Chapter 28
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Delilah
Truett
Delilah Jean Ridgefield, we’re going on a date tonight.
Me
Who are you to middle name me, my mother?
Truett
Not your mother. But you can call me Daddy if that’s something you’re into?
Me
That is especially gross when I’m sitting right next to my ACTUAL father.
Truett
…so that’s a no on Daddy. *crosses off list*
Me
What else is on the list?
Truett
You’ll see ;) Pick you up at 6. Already paid Roberta to stay late!
I feel like I’m seventeen again.
Nerves bubble in my chest. Clog up my throat. I’m hyper-analyzing myself in the mirror, checking for flaws in makeup that took me too long to make this little a difference. I scan my hazel eyes and mousy hair, trying to understand what it is Truett claims is there. But I don’t. And right now I’d much rather strip the too-tight jeans and slim-fitting crop top I’m wearing off and meet him outside in cutoffs and a loose tee.
I’m highly considering it when Dad raps twice on my cracked-open door and pushes inside. He finds me at my vanity and smiles. “You look beautiful, sweet pea.”
Those nerves unfurl, leaving something glimmering and soft in their wake.
“Thank you.” I tilt my head, scanning him. He looks good. Vibrant. He had a music lesson earlier, and that always makes him feel better. I hate the idea of missing even a few hours with him when he’s like this, so fully himself. It’s getting rarer and rarer lately. Especially since the graveyard incident. “You sure you’re okay hanging with Roberta tonight?”
“Absolutely! You need to go out and have some fun. Hanging with your old man all the time isn’t good for you.” He glances around the room. When he notices the pile of discarded clothes in the corner, he chuckles. “Is that the ‘no’ pile?”
“Ugh, yes.” I purse my lips, eyeing the black cowl-neck tank on top of the stack that my crop top just barely edged out. “Should I have picked that black one instead?”
Dad shakes his head, still smiling at the pile of clothes. “You look perfect. And he’ll have me to contend with if he says otherwise.”
The idea of my sweet, loving father being someone to contend with is laughable. Especially when he loves Truett arguably more than he loves me. Even so, my chest grows impossibly tight. “I love you, Dad. You know that, right?”
His gaze flicks to mine, blue eyes now glossy. The blades of my ceiling fan dance in their reflection. “I know. And I have no clue what I did in this life to deserve it.”
Tears pool along my lash line. I blink them back, clearing my view of him. It feels like we’re really seeing each other for the first time in weeks. Perhaps in years. I don’t want to let the moment go. Lately I see so much of him in me. And the more Mom shows her true colors, the closer I look at my feelings for Truett… It’s getting hard to feel justified in blaming my dad for everything that’s happened in our family. At least entirely.
And I want his forgiveness, I realize, for ever blaming him in the first place. But I don’t know how to ask for it in light of everything. So I ask for what I can.
“Just don’t forget it, okay?” I whisper the words, afraid they’ll upset him. But it feels impossible not to say them. I’m not sure who it is I’m pleading with, if it’s him or the universe itself. All I know is that this disease is so cruel. It’s taking something so precious from me. From my dad. I just want him to have this one thing. The knowledge that he is loved.
Maybe it’ll outlast the knowledge that I left. That I stayed away for so long.
“Never.” He chokes on the word. We both know it isn’t up to him. But I am my father’s daughter, and I’ll pretend for as long as he will.
The growl of an engine shatters the fragile moment. I tap my phone, noting the time. “He’s early. ”
“He’s excited.” Dad smirks. “As he should be. He’s been waiting since the two of you were kids.”
“Did everyone know that except for me?”
He shrugs. “Pretty much.”
I rise, grab my purse off the bed, and perch on my tiptoes to place a kiss on Dad’s stubbled cheek. It strikes me that we never got this experience. I wasn’t dating in high school—I was too caught up on Truett to see anyone else—and then I moved away. We’re doing things over, all of us, and I’m filled with gratitude that I get this chance before it’s too late.
“Love you. Don’t wait up.”
“Make good choices.” He winks, but the way he clears his throat cuts through the playfulness. He’s as sentimental as I am, and I know this moment means something to him.
“Always do.”
“That you do.” He chuckles as he steps to the side and sweeps his arm out, offering me the right of way. “Definitely didn’t get that from me.”
What did I get? I wonder. Besides a propensity for people-pleasing and an unhealthy obsession with a Parker.
That’s when it hits me: I’m going on a date with Truett Parker. How in a million years?
“Have fun tonight! And tell that boy to be a gentleman!” Dad calls.
“Or not to be,” Roberta adds in a low voice. She’s standing at the kitchen counter, separating Dad’s medications into his weekly pill holder. The doctor upped his dosage, and while it seems to be helping, I can’t stop myself from grieving this little progression. A step closer to the end.
Roberta flattens her lips, but there’s a smile written in her twinkling brown gaze.
“Heard that,” Dad retorts .
Roberta nudges him with her elbow when he joins her at the counter. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
He gives her a flat look, and she laughs.
“You two behave,” I call over my shoulder. I slip on my dirt-smudged Keds as the door shuts behind me. I have nicer shoes since Mom sent my package, but it feels meaningful to wear the ones he got me. It feels right.
Tru’s parked behind my car, leaning against the door of his truck. I pause at the top step, admiring him. The late afternoon sun glistens on his disheveled hair. It’s brushing his ears and neck, long overdue for a cut. My fingertips itch to comb through it. To lace there as he settles between my legs, those gray eyes glinting with desire…
“Normally I’d never tell a woman this, but you might want to hurry up.”
I startle. My skin sizzles under his scrutiny. The way he’s looking at me, it’s like he knows exactly where my mind was headed. Impossible. And yet I flush scarlet. “Excuse me?”
He braces one hand on the hood of his truck. Veins pop along his corded forearm, and I have to force myself not to trace their path with my gaze.
“Believe me, I could stand here and look at you all night. But unfortunately one of the cows has other plans.”
“What do you mean?” I jog down the steps, aware of his gaze on my exposed midriff as I go.
“We’ve got a calf stuck.” He meets me halfway, loops an arm around my middle, and pulls me flush against him. “Our date has been derailed by childbirth.”
“I’m pretty sure my mother said something similar to my father about twenty-six years ago.”
His nose brushes mine. He’s so close I wish he’d close the distance and kiss me, but he doesn’t. He just holds me, gaze locked on mine, and breathes a laugh over my lips. “Funny, Temptress.” He gives my butt a firm pat. “It’s an emergency. Calf is coming backward.”
My eyes widen. The heat in my core subsides. “Why are we still standing here, then?”
“Jason’s with her. Doc’s on the way.” He tilts his head. “And I wanted to soak up this moment with you.”
I playfully slap his chest, but a blush highlights my cheeks. “Let’s go, lover boy. There’s a calf that needs pulling.”
A wry grin stretches his lips, and his dimple pops. “That’s my girl.”
I’ve only attended one other calving in my life, and I was too young at the time for Truett’s dad to let me get close. That calf was too big, his mama a petite heifer. He was gone before Waylon and his farmhands could get him free.
I cried. So did Tru, until his dad told him to stop.
I see it now, in the determined set of Truett’s shoulders and the hard glint in his eyes. He’s not letting this one go without a fight.
“Just be sure to give the mama some space, all right? She’s in a lot of pain and a bit unpredictable.” Truett squeezes my hand, offering me a tight smile. He’s all business now, that flirtatious man from before forgotten.
I think I like this version even more.
We veer to the right of the barn in the valley behind the main house, where a black pickup truck is already parked. The barn is a simple structure, with pens parsed out inside using more of that steel fencing they used to construct the WeightWatchers field. I chuff at the memory, but my laughter is cut short. Truett bounds ahead toward the farthest pen in the barn, where I can see the tall redheaded farmhand working with a cow. Truett strips off his shirt as he goes. The muscles in his broad back coil and unspool with the swing of his arms, and I watch, mesmerized.
“Watch where you step or I’ll be buying you another pair of shoes!” he shouts.
I glance down just in time to dodge a sizable patty and groan.
His laughter wanes quickly, replaced with the tight purse of his lips. The steel pen clangs loudly beneath his shifting weight as he hoists himself over the barrier and lands with a solid thud in the bed of hay on the other side. He sidles up to Jason, who’s working to tie chains around the dew claws dangling from the cow. Turns out, Truett taking his shirt off had nothing to do with vanity. Jason’s baby-blue T-shirt is covered in a mixture of fluids that will be impossible to remove. That shirt is going in the trash before the night is through.
I’ve hooked one leg over the pen when another voice calls from behind me, “Oh yeah, that calf’s backward all right.”
The shiver running down my spine nearly knocks me off-balance, but I manage to right myself on the steel fencing. I glance back, eyeing the short, wiry gentleman with a shock of white hair and a mustache so thick that a younger version of me once wondered how he breathes through it.
“Delilah Ridgefield, is that you?” He sets a bucket down at the barrier of the fence and peers up at me through narrowed eyes.
“Yes, sir,” I say, though it’s barely above a whisper.
“I’ll bet you don’t even remember me. I’m Doctor?—”
“Van de Berg,” I say. “I remember you.”
His hooded eyes widen in surprise. He’s right to think I wouldn’t. After all, the last time I saw him, I was about thirteen years old. My cat, Skittles, had developed kidney failure. Dr. Van de Berg sat with me and explained everything as he put her to sleep, his faint Dutch accent making the words sound more like a fairy tale than a tragedy. It was one of the worst days of my life up to that point, and he softened that blow as best he could. Even my dad, who loved that cat arguably more than I did, sobbed in the tiny back room of the local vet’s office. It’s the kind of day you don’t forget.
Which is why I was so shocked that Dad did, that first day when I arrived back into town.
He nods, his lips disappearing in what I assume is a smile beneath that bushy mustache. “Right, well, we’ll catch up after. Got a job to do.”
I salute him and he chuckles, unbothered by the apprehension pulling the air taut around us.
“Have we tried pulling with the chains yet?” He directs the question to Jason and Truett, who stand bracketing either side of the cow’s hind end.
“Nope, just got them secure,” Jason offers.
“Good. Don’t pull till I check her out inside. A torn uterus equals a dead cow.” Dr. Van de Berg unbuttons his short-sleeve Happy Tails Veterinary Clinic shirt and slips out of it, tossing it on a clear patch of ground. He climbs the fence with surprising grace for his age—I offer him a hand, which he huffs at—and drops down on the other side near my dangling legs. “Is this her first?”
“Nope,” the other two reply in unison.
“Okay.” The vet slips a hand in around the dangling calf hooves, closing his eyes as he feels for…well, for what, I don’t know. Placement maybe? “Let’s try with the chains, and say a prayer that this little one behaves.”
I haven’t prayed in a long time. Not since I was a little girl, trying it on for size and realizing it wasn’t my thing. But I say one now, sending up a plea to anyone who will listen to let this little baby make it. I meet Truett’s tense gaze, and he nods. We both need this bit of positivity in our life, this proof that the universe can sometimes be kind, too.
“You two pull while I guide the calf. All right? ”
“Got it,” Truett says. He passes one chain to Jason and takes the other for himself. “Tell us when.”
“When,” Dr. Van de Berg commands.
The two men lean back, pulling with all their might. Jason’s freckled arms flex, and Truett’s back ripples with the effort. Sweat beads on Truett’s forehead, dampening his dirty blond hair till it’s nearly brown. I can’t look at Jason or the vet, or the poor cow who bellows as they pull. The puckered line where the steel fence was welded bites into my palm. I grip it harder, my hands be damned. My entire body coils tightly. They pull, pause for Dr. Van de Berg to readjust, then pull again. Over and over with very little progress.
“Can I help?”
Truett opens his mouth to answer, but it’s Dr. Van de Berg who speaks first. “There’s a calf puller in the back of my SUV. Big metal thing that braces on the cow’s hind end. Would you grab it, please?”
“I can grab it,” Tru says, releasing the chains.
“No, it’s fine.” I hold up a hand. “I’ve got this.”
The corners of his eyes soften and he nods. “Watch for patties.”
I kick off my shoes, letting them fall beside the vet’s discarded shirt, and Truett lets out a guffaw that cuts the tension thoroughly.
While I’d never admit to Truett that I was nervous, relief courses through me when I throw open the Forerunner’s back hatch and identify the only thing that could possibly be called a calf puller. It’s heavy and awkwardly shaped, but I’m determined to be helpful. I hoist the thing up and race back into the barn without even pausing to close the hatch.
“Here.” I pass it through a gap in the fencing to Dr. Van de Berg. I have what I’m choosing to believe is mud in between my toes and bits of hay stabbing me in the soft soles of my feet, but I scrape it off on the rough edge of the steel panel and start climbing, this time until I’m all the way over and standing a few feet back from the action.
Dr. Van de Berg braces the crescent-shaped bracket against the cow’s hindquarters, below the dangling hooves. Truett attaches the chains to the center point of what I’m realizing is basically a jack, and locks eyes with the vet.
“Go slow,” Dr. Van de Berg cautions.
“Got it, Doc.” Truett grabs the cranking mechanism and begins the arduous process of pulling the calf inch by inch, now with a bit of the effort taken out of it for him.
“You’re doing great, girl.” Jason pats the cow’s dark hide. She throws her head back and bellows, letting him know just how great she thinks she’s doing right about now, and he flinches. “I know. We’re trying.”
“Finally, making some headway!” Dr. Van de Berg smiles, his teeth flashing beneath that mustache. “Let’s get this little one’s rump out and things should go smoothly from there.”
What was once hooves becomes knobby knees and, eventually, hindquarters. Truett quickly unhooks the jack, and the vet tosses it to the side. On instinct I surge forward and take the other chain. Tru glances down at me, surprise widening his features. Then he smiles. “Come on, Delilah. Show me what you’re made of and pull. ”
We each put our whole bodies into it. The chain is slick from blood and other fluids, but I notch my hands between the loops and pull with everything I’ve got. Jason disappears over the fence, and then it’s just the three of us, with Dr. Van de Berg coaching us through. We give it one last yank, leaning all the way back, and the calf slips out with a wet squelching sound. I lose my footing and fall, hitting the ground at the same time as the glistening black calf.
Truett drops the chain, concern lacing his features as he turns and reaches for me, scooping me off the ground. He braces me against the steel fence and smiles. “You did great.”
“Is the calf alive?” I ask, biting a lip and glancing past him to the unmoving pile of limbs and midnight-colored fur on the ground.
“Get some water!” Dr. Van de Berg says.
“Already ahead of you.” Jason holds a bucket up over the fence, and Truett grabs it from him.
I turn just as Truett dumps the bucket of water on the newborn’s head. It lurches upward, head swinging, and sputters through its first breath.
“Congratulations, it’s a boy!” Dr. Van de Berg reaches out to smack Truett’s shoulder, but Tru dodges it.
“Not with that hand, you don’t. I know where it’s been.” Truett laughs, and the older man joins in. The anxiety that filled the room is gone, replaced instead by a contagious joy. Jason and I let out breathy chuckles that turn into full-on belly laughs, and I swipe at a tear that spills down my cheek with the back of my hand.
“Well, she’s clearing the afterbirth on her own. I’d say you’re all good from here.” Dr. Van de Berg’s gaze cuts from Truett’s to mine and softens. “What a pleasant surprise to see you, Delilah. I trust your parents are well?”
I press my lips tight and try to nod, but it comes out as more of a tremor. Dr. Van de Berg’s shoulders droop, and he sighs heavily. “I’d heard your dad resigned from the music school. Guess I’d hoped he won the lottery or something and got to retire early, unlike the rest of us.” He smiles, and it’s full of kindness. Enough to steal my breath. “Tell him I wish him well, okay?”
I tilt my head and do my best to smile in return. “Will do, Doc.”
The corners of his eyes crinkle and he nods. His gaze cuts over my shoulder to the redheaded farmhand behind me. “Jason, help me carry that calf puller to the car? I’m an old man, after all.”
“An old man who could out-pull any of us, I’m sure,” Jason quips, his tone playful. “Yeah, I’ll get it, Doc.”
They gather his supplies and head for the exit. The calf glances up at me with big brown eyes, his thick lashes blinking slowly. He’s precious—and alive. My heart tumbles over itself at the sight of him.
“What are you gonna name him?”
Tru glances from me to the calf. “Don’t typically name the bull calves, for obvious reasons.”
My stomach plummets. I know how farms work. I know what happens to the steers in the feeder lot. But I look down at this baby who worked so hard to be born, and my heart can’t take it. “Can we make an exception for him? Please.”
I bite down on my bottom lip. I’m covered in hay and questionable liquids, and my arms are still trembling from more exertion than I’ve put in, in months. But all I care about is this little calf, staring up at me with his precious, dopey eyes. Not this one, I reason. This one is special.
Tru braces his hands on his hips and sighs, his shoulders caving in on the exhale. “What are we naming him?”
My eyebrows hit my hairline. “You mean it?”
He laughs, his whole body trembling with it. He’s dirtier than I am, but he’s never looked so attractive. “Yes, I mean it. So what’s the name?”
“Well, I need time to think about it.” I purse my lips. The mama cow turns in her stall and nuzzles her baby, cleaning his forehead with a swipe of her long tongue. “I’ve gotta make sure it’s perfect.”
“Understandable.” His eyes are alight as they dance over me. My skin heats, and I’m suddenly aware that every effort I put into how I look has gone out the window. I shift my weight, and Truett tracks the movement, a smile quirking the side of his mouth. “In the meantime, wanna head up to the house and get cleaned up? Not that afterbirth doesn’t look amazing on you, because it does.”
It snaps the nerves, the agonizing, the floundering all in half. I let out a laugh so loud it startles the cow, and she glares, letting me know I’ve overstayed my welcome.
“Yeah. Yes.” I shake my head, hoping to loosen some of the anxiety leaving me dizzy. “I would like that.”
He tucks his chin and offers a hand to assist me over the fence. “After you, then.”
I take his hand, and he lifts me up. “Such a gentleman.”
His reply is almost lost in the thud of my bare feet on the other side of the railing, but I swear I hear it. Sense it, down to the marrow of my bones.
“I’m certainly trying to be.”