16. 16
16
Honey
M y blood was still boiling when I jumped down from the saddle and hitched Misty to the rail outside the barn. I could see she was antsy, forcing me to rein in my emotions which always seemed to skyrocket astronomically around Colton. Misty was the definition of a horse being a mirror to the human soul. It was why Colton had gifted her to me with a bow made of pink and blue bailing twine wrapped around her neck. ‘Too kind to be a stockman’s horse,’ is what he’d said when he’d passed the lead rope to my bewildered self. I looked past the barn and to the paddocks where his bobbing figure would rise over the crest before disappearing again.
‘Hey.’
I whipped around at the sound of Beau’s voice, feeling my body burn with the shame of being caught red-handed. Sure, I was only watching a cowboy ride, but Beau would see it as me watching his brother instead of him. I tucked my hands into my back pockets as I made my way over to him. He was lunging a horse in the round yard, making me wish it was the right time to snap pictures of the dust moving across the morning sunlight. I climbed up onto the rails and sat at the top, staying silent as I watched Beau push the horse around.
I knew what was coming next, but it never ceased to be magical.
‘Whoa,’ said Beau in a low and calm tone.
The horse stopped dead, its tongue licking its lips and one ear turned in to Beau. Soon, I was no longer looking at Beau, but a younger Colton. The horse wasn’t a buckskin but a paint. I was wearing a battered peak cap, a shirt two sizes too big, daggy shorts and sneakers with holes in the toes. It’d been my first visit to the Double Q Ranch. Granny had insisted I make friends with the boys next door.
‘See how he’s licking his tongue? He’s learning. And his ear is towards me all the time, meaning he’s paying attention to every move I make. Now he’s gotta face up.’
As if on cue, the horse had craned its neck to face Colton without moving from its spot. The belt buckle, which had been too big for his little hips, had twisted with each step he’d taken towards the horse. He patted the horse, down its face and its shoulder. When he moved away, the horse was his permanent shadow as they walked around the round yard. I’d felt a glow inside me then, at how moving it’d been to witness a connection between human and horse.
I watched now, with that glow still inside of me, as Beau stopped walking around the yard and gave the horse a pat. He made his way over to me, the buckskin in tow.
Beau’s jaw ticked slightly and I sensed another of our arguments hurtling towards us like a road train. ‘Why did you leave so early?’
I frowned. ‘I didn’t want there to be any awkwardness.’
‘Who cares if it makes Colton awkward? I’ve never known someone to protect their ex so much.’ Beau fiddled with the hat on his head, then the halter on the horse.
‘It was so I didn’t feel awkward.’ I could feel my defences rising.
‘If you really didn’t feel anything for him then it wouldn’t be awkward being around him anymore, would it?’ Beau’s eyes were sharp, waiting to catch my lies. ‘Did something happen on the drive home?’
I flinched. ‘What?’
Beau shook his head and moved away to the centre of the yard again, pushing the horse into circles around the perimeter.
I pinched my eyes shut, sighing tiredly. ‘You know it’s not simple, Beau. He’s your brother. There’s so much history between Colton and I—’
‘I’ve heard it all before,’ he called bitterly. He stopped moving, as did the horse, looking at the ground with his hands on his hips. I knew beneath the brim of his hat his face would be in pain. ‘Tell me straight. Do you still have feelings for him?’
He sent the horse running again and I could sense he was breaking his rule of working horses angry.
I waited for the puffing horse to pass me before dropping into the yard and marching towards Beau. ‘We have history. We can’t just … erase that!’
He gave a bitter bark. ‘That’s not what I asked.’
I threw my hands up in the air. ‘How many times do I have to say this, Beau? You’re my future—he’s my past !’
‘Oh yeah?’ Beau brought the horse to a halt and faced me. ‘So you’re telling me there’s no secrets between us? None at all?’
I baulked. ‘There is something … but I can’t tell you. Just not yet.’
‘ What? ’
‘Beau, please.’ The tears I’d managed to hold with Colton were now trickling. I wasn’t sure if it was purely caused by my painful secret being revealed or the exhaustion of this never-ending argument between us.
He closed his eyes. ‘It involves him, doesn’t it?’
The tears were flowing fast now. ‘Yes, but it’s not what you think and it’s complicated. So, so complicated.’
‘So when are you going to tell me this secret? When we’re at the altar about to be married? I suppose for that to happen you’d actually have to say yes to marrying me.’
I flinched, finding myself backing up a step. The Beau I’d started dating had been soft and gentle and loving. But the cowboy before me was bitter and hard and angry. Hurt. I’d done this to him.
‘I’m constantly fighting a fucking ghost,’ muttered Beau.
The tears travelled down my neck as I watched him clip the lead onto the horse’s halter and stalk from the round yard, the gate clanging at his exit. I wasn’t the type of person for fights. I would rather suffer in silence than stand up for myself against a bully. I knew I shouldn’t keep fighting Beau. But Colton brought out a fiery side of me. A side of me I hadn’t known until he came into my life. A side I wish I’d had when I was a young and scared little girl, so I could scream to my parents about how much I hated them. For traumatising me, for not loving me the way parents should.
Clenching my hands, I marched after him, coming to a stop when he entered the barn ahead. ‘It’s not my fault you’re insecure, Beau!’
The anger evaporated from my body as soon as the words left my mouth. In some ways it was a relief to finally scream the words I’d been wanting to say for so long. But now they were out there and in the open, there was no taking them back. Beau stopped walking. His shoulders slumped. I closed my eyes, knowing I should’ve kept my stinging words to myself. When I reopened them, his silhouette next to the horse was still unmoving in the barn aisle. I waited for him to round on me, to stab a finger into my chest and scold me for stooping so low. God, I wish he would. But he only kept walking away, eventually putting the horse in its stall and disappearing into the feed shed.
I knew I should go after him, but I was exhausted, and nothing good would come out of it. We would keep arguing our frustrations until it was too far gone. Too damaged to be fixed. Even though I knew we’d surpassed that point long ago, and I couldn’t even put the blame on Colton’s return. I began walking over to Misty, feeling like my heart was being dragged through the dirt on a chain behind me. There was movement by the kitchen window, the swaying curtain evidence that Clyde had witnessed yet another of our arguments. With trembling fingers and blurry vision, I managed to buckle Misty’s bridle back on and swung up into the saddle before tearing through the laneway of yards towards the big paddocks that would take me home.