“It’ll be fine,” Nathan repeated. “Really.”
When Angel didn’t respond he grinned and jerked his head toward the barn. “Let me get this mattress down, and then we can have something to eat. Maybe after that I’ll teach you how to milk a cow.”
***
As Nathan strolled toward the barn under the load of the mattress, Angel couldn’t help comparing the twelve-year-old boy she had met years ago with the person he had become. Yes, Nathan was taller, the angles of his face stronger. Those things had come with time. But he was more different than even seven years would have warranted under normal circumstances.
Angel remembered the twelve-year-old Nathan well—he was the youngest person besides herself she had seen at the saloon before or since. He had spent most of the time she had sat with him staring at the dust at his feet. Now, gone were the hunched shoulders, the jittery over-the-shoulder glances, and, perhaps most noticeably, the downcast eyes. Nathan didn’t look down anymore.
What had changed? Angel wondered as she walked back to the cabin. She sometimes still felt like the little girl that had sat on the steps beside Nathan that day.
By the time Nathan had finished in the barn, the wind was howling against the cabin walls, and when Angel looked out the window, she could see tiny flakes of snow violently hurtling sideways through the air. She pressed the back of her hand against the glass and shuddered.
A gust of cold air blew in with Nathan, and he shook himself as he closed the door, stamping his feet and rubbing his hands together. He hadn’t been dressed for the sudden drop in temperature.
“I’m glad you kept the fire going.” Nathan nodded toward the fireplace and moved to stand in front of it.
“You were gone longer than I thought you would be.”
“It started feeling cooler and the wind started picking up while I was putting the mattress up, so I decided to go ahead and milk the cow a bit earlier this evening. I’m glad I did. It’s getting cold out there. Early winter storm, I guess.”
Angel couldn’t keep the concern from showing on her face, and Nathan hastily added, “I’ll be warm enough.”
Their meal was a silent affair. Angel used her spoon to push the food into patterns on her plate, and Nathan chewed in thoughtful silence. Both occasionally glanced at the window whenever a particularly strong gust of wind rattled the pane.
The contrast between the soft crackle of the warm flame and the constant, muted bluster of the cold outside made Angel shiver. Once, she saw Nathan anxiously watching the storm, but when he caught her eye, he merely smiled and shook his head, as though suggesting whatever his anxiety had been was nothing.
As the storm wore on, Angel grew more and more agitated. Storms made her nervous. They were unpredictable and had an uncanny knack for hiding things that, in her opinion, would have been better off remaining seen. It was cold outside, and no matter how many complaints Nathan assured her the cows did not have, she was sure the barn would not hold enough heat for him to stay warm all night.
Her thoughts drifted to their conversation from the night before, and she mused on what Nathan had said—it’s easier to trade secrets in darkness than daylight. It’s true, Angel thought, because in the darkness you don’t have to see yourself through the mirror of someone else’s response. But why trade secrets at all?
Nathan had spoken so easily to her that Angel felt a twinge of guilt for having offered nothing in return. Nothing voluntarily, at any rate. Nonetheless, she was grateful for what he had told her. It made her feel less of a burden and more of a friend.
Still, there was the matter of the barn.
No matter her uncertainty regarding Nathan in general, she could guess his response to the idea that had begun circling her thoughts as the evening progressed. Their current situation was not one of particular propriety, but she suspected that even so, Nathan would balk at what she was about to suggest.
Angel closed her eyes, pretending it was dark, and blurted, “Maybe you should stay inside tonight.”
Nathan looked shocked, and he emphatically shook his head. “No,” he spoke firmly. “It wouldn’t be proper.”
“How would that be different? Nothing about any of this”—Angel waved her arm inclusively—“is proper.”
Nathan didn’t argue as she had expected. Instead he shook his head and said, “You’re right. It’s not. I’m sorry for that. You deserve better.”
Angel was taken aback by what Nathan had said, but before she could respond, another gust of wind shook the windowpane and Angel gestured toward it. “You are going to freeze outside.”
Nathan merely shrugged. “I’ll be fine.”
Angel sighed with something that was not quite irritation and not quite admiration, but somewhere in between. She found herself watching him earnestly. This was made easier by the fact that Nathan seemed determined to avoid eye contact after Angel had suggested he stay inside, and had busied himself carving a small piece of wood into a shape that was yet to be uncovered. No matter what he said, he did not appear eager to brave the cold outside.
Angel closed her eyes, forcing herself to breath slowly, fighting to calm the rapidly increasing pounding of her heart before it choked out her breath altogether. Her tongue felt thick, heavy, clumsy. “You don’t understand.”
Finally, slightly exasperated, Nathan turned fully to face her. “What don’t I understand, Angel? You staying here is already bad enough for your reputation, without us living in the same house. I will not be like my father.”
Angel struggled to come up with an explanation she thought Nathan would understand, but she suspected he would only listen to a few words before cutting her off. Her thoughts were clear, but the words remained muddled. In the end, there was only one thing she could tell him. Even though the fire dimly lit the room, the darkness of the storm swirled outside. Safe enough for secrets.
“I’m afraid,” she whispered.
***
With wakefulness came reality. Angel no longer found herself on the floor of the saloon as she did every time she dreamed. She was in her own bed and Maria, one of the women who worked at the saloon, was gently smoothing the hair back from her face.
Angel closed her eyes. Why did it have to be Maria? Maria, who hated her, who jumped at every chance she had to make her squirm, to laugh at her expense.
Maria shifted as she noticed Angel’s slight movement. “You’re awake,” she spoke the obvious.
Angel didn’t reply.
“Shame you aren’t able to remember more of what happened,” Maria said casually. “Are you sure you didn’t recognize the man at all?”
Angel, distracted by Maria’s tone, spoke uncertainly. “I already told everyone, I don’t remember. It was probably someone with a grudge against Tom. That isn’t uncommon.”
Maria nodded, satisfied, and continued stroking Angel’s hair.
“Guess you’re not so different from us after all,” Maria said softly. Angel opened her eyes again, too emotionally exhausted to protest but unwilling to let the injustice of that statement go unacknowledged. As Angel looked at the other woman, though, she realized there had been no malice in Maria’s words, only sadness.
The unexpected feeling in Maria’s voice pricked a hole in the hastily laid dam between Angel and the flood of emotions that followed. Unable to stop the words before they left her mouth, or the tear before it trickled down her cheek, Angel whispered, “It hurts.”
Her body was stiff, and achy, and felt feverish, and there was a raw hole inside her chest that seemed to be eating itself, growing.
Maria wiped the tear from Angel’s cheek and nodded. “I know, sweetie.”
“What if he comes back?” Angel asked. “They haven’t found him yet. They don’t even know who they are looking for.”
Maria moved, resting Angel’s head carefully against the pillow, and sat so that she could face Angel on the bed. Carefully taking her hand, she looked into Angel’s eyes. “We’ve never been friends. But I’
m going to give you some advice, and you can take it or leave it how you want.”
Angel waited without interest for the words that were supposed to make her feel better. What would Maria say? That Angel was one of them now? That she was safe? That the girls at the saloon understood? That men were more beasts than human—creatures to be tamed but never trusted? Most of those sentiments Angel had heard repeated by one or another of the saloon girls at some point, although they had never been spoken directly to her.
Maria paused, as though trying to decide how to adequately convey the message she wanted Angel to hear. In the end, Angel thought, Maria must have failed, because the words she spoke rang in Angel’s mind like off-key church bells as she drifted back to sleep.
“Don’t let anyone know you’re afraid, and when the numbness sets in—and it will—don’t fight it. Let it take you. Forget what it’s like to feel.”
***
“What are you afraid of?” Nathan asked. All of the previous signs of frustration had been wiped from his face.
Angel shrugged. “Storms, the darkness, being alone.” She paused, then added, “That if something happens, there won’t be anyone to hear me scream.”
Nathan was watching her with a peculiar expression. “That’s quite a list. Anything else?”
Her eyes never left his. “That this is all there will ever be—fear and running. Never really being anywhere because I’m always leaving, and nobody caring one way or another.”
A half smile rested on Nathan’s face. “I asked you to stay.”
“You could change your mind.”
“I won’t.”
When Angel didn’t respond, Nathan rubbed his hand through his hair. “Guess I’d better go bring that mattress in from the barn.”
He sighed as another gust of wind struck the cabin, but he smiled back at Angel when she hesitantly smiled at him. “It’ll be okay,” he reassured her. “All of it.”
Angel watched him as he walked out the door, then turned to gather some blankets to bring to the front room. She laid them out in front of the fire to warm.
When Nathan came back through the door, he looked gratefully at the blankets Angel had laid out, and as they hastily brushed the snow off the mattress, she better understood his gratitude. The cloth was cold to the touch. It wasn’t just the kind of cold that would have come from its short journey through the weather. It was the kind of cold that had sunk deep into the mattress, the kind that radiated from the inside out.
As Nathan finished moving the mattress to a corner of the room, he nodded toward the blankets and the fire. “Thank you, Angel.”
Angel felt her cheeks flush, and she was glad she could hide behind the warmth of the fire. The strange lightness she had felt when Nathan asked her to stay had returned.
Never before had she thought of a simple thank-you as a compliment. Thank you—the words rolled off one’s tongue so casually, without thought, more habit than anything else. But Nathan had spoken so sincerely. It was hard not to take the words, “Thank you,” for what she thought, in their purest form, they must have originally been meant to be. An expression of appreciation and of approval. An acknowledgement of usefulness and of rightness. A mutual sharing of joy, small or great. Is it possible to have a small joy? she wondered then. Aren’t all joys great?
She walked toward her room, raising her hand to the side of her face and pretending to brush a stray strand of hair back to hide the beginnings of a smile. Before she opened the door, and when she had the smile safely under control, she turned and paused.
“Nathan?” she asked. As he looked up, she said, “Thank you.”
“For what?” he asked.
“For everything. For being you.”
Nathan grinned, and this time Angel was less successful at hiding the half smile that crept onto her face. She quickly closed the door behind her and, in the darkness, smiled at the soft glow of firelight shining under the door. And still, the strange lightness remained.
Chapter 7
Every mistake I’ve ever made has haunted me—ruined me—and made my brother. I gave him his life, his woman. He wouldn’t have had any of those things if it hadn’t of been for me.
***
The wind howled through the night. With every gust, the cabin creaked, both resisting the outside forces and settling into them. Every unfamiliar noise startled Angel awake, and she breathed shallowly, quietly, listening for any sounds beneath the noise of the storm before falling back into her restless sleep.
The next morning, Angel groggily opened her eyes, vaguely aware that something had awakened her but unsure what that something might be. She listened for a few moments before it struck her. There were no howling winds, no creaking cabin, no brittle, skeletal branches cracking and snapping—only silence.
Angel reluctantly sat up. The air outside of the covers was freezing, and the touch of the cold wood floor against her bare feet sent goosebumps up her spine. Shivering, she wrapped a blanket around herself and padded barefoot into the main room.
Nathan was already up. The fire was blazing cheerily, and the main room was significantly warmer than the room Angel had slept in. She sighed gratefully as she stepped onto the warm floorboards.
The room smelled wonderful—of pancakes and fresh milk and bacon—and Angel suddenly realized how hungry she was. She hadn’t been able to bring herself to eat much the night before, and now she sat down at the table and put her head between her hands, slightly queasy from going so long without food.
“Are you feeling well?” Nathan asked anxiously.
“I’m fine,” Angel reassured him. “I’ll be fine after I eat.” She took a bite of pancake and nibbled on a piece of bacon. “This is good,” she said, surprised.
Nathan shrugged, turning another pancake. “No one else was ever gonna cook around here, so I learned. And if I was going to be cooking, I figured I might as well make something worth eating.”
“How bad is it out there?” Angel asked.
Nathan shrugged. “The storm’s cleared up, but there’s at least a foot of snow out there, and the wind blew it into some pretty good drifts. I think the worst of it’s over, but it might be a while before we can get out and into town.”
Which meant there would be no taking the train out of town.
Angel rose to her feet and walked to the door. Opening it, Angel was faced with a new, glittering world. A pristine blanket of snow covered everything, rising and falling gracefully with lines of the shrubbery and trees beneath. The air was icy and still—Angel’s breath rose in shimmering clouds around her as rays of light from the emerging sun danced across the landscape.
“That’s something to see,” Nathan breathed from beside Angel. He had come to stand beside her, almost without her noticing. Angel nodded without speaking.
“I’m sorry we’re snowed in,” Nathan said.
Angel gazed out across the blinding landscape. She knew that sooner or later she and Nathan would have to leave the cabin. Sooner or later she would have to go to town. Sooner or later the rumors—and truths—that had been chasing her would find her and catch her, even here.
But today was not that day.
Today, again, she would pretend.
***
Milking Bossy, the cow, was one task Nathan had decided Angel would safely be able to handle. Despite her initial trepidation, Nathan turned out to be right. Angel soon found taking care of the milk cow to be a relaxing, if somewhat methodical, chore, although she had raised an eyebrow when Nathan first told her the milk cow’s name.
“Bossy?” she had asked, looking at the cow skeptically. The cow had seemed to shrug at her, as though to say she could think of no reason to be named such, and then taken a mouthful of hay.
“Yep,” Nathan had responded, unconcerned. “Just keep an eye on her—sometimes when she’s switching her tail, it’ll catch the milk bucket.”
Angel had sat hesitantly on the milking stool and, with Nathan’s guidance, soon had manage
d a few weak streams of milk. It had been nothing like the frothy hiss that so rhythmically filled the metal pail when Nathan had demonstrated her new chore, but Angel had nonetheless felt a surprising sense of satisfaction.
“Don’t worry,” Nathan had told her. “You’ll get the hang of it quick enough.”
When Nathan had walked out of earshot, she had glanced up at Bossy, who’d turned to look at her.
“Bossy, huh,” Angel spoke. “You look more like a Bluebell to me.”
The milk cow had stopped twitching her tail. Angel smiled. Bluebell it was.
Now, Angel was used to their morning rhythm. She milked the cow while Nathan worked in the background, finishing the rest of the barn chores. The barn cat waited patiently for her share of the milk, and the chickens fussed.
Nathan walked up and laid his free hand against the milk cow’s back; the other held a pitchfork. “Hey, Bossy girl.”
Bluebell, who had been chewing her cud, turned her head toward Nathan and coughed, covering him with a spray of moisture. He grimaced as he wiped a hand on his pants.
“She likes the name Bluebell better,” Angel told him without looking up from the milk pail. Bluebell turned her head to look at Angel, then mooed a soft rumble as though she were comforting a calf, and Angel rubbed the milk cow’s side affectionately.
“Bluebell, huh?” Nathan asked. “I think she just likes you better.”
“Probably because I don’t call her bossy.”
Nathan chuckled and leaned against the pitchfork. “Maybe so.”
***
Nathan had known the barn cat was due to have a litter of kittens for several weeks, so when five multicolored balls of fur suddenly appeared in the barn one day, he was not surprised. What did surprise him was how quickly Angel became attached to each of the kittens. She loved watching them play or sitting with them in her lap while she stroked their fur and they purred.
Nathan knew that, practically, he couldn’t keep all of the cats around, and if Angel hadn’t been there, he would likely have followed convention and simply drowned the kittens in the creek. But as he sat beside Angel and scratched the ears of the lone kitten—a white one with black on his ears and paws—that had chosen to sit with Nathan, he couldn’t bring himself to follow through on that idea. He knew that if he did, Angel would never forgive him, and as much as he hated to admit it, Nathan was beginning to grow fond of the tiny kittens as well.
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