“That’s good. She’s obsessed with you.”
A few hours later, we turned onto a long dirt road.
And then a pasture opened in front of us, lush green and wide under the late afternoon sun. It surprised me how familiar it looked. For a second, I just stared, the memory of a space similar to this made its way into the forefront of my mind—like I’d shut it behind some old door and only now realized it was never really locked.
I took in the smell of hay, leather, and dirt baked under years of heat and drought. Then the dust that was kicked up in softgold sheets under the morning sun. And finally, my eyes focused on the horses’ shifting weight in the grass, tails flicking lazily.
I hadn’t realized how much of my body still remembered places like this.
Harper gasped, pulling me out of my memories, “Daddy… they’re real.”
I smiled before I could stop myself. “Yeah, bug. They are.”
After unloading the car and helping Harper into cowgirl boots, the ranch owner greeted us and led us down a weathered stone path towards the barn on the far end of the pasture. She was about sixty years old and kept a wide smile on her face as she spoke enthusiastically, telling us about her family’s farm and introducing us to the farm dog that was basking in the sun.
I took in all of the details, allowing myself to soak it all in. But it wasn’t lost on me that after one conversation, Dani had not only remembered, she’d orchestrated the entire thing.
When we reached the horses and Beth, the ranch owner, introduced me to a dark brown horse named “Buck”, my eyes caught Dani’s as a knowing smile danced across her face.
At first, Harper clung to my leg.
“They’re big.”
“They are,” I said. “But they’re gentle.”
I stepped toward the fence and laid my palm against the first horse that approached. I could feel the warmth and the dense muscle of the horse under my hands. The animal shifted under my hand, alive and grounded and solid beneath my palm.
My body adjusted without thinking — stance wider, weight balanced, voice lower.
Out of the corner of my eye, I could see Dani watching me carefully.
Her fingers flexed around the reins, then stilled. She let out a slow breath, barely audible, as if she was holding something in. Not with curiosity, but with recognition.
Like she’d just met a version of me I didn’t show.
“You’re different here,” she said gently.
“Different how?”
“You breathe differently.”
I exhaled through my nose.
“Feels… familiar,” I admitted.
She nodded like that meant something to her.
As we stood by the horses, Harper fed them apple slices, squealing every time one nuzzled her hand. The sound of her laughter in that open space did something to me. It wasn’t just joy.
It was relief.
Because for years, I’d believed feeling too much joy meant I was betraying something. My hand tightened unconsciously on the reins, fingers digging into leather, as if holding myself in check could keep the feeling at bay.
Elena’s face flickered in my mind: her smile, the way she’d teased me about being too serious, the way she’d squeezed my hand when Harper kicked for the first time.
Elena would’ve wanted this.
That thought landed heavy and light all at once.
