The Cowboy's Courtship

by Brenda Minton

  “Well, it’s about time you answered.” Her mother’s voice.

  Cold water in her face couldn’t have been more effective in bringing Alyson back to reality.

  “Mom.”

  Jason didn’t move away. He sat next to her, filling their paper plates with food and twisting the top off a bottle of water before setting it next to her. Her mother’s voice, tense and cool, edged out the warmth of the afternoon.

  “So, I take it you’re in Dawson?”

  “I am.”

  “You need to come home. You have concert dates. You have family obligations.”

  “Mom, no one wants to hear me play. I’m twenty-eight. I’m not a child prodigy anymore. You don’t need me.”

  Her shelf life had expired. Her father had other prodigies on his client roster. And yet, the guilt was still there because it had always been about doing the right thing for her family. Playing, even when playing was the hardest thing in the world to do.

  “Alyson, Oklahoma isn’t your life. You’re not one of them. You’re my daughter, not his.”

  “He’s gone, Mom. And I’m trying to decide if this is my life.”

  Because she was suspended between who she had always been, and this new person she wanted to be, the person who made her own decisions, and kissed a cowboy until she couldn’t breathe.

  Chapter Eight

  On Wednesday afternoon, the third day of camp, Jason stood next to a little gray mare as a boy with boots a size too big and a cowboy hat falling over his eyes swung himself into the saddle, nearly falling over the other side.

  “Careful there, Hoss.” Jason grabbed the boy by the arm and smiled at the gap-toothed kid. “You can’t be like Jell-O. You’ve got to keep your back straight without being stiff and keep your arms tucked to your side. No spaghetti arms, okay?”

  The boy nodded and Jason smiled again. The kid was shaking like a sapling in a storm.

  “What’s your name?” Jason adjusted the stirrups and then fixed the reins in the kid’s hands. He had probably asked the kid his name three times, but eventually it would stick.

  “Bobby.”

  “Well, Bobby, this is Cheerio. She’s a pretty good little horse and she’s never thrown anyone. The two of you are going to be good friends.”

  “Okay.”

  “But you have to breathe a little, okay? ’Cause if you pass out, you’re gonna fall off.”

  “Okay.”

  Jason led the boy to the arena where four other kids were already walking their horses around the perimeter of the enclosure. He gave the horse a little pat on the rump, the boy jumped and the horse took off at a sedate walk.

  He’d already given them all pointers on commands and how to keep their seat. A few had some experience. Some claimed experience they didn’t have. He leaned on the gate and watched, but his gaze traveled to the dining hall.

  Alyson had worked in the kitchen for the last few days. He’d seen her at lunchtime, serving chicken nuggets and salad to the campers and staff. She had smiled at each one of those kids, and he knew how that smile made them feel. It probably made them all feel like a five-yearold with the greatest kindergarten teacher in the world.

  But she hadn’t talked to him. Their gazes had connected, but she’d looked away and he’d pushed his tray off the end of the counter. Salad and nuggets had gone everywhere and the kids had gotten a great laugh over the mishap.

  He shook his head and gathered his wits, because he had kids on horses and he didn’t have room in his mind for them and Alyson. It was better, thinking about the campers, the sun beating down on his back, and a youth rodeo. Anything but a woman.

  “How’s it going?” Adam Mackenzie walked up, his hat off and his hair plastered to his head.

  “Hot, isn’t it?”

  Adam nodded. “I’ve been chasing two boys around the yard, trying to get some kind of little snake away from them.”

  “But you love it.”

  “Yeah, I do.” Adam rubbed his brow with his sleeve and settled his hat back in place. “How’s it going?”

  “Pretty good. I mean, you’re not going to have a lot of problems with horses like these.”

  “What about your knee?”

  “Good to go.” Jason didn’t look at the other man. He kept his focus on the kids, on the horses, watching for problems.

  “Right. What do you think about this group? Can we pull off a showdeo at the end of the two weeks?”

  A showdeo. A combination between a rodeo and a horse show. They would have steer riding, pole bending, egg relay and a Western pleasure class. If he had the kids with the ability, they might try roping.

  Jason shrugged. “I think so. I’m going to work with a few of the more skilled riders this afternoon. I have a couple who think they can learn to rope.”

  “You’re going to build Rome in a day?”

  “I’m going to turn these kids into rodeo stars in two weeks.”

  “I don’t doubt you will. Jenna suggested you let Alyson help you out. She looks a little lost in the kitchen.”

  “And you think she’ll be better off working with the horses?” Jason knew this game, and he wasn’t playing.

  He’d found out a long time ago that controlling situations solved a lot of problems before they happened. Walk away from an argument, no fight. Walk away from the girl, no problems when she got sick of you or you got tired of her. Walk out the door of the hospital room…

  And pretend it never happened, that his mother hadn’t lost her life with the turn of a switch.

  He’d been accused of not letting himself feel.

  And Sunday afternoon he’d learned that maybe people were right. Because Sunday, he’d felt everything. He wasn’t about to admit that what he’d felt the most was scared to death.

  For a guy who rode bulls for a living, that was a little unnerving.

  “I think Alyson would like working out here.” Adam cleared his throat a little. “I didn’t really think you’d mind.”

  Jason laughed. “Thanks, but no thanks. I have enough problems keeping focused without having to keep her out of trouble.”

  “I’ll pass that on. You know your objections are only going to make the women push harder, right?”

  “Yeah, I get that.” Jason shifted his weight to his good leg. “But maybe you could tell them to give me a break. No sense in having a woman feel forgotten. That wouldn’t be good for her self-esteem.”

  “That’s a good point.” Adam stepped away from the gate. “I need to get a few things done in the office. Yell if you need help.”

  “Will do. It’s time for this lesson to end. I’m going to let them trot a little, so they feel like they’ve done something.”

  “Thanks, Jason. This program will be better with you involved.”

  “I hope.”

  Jason strode into the arena and called the kids to the center. After a few minutes of instruction he turned them loose. Smiles split across serious faces when he gave the nod and they loosened the reins and gave their horses the nudge to move them at a faster gait. He laughed a little because several of them looked as if they’d bounce right off the back end of their horses if he didn’t stop them soon.

  But he remembered being a kid and escaping on the back of a horse. And these kids needed the escape, probably more than he ever had.

  As he ended their lesson, his gaze swept across the open field, catching sight of movement. Alyson walked down the hill to the chapel and he wondered why.

  Alyson walked through the open doors at the end of the chapel and stood for a moment in the dimly lit entrance. The building had a roof and screened walls to let the breeze flow through.

  At the front, behind the pulpit was a giant cross. She stared at the cross, not really getting it, and yet…

  It ached inside her heart, not understanding what everyone else believed and held on to. And she needed something. She needed something more than herself and something more than her career.

  She reached into h
er pocket and pulled out her phone. She pushed the button that turned it off. She couldn’t take another call from her mother, more pressure, more guilt.

  Alyson walked down the aisle to the front of the chapel. She sneaked a look around and hoped no one would be upset with her for being here. But when she’d left the kitchen, needing to be alone, to get away, the chapel had seemed like the place to go.

  Last night she had sat in here with Etta, at the back, listening to Pastor Todd, the camp minister. He’d told funny stories, drawing the kids in with laughter. And then he’d brought them to a point where they understood faith, understood the point of a Father’s love. An unconditional love.

  She sat down on the bench and lifted the cover to expose keys that were faded and worn from use. She loved pianos like this one, the kind that had been played for so many years, by so many people.

  She touched the keys, but she didn’t play. Instead, she waited for the fear, the panic. With her eyes closed, she remembered what it felt like to be onstage and be consumed by that fear. But the fear hadn’t been about the piano, it had been about the audience watching her. The fear had been about what they would think of her performance.

  When the fear didn’t grab hold she started to play. “Jesus Loves Me.” The words were so simple, the melody was sweet. Jesus loves me, this I know, for the Bible tells me so.

  Jesus loves me. Here, in this town, with her grandmother and these people, that love was natural. They all accepted it, as if it were a given. But how did she accept that He could love her that way?

  Love her. She tried to remember feeling loved. And the only moment that came to mind was a picnic by a lake and a cowboy. That wasn’t love, though. That was…

  She didn’t know what it was. It was more than her limited experience with life could really fathom. The one thing she knew for sure, it was a memory she would hold on to forever.

  After walking the kids from his afternoon group back to the dining hall, where they met up with their counselor, Jason headed down the hill toward the chapel. He couldn’t seem to convince himself to let it go.

  He heard the piano before he got there. The tune was simple, “Jesus Loves Me,” but it was sweet. Of course it was Alyson. He had watched her walking down there thirty minutes earlier.

  He walked up the back steps and stood in the open doorway. She was sitting in front of the piano, playing with one finger, her eyes closed.

  While she played, he stayed at the back of the chapel and watched. When she didn’t notice him, he sat on the back pew and waited. Her hand came up and she wiped at her cheek.

  He should go. Common sense told him that. There were a million things he could be doing. He had kids who wanted to learn to rope. He had cattle of his own that needed to be taken care of.

  And instead of doing those things, he sat there, waiting, in case she needed him.

  What made her cry? “Jesus Loves Me”? Or playing the piano. Maybe both?

  She stopped playing but she stayed on the bench, her head bowed over the keys. He stood, not sure which door to exit from, or how to get away from her.

  A sane man would have left, would have ignored her tears, would have called Jenna to talk to her. Calling Jenna was about the only thought he’d had that made sense.

  He couldn’t remember what he was doing half the time, and he had never been accused of making all the right choices. With her shoulders shaking gently, he moved forward, because he couldn’t leave her there alone. And he didn’t want anyone else at her side during this moment.

  For a guy who knew when to exit a situation, he seemed to have lost all sense of timing.

  When he sat down beside her, she did the unexpected; she turned into his arms. He sat there for a few seconds, unsure, and then he wrapped his arms around her and held her as she cried. He tried to tell her it would be okay. He whispered the words through emotion that settled in his throat, and he rocked, back and forth with her in his arms, waiting for her to tell him what she needed.

  Strong arms wrapped around her and Alyson had never felt so safe. Jason held her against his solid chest, rocking her gently, his lips brushing against her temple as he whispered that everything would be okay.

  After a few minutes, she pulled back and she knew that she had to be a mess, with tear-stained cheeks and swollen eyes. Her nose was probably red. She never looked good when she cried.

  Jason smiled and then he wiped her eyes with his hand.

  “Should I ask what’s wrong, or just give you a shoulder to lean on?” His words melted her eyes into another round of tears. She brushed them away and leaned, resting her forehead on a shoulder that was strong.

  “I guess that’s your answer,” he whispered.

  She moved out of his embrace, even though staying would have been good. But that was the problem. If she stayed in his arms, she would want to stay in his life. And how did she do that?

  A breeze picked up, and she closed her eyes. How did she explain a lack of faith to a man who had grown up here, surrounded by faith? How did she explain that her life had never been like his? For every moment that his father wasn’t invested in his life, Alyson’s mother was consumed with hers.

  “You were playing the piano.” He encouraged, nudging her with his shoulder as they sat side by side on the bench.

  She touched the keys again. “Yeah, ‘Jesus Loves Me.’”

  “It’s a good song.”

  “Is it a song, or does it mean more? ‘Jesus loves me, this I know, for the Bible tells me so.’ I don’t know, Jason. I sat there this morning listening to the chapel service for the children, to a story so simple, and I’ve never heard it before. I’ve never heard these stories, about Jesus. Greater love hath no man than this, that he would lay down his life for a friend.”

  “For you.”

  She looked up, still conscious that her eyes would be swollen and her nose red. “Excuse me?”

  “For you. He laid down his life for you. If you were the only person who ever accepted. If everyone else said a collective ‘No, thank you,’ He still would have done it. For you.”

  “It’s like accepting that the world is round after years of being told it is flat. How does a person change everything she’s ever known or believed?”

  “Baby steps. You start by opening the door to faith, and you let that faith grow. You take steps. You test it. It tests you. And you change. Your ideas about God change.”

  “You make it sound easy, maybe because you’ve always lived here, always heard the stories. But my world is so far from here. My world…was flat until today.”

  She couldn’t explain it any other way. Her mother. The anger her mother had with the people here, with their beliefs, with their faith. How did Alyson reconcile those two worlds?

  “I can’t imagine myself in this world, with this faith. I don’t know how to be this person.” She played the song again. “Jesus Loves Me.” “Why would He love me?”

  “Because He created you.”

  She was trying to reconcile that morning’s sermon, about a God who loves unconditionally with a mother whose love always seemed to have conditions.

  Her lawyer had told her to walk away, to find a new manager and break that connection with her parents that gave them control of her career. And she hadn’t known how, because she’d known what it meant to them, to her sisters, and to the other performers connected to them.

  If it had been about her—her alone—it would have been easy.

  She closed the lid down over the piano keys. Gift. It wasn’t a gift; it was a curse. It was always having to be what other people thought she should be. It was performing because people expected it of her, even when she hated it. It was the stares, the lack of friends and relationships, because people didn’t understand. They didn’t get that she was just a person who played the piano.

  “Have you always had faith?” She looked up, into his brown eyes that were deep with compassion, and she was moved in new directions that her heart didn’t know how to
react to, how to soak up.

  “Not always. My mom had faith, enough for all of us, I guess. And then, when she was gone…”

  He faltered and looked away, and she knew this was another part of him she was getting to know, the part that hadn’t dealt with the death of his mother. This was a man who found it easy to comfort, to joke, but not easy to deal with his own loss and his own pain.

  Or at least she thought that was who he was.

  “I’ve had to work through a lot in order to get over being angry with God for taking her.”

  “Are you still angry?”

  He looked away, to the back of the chapel, to a simple wooden cross hanging on the wall.

  “No, I’m not.” He took hold of her hands, cupping them in his as he lifted them to brush a kiss over her knuckles. “Are you?”

  She didn’t know how to answer. “I’m not as angry as I was. But it isn’t easy, to let go of what my mother did. And then, in April, my sister eloped with my fiancé. Which I can now say I’m glad about, but…”

  He blinked a few times. “Bad month, April.”

  “A little.” She managed a smile. “But each day since has gotten better.”

  “Alyson, can I pray with you?” He still held her hands in his. His thumbs stroked her fingers. He had straddled the bench and was watching her, waiting. And she didn’t know what to say, because this time it wasn’t frozen pizza they were praying for. This time they were praying for her to find faith.

  She nodded and emotion, so heavy it hurt to breathe, settled in her chest. “Please.”

  They bowed their heads. Ceiling fans hanging from the rafters swished the air downward, circulating but not really cooling. The chapel wasn’t fancy. The piano was old and out of tune. The hymnals were held together with tape. But the moment was one that settled in Alyson’s heart.

  It all became real in that moment.

  After he prayed, Jason touched her back and stood up. She remained on the bench, unsure of her next move. What did a person do after praying for faith? How did they meet the next moments of their life? It changed everything. It changed her heart. It changed how she looked at her future. Because she had faith.