He glanced at the house, then back at me. “How’s she doing?”
“There’s no good way to bury the only parent you ever had,” I said.
He nodded once, slowly. Holt was a big man, thicker through the shoulders than I, with dark hair going grey at the temples, lines around his eyes from years of squinting into the sun. He had been my ranch boss for more than a decade.
I cast one last look at the house. The curtains in the frontroom were drawn halfway. A sliver of movement passed behind them, just the flicker of a shadow. I didn’t know if she was watching or not.
I climbed into the truck on the passenger side. He climbed back in, started the engine, and turned us around, heading out of the yard and back toward the gravel road. The ranch looked tired as we pulled away. The sagging fence. The chipped paint on the eaves. The barn roof needed more than a patch job. So much of it could have been avoided if Ray let someone in earlier.
“You carry him alright,” Holt asked after a few miles, eyes still on the road.
“The casket was lighter than some of the bulls we shove onto trailers,” I said.
“That’s not what I asked.”
“I know.”
He waited.
“I did what he asked me to do,” I said finally. “He wanted me there. He wanted me to walk him out, then bring her back. I did it.”
“And she still thinks you want to pick his bones clean,” Holt said.
“She has reason to,” I said. “From where she is standing, I am the man who shows up and announces the place is drowning, that the bank will come, and the taxes are behind. That her uncle lied by keeping it from her.”
“It’s not your lie,” Holt said.
“Doesn’t matter. Truth hurts the same no matter who says it.” I leaned my head back lightly against the seat and closed my eyes. “He talked about her more than he even realized.”
“I know,” Holt said. “I was there when he used to stand at the edge of his yard and stare up your way like you had his answers in your back pocket.”
“He wanted to sell,” I said. “Right up until heremembered she might come back one day. Then he wanted to hold it for her.”
“And now she has it. Plus the mess that comes with it.”
The truck hit a pothole, jostling us both. When we settled again, I opened my eyes. The land here rolled gently, not as dramatic as farther west, but still full of lines and curves that meant something. Fence lines marked the boundaries, and the cattle we passed were as familiar to me as neighbours.
“Did I ever tell you about the first time I saw him with her?” I asked.
Holt kept his eyes on the road. “No.”
“She was little,” I said. “Five, maybe six. He had her sitting on the fence rail down by the corrals. Big straw hat swallowing her head, boots that didn’t fit, braids crooked as sin. He kept putting her back up every time she slipped. He complained the whole time. Said she was a handful, distracted, and had no sense of balance. Yet, he never once put her down.”
“I was just a kid working whatever job that would get me out of my dad’s place. But I knew he had something I didn’t. Someone is waiting at the end of the day. Someone with his eyes and his features.”
Holt flicked a glance at me. “You had that for a while, too.”
I knew who he meant. Rena. My ex-wife. Dark hair, quick wit, a laugh that hooked into me before I could fight it. We built something once. A life. A routine. A future that seemed clear.
Then life changed. The ranch needed more, the brewery was a dream realized, and the markets tanked. Long days turned into longer nights. Rena got tired of talking to the back of my head. I hadn’t seen it fast enough. Or maybe I had convinced myself that the land would be enough of an explanation.
“Yeah, well, that didn’t work,” I said.
“You’ve got Maddy, though,” Holt said. “That counts for something.”
“Yeah,” I said quietly.
Fields flicked by outside, green giving way to golden patches. The sky was streaked with pink now. The long line of cottonwoods that hugged the creek glowed in the low light, their leaves shifting in a faint breeze.
