“What?”
“What’s his problem? Rey’s?”
“I have no idea. I know Lake and River found him on the streets and picked him up. He seems to have an intense fear of open spaces. Lake said it was more about being outside back in New York, but here it’s more about the big sky overhead I guess.”
Seb frowned. “Being in the middle of fields doesn’t help.”
“I don’t reckon it does.” I scratched my beard. “He’s a good kid, but there’s something in his past, some shit with his family I think, that makes him scared to even get a new ID because he thinks they might find him if he does.”
Sebastian hissed through his teeth. “That’s…a lot.”
“Yep. I mean, you hear all sorts of stories, but I don’t know why a kid would be that scared of his own family.” Then, because it had been something I’d been thinking about, I explained. “He wasn’t thrown out or anything. He left.”
Sebastian looked confused as he glanced at me. “That’s…”
“Yeah.”
We watched as the mare stumbled a little, wavering on her legs as she went to get a drink of water.
“She seems better otherwise.” Seb sighed. “I’m so glad. She should grow up into a healthy adult given time if we can figure out her hoof issues and make sure she’s relatively comfortable until her body readjusts…”
Nodding, I turned my attention to the tiny donkey that was examining the bottom of the fence as if trying to find a weak spot.
“I think she’ll be fine. We need to watch what we feed her and all that. The usual.” I pointed at the donkey who was shifting closer to the fence across from us. “Now that one. He’s trouble.”
Since we’d made the corral from metal fencing and built a large metal box stall on one end, we’d had to put it a little ways apart from anything else. Ruth had wanted to build more corrals, but we hadn’t gotten to it. I guess this was a good start, since we needed to expand beyond the yard space we were using now.
Narrowing my eyes, I took out the multi-tool I had in my pocket, and waited until the donkey was almost touching the fence.
At the last moment before he made contact, I tapped the lowest rail with the metallic tool. The echo reverberated through the fence and the little guy jumped back as if he’d been shocked.
That gave me an idea. Or the beginnings of a solution to a problem we might have soon.
Since Seb was there on his day off as a friend as much as a vet wanting to check on his patients, I asked, “Want to help me put a line of electric fencing around this thing under the bottom rail?”
Sebastian chuckled. “Sure, why not.”
* * * *
He helped me with the fence and then he wanted to check on every critter we had, dogs and cats included. Because that was the kind of vet and friend Seb was; he needed to know his patients were okay. To be fair, he didn’t see most of our animals for anything but vaccinations and general checkups, just like everyone preferred, so I understood.
Something about him was almost wistful when he looked around the yard as we meandered across it. He was about to leave and I wanted to just go sit in my cabin for a while and relax.
As we reached the parking lot, River got home from work. He climbed out of his car, clearly exhausted and happy.
I smiled at his expression. “How was it?”
“So good. The Doc is a good guy. He’ll be a good boss to have for sure.”
Again I was reminded that River, at least, wanted to stay. I’d been so stupid about this.
“Hey, guys!” Lake jogged down the path from the house. “Rey cooked a bunch. He says you all have to come and have dinner with us.”
River groaned, but the sound was the happy,I don’t have to figure out food for myselfkind that came only after a tiring workday.
“Uh.” Seb seemed torn.
“Do you have a better offer?” I asked him.
