Chapter 9 Winnie
WINNIE
Jonah is a very good guitar player. I’ve messed around on a guitar enough to know that what he’s doing is very difficult.
His fingers move deftly across the strings, switching between complex chords with ease.
What he’s playing is a bit folksy and a bit bluesy, with a touch of jazz, and it has me bouncing my knee in time.
And then he opens his mouth to sing. And I realize that while Jonah might be a good guitar player, he’s a phenomenal singer.
He’s got the type of raspy bass that most country singers would kill for but never quite achieve, and he hits every note easily.
I’m so intent on studying his voice that I forget, at first, to pay attention to the words of the song he’s singing.
Once I do, I realize that it’s an original.
And it’s sad, without being maudlin or melodramatic.
The lyrics are simple and straight to the point, but they’re beautiful.
He’s singing about searching for something and being afraid of whatever it is he might find, of knowing something is wrong and wanting to find a cure, of uncovering secrets he wished didn’t exist.
And through the gravel of his voice, I can also hear his pain.
It touches something deep inside of me—to see someone be this vulnerable in front of a room full of people.
It’s so different from my own experience of being on stage.
Of smiling and waving in an evening gown, singing a song my mother selected for a panel of judges, and then strutting around in athletic wear and pretending I’m a good dancer.
That’s all pageants became for me—me, up there on stage, just pretending.
Jonah is putting his whole heart on the line right now. He’s not hiding who he is and he’s not afraid of letting anyone see that person, either. Somehow, it makes me feel small.
I push my seat out and stand up, suddenly desperate to leave and to get some air.
“Are you okay?” Candice asks over the music.
“Yeah, I’m fine, just going to get some air and pee.”
I head off in the direction of the back door, elbowing my way through the thick crowd, and am hit with a wave of frigid air when I exit.
Standing out in the cold with nothing but my flimsy silk top on, I suddenly feel silly and vulnerable.
First I cry over Jewel’s beautiful voice, and now I’m hiding outside because listening to Jonah of all people is making me too emotional.
At least I’m alone out here, except for one parked car across the street.
No one will see how rattled I actually am.
Sure, I love music and it tends to make me emotional when it’s really good.
But it’s more than that. I’m jealous, I realize.
Jealous of Jewel and of Jonah, for being able to do the thing they love with so few consequences.
I could get up there and sing, too, but what if a video got posted online?
What if my parents saw it or someone sent it to them?
What if they showed up here in Star Mountain?
What if I was forced to see them in person?
If they were here, in front of me, begging me to go back to them, would I be strong enough to say no?
It’s not that I want to, but when you’ve been controlled your entire life it’s difficult to know how to live without it.
In all honesty, I’m not sure how they’ll survive without me.
My social media income funds their entire lives—neither of them have jobs.
I left like a coward. Without telling them first, without confronting them about their years of control, about their financial abuse. I was there one day, and gone the next. I disappeared like a ghost from my own life.
And now that I’m trying to make a new one for myself, my past is still haunting me, reminding me that I won’t ever really be free.
Sadly for me, it turns out that even if the entire barn crew goes out on Thursday evening and gets drunk off their asses on spicy margaritas, they still have to be up early the next morning.
No one is as hungover as I am, though. Jenny seems downright perky, and is currently playing with her daughter Lila in the snow.
Candice is ploughing through paperwork in the office with a thermos of coffee, and Nathan is working with his new reining horse.
My head is pounding and I’ve only been able to have electrolytes mixed with water since I woke up.
Just the thought of food makes me nauseous.
I’m a light weight, and even when I was at college, I lived with my parents and didn’t go out very much.
I never had the chance to build up a tolerance and I can count the number of times I’ve been drunk on one hand.
One time, after a particularly bad fight with my mom, I grabbed some of the fancy white wine she drinks and had the whole bottle to myself.
I drank it while sitting on the floor of my walk in closet, with nothing but my clothes for company.
I felt like death the next morning—just like I do right now.
Currently, I’m mucking out Rosie’s stall while she hangs out in her paddock outside.
Frankly, I’m not very good at mucking. While Tomás is able to rake and separate the poop from the shavings like a wizard, I’m very slow going.
It takes me twice as long to do one stall as him.
And by far the worst part about mucking is hauling the wheel barrow outside in the freezing cold to dump everything out.
I did spin and hot yoga back in Birmingham, but I was mostly focused on staying slim.
I have some muscles, but not the kind used for wheeling poop around I guess.
After I finish mucking, I lay down some new shavings for Rosie, and go outside to grab her. She’s got an appointment with Jonah for new shoes in about twenty minutes, and God knows it will take me at least that long to catch her.
As soon as I enter the paddock, she stops munching her hay and bolts in the other direction. I walk towards her slowly, just like Candice taught me to, but she still trots away, head held high.
“Rosie,” I call out, “come here, sugar.” Unfortunately, she doesn’t seem to give a rat’s ass about me asking nicely, and trots in circles around me, and then zig zags over to the corner.
I approach her again, and she darts out of the corner she’s in, easily evading me.
I try again, and the same thing happens, but this time, she kicks snow up behind her and it hits me square in the face.
The mixture of snow and dirt drips off of me, and I wipe it off with one hand, spitting some of it out of my mouth as I do.
“Fucking perfect,” I mutter, letting the curse fall from my lips without thinking about it too much.
Deep, masculine laughter sounds from behind me, and I whirl to find Jonah standing by the fence. He’s wearing a deep green work coat that fits his muscular frame perfectly, and his hair and beard are both neatly styled. He looks far too good for someone who was out late last night drinking.
“What’s so funny?” I stalk over to the fence and leave Rosie be for a moment.
“I could watch you try and catch that horse all day long. I haven’t laughed that hard in a while,” he says, his voice still full of mirth.
“You try having snow kicked up at your head.” I have half a mind to grab a handful and throw it at him. But Jonah and I aren’t like that—we don’t joke around, not like I might with Tomás or Candice.
“I’ve been working with horses since I was a teenager, I’ve had plenty of snow and dirt kicked up at me. And worse.”
“You’ve been a farrier for that long?” I ask.
He shakes his head. “I worked at one of the local ranches as a cowboy for years, and that’s where I got interested in being a farrier. I apprenticed with an older local farrier when I was twenty-one.”
“I see. Makes sense.”
“What about you?” he asks. “How’d you start doing pageants?”
“Oh,” I say quietly. “I, uh, I was a kid and I wanted to be on stage. I loved performing, and enjoyed the attention. Plus the clothes and hair and makeup were really exciting when I was ten.” It’s only half of the story, and the good part of it at that.
It’s what people expect to hear, too. What a silly, foolish girl, starting pageants because she liked the clothes.
It keeps them from asking further questions.
Jonah lets out a whistle. “Ten? Your parents let you do that when you were that young?”
Strangely, he doesn’t sound like he’s judging me, but like he’s wary of my parents instead.
It’s not the reaction I usually get, and it warms my heart enough that I say, “Yeah, they didn’t really pay that much attention to what I did, and it was my idea.
I begged them, and they eventually relented. ”
“Is it healthy for a little kid to be performing like that? I mean all dressed up, in makeup and stuff?” he asks, concern growing in his voice.
“No, probably not,” I say honestly. “But I turned out no worse for the wear.”
I’ve probably never told a bigger lie, but that’s part of the job of a pageant queen: smile and lie through your teeth. And never, under any circumstances, admit how much beauty hurts.
“You still look like a pageant queen, you know. Even standing there covered in snow and dirt.”
“I don’t know if that’s a compliment or an insult.”
“It’s a compliment. You always look elegant. It’s obvious you’ve spent a lot of time on stage,” Jonah responds, giving me a small smile.
Such kind words from such a grumpy man make my heart beat a little faster, and my cheeks warm despite the cold. Jonah thinks I’m elegant. I didn’t know he had it in him to compliment me or to do it so well. Most guys tell me I’m pretty or hot—no one has ever said that I’m elegant before.
“Thanks, sugar,” I say.
The moment hangs between us, quiet and soft, like freshly fallen snow. Jonah finally breaks the tension by saying, “Here,” and sticking out his hand over the fence. “Treats will get Rosie to come to you. I always have some in my pocket.”