I had done some checking into that matter, since I hadn’t been involved with the agricultural acquisitions Allory had started making a few years back. From what I could tell from the file, it might have been possible for my father to turn things around, and he didn’t have to close the farm outright, but it wasn’t like he’d murdered the town’s golden goose. It had been dying long before Allory got involved.
But small-minded people couldn’t wrap their heads around the complex interplay between fate and circumstance. They didn’t want to hear about market forces, economic fluctuation, and the razor-thin margins most farms operated with. And if you did tell them about those things, their eyes would just glaze over, their brain going into sleep mode.
It was easier to just blame the Whitakers. And when the parents left, they just blamed it all on Shelby.
It wasn’t fair but life rarely was. All any of us could do was keep going, no matter what situations we found ourselves in. Beit a struggling farmgirl or the man trying to earn her forgiveness, all we could do was our best.
A loud bang came from outside, but it wasn’t thunder. I wasn’t sure what had just happened. Shelby didn’t hesitate like I did. She ran to the window and looked out. I came up behind her to look over her shoulder. With the power out, the rain, and the dark clouds above, it was difficult to see anything.
“The door to the chicken house is open,” she said, panic in her voice. “I have to go close it.”
She spun around, and instinctively, I caught her arms. “Hey, slow down. It’s the end of the world out there. Can’t it wait?”
“No,” she said, shrugging off my hands. “I’m not losing any ladies tonight.”
“Ladies?”
“My hens.”
“Right, well, let me do it. I’m still in my raincoat.”
“I know,” she said. “You’re dripping on my credenza.”
“I’m not sure which part of you that is, but I’m sorry.”
A smile cracked through Shelby’s worried expression and she pointed at the long cabinet behind me. “That’s a credenza.” Then her face fell again. “Anyway, I have to go out there. You don’t know how to close the door.”
I chuckled and shook my head. “I know how to close a door. I mean, I think. Is it really complicated?”
“No,” she said, brow furrowed. “You just have to latch it. I’m sure it just came loose.”
“Then let me go. That way you don’t have to get wet again and I’ll feel like I helped by driving all the way out here.” I looked into her eyes, hard to read in the dim light. “Let me do this for you.”
“It’s dangerous out there,” she said.
It’s dangerous in here.“All the more reason for me to do it.”
“Okay, fine,” Shelby said. “Just wait a sec.”
She pushed past me and went into another room. When she came back, she shoved her rain hat on my head and cinched the drawstring tightly. “There.”
“I seriously should have brought a hat like this with me.” I adjusted it on my head. “I had no idea it rained this much in Kentucky.”
“Just keep an eye out for any tornados.”
I glanced out the window at the trees whipping in the wind, the tall grass flat like an invisible giant was stepping on it. “What do I do if I see one?”
“Oh, just crouch down, put your head between your legs, and kiss your ass goodbye.” She patted me on the butt like she was punctuating her statement. “Now hop to it, bad bunny.”
I laughed. “Once I close that door, can we agree I’ll graduate to good bunny? Or just regular bunny at least.”
“Nope,” she said with a smile I would face a hundred tornados to see.
“Fine.”
Then I was out the door. Wind tore at me, rain hit my exposed skin like needles, and the ground was a muddy swamp. It wasn’t the most glamorous way to play the hero, but I wasn’t about to turn back now. Shelby would never let me hear the end of it, and someone had to close the door.
The birds needed to be kept safe too. I didn’t have the same attachment to them as Shelby, but I wasn’t a serial killer. I didn’t want any hens getting hurt. The ducks, on the other hand… No, even they deserved to be safe.
