Finding Home

by Lois Greiman

  “So the auction’s tomorrow?”

  She fiddled with the grimy telephone cord. Barring an act of Congress, Clayton hadn’t been one to go for newfangled ideas like cordless phones or anything involving a satellite. Electricity was lucky to have found its way on to the Lazy. “No, it was tonight. It’s just that I …” She glanced toward the door, imagining the gray mare being dragged about the sales ring like a decrepit old shoe. “I didn’t want to stay any longer.”

  “Merchandise usually sells better if someone’s on hand to brag it up a little.” Five years her senior, Bradley had been in pharmaceutical sales before being accepting into medical school at the University of Minnesota.

  “I suppose,” she said and drew a deep breath. “But there was this horse …”

  “It was a livestock auction?”

  “Yeah, the horses sell before the tack.”

  “You didn’t come home with another goat, did you?” The humor in his voice was edged with something a little sharper. Which was fair, of course; no one in her right mind needs a hairless goat, even if said Nubian did smile like a happy cherub when you brought him cabbage leaves.

  “No …”

  “That’s good, because it’s going to be hard enough getting rid of the animals you’ve already accumulated … and rent’s due.”

  “I know.”

  “How long do you think it’ll be before you can sell the farm?”

  She didn’t say anything for a second.

  “Cassandra?”

  “I’m not sure.”

  “Have you found a realtor yet?”

  She’d wrapped the coiled telephone cord around her pinky finger and regarded it studiously. “No. Not yet.”

  He paused momentarily. “I know it’s hard, Cass, and I wish I could be there to help you through this, but these rotations are murder. And your dad’s been gone for weeks now. It’s time to move on.”

  Her stomach churned. “I need to get the place cleaned up before I can list it.”

  “Isn’t that what you’ve been doing?”

  “Yes, but there’s so much more to be done.” She hadn’t been entirely forthcoming about Clayton’s decline, even to Bradley. “The house needs a lot of repairs. Not to mention the fences and—”

  “Cass …”

  She paused.

  “Let’s think about this logically.” He was using his patient father voice.

  “About what?”

  “The house. The property. How long did your parents live there?”

  “I don’t know.” She scowled, recalling her fuzzy first memories. Standing up in her high chair to see if she’d grown since dinner. Riding bareback on a potbellied pony. Her mother had been a barrel racer in her youth. Maybe she had even hoped her daughter would follow in her footsteps, but speed made Casie nervous. She’d been far better suited for the control needed for horsemanship, western pleasure, or other, more sedate, events. “It’s been in the family a long time.”

  “But your parents … they had it for thirty years, right? Maybe more?”

  “Yeah. So?” Her stomach felt queasy.

  “And Clayton died broke.”

  “Times are hard, Bradley. Since—”

  “To hear your dad talk, times were always hard, Cass. While the rest of the world was investing and expanding and building portfolios, he was struggling just to stay afloat. I’m not saying it was his fault,” he added, but his tone suggested otherwise.

  “What are you saying?” A little irritation had crept into her tone. Which was weird. She wasn’t the one to be defending her father. She wasn’t even sure she had liked her father. Neither was she certain he had liked her. But it had been her duty to help him out when he’d needed it. She’d tried to explain that to Brad a dozen times.

  “I’m saying I don’t believe anyone can make a decent living on that farm. Not in the traditional sense anyway. I think you should consider the possibility that no one’s going to want to live in that house. No one’s going to want to nickel-and-dime it on a couple hundred cattle and a few acres of barley.”

  “Wheat,” she said.

  “What?”

  “We raise …” she began, but a noise from the basement startled her.

  “Cass?”

  “Yes?” She’d entirely forgotten about the lambs. Number 427 had given birth to triplets, not a number any rancher desired. Twins were best, but the young ewe had only wanted one of the three. So Casie had bundled the shivering twosome inside her coat and carted them into the basement.

  “What’s wrong?” Brad asked.

  “Nothing. I’m just tired.” And the lambs were awake now. Awake and raising a ruckus.

  “What’s that noise?”

  She considered lying, then felt horrible about it. Why would she lie? It wasn’t as if she should feel guilty for Number 427’s lack of maternal instincts. “The lambs are hungry.”

  “Lambs?”

  “I’m bottle-feeding a couple of newborns.”

  “In the house?”

  She closed her eyes and rubbed them with her left hand. “It’ll just be for a day or two, but it was raining when they were born, and sheep don’t tolerate wet conditions as well as cattle or horses or—”

  He laughed. “My God,” he said. “I’ve got rounds in the morning and a colonoscopy in the afternoon, but listen, don’t worry about finding a realtor.”

  Luckily, the cord reached the kitchen sink, allowing Casie to fill a bowl with powdered milk replacer and warm water. “I’m going to sell the place, Bradley. Really I am. I just—”

  “Of course you are. You’re not an idiot. In fact, according to your GRE scores you’re almost on par with me. But it sounds like you’ve got your hands full, so I’ll make a few phone calls.”

  “Phone calls to whom?” she asked, but as she tried to stretch a little farther, the ancient cord popped out of the jack. The receiver bobbled on her shoulder, then dropped with a soggy splash into the milk bowl. “Holy …” She fished around, pulled it out, and stuck the cord back into its slot. “Bradley,” she said. “Brad?” But not surprisingly, the phone was dead.

  The lambs, on the other hand, were very much alive. Alive and ravenous.

  CHAPTER 4

  Casie hooked the log chain to the clavicle, mounted the ancient Farmall, and hauled the last of the rotten fencing into a pile between the cattle barn and the corncrib. She’d started work before dawn. Maybe her conversation with Bradley had precipitated this burst of outdoor cleaning. Or maybe her early efforts were due to a pair of lambs that had awakened her in the small hours of the morning. After that she’d been sleepless and restive. Clearing out the decrepit fencing felt strangely cathartic, but as she unhooked the post from the chain and drove the tractor back to the hip shed, the sun was setting and she was certain she’d be catatonic before her head hit the pillow.

  Still, her mind was buzzing with a thousand unfinished chores as she dragged herself up to the house. She’d almost reached the tilted porch when she realized she’d forgotten to check Bones’s water. The setting sun, round as a pumpkin and bloodred, had just dipped into the old elms. Chickasaw Creek, twisted as an ancient root, shone in the day’s last gasp of sunlight. But inside the barn it was dark and silent. Casie flipped up the light switch.

  There was a skitter of noise as something scrambled into hiding.

  Heart pounding, Casie plastered herself against the wall. What was it? Too big for a dog, too small for a horse. Just about right for a person.

  “Who’s there?” Her voice sounded tight and terrified. Seconds ticked away. Possible scenarios rushed through her mind. She could run to the house, but the locks hadn’t worked for ages. She could jump into Puke, but it might not start. She could call Sheriff Swanson, but she had no phone. Finally, easing off to her right, she seized a broken hoe that was propped beside the door. Gripping it in both hands, she splayed her fingers, held her breath, and tightened her hold.

  “Who’s there?” she asked again and searched
for nerve. But her courage seemed to be AWOL. Her voice trembled, and somehow the sound of it dredged up a little anger. Life had been kind of sucky lately, and she didn’t really feel like sitting back and letting it get suckier. “Come on out into the light.”

  A scratch of noise sounded in the darkness. Bones flicked her ears forward and back.

  “I’ve got a shotgun and I’m not afraid to use it,” she said and stepped forward a pace. “Come out or I’ll pepper this barn full of buckshot.” She sounded like Clint Eastwood on an estrogen high.

  The silence that followed stretched into forever, but just when she was about to back out of the barn and scamper for cover, a boy stepped into view. He was scrawny. His cheeks were hollow. His expression was angry, and he was holding his hands in the air as if he’d just been apprehended by a bloodthirsty vigilante.

  Casie blinked in surprise. Apparently, she had never really believed there was someone there at all. “Who are you?”

  The boy’s jaw was set. She could see that much even in the dim lighting.

  “You don’t have no gun.”

  An observant kid, and strangely accusatory, she thought.

  “What an odd name,” she said and tried to sound relaxed, maybe even amused. She was neither.

  “I wasn’t doing nothin’ wrong.”

  She shifted her gaze right and left. The animals seemed to be fine. Al was peering hopefully over the top rail of his gate while his poultry entourage discontentedly waited for him to recline. “Then why are you sneaking around in the dark?”

  He didn’t answer.

  She took a step toward him, hoe raised like a Louisville Slugger. But she’d never been much good at softball. She tilted her head, trying to see beneath the boy’s weathered cap. “What’s your name?” she asked, but he didn’t respond.

  “All right, then.” She had to dig to find her tough-guy persona. “Maybe the sheriff will recognize you if I give him a call,” she said and reached for her pocket as if to pull out her nonexistent cell phone, but at that moment she recognized him. “Hey, aren’t you the kid who led the mare in?”

  There was a moment’s pause, then, “What if I am?” His tone was belligerent at best.

  “You’re Gil’s son?”

  A muscle ticked in his jaw.

  “What are you doing here?”

  “I didn’t steal nothin’.”

  That was most likely true. After all, he probably wasn’t a complete moron, she thought, and didn’t bother to glance at the worthless piles of rubbish that surrounded her.

  “How’d you get here?”

  Bones was watching him with quick ears and soot-black eyes. “It don’t matter,” he said finally.

  “You didn’t walk.”

  He neither argued nor confirmed.

  “It’s four miles to your dad’s farm.”

  “I got a bike,” he said.

  She glanced around. “Where is it then?”

  It seemed difficult for him to unlock his stubborn jaw. “Hid it in the shelterbelt out back.”

  “Why?”

  He shrugged.

  “What’s your name?”

  There was a silence deep enough to drown in. “Ty,” he said finally.

  She stared at him, waiting.

  “Tyler Roberts.”

  She was tired enough to do a face plant right onto the dusty floor, but she lowered the hoe finally and searched for her last drop of human kindness. “I’ll give you a ride home.”

  He didn’t move.

  “It’s too dark to bike there,” she said, but he pursed his lips and raised his stubborn chin.

  “I ain’t getting in no car with you.”

  She paused, wondering what kind of rumors had been started about her. Maybe that she was crazy. She glanced toward the hairless goat, the bossy goose, the ugly, emaciated horse. Could be that particular rumor had some truth to it. “Can I ask why?”

  “Dad says never to accept rides from no strangers.”

  She couldn’t quite manage to squelch her snort. “Does he recommend pawing through other people’s barns in the middle of the night?” she asked, then wondered if he just might. The Gilbert Roberts she had known as a kid didn’t necessarily frown on felonious behavior.

  The boy’s ruddy color increased, but she couldn’t tell if it was caused by anger or embarrassment.

  “Come on,” she said.

  He didn’t budge. “I told ya, I ain’t goin’ with ya.”

  “Fine, then.” She was weary to the marrow of her soul. “Just get out of here.” She turned toward the house, but he mumbled something.

  “What’d you say?”

  He slouched even lower and stared out the broken window to the west as if he wished to be elsewhere. “I said, you shouldn’t feed Angel that hay.”

  Casie glanced toward the mare’s ten-gallon head. “Her name’s Angel?”

  She wouldn’t have thought his scowl could get any darker. Wrong again. “Gotta call her something.”

  True, but Angel? The horse resembled a celestial being about as much as a toad looked like a ballerina.

  “She’s got heaves,” he added.

  The mare had returned to munching contentedly.

  “What?”

  “It’s an allergy thing. Makes ’em cough if they get dust in their lungs.”

  “I’m familiar with the disorder,” she said.

  His body looked as stiff as a T-post. “Then you shouldn’ta fed her that crap.”

  She felt her pride prickle a little. Her equine knowledge team had been state champions back when she’d participated in 4-H events. “I haven’t noticed any symptoms.”

  “That’s cuz she’s been getting good hay.”

  She raised her brows and sent a pointed glance at the mare’s jutting hip bones.

  “Well, she was before we started running low on bales. She looked real …” He paused. “Whatever. Do what you want. She’s your problem now,” he said and turned away.

  She ached to let him go. To see the last of him. To forget about his belligerent voice, his accusatory eyes, and his caustic body language, but she spoke nonetheless.

  “Does she ride?”

  He stopped, shoulders as square as a soldier’s. Then he lifted his hand hastily to his cheek and turned back toward her. “ ’Course she rides. Horse that don’t ride is worthless as tits on a boar.”

  Ah, one of South Dakota’s many charming maxims. “You didn’t ride her in the auction.”

  “Bony like she is?” He almost managed to hide his wince as he glanced at her sorry state. “Woulda hurt …” He stopped himself. “My butt don’t need that kind of abuse.”

  He could have saddled her, she thought, but didn’t mention it. He was already pivoting toward the door at the south end of the barn.

  “Can you fit her?” she asked.

  “What?”

  “Can you fit her? Get her in shape?”

  He canted his head warily. “Not till she gets some flesh back on her.”

  She paused, fighting those many lamented weaknesses, but there was a streak of damp dirt across his cheek, and how the hell was she supposed to fight that? “All right. Until then you can groom her once a day.”

  “Why would I wanna do that?”

  “So that I don’t tell the sheriff you were sneaking around in my barn.”

  He narrowed his eyes. “Go ahead and tell him if you want to.”

  She watched him for a moment. “I don’t want to,” she said finally. “What I do want is for you to brush Angel down once a day.”

  He stared at her in silence as if trying to puzzle out some indecipherable riddle. “Why?” he asked finally, but she had already turned toward the house.

  “Because I don’t have time to mess with it, and she needs to get back under saddle if I’m going to get a decent price for her. A horse that don’t ride is worthless as tits on a boar,” she said and left him to stare after her in perplexed silence.

  CHAPTER 5

&nbs
p; The thermometer nailed above the chicken coop door was too rusty to discern the name of the seed company that had distributed it fifty years earlier, but the temperature was clear: forty-seven much anticipated degrees, a veritable heat wave for April in the Dakotas. Casie stood, resting her palms atop the wooden handles of the posthole digger, getting her breath back and letting the golden sunlight sink its ancient therapy into her soul. Winter had almost lost its icy grip on the world. Purple crocus, as fragile as unspoken dreams, bloomed in the sheltered crooks of rock. The frogs had begun their springtime chorus, and three chickens had ventured from Al’s toasty back to scratch in the yard. Jack circled them, keeping them in a tight cluster with the intensity of a cobra while Angel grazed beside the barn and Tyler scraped off masses of her loose hair. It hung in the air for a moment before being swept away on a swirling zephyr.

  The universe felt softly tranquil and old-world silent until the sound of an engine broke the quiet. Casie glanced up as a red car, as bright as a candy apple, maneuvered slowly down her bumpy driveway. She shifted her weight uncomfortably, wondering if it was too late to hide in the barn, but in a second the car stopped not thirty feet from where she worked. The driver disembarked.

  He was tall, blond, dressed to perfection in a dark suit and snazzy tie that clashed with sharp precision with her stained jeans and holey sweatshirt.

  “I’m looking for a Casie Carmichael.” He stood very erect, but managed to emit a sort of friendly confidence with no visible effort.

  For a moment she considered telling him she wasn’t home, but honesty was like a burr under her saddle, irritating but nearly impossible to be rid of. “I’m Casie.”

  “Oh.” He smiled. It was the kind of expression that makes orthodontists proud and cheerleaders swoon. “I was expecting someone …” He cranked up the wattage a couple amps and took the few steps between them in long-legged strides. “… with more facial hair,” he said and stuck out his hand. “I’m Phil Jaegar.”

  “Hello,” she said and found that she was excessively aware of the duct tape that kept the ring finger of her right glove intact.

  He held her gaze and her hand for a good three seconds before drawing away and glancing toward the barn. “So this is the Lazy Windmill.”