From Here to There

by Rain Trueax

  Helene sensed the reserve in Phillip, his unwillingness to share completely with her, but as she'd learned with her uncle, she waited patiently. Eventually Phillip would want to talk to her.

  "I talked to the attorney the state had assigned. The guy seemed okay if not particularly interested in Derek's case. He got more interested when he realized I could afford to pay." Phillip shook his head. "I don't know what was right, but I did pay Derek's bail. Right or wrong, I couldn't let him sit in jail."

  "That should show your brother you care."

  Phillip pushed aside his plate and lit a cigarette. "I doubt that. He'll see it as guilt money. I don't know if he listened to anything I said. Sometimes it can just be too late." He clenched his jaw.

  "It's never too late so long as you and he are both alive." Helene reached out to stroke his jaw.

  "It would be if my father tried to come around," Phillip admitted, revealing more than he realized by the simple statement.

  “Did you know him?”

  “Not more than his name really.”

  “Maybe he has regrets.”

  He shrugged. “I doubt it.”

  Helene reached out and took his hand, bringing it to her lips. "You don't know the reasons why your father did what he did."

  "Don't give me some Pollyanna answer to all this," Phillip retorted with a hard smile.

  "I'll try not to, but if you don't have hope, Phillip, what do you have?"

  "Nothing?" he suggested wryly, wondering if he had any more hope for himself than he did for Derek. He had come to realize he loved Helene, but all he could think of was the pain it was going to cost him. Love led to loss.

  They heard a truck grinding its way up the driveway, and Hobo ran to stand by the door, his tail wagging enthusiastically. "Uncle Amos," Helene said as she took Phillip's hand and kissed his open palm, nipping it before she freed it. "Things will work out, and if that's a Pollyanna answer, then so be it!"

  "How is the old guy?" Phillip managed to ask, keeping his voice level and trying to ignore the instant arousal Helene's merest touch built in his loins. Outside, they could hear Amos stomping the snow off his boots.

  Helene debated for only a second. There wasn't time to explain to Phillip all of Amos's concerns. He had enough of his own worries at the moment. "All right I guess."

  When Amos opened the door and saw Phillip and Helene, he grinned. “Saw your truck outside and was real glad you got back, son.” Hobo whined at the door and Amos patted his back before reopening the door to let him out for one last run.

  "So," he said walking into the room, "how was your trip?" He reached out his hand for Phillip's. "She tell you she's been fretting over you?"

  "I got the idea," Phillip replied with a satisfied grin.

  Amos looked thoughtfully at them both, then smiled as he put his coat on the hook by the woodstove. Helene blushed, fully aware she and Phillip wearing robes wouldn't have escaped her uncle's notice. It was obvious it didn't displease him either.

  "The car radio said a blizzard's going to hit us sometime late tomorrow," Amos said as he turned back to face them.

  "Blizzard?" Phillip asked. "So what can we expect?"

  "Depends on how cold it gets, how much wind comes with it, how long it lasts. From what the radio said, they look for some rough days ahead. There was a storm in the late 1800's that took out over half the cattle in the state. In some areas, there wasn't a herd left. These days though, we oughta be able to do better. My land here is more protected and I have that hot spring up there that keeps water available. Trouble is the wind gets so bad sometimes you can't get out to feed the herd... or if you do, you risk your own life."

  "You mean Curly wasn't exaggerating," Phillip said.

  "Not much. When the snow gets to blowing, a man can barely see his hand in front of his face. It saps the life right out of all the critters, us included. They've got newfangled terms for it these days. Hypothermia, wind chill and the like. All I know is when it gets so dang cold my bones ache and it hurts to breathe the air, we're in trouble." He smiled and abruptly changed the subject. "So, tell me, how's that brother of yours?"

  Phillip briefly repeated the bare facts of his meetings with his brother and the attorney. He didn't touch on his own emotional reaction, the guilt that still plagued him, or the hopelessness he felt when he tried to come up with an answer for his brother. How could he hope to do that when he couldn't deal with his own life? If his brother was experiencing the result of the family they had had, Phillip was also.

  “Does Derek’s father come around?” Amos asked.

  Phillip hadn’t thought of that. He did know the man and remembered the years when he’d been seeing their mother. He wasn’t really a bad man, just an unsuccessful one. “I don’t think he still sees Derek,” he said finally.

  “You might give that a try. Call him and see what he thinks about it. Maybe he can do something for the boy if he came around.”

  “That’s possible,” Phillip said wondering why he had never thought of that. Probably because he didn’t want his own father in his life but they weren’t the same man. He wasn’t good at thinking emotional things through.

  “You had a good relationship with your father, didn’t you?” he asked Amos.

  “The best. He was a good man. He was there for me in all the ways he could. He taught me all he knew about ranching and really life. He was tough but loving. Taught me about the good side and the bad, but the example he set was one of honor. I never forgot it.”

  Phillip had had no such guidance. Business had come easily to him. Decisions were made, and the consequences ruthlessly fought out. He did operate with honor but more because he’d seen it worked best in the long run than any example or religion.

  In his personal life, he had been less directed or firm. There he realized, from the time he was old enough to make choices, he had avoided anything that smacked of risk. The desired result, when he asked Helene to marry him, was to have been a safe marriage of convenience. The scheme backfired in his face. In California, he had faced the truth squarely. He loved the woman he married, he could barely concentrate on anything when she was in the room, and he was scared to death.

  Amos interrupted his painful introspection. "Maybe what your brother needs is a change of scene. Why don't you bring him on out here for a spell?"

  Phillip flinched. He rose and walked to the woodstove. "Unless we get the charges against him reduced, he can’t leave the state.”

  “Well that’s too bad. He might get a lot out of this country. It can really heal a man’s soul. What do you think?”

  “The fire's dying," Phillip said to avoid answering. Wearing only his robe, he went outside and quickly gathered an armload of firewood from the stack on the porch. Hobo rushed past him when he came back inside. Phillip threw the wood into the copper kettle by the stove and knelt to feed several chunks to the fire.

  When he turned to face them, both Helene and Amos were watching him, still waiting for his answer. He shrugged. "Maybe... after awhile, we'll see." He couldn't bring himself to say he wasn't certain he would be in Montana long enough to bring Derek there.

  "Well, you do as you see fit," Amos said, heading for the door. "I'm going to bed. It's going to be a long day tomorrow. I figure we oughta put a couple extra loads of hay at the edge of the pasture. If the weather closes in, we can let them feed off it without running out every day."

  "You're really expecting trouble," Phillip said.

  "When I came home the outside thermometer was at zero. That old barometer is still falling. So... I just don't know what to expect, but I'd rather be wrong in being over cautious than be wrong and have a herd of starving cattle." He didn’t mention the main fear—frozen cattle.

  Phillip nodded, watching without comment as the old man left the room. He turned then and faced Helene. She didn't look at him, but instead picked up the dishes and carried them to the counter. "You look tired, Phillip. Go to bed. Things might seem clearer in the
morning."

  He knew she was right, but his tiredness was as much of the spirit as of the body, and he was uncertain he could sleep. "Where will you sleep?" he asked finally. It was the question he had most and least wanted to ask.

  "Where do you want me?"

  He swallowed hard and avoided answering by feeding another log into the fire. Where did he want her? He didn't have the answer for that either... or if he did, he was afraid to face it. "Wherever you want to be," he said finally.

  She laughed at him, the sound startling in the quiet kitchen with only the sound of the fire crackling in the stove. "You can't commit to anything, can you?" she asked, shaking her head. "Even for a night, you're afraid to say what you want. Or is it that you're afraid to find out what you want?" When he didn't answer, she turned and looked at him. She made a face, wrinkling up her nose. "I'll tell you how to decide," she said.

  He didn't know if she was angry or teasing him. "All right. How?"

  "Flip a coin." Then smiling coldly, she added, "Or better yet, ask somebody else to decide for you. How about me? Shall I decide?"

  Now he knew she was mad, but it was too late to rectify the situation.

  "I'm sleeping in my bed," she snapped, "and you sleep where you want. Now see, wasn't that easy!" She brushed past him and was up the stairs before he could think of a response.

  He looked at Hobo lying behind the big stove. "So," he said to the big dog, "it's just you and me. I suppose you don't want anything to do with a coward either."

  The big dog looked at him, his eyes soulful, then he closed them and sighed deeply as he stretched out.

  #

  After a restless night and very little sleep, Helene almost turned off the alarm when it rang at five. Only the knowledge, that Phillip and her uncle would be in too big a hurry to fix breakfast and that they had a hard day ahead of them, got her out from under the warm covers and made her dress hurriedly in the cold bedroom.

  In the kitchen, bundled in two sweaters, jeans, two pairs of socks and boots, she stoked the fire to life, let Hobo out for a quick run through the snow, and began a large pan of oatmeal. She knew her uncle favored eggs and bacon for his breakfast, but she also knew his cholesterol count had been too high when he'd last seen Doc Albertson. It wasn't easy to get him to see the benefit of low fat and high fiber food, but Helene wasn't about to give up. Measuring out coffee and water, she plugged in the coffee maker, then let back in the cold dog, who proceeded to reward her by shaking snow all over the kitchen.

  Helene stood at the window, staring out at the darkness. Even in the dim light before dawn, the world was white, illuminated by the snow on the ground and that falling through the air. The flakes were powdery, small and thick. She wondered if they would get a blizzard or would the valley be spared the worst of it. She switched on the radio, hoping to hear a weather report, but the station wasn't coming in well and all she caught were a few words here and there. When she decided static was the main thing she was going to hear, she switched it off.

  To be on the safe side, she pulled a chair over to the high cupboard shelf and brought down the kerosene lamps. If it got to blowing, it was possible they would lose power. Washing the glass chimneys, she thought again of Phillip, the things he'd said and hadn't said. Would she ever hear him say he loved her? She knew she loved him. There was no use denying it at least to herself. She hadn’t told him that either and wasn’t sure why. Maybe because love wasn’t really enough. They wanted different things, so different as to make a melding of their lives insoluble. To try would probably lead to heartache for them both.

  She thought then about her aunt saying in her journal to follow her heart. How did one do that? She heard quick footsteps on the stairs and clenched her jaw as she turned to face the door. Somehow she found a smile. "Breakfast is almost ready," she said as brightly as possible. "I hope you like oatmeal."

  Phillip looked blankly at her. "As in cereal?" he asked.

  "Of course, what else did you think?"

  "I didn't know." He grinned wryly. "I've never had oatmeal."

  "That's impossible. Everybody's had oatmeal."

  "Not me. Until I got here, I rarely ate breakfast, except coffee and toast."

  "That's a terrible habit. Breakfast is the fuel for the day," she lectured.

  "You sound like an advertisement," he said as he poured his coffee.

  "But it's true. Without a good start in the morning. There's nothing to run your machinery on all day."

  Phillip laughed. "And where did you hear that?"

  "Aunt Rochelle, of course." She turned back to stir the oatmeal. "I certainly wish I knew what the weather was going to do."

  "Snow," Phillip guessed, looking out the window.

  "But how much, and how much wind will we get?"

  "If we don't want it, we'll get it," Phillip observed wryly as he sipped his coffee and watched her at the stove. "How did you sleep last night?"

  She looked up, her gaze meeting his. "Not well. How about you?"

  "Same." He hesitated. "Helene, I--" He stopped when he heard Amos opening the door.

  When the older man entered the kitchen, he looked at the pan on the stove first. "Not that again," he growled with a grimace of distaste.

  "Remember what Doc said," she reminded him as she'd done every morning since she'd been told about his rising blood pressure.

  "Ain't worth living if a man can't start the day with bacon and eggs and end it with a thick steak," Amos grumbled.

  Wisely, Phillip decided to stay out of the argument. He accepted his own bowl of oatmeal with a smile of thanks. Sprinkling it with brown sugar and pouring milk over it, he took a bite and decided, although not gourmet fare, it wasn't bad, and he told Helene so.

  "Traitor," Amos accused.

  Helene smiled. Although Phillip's compliment wasn't exactly the one she would have preferred, she took it as the best she was going to get.

  "What's on tap for today?" Phillip asked Amos.

  "Curly'll be over before six. We'll gas up the big truck, load her and cart hay until we're too tired to lift our arms." Amos finished his own cereal with a curl of his lip.

  Phillip nodded. "You're really worried about this storm, aren't you?"

  Amos looked toward the window. "Probably foolish, but it don't feel right to me. I'll feel better tonight, after we get that hay stacked out in the field."

  "What keeps the cows from eating it too soon?" Phillip asked, nodding to Helene as she brought the coffee pot to refill their cups.

  "We'll stack these loads on the south side of the gate. If the storm hits, we'll open it and let them feed free will."

  "I guess this is stupid, but why don't we move the cows down closer to the barn?" Phillip asked, feeling like the new kid on the block with his lack of knowledge about ranch practices but disliking doing anything where he hadn't considered all the angles.

  "That spring in the upper meadow's heated, not too salty for the cattle to drink. It's the reason my people settled here. I ain't never seen it froze over. Carting water to a couple hundred thirsty cows'd teach you quick that lugging bales was easy work.”

  “How about another dumb question. Why haven’t you bought a generator for these kinds of storms?”

  “Didn’t never seem I needed one. I mean we just hunker down and it’s over sooner than later. But it ain’t a bad idea for the future. It wouldn’t solve the frozen water though.”

  Phillip grinned and nodded.

  "I can drive truck if that would help," Helene offered. "Drag bales too for that matter."

  Phillip looked up with surprise. "You?"

  Amos laughed. "Chelle used to do it all the time. I don't see why not. Get dressed warm though, girl, because it's a cold one out there."

  Three hours later, the four of them were in front of the barn, two loads of hay already delivered to the upper meadow, snow stinging their faces as they began the arduous task of transferring more bales from the barn to the truck bed. Phillip, hot desp
ite the cold, vowed if he was here through another of these winters, he’d talk Amos into the big round bales and getting a front loader.

  Although the sun rose in the sky, it was only dimly seen through the falling snow. "Go on back to the house," Amos told Helene before they began loading the next stack. "We won't take this one up until after we eat."

  She nodded, her teeth chattering so much she didn't trust her voice as she headed for the house to heat up their lunch.

  "Might be we'll have to chain up," Amos told Phillip through his scarf, "if this snow gets any worse." Even though they were in the barn, the snow was blowing in, and the wind cut through their clothing

  "You look tired," Phillip said, raising his voice to be heard above the rising wind.

  "I'm okay," the older man insisted and started to push another bale from the stack in the loft. Before he could get in position to load, he grabbed at his chest and sank to his knees.

  Phillip was at his side almost instantly. "What is it?"

  "Just... lost my wind," Amos grunted, his face paling as he struggled for breath.

  "Does your left arm hurt?" Phillip asked, pulling the muffler away from his face to ease his breathing. Amos's lips were blue, which might just be the cold or a sign of something more serious, much more serious.

  Reluctantly, Amos nodded. "Just aches a mite."

  "You're going to the house," Phillip ordered, grasping his arm and half carrying, half dragging him down the steps of the loft.

  On the main floor, Curly looked up with concern. "What's wrong?" His eyes turned bleak as Phillip told him, and he followed them up to the house.

  On the porch, Amos recovered his wind. "Don't say nothing to Helene," he insisted. "Nothing's wrong with me."

  Phillip pushed him through the door into the warm kitchen. "Maybe, but then it won't hurt for you to take a minute to sit down and rest."

  Amos grumbled but dumped his coat over a chair by the fire.

  "What's the matter?" Helene asked, seeing their upset faces, a can opener in her hand and several cans of soup on the counter in front of her.