Just as Stubborn

by Jeanne Arnold

  He was a sight.

  Janie would have to come up with a new word for Gabe’s winter look.

  “I’m fixing to live my life any way I please, thank you,” I told him, mimicking the way he spoke. I could hardly stop fidgeting with my itchy cast.

  “I don’t want to be blamed for you running back here without telling your folks. Look what happened before. Your mom practically chained you to the house. She don’t like Haldens, Av’ry. And my dad’s not a fan of us either. Can’t focus on oil if I’m focusing on a girl.”

  “I think my mother and Meggie had something to do with dragging you away from me after less than a week in New York. My mother will do anything to ruin my life.”

  “Nah. She already thinks I ruined it,” he said.

  “She thinks you corrupted me.”

  “Guilty,” he said as his cheeks pushed into his eyes. “I’m only just getting started.”

  “She thinks I’m like Meggie when she met your dad—too smart for my own good. Too young to decide what’s good for me. Whatever that means. Meggie seems pretty well off right now, aside from getting fat. I can’t imagine what she looks like today.”

  “Yeah, that too,” he said and snorted.

  I melted inside. Sleeping the last few months with a photo of Gabe’s rare smile beside me was nothing compared to seeing it light up in person.

  “I don’t think I’m going back,” I said.

  Gabe laughed a chortling laugh. What was so funny? Didn’t he want me to stay? I wanted another kiss. I wanted him to touch me. I wanted to touch him. He hadn’t left the sink.

  “I know my dad had everything to do with it. Up to his old controlling ways. You see, he don’t even like turkey, so we’re having ham for Thanksgiving.” He opened the fridge to show me. “In Meggie’s house. Not his.”

  “It sure doesn’t look like Meggie’s house,” I replied as my eyes photographed the room. I leaned over and jerked my jeans up to my knee so I could scratch around the perimeter of the cast.

  Gabe pushed off the counter and approached with a long stride and then took a seat beside me. “How come you still got this dang thing on you? Going for shock value with those words again? I’ll get you a pair of cowboy boots when this comes off. Real Texas boots, not the knockoffs they sell around here.”

  He traced a finger over some of the inappropriate graffiti I acquired by accident when I fell asleep at the Y. The words had an interesting effect on my mother.

  His proximity had an interesting effect on every cell in my body.

  “I missed the appointment. It’s killing me. I think I need to go to the clinic and get it cut off. Like right now.”

  “They’re so full up, you wouldn’t get seen for a month. I wouldn’t go near that madhouse. Did you even drive through town? On top of the oil crowd, we got new hydrofracking protestors, environmental weirdoes, news crews, murderers, strippers, you name it. Town’s looking to expand the highways out of Williston. Maybe then everyone will leave. This place can’t get any worse. I miss my old Texas life.”

  “Then why did you come back?” I scratched the back of my leg. I wished he missed New York.

  Gabe tugged on my pocket until I sat down. With both hands he rammed the leg of my jeans up and over my knee so he could set the entire cast across his lap. He tapped it with his knuckles. I watched the corner of his lip curl.

  “Money.”

  “Oh. So that’s what drives you now? Halden-Remington money.”

  “Money for books,” he said.

  “Not freedom or college or me? You don’t even buy new books.”

  “Money for rare books,” he replied. “Why are you always breaking yourself? Isn’t this the foot you twisted twice last summer?”

  “Why are you changing the subject?” I asked.

  I couldn’t get enough of his face. His hair. It looked different—and wonderful.

  My shoulders jumped when a gust hit the house and rattled the windows.

  “Are you waiting for your parents to send the cops out here to get you?” he asked.

  “Gabe, I’m eighteen and they can’t even make me go back to school. I’ll call them later when they’ve missed me.”

  “How’s your sis Brianna?” His hand curled around my knee. His touch reminded me of a silky fabric against my skin. I wanted to grab his neck and kiss him hard, but I couldn’t reach.

  Didn’t he feel the same?

  “The banana’s been cranky. I didn’t get to say goodbye. Maybe they’ll let me talk to her later. Maybe not.”

  “You better let Meggie know you’re here. She’s gonna wanna give me the boot,” he told me.

  I crumpled my brows and glanced past the new sink and out to the coop. “What do you mean?”

  “I sleep in your bed. Caleb’s been having lots of company out there,” he said, jerking his chin at the coop. “She lets me. Plus my dad likes one of us to be in here. I don’t know if he trusts Josh to drive her to the hospital.”

  I lost him after he said he sleeps in my bed. Imagining Gabe asleep under the same covers I used all summer made chills crawl all over my skin.

  “You’re picturing me in your bed.” The back of his hand rose to my cheek. “You got a blush, Av’ry Ross. What exactly are you imagining me doing?”

  I leaned out of his reach. His hand fell.

  “I was not,” I said. “Why didn’t Joshie get a new truck? He knows he’s Joel’s son. I overheard my mother and Meggie on the phone. Isn’t getting a new truck customary in your family?”

  “Yeah. But she said heck no. He said he didn’t want it anyway. He’s pissed nobody told him he was a Halden all these years. Let’s just hope you aren’t my sister.”

  He pinched my toe and distracted me from jamming my fingernail down the cast. I was in serious agony. I needed something to stop the itching.

  “Did you hear that?” Gabe stood fast and set my leg on his seat with a clunk. “What on earth is he doing?”

  I heard it, but I wasn’t sure what it was. At first, I thought a gang of motorcycles had surrounded the farmhouse. Not until I hobbled out to the back porch did I recognize what the commotion was.

  The porch light flipped on and lit up the new driveway and Meggie’s spruced-up office building.

  “Haldens don’t go back on promises,” Caleb yelled over the chainsaw’s whiny two-stroke engine. He looked like he’d stepped out of a western horror flick wearing his cowboy hat while holding the menacing machine. “Bring her down here, baby brother!”

  No way.

  I wasn’t letting him near me. I knew he was kidding, yet a small part of me questioned if he wasn’t. Gabe’s hand reached out as I turned fast and tried to yank the screen door open. There was no way I was going to be able to run anywhere. I could hardly walk.

  “Let me go! He’s not getting near me with that thing!”

  Gabe pulled me into an embrace and chuckled at my resistance.

  “Come on now, Av’ry. You said you were dying. It’ll be fun.”

  Caleb strolled to the steps. The chainsaw sliced through the air as he swung it with two hands.

  “Gabe! Let me go or I’ll call the police. Oh my god. Let me go!”

  He loosened his grip because he probably knew I wasn’t going to get far. I hobbled into the kitchen and stood behind the table, using it as a shield.

  “Stay right there. Here he comes,” he said laughing.

  The blood must have rushed out of my face. I was woozy, lightheaded, using the table to brace myself so I wouldn’t fall over. “Don’t let him bring that thing in here! I’ll call Meggie. She’ll kick you out!”

  Gabe slapped the table with his palms and made me jump. “Don’t be a baby.”

  I started for the basement stairs. It smelled exactly as I remembered. I hopped awkwardly, tripping on the top step before I even got going. Gabe was on me in a second, scooping me into his arms.

  My hand flew up and slapped him on the cheek. His head shot back; his hat popped off. I don
’t know what got into me, but I was royally peeved. I wasn’t in the mood to be teased by the two of them after ten hours of travel and no sleep the previous night because I was too busy fantasizing about my visit.

  He squeezed me tighter and grinned. My return had not turned into the romantic reunion I anticipated. I thought he would want to get me alone the moment he saw me. He’d been hinting at it for the last two weeks.

  “You’re feisty. I missed this,” he said. “Why don’t you want us to cut it off? Your leg is bleeding in there.”

  The chainsaw turned off, and the kitchen door slammed. I blew out my breath in Gabe’s face as he held my arms to my legs and stomped down the stairs.

  “Help me here. She’s gonna get away,” he called over his shoulder.

  “Enough!” I yelled. “I’m serious. Put me down. Don’t you dare touch me, Caleb!”

  “As you wish,” Gabe said at the edge of the pool table. A pool ball rolled out from under my back. “Seems the operating room is ready. Just need some tools and a rope.”

  I wanted Gabe to keep touching me even though he was being a jerk. I rehashed the episode of him lying passed out on the pool table after Caleb stitched his stab wound in the summer. It was a relief to know that his family’s archenemy, Hunter Barrett, and some of his knife-wielding thug army were still locked behind bars.

  “Jeez, Gabe,” I hissed. “I didn’t come all the way out here for this. If you ever want to…if you even care…you’ll put me down.”

  I wiggled and tried to kick his side with my cast, but he made it so all of my limbs were confined. He was wicked strong, stronger than I remembered.

  “So where do you want the rope?” Caleb called down the stairs.

  “Stop now!” I shrieked.

  “She’s a spittin’ handful. Just get the saw, and I’ll sit on her,” Gabe said.

  “I’m going to call Meggie!” I shouted my threat.

  “My my, legs. You’re a little overdrawn in the memory bank today. She’s a million miles away. Doubt she’d hear you hollering like this,” Caleb said.

  I was panting so hard I almost gave up my fight. Caleb stuck his head beside Gabe’s, and I stared at the two of them. I missed their faces. I’d only spent a few months with the Texas boys, but it seemed as though I’d known them my whole life.

  “No saw. But how about these?” He held up a pair of tin snips and jerked his brows up and down.

  I rolled my head from side to side and knocked a striped ball into the corner pocket.

  “Nuh uh. No way. You’ll cut me. No!”

  Gabe grabbed my shoulders and pushed me down lightly but kept his face in my face so I couldn’t sit up. When my head hit the pool table, he drove his lips into mine and tried to kiss me quiet. I shook him off.

  Caleb chuckled and seized my legs to straighten them while Gabe leaned over my torso crosswise like a giant seatbelt. I felt his heart beating against mine. I couldn’t believe I allowed him to touch me like that. I couldn’t believe how good he smelled.

  “Avery, I know what I’m doing. I won’t hurt you,” said Caleb. “I finished my paramedic training.”

  I kicked at him with my good foot.

  “Hey there. Watch the ribs. I’m just starting to feel normal again.” He ran his hand across his chest and patted his heart. Almost four months had passed since his rollover accident.

  “Just get on with it,” Gabe told him as his forehead rested on the green felt.

  “Maybe we need to drug her. Josh still keep a stash of booze around here?” Caleb asked.

  I continued to struggle and try to push off Gabe.

  He whispered, “I’ll let go if you let him cut it off. Then we can have some real fun.”

  His twangy promise sent an army of goosebumps marching over my shoulders and down my arms.

  He was thinking like I was.

  “No!” I barked.

  “Okay. The lady says go ahead,” Gabe teased.

  “Oh come on! This isn’t funny. Please just take me to the hospital and let them do it,” I begged.

  “Hell yeah, it’s funny. Seeing you with this crazy pink cement block on your leg. You could’ve painted over this word here. Who wrote this? Av’ry, you let guys near you?”

  “I thought you liked pink,” I said calmly, almost smugly now that I knew he was bothered by the male signage from the swim team.

  Caleb tickled my toes, but I couldn’t see him over Gabe, so I tried to knock him with my good foot.

  “I love it, Av’ry. You just ain’t a pink girl,” Gabe said.

  I knew he was making a reference to his ex-girlfriend who adored pink.

  I closed my eyes and tried to slow my rapid heartbeat. Caleb was cutting the cast off. The itch was so awful—I didn’t care.

  “Wait a minute,” Gabe said. “Are you wearing that pink Rockin’ the Bakken shirt under this?”

  He lifted off my chest and glared. Surprise played across his features when I didn’t make a move to get away. His hazel eyes mesmerized me.

  “Hey, don’t let her up. I started cutting.”

  I shot up and rested on my elbows to get a look. Gabe slunk off the table, and Caleb’s cutters inched up my foot.

  “Oh no. I thought you were kidding,” I told him and stayed as still as possible.

  “Would I kid you, legs? I got it handled. Just stay put, alrighty?”

  After the cast was removed, I had to admit to both of them that I was able to get up the stairs much better without it.

  Meggie’s wall phone rang as I sipped hot chocolate and glared at my scratched up leg propped on Gabe’s lap again. He put Band-Aids all over me like patchwork.

  “I’m not supposed to be here. I’m not getting it,” I told him when he looked at me as though I should answer it. “You get it.”

  He stretched his long arm back and grabbed the cord.

  “Yup,” he said into the receiver. “Hi, Ma.”

  My eyes spread wide with curiosity. He winked at me. He didn’t have a mom whom he acknowledged. It had to be Meggie. I knew my cover would be blown and everyone would be out of sorts when they figured out where I landed.

  “Yep. Nah. No plans to get a phone, ma’am. Nope,” he said.

  Then he listened.

  “When’s it coming out?”

  I stood up and held open my palm in front of his face. He got up, slapped the phone into my hand and then stomped into the living room.

  “Aunt Meggie, it’s me Avery.”

  I waited a moment.

  “Avery Ross? Uff-da. What in the world are you doing in my house in North Dakota for goodness sake? Don’t you have school this week? Your mom forbid you from taking the jet. Did Joel set this up?”

  I wanted to stomp my foot through the sparkly floor. “I’m eighteen, Aunt Meggie. I’ve got a job, remember? I bought the ticket myself, and I’m staying with Gabe for the week and then we’re eloping.”

  “Huh?” Gabe called from the other room.

  Silence on the other line made me wish I could eat my words.

  “I’m kidding. Just about the eloping,” I backpedaled.

  I heard her breath blow into the phone, but she remained quiet. After a moment, she hissed and her breath got very heavy.

  “Aunt Meggie? Oh no. Are you okay? I was just…I mean, I’m not getting married to Gabe!”

  “What about me?” Gabe yelled. I ignored him.

  “Aunt Meggie?”

  “Avery, I’m going into labor. Well, I think I am. It’s been a few years since I did this. That’s why I’m calling. I need Josh here when the baby comes. I won’t make it back for Thanksgiving. I need Gabe or one of the boys to drive my kid down here. He can miss school. Joel insists they all come right away, but I don’t need the hotheaded bunch of them all bickering and backbiting while I’m birthing this kiddo. So maybe you and Gabe could bring him for me, okiedokie? I know it’s a heck of a long haul, but Josh won’t go near Joel’s jet. I’ll deal with your mom. I just got off the phone with h
er. She said you were at the mall, for crying out loud!”

  “I was at the mall, and now I’m going to sleep over at Janie’s and go to the mall again tomorrow.”

  “I’ll be darned, Ross. This isn’t a time to joke. Your poor mom is out of her mind trying to get your sister’s fever down and you’re halfway across the country. She has a double ear infection and strep throat. Maybe it wasn’t the best time for you to visit Romeo on the other side of the planet.”

  Poor Brianna. I didn’t even get to say goodbye to her.

  “Are you really having the baby right now?” I asked.

  “If back pain and an occasional knife in my abdomen means anything, then yep, I sure am. It’s storming right now, so Joel wants to wait it out before we head into the city. The nurse-midwife is here and all of my vitals are textbook. Contractions are miles apart. You got plenty of time.”

  “Wait, Aunt Meggie?”

  “Yeah, kiddo?”

  “What happened to your house?”

  I could hear her cringe through the phone. I missed her longwinded chatter. I missed almost everything about North Dakota.

  “What do you think, eh? That man is unrelenting. I’m wearing a diamond the size of a walnut shell, and my house looks like it jumped out of the pages of a home and garden monthly. He swore he wouldn’t let the mother of his kids live in the dump I called home for nearly two decades. He summoned a design team from Texas in a tractor trailer when he couldn’t find available help within a hundred miles of Williston. Have you spoken to Josh? You know he’s having a hard time with all of this father business. Lane’s been keeping an eye on him and feeding him.”

  “No. He must be out. We can look for him. Then we’ll pack, I guess.”

  “You be safe, Avery. Tell Josh to answer me when I call him. Tell Gabe this isn’t a request.”

  * * *

  “He put in a shower? This place is unreal.” I called out the second-floor window when I spotted Gabe unloading books from his truck onto the pavement. The snow had stopped. Nothing stuck to the ground. “Where is Josh anyway?”