Lone Star Refuge

by Mae Nunn

  Watching the livestock brought back memories for Stella, who used to show goats when she was little. Her mother had been a sponsor for 4-H, and the county fair had always been a big deal for her.

  They had just found seats in the bleachers when someone yelled, “Joiner!”

  Adelaide and Sophia ran up in their sequined cowboy boots and bedazzled shirts paired with blingy jean shorts. They both had their faces painted with horses that looked like a galloping Pistol with glitter strung out behind him. Their mother followed close behind.

  Joiner jumped up and held out his arms to them, enfolding both girls in hugs. Then they each sat on one of his knees, swinging their boots and licking suckers as big as polo balls. Their lips were stained red.

  “Hi, Miss Stella,” they said in near-unison. She was obviously an afterthought, but Stella didn’t mind. She understood their devotion to Joiner.

  As she watched the little girls sitting on his knees, describing the thrills of the Tilt-A-Whirl and the Octopus rides, Stella’s heart melted. Joiner gave them his full attention, laughing and gasping at all of the appropriate places in their stories. Their mother, who Stella thought resembled a worn-out Barbie, stood on the other side of Stella and admired the threesome.

  “He is so great with my girls.”

  Stella smiled at her. “They are such little sweethearts.”

  “Thank you. They really enjoy coming to the school.”

  “Well, I am glad they do.”

  The girls’ mother leaned in conspiratorially. “I think I have as much fun watching as they do riding.”

  “I know what you mean. They are adorable.”

  “And that ranch hand of yours is sure easy on the eyes.” She winked.

  Stella tried to control the anger that rose up within her, even though she was sure it showed on her face. After all, the woman couldn’t be expected to know that she and Joiner were a couple. It was natural for her to be with her ranch hand at the livestock show, right? Yes. Sure it was.

  “He certainly is,” Stella agreed. “I pay him extra for that.”

  “Is he single? I mean, I’m sorry to put you on the spot. It’s just that it’s not every day someone comes along who is so good with kids, you know?” The woman’s blue eyes were wistful. She wasn’t really that bad. But she also wasn’t getting a chance with Joiner.

  “We’re actually together,” Stella said bluntly.

  “Oh.” And then after a few minutes, “Girls, it’s time to go.”

  Stella looped her arm though Joiner’s, holding his biceps in her hand. He flexed it, making a ball the size of a softball. She squeezed it.

  “Be careful, you might break something,” Joiner whispered.

  “You’re not that fragile.”

  “I wasn’t talking about me.”

  “You better lose that naughty grin on your face.”

  “Or what?”

  “Or this.” She grabbed his face and planted a kiss on his lips right there in public.

  He laughed. “Remind me to grin naughtily more often.”

  They watched as cute kid after cute kid presented their animals. Stella ended up buying a hog named Wilbur, and a wife for him currently named Olivia, but she was going to change it to Arkie. She snapped a picture and sent it to Cha Cha. She also bought ten chickens and three heifers. Or Buster did. He’d insisted on donating the money from his bronc-busting lessons to the school, and Stella had to admit her whole life seemed like an experiment in irony.

  After making arrangements for transporting her purchases to the ranch, she and Joiner walked around the fairgrounds.

  “Do you like rides?” he asked her. “The Tilt-A-Whirl and Octopus come highly recommended.”

  “No Tilt-A-Whirl for you.”

  “Huh?”

  “I read it on the internet. Bad for your brain.”

  “Oh. My poor brain.” Joiner rolled his eyes.

  “But we can ride the Ferris wheel.”

  They stood in line with quite a few teenagers who were all on their cell phones. When they got on, Joiner immediately started rocking their car. And that’s when everything made sense for Stella.

  “You’re an adrenaline junkie, aren’t you, Joiner?” Stella blurted out.

  “Huh?”

  She exhaled loudly. “I just figured it out.”

  “You figured out what?”

  “That you’re addicted to danger. You are, aren’t you?”

  Joiner stopped rocking and looked at her. “Stella, you are a genius. And an amazing psychotherapist. You figured out my deepest, darkest secret, sitting here beside me on the world’s smallest Ferris wheel.”

  Stella started to engage him but bit her tongue. He could make light of it all he wanted to. But it was all fitting together now. He’d said himself he had a need to push the limits.

  In Stella’s heart she realized she’d finally drilled deep enough to hit a geyser of truth. But would it change anything?

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  BY MID-SEPTEMBER, all of the mares had been successfully bred and had gone home to their owners. Joiner was back where he started—it was just him and Pistol—except he was two-hundred-and-fifty-thousand dollars richer. It was time to make a move, but to where?

  His best laid plan had been to work for Buster and Stella, stay in the RV, breed Pistol and make some money so he could go out on his own. He still wanted his own land, and since the breeding operation had worked out so well, he planned to expand it once he had his own ranch. He figured if he had his own place he might also board horses, and he would continue to teach riding lessons, as he enjoyed it. But maybe for more serious riders than what his clientele was at Star Stables.

  That made him think of Adelaide and Sophia and he grinned. The truth was he loved the school and all of the kids. And he loved Stella. Star Stables had everything he needed, and there was plenty of work to be done there to last Joiner a lifetime. But the land belonged to Buster. And even if he and Stella settled down together, pooled their resources and made a go at a quiet life together, would Joiner ever truly be at home?

  It was times like this he sorely missed playing polo. When he’d discovered the game in college, it had offered him the exhilaration and frantic pace he’d needed to keep his mind off things. He’d been able to keep his life going, even earn a master’s degree, without asking these kinds of hard questions. As long as at the end of the day he could get on a horse and play polo, he was all right. It was something he’d excelled at from the beginning.

  His first polo pony, the first stick and ball—it had just felt natural. When he was playing polo he never wondered where his place was or what his life was supposed to look like. There was always another chukker, and one thing to focus on: the goal. Life made sense in that context. But now his polo career was over, and Joiner was back in the real world of Kilgore, afraid of getting too emotionally invested with a woman, a ranch and a town that hadn’t felt like home since he’d lost his parents. It would take a lot more than a polo club to make him settle down.

  “Hey, man.” Clint Cavender walked over to where he was giving Picasso a bath.

  “Hey, Clint. How’s it going?”

  “I just dropped off Cade at the barn. Jacob wanted to do some speech therapy with him in a group setting before he gets to ride.”

  “Well, I don’t live with Cade, but from what I see here he seems to be really developing his communication skills. What’s your feeling after six months of equestrian therapy?”

  Clint shook his head. “I just can’t say enough good things about this place. I realize it sounds cheesy, but it has really brought a lot of hope back into my life.”

  Joiner smiled at him. “I’m glad to hear that, buddy. You deserve good things to happen to you. You do a lot of good for other people.”

  “Ah, I just do what I can.”

  Joiner sponged Picasso’s big brown splotches. He’d always thought paints were such fascinating horses, even when you understood the genetics behind w
hat gave them their strange coats.

  “What about you, Joiner? What are your plans? I know you’ve been breeding Pistol, and I heard that went well. You plan to continue here?”

  “I’ll admit I’ve been thinking about the future, even this morning. This was just supposed to be a temporary gig.” He wiped the sweat from his brow. “I originally approached Buster about buying some of his land, and then we made this arrangement instead, for me to live and work here while I got started breeding Pistol, and Stella was getting her school off the ground.”

  “I see. Well, those two things seem to be up and running.” Clint squinted into the sun, taking in the sizable operation Star Stables had become. “You know, if you’re ever interested in a job…”

  Joiner smiled. “That is kind of you. But whatever I do, I’ve got to be outside. I wouldn’t look good in all of those fancy suits you wear, even though you do spice them up with some great hats and boots.”

  Clint laughed. “Thanks. I think.”

  “My brother Cullen asked if I’d be interested in teaching literature at Kilgore Community College.”

  “Really?”

  “I guess my family’s worried what I’m going to do, too. But I told him I’d stay a ranch hand forever if the alternative was standing in front of a classroom and grading essays.” Joiner laughed. “I admire people who can do that, but I do not have it in me.”

  Clint straightened his hat. “Joiner, what do you know about the school’s finances?”

  “Kilgore Community College?”

  “No, dude.” Clint shrugged. “Star Stables.”

  “Well, it seems to always be iffy. Stella runs a tight ship but health-care staff are expensive, and so are horses.”

  “It’s a mess,” Clint admitted.

  Joiner added, “I am sure she appreciates all of your help.”

  Clint sighed. “I’ve thought about trying to buy the school from her, as an investment, and bringing it under the Cavender Holdings umbrella. She’d never have to worry about money again, but I’m not sure how she’d feel about selling.”

  His statement seemed more of a question directed at Joiner. Hiding his initial shock, Joiner decided to dig for a little more information. “Well, it is her baby. But what would that offer look like, exactly?”

  Clint hooked his thumbs through two belt loops at the front of his starched jeans. “However she wanted it to. She’d retain total control, of course. From my perspective it would just be a way to protect her, protect the school so it could go on as long as she wants to keep doing it, but without all of the constant worry.”

  Joiner felt his soul shrinking when it should be expanding. “That is very kind.”

  “It’s not completely unselfish, Temple. Like I said, Stella and this school are the best thing to happen to Cade and me in a long time. And it’s possible the school might someday become profitable.”

  Joiner should be glad that Stella and her school would be fine when he moved on. So why did the idea leave him unsettled?

  *

  JOINER COULDN’T BELIEVE he’d let Stella talk him into this. They were driving to a little town called Fouke, Arkansas, where Kandan and Georgiaberry Mobley lived, friends of Stella’s since childhood. The three of them had been part of a homeschool co-op that included every counterculture kid in the tristate area.

  Kandan came from Louisiana, and Georgiaberry was raised in Texarkana. They’d settled in Fouke after graduating from Homeschool High and were now raising little counterculture kids of their own. Besides the fact that they were some of Stella’s “oldest and dearest friends,” she wanted to go to Fouke to talk to them about organic farming. Stella said they were experts.

  Joiner figured they were also hippies, and by the time he turned down the dirt driveway toward the Mobley house two hours later, he was already way out of his comfort zone. He could only imagine what awaited him.

  What Joiner found at the end of the driveway was a complete shock to his preconceived notions. A neat, sturdy cabin was the centerpiece of lavishly landscaped gardens with every kind of blooming flower. Purple clematis climbed French-style columns that framed the front porch steps, which were sandstone. They climbed these steps to knock on the cedar-trimmed door.

  A luminous woman answered. Her eyes were an otherworldly color of greenish blue. She wore no makeup and her skin seemed translucent. Strawberry blond hair drifted past her shoulders in waves. She had a beauty mark above her lips, which were the color of ripe apricots. She was dressed in jeans and a white linen shirt, and her feet were completely bare.

  Stella elbowed Joiner and stepped forward to enfold Georgiaberry in a hug. Then she introduced them. Georgiaberry’s eyes danced as she shook his hand. “A real cowboy!” she exclaimed, obviously amused.

  They stepped into the cabin and were immediately in the living room. One whole wall was books—there must have been a thousand of them—on floor-to-ceiling shelves, and another whole wall was windows. Rounding out the room were a mismatched couch and chairs that looked comfy, and an old beat-up chest that served as a table.

  “Kandan, they’re here!” Georgiaberry called, and then invited them to sit.

  Joiner and Stella took the couch, while Georgiaberry sat in one of the chairs. It was green, with an orange-and-brown granny-square afghan folded across the back.

  Kandan Mobley appeared with a tray in his hands, which he set on the table. On it was the strangest cake Joiner had ever seen—at least, he presumed it was a cake—and a china teapot with four nonmatching teacups. There was also dark red jelly, honey and what looked like milk. Joiner found out later it was cream from one of their grass-fed cows.

  Kandan sat on the edge of the other chair after he set down the tray, crossing his birdlike legs under him and studying his guests. Then he bounded up again and kissed Stella on both cheeks, shaking Joiner’s hand heartily.

  “I’ve made you this king cake. It’s a Mardi Gras tradition. And of course it’s not Mardi Gras but it’s such a fantastic cake GB said I should make it. And I always do what my lovely young wife says. Well, almost always. And this is fresh currant jelly.”

  His eyes were the kindest Joiner had ever seen. They were dark amber and seemed to contain a fire that was kindled from the inside. At the same time there was sadness in his eyes, and Joiner wondered what they had seen to make them be that way. But only for a moment. Because then Kandan’s eyes were crinkled around the edges by a smile that said I am so happy you have come.

  With tiny hands that were rough and worn, he served the cake while Georgiaberry poured tea. She towered above him. He wore cargo shorts, an old T-shirt and a leather strap around his neck with an amulet like Stella’s. His dirty-blond hair was tied back in a ponytail.

  “He has the same necklace as you, Stella,” Joiner observed, as they sipped tea and devoured the delicious king cake.

  “Yes. She got it for me. I lost my brother a year after she lost Lily. It’s for healing. We made a vow to take them off when we were healed from our losses, didn’t we, Stella? I always planned to give mine away to someone who needed it more. But you see I cannot part with mine. I still need its comfort somehow.”

  Stella pulled hers out of her shirt. “I’ve not taken mine off, either.”

  As the conversation continued, Joiner began to understand Stella’s attachment to these people. There was no small talk. They fully engaged with him from the beginning as if he was as well-read as they were. Whether it was politics, literature, science, culture, they had ideas. And they wanted to know his.

  It was kind of like being inside another world, in their house. They behaved as if this way of communicating was the norm. And so it was, in their world. It reminded him of an honor society he’d been a member of in college.

  They showed Joiner and Stella their greenhouses, which they’d built with their own hands, and where they grew every imaginable vegetable. They explained how it had to be done to be sustainable for the earth. Kandan spoke with such passion about organic
s and health that he sounded like an evangelist. After a while, Joiner’s head started to hurt from all of the knowledge he’d been exposed to, but he was close to being converted.

  Georgiaberry led them to a small warehouse where she gathered her Sunshine for Dinner. This was the name of her business, and it was also what she shipped all over the tristate area to individuals who paid her monthly. Into lined boxes she placed whatever was ripe—radishes, carrots, lettuce, squash, cucumbers, basil, onions, peppers, okra. Then she added a carton of brown eggs from her “hardworking hens.”

  As Joiner and Stella left, Kandan invited them back in the winter for “hog killing time,” when he and Georgiaberry would slaughter a hog and dress it themselves. Kandan’s description of the bacon was enough to make Joiner want to try it. Kandan also sent them home with a plastic bag full of frozen beef from his last butchered cow, and Georgiaberry included a box of vegetables.

  “Your friends are great,” Joiner said as they drove out of Fouke.

  “Thanks. I think they are. It’s a joy for me to spend time with them.”

  Surprisingly, Joiner thought he would like to visit them more often himself.

  “They seem so settled—so invested in each other and where they are.”

  “I love that about them.”

  “But do you think they ever get bored?”

  “With what?”

  “With being so settled.”

  “I doubt it. At least not for long. It’s something we have in common, actually.”

  “You mean your commitment to Kilgore?”

  “Yes. I may have other issues, but I know what I want to do and where I want to be.”

  Joiner wished he could be so certain, but he wasn’t. The subject made him feel uncomfortable, so he decided to change it. “Will you tell me about your necklace?”

  “What do you want to know?”

  “Why haven’t you taken it off? I mean, it’s okay if you never do. I’d just like to understand your feelings about it.”

  Stella fingered her amulet. “I guess it’s like Kandan said. I’ve never felt completely healed.”