29. Wade
WADE
Jolene called at six in the morning.
"We've got a sick calf," she said. "Henderson place. She's in bad shape. I could use a hand, if you're willing."
"I'll be there," I said.
I was in my truck before seven. The drive from town took twenty minutes through empty roads and fields still wet with dew, and the whole way my hands stayed tight on the wheel.
My chest felt like something had crawled inside it and set up camp.
Callie might be there. She might not be.
I didn't know which was worse — seeing her and getting sent away, or not seeing her at all.
The rescue looked the same as it had ten years ago. Worn red barn. Fence line that needed paint. Goats scattered across the paddock, a couple of pigs rooting in the mud. I parked beside Jolene's truck and got out. The air smelled like animals and wet grass.
Callie was standing outside the barn door.
My heart kicked hard enough I felt it in my throat, and my hands went dumb at my sides like I'd forgotten how to use them.
She had her hair pulled back in a ponytail.
She wore jeans and boots I recognized, the ones with the scuffed toes, and a flannel shirt with the sleeves rolled up.
She didn't smile when she saw me. Didn't frown either. She just stood there, watching me.
"Hey," I said. Like an idiot.
"Hey."
God, I'd missed her voice. Missed the way she said things plain and easy, no games.
Jolene stepped out of the barn behind her, wiping her hands on a rag. "Good, you're here. Calf's in the back stall. Dehydrated, probably pneumonia. Vet's coming at noon, but we need to get fluids in her now or she's not going to make it that long."
I nodded. "What do you need me to do?"
Jolene looked at Callie. Callie looked at me. Something passed between them — some unspoken thing I wasn't part of.
"Follow me," Callie said.
I followed her into the barn. The light was dim, slanting through gaps in the siding, and the air was cooler inside, thick with the smell of hay and animals and antiseptic.
My boots scuffed on the concrete. Callie walked ahead of me, shoulders straight, and I watched the way she moved — confident, purposeful.
The calf was in the last stall on the left, lying on her side in a bed of fresh straw. She was small. Too small. Her ribs showed through her hide, and her breathing came shallow and fast, each exhale a thin rattle that made my chest tighten.
Callie knelt beside her and laid a hand on the calf's neck. Her fingers were gentle, careful. "We need to get the IV in. Hold her steady while I set the line."
I knelt across from her. The straw poked through my jeans, scratching at my knees.
I put my hands on the calf's shoulder and hip, feeling the heat of her fever through her hide, the too-fast beat of her heart.
Callie worked fast, her fingers sure as she prepped the catheter and found the vein in the calf's neck.
The calf flinched once, a weak jerk, but I held her steady, and Callie got the line in clean on the first try.
"Good," Callie said. She taped the line down and hung the fluid bag on a hook above us. "Now we wait. Keep your hand on her so she knows we're here."
I kept my hand on the calf's shoulder. Callie sat back on her heels, watching the drip.
The barn was quiet except for the soft sounds of the other animals — a goat bleating somewhere, chickens scratching in the yard outside — and the calf's unsteady breathing.
Callie's hands rested on her knees. There was a streak of something dark on her forearm. Mud, maybe.
I wanted to reach across the stall and touch her. Put my hand over hers. Feel her skin against mine. I didn't. I was afraid she'd pull away, and I didn't think I could take that right now.
"She going to make it?" I asked.
"I don't know," Callie said. Her voice was steady, but I heard the worry underneath. "Depends on how much fight she's got left."
The calf's ear twitched. I stroked her neck, slow and easy, the way I'd learned to with the orphan calves those nights at the ranch. She'd always been better at this than anyone. Better at seeing what needed doing and doing it without fuss. I'd taken that for granted.
"Check the drip," Callie said. "Make sure it's running steady."
I checked. It was. "Looks good."
"Okay. In a minute we'll try to get her to drink. There's electrolytes mixed in the bucket by the door. Bring it here."
I got up and fetched the bucket. It was heavy, sloshing as I carried it back. I set it down beside Callie and knelt again. The calf's eyes were half-closed, glassy. Callie dipped her fingers in the bucket and touched them to the calf's muzzle. The calf didn't respond.
"Come on, sweetheart," Callie murmured. "Just a little. You can do it."
She tried again, patient, coaxing. This time the calf's tongue flicked out, just barely. Callie's face softened. "That's it. Good girl."
I watched her. Watched the way she handled the calf like it mattered, like this one animal's life was worth every bit of effort she could give. That was Callie. That had always been Callie. And I'd overlooked her. Waved off her worries. Answered her feelings with logic.
God, what was I even thinking?
"Callie," I said.
She looked up. Her eyes were careful, guarded. Not angry. Just waiting.
"I'm sorry," I said. The words weren't enough. They'd never be enough. But I said them anyway. "For all of it. For the years I didn't see you. For not standing with you when I should have. For putting the work and the deals and everyone else ahead of you. I'm sorry."
She didn't answer right away. The silence stretched out, pressing on me, and I made myself sit in it even though my chest felt like something was wrapped around it and pulling tight. My pulse hammered in my throat. I was so nervous it vibrated beneath my skin.
She was going to send me away. And I'd deserve it.
"You've said that before," she said finally. Her voice was quiet. Flat.
"I know." I swallowed. My throat felt like sandpaper. "And I know words aren't enough. I know I can't just apologize and expect that to fix it. But I'm going to keep doing the work, Callie. However long it takes. Whatever you need. I'm not giving up."
Her jaw tightened. She looked down at the calf, watching the shallow rise and fall of its breathing, then back at me. "I can't do this again, Wade. I can't go back to the way things were. I won't."
"I'm not asking you to." The words came out fast. I made myself slow down. "I'm not asking you to go back to anything. I don't want what we had. It wasn't good enough. I wasn't good enough."
"Then what are you asking?"
I looked at her. At the woman I'd married ten years ago and somehow lost along the way, one ignored conversation at a time.
The woman who'd built this place from nothing and handed it to Jolene when she married me.
The woman who'd spent a decade caring for my family's animals and my family's land and getting none of the credit. The woman I'd loved and failed.
"I'm asking what you need," I said. "Not what I think you need. Not what I want to give you so I can feel like I've fixed it. What you need. From me. From the marriage. Tell me, and I'll give it to you."
She was quiet for a long time. Her hand moved to the calf's side, resting there, feeling the rise and fall of breath. When she finally spoke, her voice was steady, but I could hear the weight in it — the years of holding it in, of not saying it, of deciding it wasn't worth the fight.
"I need a marriage where my husband sees me," she said.
"Where he doesn't wave off what I say or answer my feelings with logic or tell me I'm overreacting.
Where he takes my side, even when it's hard, even when it's his family I'm up against, even when it costs him something.
I need him to stand with me. Not in front of me or behind me, but with me, like we're partners, like we're in it together.
" She looked up at me, and her eyes were bright.
"I need to matter as much as the work does.
As much as the deals do. As much as keeping everyone else happy does.
I need to be more than the person who feeds the orphan calves while you're off doing the important things.
I need to be seen, Wade. I need to know I matter. "
Every word landed like a fist to the chest. Not because they were cruel — they weren't — but because they were true, and I'd spent ten years proving I didn't know how to give her any of it.
"Okay," I said.
She blinked. "Okay?"
"Yes. Okay. All of it." My throat was tight, but I pushed through.
My hands were shaking. I pressed them flat on my thighs to steady them.
"You want me to see you, I'll see you. You want me to stand with you, I'm there.
You want to matter, Callie, you do. You always have.
I was just too blind and too wrapped up in my own bullshit to show it.
But I see it now. I see you. And I'm saying yes to every word you just said. "
"Wade — "
"No bargaining," I said. "No conditions. You're telling me what you need, and I'm saying yes. That's it."
Something shifted in her face. Not softening, exactly — more like she'd been braced for a fight and I'd refused to give her one. Her eyes searched mine, looking for the catch, the angle, the place where I'd try to logic my way out of it.
There wasn't one.
Then she was leaning across the calf, and I was meeting her halfway, and we were kissing like we hadn't in years — maybe ever.
Her hand fisted in my shirt, pulling me closer.
Mine went to her jaw, her neck, sliding into her hair.
The angle was all wrong with the calf between us, and the straw was digging into my knees, and I didn't care.
She tasted like coffee and something sweet, and when she made a soft sound against my mouth I felt it all the way down. Heat burned through me.
When we finally pulled apart, we were both breathing hard. Her forehead rested against mine. My hand was still in her hair. Her fingers were still gripped in my shirt. I could feel her pulse racing under my thumb where it rested against her throat.
"I love you," I said. It came out rough.
"I've loved you since the day I met you at the rodeo grounds, when you told me my form was garbage and then showed me how to fix it, and I never stopped.
I just got so caught up in everything else I forgot to make sure you knew it.
I forgot to make it matter. But I'm telling you now, Callie, and I'll keep telling you every day for the rest of my life if that's what it takes. I love you."
Her breath hitched. Her hand went to her mouth, and when she spoke her voice was thick. "I love you too," she said. "God, Wade, I never stopped either. I wanted to. It would have been easier if I could have. But I couldn't. That's what made it so hard."
"I missed you," she whispered. "God, Wade, I missed you so much."
"I'm right here," I said. My voice came out hoarse. "I'm not going anywhere. Not ever again."
She pulled back just enough to look at me.
Her eyes were wet. Then her gaze dropped, and I watched her eyes catch on her left hand where it rested on my chest. The bare place on her finger where her ring should have been.
Her fingers touched the spot, just for a second, and the look on her face — lost, aching — made my chest tighten.
I reached into my pocket.
I'd carried the ring every day since she'd walked out. Kept it close, in my front pocket where I could feel its weight, even when I didn't know if I'd ever get the chance to give it back. It sat in my palm now, the gold band catching the low light, and my hand was shaking.
Callie stared at it. Then at me. Her lips parted.
"You kept it," she said.
"Of course I kept it." My throat was tight. "It's yours, Callie. It was always yours."
Her hand trembled as she reached for it. She took the ring from my palm, her fingers brushing mine, and held it a moment like she needed to make sure it was real. Then she slid it onto her own finger. It went on smooth.
It fit the way it always had. Like it belonged there. Like she belonged with me, and I'd been a damn fool to ever make her doubt it.
"I'm withdrawing the divorce," Callie said. Her voice was thick, but she didn't look away. Her hand tightened in mine. "We're doing this right, Wade. Together. No more halfway. No more me on the sidelines. We're partners, or we're nothing."
"Partners," I said. "I promise. No more halfway."
She nodded. A tear slipped down her cheek, and I caught it with my thumb. She turned her face into my palm.
The calf shifted between us, her breathing a little easier now. Callie's hand stayed in mine. The ring caught the light again.
We were still at the rescue. Still kneeling in the straw, still waiting for the vet. But my wife was beside me, and her ring was back where it belonged, and for the first time in months I could breathe.