl too."
A whisper of a smile flickered across his lips. Luke nodded, and then he headed back to do what I'd asked. The barn doors weren't open enough to let the horses get through, but the splash of light was enough to make it clear she'd been spotted. Faith turned around and saw my shadow heading her way, but she didn't get up.
That was basically permission to join her, so I kept going. Halfway there, one of the horses realized I was out there. I was pretty sure it was Violet's mare, Glitter, but couldn't be sure. The light was just dark enough to make them hard to tell apart. When I didn't stop, the mare went back to grazing. A moment later, Faith wiped at her face.
"You ok with me joining you?" I asked when I was close enough to not need to yell.
"Yeah," she said, trying her hardest to sound just fine.
She failed. No, I wouldn't tell her that, but the quaver in her voice came through, and her nose was running just enough to change the pitch. Once I got all the way over to her, I took a seat on the far side. That meant I could look back at the barn when I talked to her. What I didn't do, though, was say anything.
For a long moment, the silence stretched between us. Faith couldn't take it. "I was just watching the horses."
"And the sunset," I said, looking up at the mostly dark sky. "I still can't get used to the colors out here. Back in Denver, it never seemed as bright."
"Yeah." She cleared her throat. "I've never lived anywhere but here. What's it like?"
"Crazy," I told her. "You know I grew up here too, right?"
"Yeah, all of you did."
I nodded. "And when I graduated high school, I stayed for another year helping out. Gran helped me get some loans for college, and then she and Bea walked me through how to get in. I had no idea what I wanted to be, you see. I just knew that I wanted to help people, because so many had helped me. They call it paying it forward."
"That's why you became a shrink?" she asked.
I nodded. "Part of it. The other part is because of my friends. When I was a kid, some bad things happened to me. Some of them were partially my fault, but most of it wasn't. Didn't feel that way, though. Felt like I'd somehow made a mistake, and I thought everyone would hate me for it. Craziest thing, though. None of them did. They hated itwithme."
