3. 3
3
Colton
I t’d been seven years since I’d been back to Gumtree Valley but I still remembered every curve in the road to swerve for and what tree signalled how much further ‘til home. Maybe it was because nothing out here changed. The four-wheel drive I’d hired kicked up billowing clouds of dust when I turned off the bitumen and onto the gravel road. The town of Gumtree Valley was another ten kilometres along the bitumen. But I wouldn’t be going there. It was too risky. Beau and Dad needed my help around the farm, so within Double Q Ranch’s boundary was where I would stay for the next month. No one would know I was back and no one would know when I left again.
Like a magician. Poof! Where did he go?
Even if Beau and Dad needed me around longer than a month—I couldn’t. Glenn, although understanding, had been pissed when I told him I had to return home immediately. He was the one to explain to my sponsors that I’d be out of the circuit right before the finals. He wasn’t the only one stressing about how I would clamber back up the rankings to finish in the top five for the ultimate showdown in Vegas. The gossip pages of social media were already speculating the reason behind my sudden departure. I couldn’t help but chuckle to myself, thinking of the ludicrous theories the gossip mongers of the bull riding world had conjured up. A sudden stint in rehab for alcoholism, an old injury I’d been masking for months finally crippling me, the need to step back from the spotlight due to mental health reasons. Apparently, family reasons, as my PR team had announced, just wasn’t convincing enough.
I gripped the steering wheel tighter when Appleyard Farm’s entrance flashed by on the right. Misty, the Appaloosa mare I’d broken and trained, stood under the shade of a large gumtree by the fence. Her head was drooped and her tail swished at flies lazily. It reminded me of when the school bus would drop Honey off at home and she would vault onto the mare bareback to ride down to the house.
I glided the car down through two bends and over the bridge, which still rattled, before accelerating up a small rise. Soon enough the entrance to Double Q Ranch was on my right, its impressive gates of laser cut metal to make the silhouettes of galloping horses swaying open when the car passed the sensor. A tightness filled my chest as I rolled down the driveway. Young horses, kept in the white fence paddocks, pricked their ears at the new vehicle before galloping over and racing me. The front paddocks were left behind as I approached the homestead of a barn, enclosed arena, round yard and machinery shed, which housed equipment for hay making. The large house wasn’t far away, surrounded by a rectangle of manicured lawn. Easy to maintain. There’d once been sprawling gardens but they’d died with Mum years ago.
The tightness in my chest showed no sign of easing when I parked in the carport next to Dad’s old ute. The dogs barked from where Beau had said he’d hurriedly thrown them into the kennel. They were due back from the hospital tomorrow. Until then, I would try to keep my mind busy from the impending reunion with work. After a seventeen hour flight from Dallas and then a two hour drive from the airport, I was exhausted, but I knew I wouldn’t sleep.
I’d texted Beau before I’d started the drive from the airport asking if there were any jobs I could get a start on for him. I figured there was no harm in trying to butter up the older brother to make the family reunion a little less frosty. When I checked my phone, there was a new message.
Beau: The buckskin in the round yard needs some miles under the saddle.
With my bag, now full of clothes rather than riding gear, I made my way to the house. The key remained where it’d always been, in the old boot by the door. The house was hot inside with the lack of air flow. The open blinds weren’t helping, allowing the already warming sun to belt inside, and I set to work in pulling them down. Flies buzzed around the dirty dishes in the sink. Work shirts and jeans spewed from the baskets in the laundry.
I didn’t have to text Beau after all.
I threw my bag into my old bedroom, which was still decorated with trophies and ribbons won at horse events throughout my youth, only pausing to pick up the dusty frame of a photograph on the dresser. It was one of Beau, my dad and I at the Gumtree Valley rodeo, sitting aboard our horses lined up next to each other. Dad was serious and frowning. Beau, who’d only just started high school at the time, was smiling shyly under his huge hat. I was pouting, most likely growing annoyed by Mum taking photos. We didn’t have a lot of photos of Mum, thanks to her always being the one behind the lens. The only decent photo we’d been able to find of her for the funeral was a much younger version of herself riding a horse behind a mob of cattle on her family’s cattle station. In the saddle was where she’d been happiest.
I left my bedroom behind, leaving the air conditioner to cool the house as I made my way back outside. The dogs, two cattle dogs and two kelpies, barked at me with stiff tails when I reached their kennels.
‘It’s alright. It’s just me—the estranged brother and son who abandoned everyone.’ The dogs’ ears pricked; their heads cocked. ‘Now I’m going to let you all out. Just don’t eat me, okay?’
My body tensed when all four dogs charged out, barking like mad. A tennis ball sat nearby and I quickly scooped it up, breathing a breath of relief when the dogs chased after it across the lawn. After a few throws, I was their new best friend. They even trailed after me towards the stables.
I didn’t have to search for a bridle and saddle for long, because nothing had altered in the tack room of the barn. If I believed in hocus pocus bullshit, I would think that some sort of spell had been put on Gumtree Valley. One which kept it frozen in time, with the townspeople and farmers living the same lives each day. It was the sleepy and repetitive lifestyle I hadn’t been able to run away from quick enough. After living life on the road chasing titles and shining buckles though, I found the familiarity … nice. No matter how crazy my life got, home would always be sitting here unchanged.
I never pined for my home.
It was unsettling.
The buckskin in the round yard was a sweet-faced filly who watched me with curious eyes and pricked ears as I slung the tack onto the rails. I made myself known to her, speaking to her in a low voice while rubbing my hands all over her body, before grabbing a rope halter hanging on the gate and tying it around her head. Every now and then as I saddled her up, a tennis ball would roll into my boot and since I didn’t want the pack of dogs to turn on me, I flung it back over the fence for them to chase. Thankfully, as I finished saddling up the filly, and the ball began resembling a scotch egg with the amount of slobber and sand caking it, the dogs decided I’d won them over and retreated to sleep away the heat in the shade.
It was when I rode the filly out into the open spaces of the paddocks that I wished I clarified with Beau just how many miles she’d had put into her. When my legs squeezed around her sides to transition into a canter, it was as if I’d changed my profession back to bronc riding. I kicked her sides and fought control for her head with the reins as she bucked like no tomorrow. I could hear my dad’s voice in my head, his eyes watching underneath the brim of his hat with his burly arms draped over the railing of the round yard.
‘Ride ‘er, son! Gotta make them bad moments uncomfortable so they prefer the good ones!’
After a few more humpy moments, the filly quickly worked out we got along better when she behaved, allowing us to tear across the paddocks smoothly. I eased her back to a trot as we reached the peak of a hill.
‘That’s a good girl.’ Her neck was hot when I gave a gentle pat, running my hands smoothly all over her.
The view below was one which hadn’t really changed in the years I’d been gone. The Beauregard house, two-storey and white, still sat amongst paddocks of orchards. Was Granny Beauregard still making her famous jams? The farm once had beef cattle grazing, but when Poppy Beauregard had passed some years ago, the cows had been sold and the property converted to small orchards. Clothes flapped away on a Hills Hoist in the backyard. Misty had moved away from the shade, now grazing in her paddock before the day warmed more. It was this spot that Honey and I used to meet in the cover of night with our horses tied to the branches of a nearby tree while we’d be on a picnic blanket doing everything our guardians tried to prevent.
I’d known Honey almost my entire life, since Ellie-May had brought the shy and timid new girl over to our small group of friends. All I’d known about Honey McBride was that she was from a bad place. Something had happened for her to come and live with her grandparents. It wasn’t until we were older that we understood the depth of the reasons why she’d come to Appleyard Farm.
As much as I wished those things hadn’t happened to Honey, I was glad our paths had crossed. If she hadn’t come, Ellie-May would never have introduced us to a timid girl with knots of blonde hair and a bony body beneath her uniform. I wouldn’t have grown the biggest crush on her at the age of thirteen. I wouldn’t have asked her out at fifteen. I wouldn’t have proposed to her at nineteen.
But I also wouldn’t have broken her heart.
***
It was the dogs who alerted me to the moment I’d been anxious about overnight. I shuffled towards the front door, realising that no matter how slow I moved, it wouldn’t delay the vehicle I could hear coming down the driveway outside. The hot air gripped my body as I stepped onto the front porch, joining the collection of dogs. Only, if I had a tail, it wouldn’t be wagging madly like theirs. My invisible tail was tucked firmly between my legs.
Beau’s LandCruiser came to an idling halt in the carport alongside our dad’s and my hire car. The cutting of the engine was like a pistol commencing a running race. I sucked in a sharp breath, taking the stairs like they were made of glass behind the barrelling dogs. Beau’s tall and broad frame folded out from the driver’s side first. I didn’t miss the look of resentment he gave me when I neared the ute. The passenger side door popped open next and without the tinted windscreen to shield him, I fought not to flinch at the sight of our dad.
I grabbed the door, opening it wider, while Beau helped him down from the vehicle by holding his only good arm. Clyde Hayes had always been a strong and powerful man. Always freakishly handsome, as my parents’ wedding photos proved. I knew Dad would’ve aged significantly in the years I’d been away—a lot could happen in seven years—but I now struggled to recognise the man who’d raised us. His arm was wrapped in a medical sling and his free hand used a walking stick, which Beau had got from the tray. His legs, permanently bent from years in the saddle, seemed to buckle more. His hair, once dark like Beau’s and mine, had turned completely grey and brushed the collar of his shirt rather than being clipped neatly. A beard had sprouted on his face. For my entire life, he’d remained clean shaven.
Light blue eyes, usually intense and observing like his sons too, but now tired and sunken, caught me. ‘Colton. Good to see you home, boy.’
‘It’s good to see you too, Dad.’ I shooed the dogs out of his path while Beau got the duffel bags from the tray. ‘I wish it was under better circumstances.’
He gave a grunt. ‘It would only take me almost dying for you to finally come home.’
Ouch.
I looked to Beau, following us with bags draped over his shoulders, but he only gave a silent shrug. I turned my attention back to our dad, who was struggling to haul his weight onto his walking cane while tackling the stairs. The dogs were at the top, wearing wide grins and tails wagging as if they were his own cheerleaders.
‘Here, Dad, I can carry—’
‘My youngest son is not carrying me up the stairs to my own home like some newly married bride!’ Dad’s face was a worrying red, a mixture of anger and exhaustion. ‘I’ve had horses do worse to me!’
‘You were younger back then, Dad,’ I said cautiously.
I waited for a scathing remark, but instead he only gave a grunt and stumbled his way up the stairs. Stubborn old bastard.
‘Now you see why we were asked to leave?’ muttered Beau, tossing the duffel bags into the foyer after Dad had gone inside.
‘I didn’t think you could be asked to leave a hospital .’ I looked to my brother, hoping his grin would match mine, but he only gave a stony glare.
‘I’ve got work to do. You can have the pleasure of babysitting him now.’
Without another word, Beau abandoned me on the porch. I scooped up the duffel bags, sighing tiredly as I kicked the door shut against the heat and flies. It was no heartfelt family reunion, but it could’ve been worse. No punches had been thrown, for one, but there was still plenty of time for that yet.
***
The ceiling fan whirred above me, pushing the cooled air around the open living area as I rested in the recliner chair. A half-drunk beer rested in my hand and the V8 Supercars whizzed around on the TV screen. Beau was out completing whatever made-up jobs he’d created. I’d made the place immaculate in preparation for their arrival; fences had been checked, tack cleaned and gleaming, sheds swept, stalls cleaned out.
Frustration built inside of me.
Here I was sitting on my arse waiting for my dad to shout down the hallway when I should’ve been on the other side of the globe, continuing to rack up points and please my sponsors. Truthfully, I didn’t even need to be here. Thanks to the strong painkillers he was on, Dad had mostly slept since arriving home a few days ago.
Bloody Beau. Why had he asked me to come home? What game was he playing at? A kid looking for some cash could’ve done the horse feeding while he looked after Dad. Did Honey even know I was back in town? Was she going to come over for dinner one night, where she and I would try to ignore the history between us clouding the room, while Beau watched on, pretending I hadn’t got her first? I doubted it. Beau wouldn’t want me being around Honey any more than I wanted to be here. I knew why I’d been assigned to babysitting duty. It wasn’t just because Beau needed a break from Dad, but because I was a dirty little secret. Which made me ask the same question again, what the hell was Beau playing at?
‘Colton!’
I looked at the grandfather clock ticking away in the room. It was only the middle of the day. ‘Go back to sleep!’
‘Come here !’
I sighed, downed the rest of my beer and kicked in the footrest of the recliner. Photographs of the horses we’d bred and sold over the years decorated the walls of the hallways I moved along. Dad’s bedroom door was open, the ceiling fan whirring and the blinds down to let in only a sliver of light. I leant on the doorframe and folded my arms across my chest to look at him propped up in bed. Reading glasses were perched on the edge of his nose. Horse magazines and newspapers were tossed on the bedspread around him.
‘What’s goin’ on, Dad?’
‘I’m bored,’ he grumbled, ripping his glasses from his face and tossing them with the magazines.
I rolled my eyes, moving into the room. ‘That makes two of us. Try to do some of your exercises.’
‘I have.’
‘I’ll get you set up in the lounge room and you can watch some TV.’
‘Nuh.’
I held back a groan. ‘What do you want me to do then?’
‘Be happy to be home with your family for a start.’ Dad glared, blue penetrating blue.
‘I am happy to be home, Dad.’ I forced my tone to remain measured. ‘It’s just not great timing with the season.’
As soon as the words left my mouth, I knew they were the wrong ones to say.
Dad gave a harrumph. ‘Well, I’m sorry my accident is an inconvenience to you .’
‘Sorry, Dad, that’s not what—’
‘A book,’ he snapped.
My brow knitted. ‘What?’
‘I want a book to read.’
‘Oh, right.’
I moved over to the bookshelf in the corner of the bedroom. My mum’s romance novels and gardening textbooks sat on the first two shelves—dusty and untouched. She’d been an avid reader when she had the time between helping Dad with horses, keeping the house liveable and raising two boys. I always thought she and Honey would’ve got along like a house on fire with their shared love of anything literature.
It was a shame they’d never gotten the chance to meet.
Mum had died when I was five and Beau seven. Dad had found her on the kitchen floor while we’d been at school. Brain aneurism. No symptoms, no warning signs. She’d sent us off for our day with peanut butter sandwiches and a kiss to the cheek. When Granny Beauregard had come to pick us up from school, Beau and I knew something was amiss. We’d stayed the night with her and Poppy Beauregard. They’d played board games with us, took us out to see the cows. But it hadn’t been enough to distract us from missing our parents. Dad had come over the following morning.
‘Your mum got sick, boys.’ He’d crouched in front of us, wrapping us in his burly arms like he could protect us from the world. ‘Mum is in heaven now.’
I forced the painful memories away and bent down to the lower shelves, ignoring the way my body cracked as I did so. I skimmed the spines of my dad’s non-fiction books, picking Great Working Horse Stories by Angela Goode. Beau and I had given it to him for his fiftieth birthday a little over seven years ago. It’d been the last one I’d been a part of before jetting off to the States.
‘Nah, I want a new one.’
I shoved the book back onto the shelf. ‘You’re killing me, Dad.’
He gave a grunt. ‘ You’re killing me , more like.’
I gritted my teeth. ‘You know I can’t go into town.’
‘Why? Worried you’ll have too many autographs to sign?’ Dad narrowed his eyes. ‘I don’t understand you, Colton. It’s like you’re ashamed of this place but you loved growing up here. Gumtree Valley is a nice town full of people who are proud as punch to have you as their homegrown celebrity. Is this seriously all about Honey?’
My nostrils flared with my grinding jaw. ‘No.’
Dad gave a scoff. ‘She’s dating your brother now. You gonna stay away forever?’
‘Who says they’re going to be together forever?’ There was a bitterness to my tone, like acid rising up my throat.
‘He loves her.’
‘Yeah? Why doesn’t he marry her then?’
I became fascinated with the dark carpet, hating the way my stupid heart clenched at the thought of her with someone else, let alone my brother, after seven years. I was the one who left. I had no right to feel like this. But I did, and I didn’t know how in the fuck I would ever shake it.
‘That’s the plan.’
My head snapped up, my eyes bulging from their sockets. ‘ What? ’
There was a spark in my dad’s eye, as if he was satisfied with my response. Beau was going to propose to Honey. Or had he already popped the question? My brother hadn’t told me, although we only spoke about what he’d gotten up to outside while I’d been locked inside with Dad. Was he really keeping their engagement a secret just to spare my feelings? I’d have thought he’d be rubbing it in my face, kicking up his Ariat boots with glee chanting, ‘I got the girl!’ My brain scrambled like a detective tying string to pins.
‘You gonna go and get me a new book or what, boy?’ My dad’s gruff tone broke me from my tumbling thoughts.
‘Wait, so are they engaged?’
‘That’s your brother’s business, and after seven years of being away, you sure as hell don’t get to snoop to me about it. Now go and get my bloody book before I tear off my other arm from boredom!’
I managed to shuffle out of the room, my brain and heart still twisting over the news of the possible engagement. They’d only been together for a year. I didn’t think they were that serious. But what would I know? I was only going off Beau’s extremely rare Instagram posts of them together and my brother was even more private online than in reality. Beau was nearing thirty and I knew he craved to run the ranch with a wife and kids. Although we’d been young, Honey had talked of wanting kids when she was older—much, much older to be exact. That was so long ago, she would now be at the age most people wanted kids. My insides mangled until it felt like there was a massive knot inside of me.
‘Don’t forget your pen for all those autographs!’ My dad shouted down the hallway, followed by his wheezing laugh.
I spotted the keys to my old ute, knowing it was kept immaculate in the shed, and snatched them from the hook. I yanked a trucker cap onto my head. Book? I’ll buy him a book. A step-by-step on how not to be such an arsehole.