by B. G. Thomas
Did he? Well, he knew I had a daughter. So why the passes?
“I shouldn’t be telling you this, but Cole is in a bad place right now. He had a relationship end in a very, very bad way. Two years now and I haven’t seen him go on a single date. The man really hurt Cole.”
The man….
Wait….
Hurt Cole?
I looked over at Darla.
“A real damned bastard, but Cole loved him. Loved him with all of his heart. I think he was hearing wedding bells. And now….” She shook her head. “Now all I can do is hope he’ll love someone again someday.” She sighed. “He pretends, but I can tell that he’s lonely. But I still don’t think he’s even close to ready.”
And once more, I didn’t know what to say. I’d gone into her office to tell her… I don’t know what. That I thought it was inappropriate for a gay man to work a family ranch? That I was uncomfortable around him?
That I was scared to death of him and all he meant?
And now I was hearing how some bastard had hurt Cole? Deeply? And that she wasn’t sure if he’d find love again? That he was lonely?
I understood that feeling.
“Give Cole a chance,” she said.
Give him a chance? I thought, and then I remembered his dream kiss, a tingle spreading out over my arms. Damn!
“Neil, I believe we all come together in life for a reason, like Cole coming to live here.”
Cole lived at Black Bear?
“Your family vacationing here for years. Now you. Who knows what’s in the wind?”
I looked at her, truly looked at her…. Did she truly believe what she said? That we come together for a reason? Wasn’t it all coincidence? That’s what I had always believed. Or at least for a long, long time. What she was saying was akin to religion. And there was no place for religion in my life. But as I looked at Darla Clark, listened to her words, I couldn’t help but wonder if this old cowgirl wasn’t some kind of wise woman. Strange. Yet something felt immediately right in her words. It was like the air in my lungs.
“Okay,” I said.
Darla laid a hand on my shoulder, and we sat there awhile and looked into the morning sunshine.
WE WOUND up starting our hike by walking to my cabin so I could change. Which of course meant I’d have to go back to the main building for my cart later. But hell, it wasn’t that far.
My family was quite impressed with where I was staying, and Amy looked longingly at the hot tub.
“You can come over and use it any time,” I said.
I changed clothes quickly, and then Cole led us to places we somehow hadn’t seen before. Black Bear was huge, and it was gorgeous. We started following the creek behind my cabin and wound up walking through the woods where the water joined a small river. On the other side, we could see a large open field through the trees. Like everything, it was lovely. But to get to it we had to cross a rope-and-board bridge, which swayed as we walked over it. Luckily, it wasn’t high at all, and the water looked shallow.
A moment later, we stood in front of a field ablaze with butterflies.
“Whoa” was all I could say. A large yellow-and-black-striped butterfly drifted by me before landing on a large purple thistle. It looked as big as my hand with its wings spread out.
Stunning.
“It’s a tiger swallowtail,” Cole said.
He even knows the names of the butterflies.
“And that,” he said, pointing to a large black one with blue lower wings, “is a female. Some species you can’t tell the males from the females.”
“So the yellow one is male?” I asked.
“Maybe. The males are always yellow, but the females can be either black-and-blue or yellow.”
“What about this one?” Crystal asked, and Cole moved off, presumably to identify it.
“How are you today, Neil?” Amy asked, walking up to me.
“Okay,” I replied.
“You worried me the way you ran off last night, babe.”
I turned to see her studying me with wide eyes. “I’m sorry.”
“It’s Cole, isn’t it?”
My throat closed up.
“What’s happening between you two?” she asked.
I started to protest and then saw there was no recrimination in those eyes.
“I don’t know,” I said, my voice cracking.
Amy slipped her hand into mine and squeezed. She didn’t say anything for a while. We just walked, holding hands like two kids.
“At least your burn is gone,” she finally said.
“It is?” I touched my face with my free hand.
“Did you use some of Cole’s magic burn cream?”
I shook my head. “No.”
“You’re one lucky man,” she said. “My family burns so easily, and you wake up the next day tan.”
“What can I say?”
“It is a good thing you got the hat, though. It helped protect you from burning more. Even you’d have had trouble with a burn on top of a burn.”
I nodded. Reached up and felt the hat. For some reason, it made me smile.
“It does look good on you,” she replied.
My smile turned into a grin.
“I love you, Neil.”
My stomach leapt. Love?
“I love you too, Amy. You’re my best friend.”
“Always,” she said.
“Still missing Owen?” I asked.
“Oh, yes. Constantly. Always. I always will. Mom told me that. She said it would get better, though.” She turned to me. “Does it?”
“It helps to have a best friend.”
She managed a smile, and we walked off into the morning.
AFTER LUNCH, a marksmanship tournament was scheduled. I’d never been to such a thing. During a contest for some of the more seasoned guests, there were lessons for those of us who didn’t know which end of the gun to point away from us—namely, me.
Cole was my teacher, of course.
He stood very close to me, showing me how to hold the rifle, practically putting his chin on my shoulder as he showed me how to line up the sight with my target. We were pretty much spooned together, and my face grew hot, both by his nearness and wondering what people were thinking.
“Now,” he whispered, “when you think you have it, slowly, slowly let your finger pull the trigger.”
He was using that honey voice again. He said it like sex. Like it wasn’t a gun in my hands, like my finger wasn’t on a trigger, but something else entirely.
My cock shifted in my jeans once more—damn the effect he had on me—and when I pulled that trigger I missed my target completely. Leaves in a tree high above the green bottle burst in the air.
Cole chuckled softly in my ear, but it didn’t hurt my feelings. I could tell he wasn’t laughing at me.
“First time, I hit my uncle’s car,” Cole said. “He was not amused.”
And then he repeated his careful instructions.
I so wanted to hit that damned bottle. So wanted to impress him.
Please him?
I did what he said. Lined that little piece of metal up with the V at the end of the rifle and the bottle and hoped, hoped, hoped—
“Don’t close your eyes when you fire,” he whispered and damn, if I hadn’t been about to do that. Had done it the first time.
“It’s okay,” he said, voice as soft as Mystic’s face. “Take a deep breath.”
I did.
“Hold it….”
I did.
“Line ’er up.”
Here goes nothing, I thought, and did as he said.
“And fire as soon as you’re—”
I pulled the trigger.
An instant later the bottle exploded in a shower of green glass.
I grinned foolishly. I’d done it. I couldn’t believe it! I’d hit that damned bottle.
Then in quick succession:
“You did it!” shouted my daughter.
Amy cheer
ed.
And Cole hugged me hard from behind, his hands resting for one breath on my chest.
My legs almost went out from under me.
Cole held me only long enough so I didn’t fall and then stood back. I shivered, despite the heat of the day. And even with the sun beating down hotly upon me, I could still feel his heat.
I shivered again.
“I knew you could do it,” Cole said, smiling, those almond eyes even narrower than usual. For one frozen moment in time I thought he was going to kiss me. I almost leaned in to let him.
Then I felt a slap on my shoulder, and I turned to see Crystal give a little leap. “That was awesome, Dad! We’ll turn you into a cowboy yet.”
We practiced a little bit after that. I even got a few more bottles.
But then it was time for the entertainment, and that consisted of some stunningly impressive demonstrations from some of the wranglers.
The riding corral was decorated in bright colors—banners and flags and long, wide ribbons. There were even a bunch of mannequins dressed up like jesters and clowns—close to a dozen of them—wired to the fence posts around the corral. Each held a colored, helium-filled Mylar balloon.
But we were all taken aback when Vincent, the man who said so little, did all kinds of tricks, including shooting clay pigeons fired in the air, and more impressively, wooden blocks thrown into the air by the guests.
And, of course, there was Cole.
Why was I surprised?
He shot a row of bottles and cans along a fence top with precision, not missing one, and doing it faster than I’d been able to aim and fire just once—bam! bam! bam! bambambambam!—and then snatched up a second rifle and blew the top rail off the fence post with two shots, then shattered the opposite end, and still had two rounds left. We knew that because he fired them into the air.
Then, finally, it was Darla who took us all by surprise. Just when we thought the show was over, she came riding in on the back of her horse, firing at Mylar balloons. She didn’t miss once.
I don’t think I was the only one who was stunned.
“What?” she called out to the crowd. “You think I was born an old lady?”
And the crowd went wild!
Afterward was free time. Some people went hiking, some riding, and some of the guests went off for spa treatments. I’d forgotten to make an appointment, but hey, I had my own hot tub and was quickly becoming addicted to it. I knew where I was going.
Amy and I wound up walking Darla back. Cole had taken her horse to the stables because she had work to do at the office.
“That was amazing,” I told her.
“Thank you.”
“I never get tired of it,” Amy told her. “I think you’ve gotta be the best shot on the ranch. Vincent and Cole are fantastic. But you—you should excuse the expression—blow them away.”
Darla got a good laugh at that.
“It’s my one real chance each week to do what I love. Ride and shoot.” She sighed. “I miss my wranglin’ days. I’m just not an office manager kind of girl, you know? But it’s me or nobody. People just don’t seem to understand Black Bear. I’m the only one who knows she is more than facts and figures in a ledger. More than rules and regulations. Black Bear is a lady….”
We’d reached the main hall by then, and Darla gave us a little shrug and a hopeless little half smile. “Well, daylight’s a-wasting. Too bad I can’t see it inside.”
“Sorry, Darla.”
Then she gave us a real Darla Clark smile, told us not to listen to the ramblings of an old lady, and headed inside.
“Kind of sad, isn’t it?” Amy asked. “To have all this….” She swept her arm up and around us. “To love this land like she does. And to be cooped up inside all the time.”
I didn’t know what to say. I was just finally figuring out for myself that “outside”—even with its heat and dust and bugs and maybe snakes—wasn’t something to be shunned.
I stretched and popped my back and told Amy that I was heading for my hot tub. “Join me?” I asked.
She immediately agreed.
It became one of the biggest turning points of my life.
WE TOOK the golf cart back to my cabin, and I didn’t even think about the fact we hadn’t stopped at hers.
It wasn’t until we’d gone out back to my little fenced-in backyard, after I’d snagged my ludicrous trunks, that I suddenly realized Amy didn’t have her swimsuit.
“Shit,” I said. “Well, we can zip back in just a minute and—”
“Just turn your back, why don’t you?”
I froze as she began to unbutton her blouse.
Was she…?
She pulled off her top and stood before me in her bra.
“You gonna turn around?” she asked, reaching back to undo the hooks. “You don’t have to.”
Holy shit! I thought and quickly turned on my cowboy-booted heel.
“I’m assuming you have towels?” she asked, and telling her I did, I dashed into the cabin for two of the big ones.
When I came back, she was standing in the tub, her back to me.
She hadn’t settled down yet, and I could see half of her bottom. It was the first time I’d seen a naked woman in a long time. She looked like a Greek statue. Graceful. But….
Once again, that was all it was. As much as I had wished otherwise for my whole life, all Amy’s bare body was to me was the beauty of some statue of Aphrodite or Artemis or Athena….
Lovely, like a deer or a horse or a tiger swallowtail.
But she did nothing sexual for me at all.
Was she trying to seduce me?
This could go bad fast.
She sat down with a long sigh and shifted so she was facing me. I could only see the tops of her breasts, thank goodness. Then she covered her eyes. “Your turn,” she said.
Shit, shit, shit.
What was I going to do?
“You can do it,” Amy said, sensing my nervousness even though her eyes were still closed. “I won’t look. Promise.”
I kicked off my boots, started to undo my own shirt, and realized I’d better hurry. I scrambled out of my clothes and, for the second time, stood naked to the world. This time I was not alone. I was so anxious I think my penis partially retreated into my body.
Do it! I thought, and I quickly climbed into the hot water. It was a small tub and our legs couldn’t help but touch. Damn. Damn, shit, and damn. What was she up to? What if…?
She laid her head back. “This is so nice.”
“Yes,” I mumbled.
“Thanks. I needed this.”
“You’re welcome.”
“And you’re uncomfortable,” she said without looking at me. “Don’t be. We’re friends, right?”
I nodded, then remembering she wasn’t looking, said, “Yes.”
“Yes to you’re uncomfortable or yes to we’re friends?” she asked.
I laughed. “Both, I guess.”
She sat up, her breasts rising higher. I saw a flash of areola through the bubbles. “Neil,” she said.
Crap! What was she about to ask?
“This thing between you and Cole….”
“Cole?” I said, voice cracking. Now that was not what I was expecting. Ugh. Why was she asking about him?
“Do you like him?”
My brain locked up. Like him? My heart began to race. What was she getting at? Did she know? She couldn’t know.
Why couldn’t she? She has eyes.
Amy sighed. “Oh, my sweet, dear, lovely bestest of friends.”
I literally felt like I might explode.
She leaned forward, pushing her breasts beneath the churning water, and reached out and stroked my temple. “What’s going on in here?”
“I… I…. What do you mean?” I don’t know how I even got those words out.
“What is it about you and the whole gay thing?”
“What do you mean?” My mouth was so dry I could hardly talk.
>
“So uncomfortable. I remember you quit a job because you had a gay supervisor. It always confused Em and me.”
The gay supervisor. The one who had basically let me know that he was looking to promote someone. That he was trying to decide between two people. Me and one other guy. And he told me that while he was standing next to me at the urinals. He told me and he stared at my penis. He stepped back and showed me his.
Yes.
I had quit.
“You two talked about that?” I said, amazed.
And disturbed.
“Of course we did. She wondered why you quit just because you had a gay boss.”
I shook. “It wasn’t ‘just’ because he was gay.” And then I told her. Told her all about it. And how for a moment—one that seemed eternal—the man had actually tempted me.
“She’d wondered if you’d had an affair with him.”
“What!” I cried.
“She thought maybe you’d been with him and then got to feeling guilty or something.”
“She told you that?” I was stunned. Stunned that she thought I would cheat on her. Stunned that she’d told Amy.
“Yes,” Amy said.
“Why?” Why would my wife and her sister talk about such things?
“Em wanted to talk to you about it. Had wanted to for a while after it happened, when you were settled in your new job. She’d made up her mind, actually. She was finally going to confront you. But then….”
There was no reason for Amy to finish her sentence. Emily had died.
The pain came back. The missing her came back.
I swallowed hard.
Amy looked deep into my eyes. “She knew, Neil.”
“Knew what?” I squeaked out.
“That you’re gay.”
There was nothing Amy could have said that would have stunned me more. I jolted. My whole body went rigid. Sound amplified. The bubbles sounded like a churning flood. The chirping birds echoed in my head. I quite suddenly wanted to cry. The tears were filling my eyes. “Why… why would you think I’m…?” My mouth stopped working. I couldn’t say the word. “Why would you think that?”
Amy leaned back and her breasts rose from the water, fully exposed.
Quickly, I looked away. “Amy!” She had completely shocked me. She was naked. Well, of course she was naked, but…. But she was my friend. My wife’s sister. She was….