“Rita’s specialty.” She loads Rita into the truck. “Want to come to dinner tomorrow? Dad’s going to be out, and I’m attempting to cook something that doesn’t involve a microwave.”
“Absolutely. As long as Rita’s not helping with the cooking.”
“Rita’s banned from the kitchen. Another permanent record.”
She drives away laughing, and I think about how perfect she looked in that moment, covered in goat hair and arena dust, tears streaming down her face from laughing so hard. No distance, no walls, just Callie being Callie.
Two days later,we’re at the ranch dealing with the irrigation inspector situation. Everything’s about to gosideways in spectacular fashion.
Jesse comes running from the house like his ass is on fire. He skids to a stop. “We have a problem.”
“What’s up?”
“The irrigation inspector is here right now. Didn’t know he was coming today. He needs both ranch signatures for the water rights renewal.”
“So? Dad signs it, done. He’s back in town, so we’re good to go, right?”
“Yeah, but the inspector wants Dad’s signatureandMr. Thompson’s signature. On the same document. At the same time. In the same place.”
“Oh.” I set down my tools. “That’s going to be interesting. And by interesting, I mean potentially violent.”
By some miracle, we get Mr. Thompson to meet us by the irrigation system by stressing the urgency of the situation. The inspector, standing between the men, is a small, nervous man who’d rather be anywhere than here. I don’t blame him. The two are glaring at each other with enough intensity to cause spontaneous combustion, and my brothers and I stand close by in case someone takes a swing.
The inspector holds his paperwork like a shield. “Gentlemen,” he says, his voice cracking as if he’s been warned about these two rival hotheads, “if we could just sign these papers...”
“I’m not signing anything that has his name on it,” Mr. Thompson declares, arms crossed like a bouncer at a club for people who hate McCoys.
Christ. Why did he even bother coming over, then?
“The feeling’s mutual,” Dad shoots back. “I’d rather sign my own death warrant.”
“That can be arranged,” Mr. Thompson mutters.
“Is that a threat?”
“It’s a consideration.”
The inspector looks like he might cry. “It’s a new legal requirement,” he protests, pulling out a handbook and flipping through it frantically. “Both properties share water rights to Cedar Ridge Creek. Both signatures are required for renewal. It’s a statute in the water code.”
“Then we don’t renew,” Mr. Thompson says.
“Then you lose water rights. Both of you. No water for irrigation, livestock, nothing,” the inspector says.
“Better than sharing with McCoys.”
“I’d rather watch my cattle die of thirst than share water with Thompsons,” Dad adds.
Two fools in competition for who can be most dramatic. They’re also in competition for who can be the bigger asshole.
It’s ridiculous, even by our families’ ridiculous standards. They’re willing to lose water access rather than sign a damn piece of paper. They’d rather destroy both ranches than cooperate for thirty seconds.
Jesse tries his charm, turning it up to maximum wattage. “Mr. Thompson, surely we can come to an agreement on this. It’s just paperwork. Bureaucracy. Red tape. Nobody actually cares about it.”
“Nothing involving McCoys is ‘just’ anything,” he replies. “Give them an inch, they take your whole ranch.”
“We don’t want your ranch,” Jesse says. “We have our own ranch.”
“That’s what you want me to think.”
