Dreamspinner Press Year Six Greatest Hits

by JD Ruskin

  “Jesse, get us a trailer, and bring my operating kit out of the calving barn. And call your aunt. Tell her what’s going on and have her call the vet.”

  Jesse and Dane took off at a run, and Uncle Karl and I jumped in the truck. My uncle gunned it, but still, everything seemed to take too long. I beat on my knees with my hands, trying to speed us up as I stared out the windshield watching for my horse.

  Uncle Karl spotted him first, and I flew out of the truck as soon as it stopped. I dropped to my knees alongside Hurricane’s head. He moved slightly in my direction, like he was reaching out for me to comfort him. I rubbed his jaw and forehead.

  “Uncle Karl will fix you, boy, I know he will.”

  My uncle squatted down in front of Hurricane, rubbing and soothing him as he surveyed the wounds.

  “Damn, I wish I could tell how much blood he’s lost. Obvious neck wound. And one in his front shoulder.”

  He touched both my shirts but didn’t pull them free.

  “Good job, Josh,” he said, his eyes never leaving my horse. He probed with gentle fingers until Hurricane thrashed.

  “There now, boy. You stay calm for me, okay? But Hurricane, we need you to get up.”

  “He tried twice already, Uncle Karl, and couldn’t.”

  “Maybe if we get him some traction under his feet. Go see what you can find in the truck, son.”

  I ran to it and ransacked my way through the capped bed, tossing things every which way until I found some burlap sacks. I grabbed them and ran back to my uncle.

  He was still inspecting Hurricane’s neck wound.

  “How bad?”

  “I can’t tell.”

  “You’re not lying to me?”

  “No, Josh. I wouldn’t.” His words kicked me in the gut. I turned away from him.

  “I’m sorry, Uncle Karl. Really.”

  He stood up and put his hand on my shoulder, then turned me toward him. “Nothing to be sorry about, son. I think I understand. Now, get those spread out under Hurricane’s feet, with more under the back feet. He’s gonna shift his weight real fast once he feels the pain in the front.”

  I did as my uncle instructed.

  “Tell your horse to get up, Josh. You can make him do it.”

  I uncinched the saddle, then stepped away to give Hurricane room to move. Making sure he could see me clearly, I held out my hands. “Hurricane, get up now.”

  He looked at me and raised his head.

  “That’s it. Get up. Hurricane, get up.”

  After several hard huffs of breath, like he was priming himself, Hurricane rocked off his side. His feet thrashed under him, then found the burlap sacks and planted firm. His muscles clenched and quivered, and he squealed when he put weight on his front legs. But he kept moving, kept pushing, and rose to his feet. With a dull thud, the saddle slid to the bloody red ground.

  I threw my arm across his back and fell on his withers, hugging and patting and praising him, but staying far away from his wounds. “Good boy, Hurricane. You’re going to make it now, I know it.”

  Uncle Karl walked around him. “Well, we’ve got one exit wound. Looks like one bullet went clear through his shoulder. Do you know how many were fired?”

  “Three.”

  “Then there could be two in his neck.”

  “No. One went past my head.” As I said the words, I knew they were true, and I realized I could have been hit too. I clutched Dane’s jacket around me to stop the shakes that suddenly interfered with my ability to talk.

  Anger like I’d never seen clouded my uncle’s face, and he clenched and unclenched his jaw. Then his arm went round my shoulders and he pulled me close, trying, I guess, to warm me up. But he was shaking too.

  “H-Hurricane….” My tongue kept hitting my teeth, and I couldn’t say anymore.

  “I don’t know for sure, Josh. Damn it, where is your brother?” He tightened his hand on my shoulder, and he scanned the area Jesse should come from. Then he looked at me again, his anger pushed aside by his concern for me.

  “It may look a hell of a lot worse than it is. Neck wounds can be that way.”

  I nodded. I knew he was trying to keep me hopeful, and I wanted to believe him.

  We heard the truck then, and it appeared moments later. When it came to a stop close by, Dane and Jesse jumped out, leaving the doors open and the truck running.

  “Vet will be at the hospital before you, getting stuff prepped,” Jesse said to Uncle Karl. “He says for you to call and update him on your way.”

  “Josh, load Hurricane up.”

  I did as directed and came around to the cab.

  “You drive,” my uncle instructed me. “I’ll stay in back with Hurricane and call the vet.”

  I climbed into the driver’s seat and then stopped. “Hurricane’s saddle?”

  “Got it,” Dane said as he slammed the passenger side door. “Get going.”

  I DROVE as fast as I could to Livingston, passing cars whenever I could and keeping an ear out for noises from the trailer. But Hurricane was quiet. When we arrived at Doc Russell’s office, I pulled around back. He already had the large door open for us.

  Uncle Karl jumped out of the trailer and made for the vet. I brought Hurricane out, careful to avoid the pool of blood on the floor, and we went into the clinic.

  The vet tech, a brown-haired girl who’d been a few years behind me in school, already had the room prepped. She fiddled with a tray of instruments rather than look at me.

  Doc Russell didn’t give an indication of anything when he saw the wounds. He just pointed us toward the waiting area out front and led Hurricane deeper into the clinic.

  My uncle took a seat on a hard plastic chair in the tiny space between the dog and cat food display and a rack full of pet toys, collars, and dental chews. The lights were off, and the room was darkening as the sun set.

  I sat in an identical chair across from Uncle Karl and stared at the white linoleum floor. I pictured Hurricane’s head in the bloody puddle, and the blood on the trailer floor, and the vet tech who wouldn’t look at me.

  “You don’t suppose….” I began without thinking through what I wanted to say.

  “What, Josh?”

  I looked up to see my uncle looking at me with sympathy.

  I cleared my throat. “You don’t suppose he won’t try real hard because I’m gay, do you?”

  Uncle Karl closed his eyes and shifted in his chair, then opened his eyes and leaned forward toward me.

  “I’d been hoping we would have spoken a couple days ago, son, but you didn’t come see me.” It wasn’t a rebuke. He sounded sad.

  I glanced around the room, making sure the vet tech wasn’t around.

  “The doc will do the best he can, Josh, like he’s always done for us. Nothing’s changed.”

  My uncle leaned toward me, so less than two feet separated our heads, and continued softly. “Now, let’s have this talk we could have had years ago.”

  I nodded and stared at the floor again. I gripped my rain-soaked jeans.

  “I’ve been waiting since I heard what Hanson said in the bar. I finally decided maybe you were too embarrassed or ashamed.”

  I nodded and chanced a look at his face. He was struggling to find his words. I waited.

  “I never realized you were gay, Josh,” he said, confusion and sadness flickering across his face. “Your aunt says she thought maybe, but it never occurred to me. And I’m not happy to hear it.”

  My whole body froze, bracing itself.

  “But it’s not for the reasons you think,” he continued. I guess he’d seen my reaction.

  “When your parents died, I promised them at the funeral that your aunt and I would take care of you and Jesse like you were the children we were never able to have.”

  He looked down at his hands clasped in front of his knees. I looked at them too. They were scarred hands, with a finger that wouldn’t bend anymore and faded marks from cuts and rope burns and stitches across t
he wide tanned backs. They were strong hands.

  He cleared his throat. “We tried our best to do that, and I don’t think we let you down.”

  “You didn’t do anything wrong.”

  He searched my face. “I’m glad to hear you say that. So, I’m hearing this about you and remembering back over all these years. Your parents didn’t do anything wrong, that’s for sure. And now you tell me Kate and I didn’t, and I accept that.”

  I nodded and waited.

  “I started thinking about all I’ve seen in cattle—the females that will mount each other, and the bulls that mount females and males. Did you know that some male sheep won’t ever mate a female, but will mount other males? Bill Green told me that once when I was visiting his operation.”

  I glanced at him, and he nodded to emphasize his point.

  “Anyway, what I’m saying, I guess, is that some animals seem to only like their own sex, and I always figured that was just the way of nature sometimes.”

  “Yeah.”

  “So it must be nature when it occurs with people too. I can’t reason anything other than that, given my experience. And other people can tell me they believe different, but I’m going to decide based on what I know.”

  He reached out one of his hands and laid it on mine. “Josh, your aunt and I are sorry this is how you are—”

  I winced and looked away.

  “Look at me, Josh,” he said sternly. “I want to be sure you really understand what I’m saying to you. This is important.”

  He squeezed my hand hard, like he could force my compliance, I guess. I pulled my eyes back to him.

  “Thank you.” He released my hand, swallowed, and continued. “We’re sorry you’re gay, but only because we know it is going to make life extra hard for you, because of how people can be. You already know that, I guess, after what Hanson’s done and what other people are saying. And maybe that’s why you never felt you could tell us yourself.”

  He paused again. “We wish it could be different for you because we love you, Josh. And I wish there was something I could do to make it easier, but there isn’t, and I hate that. Do you understand?”

  I nodded, and tears welled up in my eyes. I blinked them back hard and looked at the floor. I was too close to crying again.

  “Now your aunt, when she talks to you, will probably say a bunch of stuff about the grandchildren she won’t have. She’s always said your grandchildren would be special.”

  He smiled briefly, then looked incredibly sad. “We’ve never told you or Jesse how hard it was on her when we didn’t have kids, and I won’t. But remember that if she says anything about grandkids, all right? And try to understand what she’s really saying.”

  I nodded. “Thank you.” It came out in a muddled whisper. It was all I could manage.

  He frowned, and his forehead wrinkled like it did sometimes when he couldn’t understand what someone was saying.

  “Nothing to thank me for, son. This is what family does. This is how love behaves.”

  I tried taking in everything he said, I tried real hard. I’d underestimated both him and my aunt, and I was ashamed.

  “I’m sorry.”

  He patted my knee. “Don’t be. I’m just sorry you thought it was a secret you had to carry alone.”

  After a minute, he stood up and stretched. “Damn, I hate waiting like this.”

  He walked around the shelves, to the front door and looked out the window.

  “You want anything from Bridgers across the street?” he asked.

  “A beer?”

  He grinned. “Maybe a celebratory one when we get home.”

  “Yeah. Good idea.”

  He came back and sat down again.

  “Do you think Hanson was aiming for you or the horse?”

  I was quiet a moment before I spoke. “Hurricane, I think. But why’d he go that far? It wasn’t enough, what he did in Cunningham’s?”

  My uncle shook his head. “I’ve been trying to figure it myself. He just couldn’t stand you besting him and had to erase the proof, I guess. But Josh, I don’t think there’s a lot we can prove legally.”

  “I know.” I sighed. “It’s okay. I don’t care about Hanson. Even if Hurricane doesn’t make it,” I gulped, “nothing’d be enough to make up for it.”

  He nodded, and we sat together in silence as the room got dark and the neon lights of the bar across the street came on and illuminated the waiting area.

  TWO HOURS later, Doc Russell came out.

  “Geez, Karl, you could have turned on the lights.”

  “What’s the word, Dave?” my uncle asked.

  The vet turned to me. “I think he’s going to be okay, Josh.”

  All my muscles relaxed. I hadn’t realized how tight I’d been holding them. Even my hands hurt. The vet was still talking, and I concentrated on listening.

  “One bullet went clean through his shoulder, and I was able to remove the one in his neck. I’ve cleaned everything out real good. He’d lost a fair amount of blood, but if an infection doesn’t set in, he’s going to be fine. We’ll have follow-up med and wound care, and some down time. But I think he’s going to be fine.”

  Doc Russell gave me a big smile.

  “Can I see him?”

  He nodded and motioned for me to follow.

  UNCLE KARL drove back to the ranch and headed right for my cabin. As we got out of the truck, Jesse’s door banged, and my brother and Dane headed toward us.

  “Well?” Jesse asked my uncle.

  “Looks like Hurricane is going to be okay. Dave is real hopeful.”

  “Good,” Jesse said. “You’re sure it was Hanson?”

  Even though the question wasn’t for me, I answered. “Who else? Came from the same spot where the fence was wrecked. Same spot where Hanson was when he spied on me.”

  “I don’t see how we prove it,” Jesse said, turning pointedly toward my uncle.

  Uncle Karl watched us closely. I knew he picked up on what Jesse was doing, but he didn’t say anything.

  “Josh and I agreed to let it go,” he said.

  Dane spoke up. “I should have been able to prevent this.”

  “You couldn’t have,” Jesse insisted.

  Dane shook his head. Later, I would remember that and realize he was shaking me off too. “I should have,” he repeated.

  “It’s okay. Hurricane’s going to be okay.” But Dane didn’t seem to hear me.

  “I’m leaving,” he said loudly. He stared into the dark above all our heads. “I got a call. I’m leaving.”

  Jesse and my uncle didn’t say a word. I couldn’t believe what he was saying.

  “You can’t leave. Not now. I love you.”

  Dane winced like I’d kicked him.

  “Oh, fuck,” Jesse spat.

  Dane glanced at Jesse for the briefest second, then turned toward me and looked over my head.

  “I love you.” I grabbed at Dane, but he took a step back from me.

  “I told you not to.”

  I froze inside. Everything in my mind, in my vision, tunneled down to only Dane. I didn’t see anything but him moving away from me. I couldn’t think of anything but him leaving.

  “Don’t go. Please, Dane. Forget what I said. I didn’t mean it. I take it back. Don’t leave me.” My words came out in a rush that ended in a barely audible plea.

  He turned to walk away.

  “You can’t do this,” I yelled at his back.

  He kept walking.

  “Only cowards walk away.”

  “I’m already gone.” He barely turned his head as he tossed the words over his shoulder.

  “You fucking coward,” I screamed, clutching at my stomach. “Go to hell.”

  Still Dane didn’t turn around. He didn’t say anything. Jesse followed behind him, not talking, just following. And I realized he already knew Dane was leaving.

  I didn’t look at Uncle Karl, but I knew he stood in the drive watching the two of them walk
toward Dane’s truck. My vision blurred, and I ran into my house and slammed the door shut.

  Tears ran down my cheeks. I slid down the door until my butt hit the floor. Sobs broke through my clenched teeth, and I shoved my knuckles in my mouth to force the sound back down my throat. My whole body shook.

  I heard Dane’s truck start up and pull away, and I stilled. I stopped breathing, straining to listen. When I couldn’t hear it anymore, I gasped in a breath and started sobbing for real, over Dane and Hurricane and Guy and how Jesse felt about me.

  After a while, it hit me that Jesse didn’t seem to mind that Dane was gay. It was clear he didn’t consider me his brother anymore. But he wasn’t bothered at all about Dane.

  The truth of that stabbed me like a gut punch, and a pain too sharp to name melted together with my tears. I covered my head until the tears finally stopped, then clutched at my aching ribs.

  Shit, I still had Dane’s jacket on. I ripped it off and threw it across the room. If I’d had any energy, I’d have burned it. But I didn’t. I wiped at my nose with the back of my hand. I got up and moved to the couch, where I curled up in a ball and stared at the damned jacket, cursing it and Dane both.

  When I became too cold, I got up and put on a shirt. As I came back into the living room, there was a knock on the door.

  “Can I come in?” Uncle Karl called.

  “Yeah.” I wiped at my face with the tail of my shirt.

  He let himself in and headed straight for the kitchen, the smell of my aunt’s beef stew following after him. Even though I wasn’t hungry, I did too.

  “Sit.” He pointed to the kitchen table. I slipped into a chair. I hung my head so he couldn’t see my swollen eyes or the tearstains. Then again, did I really have anything else to hide from him?

  He put a cloth-covered steaming bowl in front of me, then brought me a soup spoon from a drawer.

  “Eat.” His eyes didn’t leave my face.

  I stared at the bowl. The stew topped mashed potatoes, just the way I liked it. I scooped up a spoonful and swallowed.

  “Keep eating.”

  He went back to the cupboard and located two glasses, then got the milk out of the refrigerator. He poured some into each glass and set one in front of me, then sat down across from me. He watched me until I ate everything in the bowl and downed the entire glass of milk.