A Feather in the Rain (21 page)

H
e was only half-asleep, aware that she was not, when he heard her say, “How do you feel about having a child again?”

“I can't even imagine it.” He was stunned by the question and spoke into the pillow.

His answer pierced her heart like a lance of ice, as unexpected as if it had been hurled out of a bouquet of roses.

He realized only as the words had left his lips, the brutal bluntness of their force. He propped on an elbow and saw on her face how hard they'd hit. He knew he'd spoken the truth but wished he'd done it better, or not at all. “It's just that…I don't know, I love kids. But since Damien died, I find it difficult to think about babies…birth…Sometimes I can't even look at a baby. I don't know how to explain it. I wish I could.” He was lost in frustration, wanting her to understand, not knowing how to get it done. “When you lose a child, even if he's an adult, you've lost your baby. That's how you first knew him. The baby always exists as long as the adult is there. When the adult dies, the baby dies, too. It's like losing two people. I guess a baby, somehow for me, represents the potential for…” he shook his head as if to deny what he was saying, “the most deeply hurting pain.”

“It can also be the greatest joy.” It came softly from a long narrow hallway in her mind.

“That's true…I know it is…” His voice trailed off. He said no more. Nor did she.

After a time of silent separate thought, he sensed the chasm between them though they were close enough to feel the warmth of each other's blood. He drew her into his arms and whispered in her hair, “I didn't mean it to sound the way it came out.”

She breathed in and released a small murmur of response.

T
he mountaintops stood behind them, islands in the morning mist. He leaned back against the fender of her car and held her close between his legs. She forced a smile as he touched her face and tugged her collar up around her neck. He kissed her soft and slow, until he felt her lips give in, he whispered, “I love you…go.” He guided her into the seat behind the wheel and shut the door. She rolled the window down and looked up at him. “Drive careful,” he said and leaned in to kiss her one last time. He stood up and looked into her eyes trying to read the silent mystery there. Something had been damaged and he knew it, but he didn't know how to fix it.

She drove away with her arm out the window, fingers formed in the sign language symbol of love, waving gently. He watched until she vanished at the end of the street. He blew out a breath and headed toward the trailer and his truck. This was a woman of many shades and hues and beneath the external tranquil beauty, churned the groans of roaring wind and rain. Children, that was an
important question she asked. Even though he'd known this could never work, he'd told her he loved her, again and again. How could he not have…even if he had known it couldn't last.

Mason had the horses booted for travel, and lined up on both sides of the trailer. Jesse clapped the boy on the shoulder and said, “Come on, let's get some breakfast. Then we'll load them up and hit the road, Jack.”

“Jack?”

“It's an old song.”

“Huevos rancheros,” the pretty college-girl-waitress repeated Mason's order as she wrote it, smiled and turned away.

Mason stared at his orange juice. “She sure is a real nice lady.”

Jesse looked after the waitress. “Yeah….”

“I mean Miss Holly.”

“Oh…yeah…”

T
he buoyant bright light of Abbie bounded off the porch behind the dogs. She hugged him while telling nonstop everything that transpired since he left, even though they'd spoken nearly every night.

He was in the saddle at seven. The colt was on the muscle. Jesse gave him his head, and he snaked it to the ground as he galloped off slinging his hind feet to the sky, clacking his hooves together applauding the day. His body cracked like a lash at the end of a whip as he bucked. He knew that Jesse was right with him, sharing the celebration of his wild spirit. Minutes later, they settled down to the business of working cattle. If anything, the colt had gotten better and smoother, as if he'd been training himself.

Mason called to thank him for the great trip. “I talked to my mom and dad. They know I'm serious about wanting to work with horses and maybe be a vet and they said it'd be okay if I wanted to ask you if I could come and help you out for the rest of the summer. You wouldn't have to pay me or anything. My dad said it'd be
all right. I…I could ride my bike over…”

Jesse sat on a horse with a smile on his face, “Come on,” he said.

The boy wasn't sure he heard right. “Are you serious, sir?”

“Yes, sir, and I'll pay you, too. I was just thinking about how I need to hire another hand.”

“Gosh, that's great. Thanks. When do you want me to start?”

“When can you?”

“I could start right now.”

“Come on.”

I
n the tiny Holly House, she sat at her desk trying to put thoughts in her journal, hoping that giving them form in ink would make them clear. Her heart still held the sting of his feelings about children. She wanted to find the truth of what she felt. She'd never thought much about having children. The idea of children was always so connected to a man, a father, a husband, and until the Texas cowboy, she had never met that man. But now with the loss of her brother and the finding of Jesse, something had begun to brew. She knew that a child wouldn't bring her brother back, but the thought of creating a human being out of love seemed a very appealing thing. If nothing else, she needed to know the possibility was there.

Worn weary with a lonely three-day struggle to resist the urge to call, he punched out her number. The sound of her hello brought scant relief. He had to see her face, touch her skin, smell her hair.

It was resolved that she would come to Texas in ten days and
videotape Jesse training. He insisted it would be a business venture. She would be paid outright or participate in a percentage of the profits from its sales, whichever she preferred. The last words he spoke before easing the phone to its cradle were, “I love you.” Every time he said them, he felt they'd escaped against his will. There was something about this love that was stronger than he. It made him uneasy.

S
he arrived overflowing with ideas, a storyboard, a script complete with camera angles, ways and places to advertise, and a marketing scheme. He smiled, sitting next to her on the sofa at the big table, a bottle of wine between them. “You've done a hell of a lot of work.

It looks so professional. Where did you get all that information?”

“I studied a little. Some from experience. A lot from Bear. I put it together on our computer.”

“I can see the whole thing.” He leaned forward and kissed her into a slower pace down a different path. He whispered thank you against her lips and felt the change as she softened under his touch and slipped her arms around his neck. She seemed to constantly create a universe wherein all was new, the tantalizing tilt of her head haloed in gilded strands of light, the smoke that veiled her mystifying eyes, the bone-china paleness of her skin, whose purpose was to take him from himself.

A
bunch of friends and neighbors came to the ranch for a potluck screening of the finished product and cheered when it was over. Jesse had to deal with a ceaseless barrage of gibes about being a movie star. He gave total credit to “my writer, my producer, my director, and my cinematographer, Holly Marie Bassett.” She bowed elaborately to applause, cheers, and whistles.

I
n the warm pink evening, a red-hot ball of sun slid down the sky for a last bloody glance at the day. Ribbons of clouds purple and white streamed along the rim of the hills. Dozer lay at Jesse's side, enjoying the probing fingers in his scalp. Holly pointed her wineglass toward the sky where a hawk wheeled on motionless wings, scanning the pastures with laser eyes for a dinner of flesh.

The hawk squealed and spiraled tighter, once, twice, then folded his wings and plummeted like a rocket. He disappeared in the distance behind the barn. “Dinner is served,” said Jesse.

“What do you suppose it is?”

“He's got a good choice on this menu, prairie dog, field mouse, squirrel, and there's Bunny Bunny.”

“That's not funny.” But she smiled anyway. They fell silent as the sun sank behind the jade and garnet hills. He looked at her profile and wondered what was in her mind. He wanted to come right out and ask her, what does she want. What does she see for her life?
How does she feel about the difference in their ages in terms of the future? Where does she think this can go? Had she thought about it? Something was occurring, a change, an uncertainty. They surely were not focused on one thing together. They hadn't talked about anything like that. Then the voice within went silent. He reached across the small distance between their chairs and touched her arm. She smiled and put her hand on his.

T
he fan above the bed churned the steaming stillness of a summer morning that would soon become a torrid afternoon. “Maybe you could keep an open mind.” She was sitting up in the bed, not looking at him, knowing she had his attention.

“About what?” He said it even though he knew.

“Having children.”

He breathed in tensely through a bitten lip. A sudden rush of anger filled him. Couldn't she understand what he'd tried to explain about his feelings regarding children? Couldn't she at least give him some time, a chance to think about it? He wanted to scream out, “No, I don't want to keep an open mind. I am not prepared to even consider what it takes to bring a baby into the world and keep it safe and raise it up to be a decent, worthwhile human being. And I'm too damned old. No!” is what he wanted to say.

This is it, he thought, I've known it from the start. The end is here. She has the right, of course she does, to be fulfilled as a
woman; and a lot of women feel that comes with bearing a child. He was not about to try to talk her out of that. Instantly, he saw her clearly: full-ripened, round, blooming pink and peach and lily white, glowing in exquisite loveliness. No way could he discourage that or even try. He loved her so and knew she deserved happiness and wanted her to have it.

Her eyes began to fill as she listened to his silence. He stood and went to the window. Her eyes would not release him. “You won't answer me. You won't say anything. You just stand there like stone.” She sprang like a leopard from the bed, naked but for his opened shirt flying like a cape as she lunged at him, tears splashing her darkened cheeks. She rammed her palms into his chest and shoved him back along the wall. “You said I mean more to you than the blood in your veins. You said you loved me.” She screamed at him, “But not enough to have a child with me.” She beat at his chest. “Why don't you hear me?”

He offered no resistance, stepping back with the blows. Her rage appeared from out of nowhere, without a cause from him that he could tell. An anger of such dimension demanded an attempt at understanding. Still, he had no voice. “Look at you,” she spat the words, her face scrunched and furrowed in frustration, red and white and glacier blue, “you're so tough…”

“I'm not tough. I don't know what to say. I'm trying to understand. I want to be honest with you. I don't know what you're seeing…or what you think you're seeing.”

She continued to shove at his shoulders till he locked her wrists in an iron grip and she thrashed like a netted tiger. He could feel her breath on his face inches from her tightened lips and glaring eyes. “You think you're a brave, macho cowboy, risk your life to save mine. It takes more courage to risk something you have to live with, something that forces you to rethink your beliefs. You're doing what you decided was best for you yesterday. You might be wiser today. You need to come out and see.”

“You need to quit screaming in my face. I can't hear what you
want me to hear.”

“You don't want to hear anything.” For a moment her energy waned and she seemed to melt in a pool of tears. Like a mournful child's lament, she said, “I want my brother…I want my mommy…”

“A child isn't going to bring your brother back…” He knew it was stupid as the words left his lips and wished he'd remained silent.

She instantly flared anew, “I know that!” She screamed. “I never even thought about having a child until I met you. I wanted a child with you. You. How stupid I am.” She slammed her clenched fists against his chest. “Do you want me to leave?”

He stood stunned in disbelief. Minutes ago, he was bringing her breakfast and kissing her neck. Now a beast he didn't recognize was snarling in his face. He tried to think, to gather his wits and not react with anger but so relentless was her assault, he could not.