by Sarah Monzon
Betsy shrugged like putting one’s life in the hands—er, hooves—of a four-legged creature with a mind and will of its own and enough weight to crush your bones was no big deal. “I took lessons when I was a kid.”
I blinked that information in, along with her People like you are the reason people like me hate people T-shirt. Maybe playing a team sport as a kid would have served her social skills better.
“What? My parents wanted me to experience some of our Argentinian culture. My grandfather was a gaucho, kind of like a cowboy here, so they made me take riding lessons for a year. All you need to remember is to keep your heels down and your chest out.”
My brain sputtered. “Excuse me?”
“It’s more like shoulders back, but my teacher kept telling me to stick my chest out and imagine I was Dolly Parton.”
I looked down at my chest, heat rising up my neck. No way would I draw attention to any, uh, attributes that made me different from the majority of my coworkers. There had to be a way to ride a horse that didn’t involve shoving one’s bosom into the air.
“Thanks for the advice.” Unhelpful though it was.
Fake it till you make it had been my motto since the first day I’d stepped foot onto UCLA’s campus, the only person in my family to ever attend college. I’d slipped a mask on over my insecurity and smiled like I belonged among those who’d grown up in Bel-Air instead of Hyde Park. I faked it all the way to graduation, through my interviews at Whalen Financial, and pretty much every day since.
How hard could pretending I knew what I was doing on a ranch be?
2
Malachi
Over a hundred and fifty years of family history and hard work crunched beneath the soles of my work boots. A hundred and fifty years of striving. Of predawn mornings and twilit nights. Of lean times and plenty. A one-hundred-and-fifty-year legacy—the weight of which I felt squarely on my shoulders.
Doc Reynolds patted the red angus heifer on her hind quarters as he slid his gloved arm from her birth canal. My thumb stroked soothing circles across the expectant mother’s jaw as she mindlessly chewed the cud rolling around in her mouth. She appeared relaxed, uncaring of Doc’s palpatations or the risk her heavy middle put her in.
With one last stroke down her wide forehead, I turned from the heifer toward Doc as he scrubbed at the sink against the wall of the barn. “Well?”
He pressed down on the faucet handle with his forearm and grabbed a towel from the peg. “It’s a good thing you called.”
Of all the times to be right, this time I wouldn’t have minded being wrong.
I squeezed my eyes shut, allowing myself a moment to sag under the stress. But only a moment. Any more and the bend would cause me to snap. Taking a deep breath in, I squared my shoulders and opened my eyes wide. The only way to face any situation, Gran always said.
“The calf is too big, isn’t it?” The possibility had been nagging me for days, ever since we’d separated those who’d be calving in the near future from the rest of the herd. Every breed of cattle on the ranch had been meticulously picked with certain requirements in mind. Natural mothers with the ability to birth calves with little to no assistance being one. Of course, feed efficiency and having a high-quality carcass were top considerations as well.
Doc lifted his Stetson off his head and swiped an arm across his brow, his wiry white hair all akimbo. “’Fraid so.”
“And there’s no way the calf can fit through her pelvis?”
He replaced the sweat-stained brim on his head, the age lines around his eyes smoothing with sympathy. “You know as well as I do that if you attempt to pull that wee thing through the birth canal then mama here will suffer nerve damage.”
I glanced back at the heifer and her wide, doe-like eyes. It seemed silly and illogical to allow attachments to animals raised for the sole purpose of feeding others. The cow’s ultimate end would be a slaughterhouse, but needless suffering beforehand didn’t sit right with me. I respected the cattle and appreciated their sacrifice to sustain life. None of them received names, of course, but neither could I treat them as commodities that didn’t possess hearts beating within their chests.
My unconventional viewpoint was smacked down by the dollar signs flashing in my mind. Doc’s vet bill. The price of the heifer. Potential profit on the calf. Feed bill. Wages. Land taxes. And on and on. Didn’t seem I had a moment to breathe before something else required me to throw money at it.
“I hear wind you have a new group coming in.” Doc picked up his vet tools and sauntered toward his customized pick-up.
I followed him, hooking my thumbs in my belt loops and squinting past the bright sun as I stepped over the barn’s threshold. “In a couple of days.”
A grin stretched across his weathered face. “City slickers, I hear.”
“Seems the wind is mighty talkative these days.” My weight pressed down into my heels.
“I reckon she is.” He hoisted his tools into their designated spots in the professional bed topper. “Corporate bigwigs, though, huh?”
All those dollar signs meant I’d had to do something to keep the family legacy alive. The Thomas family no longer lived in the 1800s, when they’d laid claim to this parcel of earth. We couldn’t keep doing things the way we’d always done them. Not if we wanted to keep our land and our cattle and our heritage. There had really only been two options: sell to the big cattle company buying up all the small operations or diversify. The decision hadn’t been mine alone, though. Thomas family land, Thomas family vote.
But I’d known the outcome of that vote, just as I’d known Doc’s prognosis of the calf before I’d called him. Gran, Nate, and Miriam couldn’t imagine life outside the Double B any more than I could. If sharing our home and heritage meant keeping them, we’d gladly welcome strangers into our life.
So far that plan had looked like women’s weekends away or homeschool groups that wanted to experience a touch of the Wild West and see what cattle drives were like. This would be our first corporate group, but it seemed like we’d all be a good fit for each other. The CEO had reminisced about his time growing up on a cattle ranch in Texas and the work ethic that had instilled in him. He wanted his team to spend time together outside of the office, using their hands instead of sitting behind a desk crunching numbers.
I peered out toward the back pasture. Later, I’d need to ride the fence line to make sure there weren’t any breaks the cows could squeeze through. Add to that mucking out the horse stalls, daily feedings, monitoring the herd, and maintaining the equipment and outbuildings, and there was plenty around the property to keep a group of suits busy.
“Yes, sir. I remember the first time my nephew came out to visit me when he was a kid. My sister moved to LA and married a man there, but when Tyler was about ten, his mama sent him my way to spend a summer with his cousins in the country.” Doc’s lined face split into a big smile. “Woowee, you should’ve seen him. Ten years old and thinkin’ he knew it all already. Not a single one of us could convince him otherwise, so we figured he had to learn the hard way.”
Poor kid. Country life and city life led to different skill sets. “I’m afraid to ask what happened.”
Doc’s eyes twinkled. “Ah, nothing so bad really. Didn’t believe us when we told him the horses liked to suck in air when saddled. He didn’t walk the mare a few paces and tighten the girth all the way before mounting.” He chuckled. “Only made it a few yards before the saddle slipped around to the underbelly and Tyler landed on his butt in the dirt.”
As far as riding catastrophes went, that was a tame one. “I’ll be sure all the girths are checked before our guests head out on the range.”
“Course, then there was the next summer he came out. Figured he’d mastered riding the horses; he was going to try to ride one of the steers.”
Nate had tried the same thing at about that age. I’d never seen a person fly so high in the air before. My lips twitched at the memory. “None of my guests are goin
g to ride any of the cows.”
“My point is”—one of his eyes narrowed at me—“watch the ones who think they know it all, cuz they’re the ones without a lick of sense.” He lowered the top of the compartment holding his tools and secured the lock. “Now, should we schedule a cesarean for say, next week?”
I held my hand out. “Next week.”
Doc squeezed a firm shake and waved a farewell before climbing in his truck and leaving a trail of dust that swallowed his taillights. Now that the issue with the heifer had been taken care of, I needed to double-check the accommodations for the Whalen group. Gran and Miriam had assured me everything was in order, but a quick peek-see would set my mind at ease.
A strange silhouette bounced through the haze Doc’s tires had kicked up along the dirt drive. What in the world? It looked almost like…
My stomach sank into my steel-toed boots. Nate. I whipped my hat off my head and slapped it against my thigh. That brother of mine had gone too far this time.
Faint at first, like the pixilated images of an ʼ80s DOS game loading onto a school-grade MacIntosh computer, the domed canvas roof made my fingers itch for a gun to shoot game to keep my party fed and my bowels constrict for fear of dysentery. No one had made it through a game without someone dying along the trail from Independence, Missouri to the Willamette Valley in Oregon from either a disease or a snakebite or some such catastrophe.
The image before me grew in clarity, as if the game had upgraded its CGI. Sure enough, a Conestoga wagon headed up the long driveway, my grinning brother at the reins and—
No. He wouldn’t.
But the proof plodded along toward me. Thunder and Lightning yoked to the wagon. It was all kinds of wrong—taking a man’s reining horses and harnessing them like a pair of dumb oxen to pull the wagon. It was like hitching a Corvette to a U-haul. Or hanging a Rembrandt next to a child’s finger painting. It just wasn’t done!
“Whoa.” Nate pulled back on the reins when he drew even to me, then set the brake. While his lips held a grin, his eyes pinched with wariness.
He should be guarded. Little pup knew better than to mess with a man’s horse. Not to mention whatever stunt he had up his sleeve with the Conestoga.
“Now, before you say no—”
“No.” I crossed my arms over my chest. “Take it back to whatever museum you got it from.”
He jumped down from the driver’s bench and planted his feet. “That would be a crying shame seeing how it’s already rented.”
The screen door slapped behind me, followed by a delighted squeal.
Great. Now I’d have to talk reason into both of my siblings. “Don’t get excited,” I cautioned the blur that ran past me and disappeared under the canvas roof. I raised my voice to make sure they both heard me. “It’s not staying.”
Miriam poked her head out the back. “Why not?”
In my mind, seventeen was too old to pout, but she pushed her bottom lip out anyway.
I hated the four words forming on my tongue. I’d had to say them too often of late. “We can’t afford it.”
A rare breeze kicked up, and Nate turned his face into the wind. Scout, our Australian shepherd, trotted from wherever he’d been hiding and pushed his head under Nate’s hand for a scratch. My brother’s long, lean fingers smoothed Scout’s blue-merle coat, the dog panting with pleasure.
Nate turned and nailed me with his piercing black eyes, so like our father’s had been. The cocky tilt his lips had sported as he’d driven the wagon in vanished, replaced with a steadiness I was still getting used to since he’d returned home. He’d yet to tell me all that had transpired over the year he’d spent in Nashville with just his guitar and his dreams. He didn’t seem to want to talk about it, and there was always something on the ranch that needed my attention.
“We can’t afford not to. Like I said, it’s already rented.”
I peered past him and studied the wooden build of the wagon’s bed. “What do you mean, rented?”
“I mean a group of women have booked a reservation to sleep in the Conestoga for two nights. The listing wasn’t even up an hour.”
Reservations meant beds and linens. The revenue from a few nights wouldn’t cover the expenses of mattresses and sheets.
“As is, Malachi.” Nate’s voice broke through my calculations. “The Conestoga is our new ‘roughing it’ option. Guests can now choose between the bunkhouse, the glamping tents set up by the river, or bringing their own sleeping bags and experiencing what a night out on the Oregon trail might have been like.” That self-satisfied smile returned. “Minus starvation and sickness.”
Miriam jumped down from the driver’s bench and brushed the palms of her hands together. “I love it.”
“Well, isn’t she a beauty.” Gran’s voice drifted from the porch behind me.
I shook my head. Even if I wanted to argue, there would be no point now. Outmatched against Nate and Miriam was nothing compared to going head-to-head with Gran. “Fine.”
Nate’s full smile broke free, and he ran his hand over the afro he refused to cover with a hat like a sensible man who worked all day in the sun would. He turned and used the wagon’s wheel to climb back onto the driver’s seat. Thunder and Lightning stepped forward when he made a clucking sound with his tongue.
“But don’t think I haven’t noticed the abomination that is my reining horses hitched to that monstrosity,” I yelled as he steered the wagon toward the river. “There will be consequences, little brother.” I cupped my hand around my mouth. “Too much time in Nashville has muddled your brain.” Next thing I knew, he’d be setting up mechanical bulls and karaoke machines and inviting bachelorette parties or something equally boisterous.
Gran’s chuckle turned me around. She had one veined hand perched on Miriam’s shoulder and the other clasping the railing of the front porch, her gray hair pulled back in a low bun. Seventy-eight years old and as strong and as stubborn as a bull. I’d never met a woman quite her equal and doubted I ever would. Who else could keep a ranch with over three hundred head of cattle running while raising her orphaned grandchildren and mending their broken hearts? At times, I swore she’d kept the family together and the ranch running by sheer willpower.
“I got a feeling in my bones.” Her rheumy gaze lowered to fasten onto mine, a hint of a smile playing at her lips. “You better prepare yourself, Malachi Thomas.”
We’d all better prepare. Because if things didn’t go well with the Whalen group and they didn’t spread the word among their corporate buddies, I wasn’t sure how much longer we could hold on to our ancestral lands before we finally had to sell out.
3
Jocelyn
I had the best friends. Though we met once a week under the guise of a sewing circle—we really needed to come up with a different name, since “sewing circle” reminded us of our grandmothers, and none of us, not even Nicole, who held the title of matriarch of the group, was over the age of thirty-five—this week the girls insisted on not unearthing a single tomato-shaped pin cushion in lieu of helping me study how not to make a fool of myself out in the country.
As any good SoCal girl would, we’d started with old blockbuster Wild West films. John Wayne, Gary Cooper, Sam Elliot—they all taught me that, as Amanda so eloquently put it, “Cowboys could rev a woman’s engine with genuine horsepower.” But their charismatic charm and ability to mount a moving horse, ride while handling a sizable weapon, lasso a cow while riding at fast and furious speeds, and use a horse’s rump to vault into a saddle were way more advanced than I’d ever aspire too.
YouTube tutorials of ten-year-olds ended up being more in my lane.
Step one. Groom the horse.
Curry comb in circles first to bring up the dirt. Hard brush using flicking motions. Soft brush to polish the coat. Who knew horses were as high maintenance with their hair care as I was with my natural curls? Also, something about a hoof pick that looked more like a prison shiv to me, and frogs in their feet. Con
sidering the power behind a swift kick, I was kind of holding out hope one of the ranch workers would give my horse its pedicure for me.
Step two. Saddle and bridle the horse.
I’d printed off a diagram with all the parts labeled. Stirrups, cantle, Blevins, pommel, skirt, seat jockey, and half a dozen more. The thing had more layers than a debutante at a Southern cotillion. Besides the stirrups, which I learned to mount by putting only my left and never my right foot in, I focused on the horn. We all had a good laugh over imagining if the thing really made a sound like a car horn and how fun that would be. I filed the horn under thing I will be clinging to for dear life so I don’t fall off and get trampled to death.
Step three. Mount and ride.
Find a mounting block so you don’t need the flexibility of a ballerina to get your foot in the stirrup from the ground. Remember left foot only! Swing right leg over the back of the horse and lower your seat. Betsy’s advice of heels down and chest out was preschool stuff compared to the adolescent YouTube experts. No, according to them I had to be aware of my entire body. Chin up. Eyes trained where I wanted the horse to go. Shoulders back. Spine straight but not stiff. Elbows in and not flapping like a rendition of the chicken dance. Control with my seat and thighs. Pressure from my knee through my calves. And, finally, heels down.
Forget patting my head and rubbing my stomach. These girls sitting astride their sleek ponies were the princesses of multitasking.
The familiar nerves I got before a test or presentation churned in my belly as I turned off I-5 and pointed my car west. A little farther north and I could be soaking in the Pacific in some of the hidden coves of Big Sur. Instead, I pressed my foot to the accelerator and prayed the earth was taking a good week-long nap at least. Along with horseback riding, I had also looked up the Double B. Turned out their land rested right above the San Andreas Fault. Made me wonder if Mr. Whalen was hoping for a little practice in a crisis situation as well as oiling our team’s cogs.