I sigh with relief. Damn. There’s something I haven’t felt in a minute. “Thanks, Holls.”
“Wow.” I think maybe it all just hit her. “You’re leaving.”
“I’m leaving.”
It’s official.
Now all that’s left to do is pack.
JOVI
The contented peace which tends to linger in the air at feeding time is absent this morning. The barn feels strange. Restless, like the horses understand that Trent isn’t coming back. That I’m it from here on out.
“Thanks again for walking me through things this morning,” I tell Sam, the neighbor’s kid that’s been keeping things running since the accident. He’s maybe sixteen or seventeen, right around the age Trent was when he first told me he would have a place like this one day.
Watching Sam so easily fill his shoes it’s not hard to imagine he’s got the same dreams brewing in his own head. “I hope you won’t stop coming around now that I’m here to take over for Trent. I can tell the horses love you, and I may need another lesson or two from you.”
“I doubt that.” He shakes his head, chuckling as he reaches out to pat the horse curiously poking her head out of her stall to watch us. Kimber. The paint mare Trent picked up at auction hoping to reel me back into this world even then. “Trent told me all about how you two used to work horses together. Said you always went straight for the ones no one would bother with. The one’s people gave up on, deemed untrainable or too aggressive to handle.”
I try to laugh, but it catches in my throat. “That wasn’t because I had skills. That was pure stupidity. Youthful ignorance always had me looking for ways to take chances and push the limits.” More than that, I was reckless. And not exclusively with horses.
“That’s not how Trent told it.” Sam runs his hand down the mare’s muzzle and steps back. “Anyway, I better get going. I won’t get to come back at all if I show up late to first period again.”
I wave him off as he hurries for the open doorway. “You’ll be back to check on me tonight?”
He laughs. “Yeah, sure.”
Then he rounds the corner and disappears. A minute later, I hear his truck start up, followed by the sound of his tires moving over the gravel as he heads down the long driveway and off to school.
Trent always said he was a good kid. I wonder if he knew just how right he was.
Now that it’s down to me and the horses, the nervous energy only expands.
“I know,” I tell Kimber, stepping toward her to crawl my fingers up her neck and under her black and white mane to scratch her hairline. “I wouldn’t have chosen me either.”
She snorts in response before tucking her head back inside her stall to resume her post breakfast munching on hay.
Judging by the quiet grinding and crunching of teeth mulling back and forth over dried alfalfa coming at me in surround sound, no one is ready to be turned out to pasture yet.
So, I take this opportunity to explore Trent’s old office.
I’ve been inside it countless times, but never once have I looked at the space the way I’m seeing it today.
For starters, it’s disgusting. I always knew Trent was a slob, but Jesus Christ, this place is nasty. And that’s just based on what I can see at first glance. Which includes seven abandoned coffee cups I’ve counted so far, a half-eaten Danish sitting on a pile of papers and a potted plant behind his desk he appears to have treated like acompost pale. I’m guessing, based on the banana peel and apple core I can still make out in the dirt.
There is no question I will be dealing with a rodent problem upon moving in.
From here, the mess gets less time sensitive. The man had papers everywhere. Contracts. Bills. Vet records. Anything and everything ever written or printed ordoodledon paper is on display somewhere in this space. On the desk. On the shelves. On the two saddles brought in here to be repaired. On the desk chair. On the small sofa. Oh, and fuck me, on the mini-fridge I’m only now discovering.
To say I’m terrified of what I’ll find inside is putting it mildly.
I put off looking for now and instead move toward the old set of lockers along the wall to my left. Their color is a combination of blue spray paint and rust. Of the two, I remember at least one is filled with Trent’s go-to work stuff, so when I pop open the door, I find exactly what I was expecting.
A pile of extra gloves on the top shelf.
A bucket of grooming supplies sitting in the bottom, a collection of his favorite brushes, and a hoof pick I recognize from my days of working horses.
“So, that’s where that thing went,” I mutter, chuckling quietly. Never did figure Trent for a thief. Leave it to my best friend to keep me on my toes even after he’s gone.
