Chapter 24
TWENTY-FOUR
Jesse
Ireached through the bars to throw a rope around Sunday Best’s neck, knotting it loosely in case she decided to buck in the chute.
Off behind me, Harlan made a kissing sound with his lips, shaking a bucket of feed to get Rock-A-Bye into the corrals and on deck.
Cade stood on the loading platform, readying the box dummy.
The sun beat down on my neck, my shirt soaked with sweat. Considering how late I had to stay up to get the gate lever working, I should’ve been dragging.
But I wasn’t.
“Look at him run!” I glanced back to see Rock-A-Bye, our two and a half year old painted gelding, trot right past Harlan’s grain offering and barge into the corrals. He knew exactly what was coming and couldn’t wait to play. We wanted the broncs to get excited about their work.
When I glanced up to focus on Sunday Best again, my eyes caught on movement up at the barn.
Hollie and the girls were nearing the arena fence.
Instantly, I tipped my face toward the dirt to hide my smile.
I’d thought about Hollie all day. This morning, when I stopped to talk with her at breakfast, she poured me more coffee before I’d even finished what I had.
Like she wanted me to linger a few minutes longer.
So I did. I sat on the picnic table and we chatted.
Her morning hair was a little frizzy but beautiful.
Based on my workload, I should’ve rushed to Cade and hightailed it straight to my chores, but I would’ve sat there all day and worked through the night to catch up if she’d have let me.
All we got was fifteen minutes. But those minutes tugged on my awareness, like rhythm to my steps when I wasn’t even humming along.
I waved and the trio waved back.
“Look who’s coming, buddy.” I nodded toward the barn.
Cade smiled, unable to contain his excitement. “Did you tell them we were bucking today?”
“Yep.”
“Nice.” Cade waved then jumped off the platform to greet them.
I watched as the girls leapt with excitement.
Nora grabbed Cade’s hand and pulled him around in a circle.
Izzy’s mouth started moving a mile a minute while she sprung her emotional support deck of cards from one hand into the other.
I knew the three had become fast friends, but seeing my son light up around other children brought a bit of relief to the constant parent guilt I shouldered.
Hollie looked down at Cade and gently touched his shoulder while she spoke to him.
Sunday Best groaned and banged against the metal chute wall, ready to get with the program, but I couldn’t pull my eyes away from the happy exchanges happening up by the barn.
Then Cade waved them all down toward the chute.
For our mock-rodeo arena, we had several types of chutes: our roping chutes at the top of the arena and our bucking chutes on the left hand side.
Corrals funneled into a small lane where we would lead the horses to the chutes.
If you didn’t know where the lanes were leading, it looked like a maze of fences.
On the outside of the bucking chutes was a loading platform, where the cowboys could climb up and get settled on the bronc, or in today’s case, where we had our dummy waiting.
I couldn’t swipe the silly grin off my face when Cade and two sets of curious brown eyes hopped onto the platform and peered into the chute.
I didn’t think she’d misbehave, but I grabbed Sunday Best’s rope just in case. “Hey, Nora. Hey, Izzy.”
Izzy said hello, but Nora zeroed in on the horse. She pushed out her lower lip and whined, “Oh my goodness he is so cute. I just want to cuddle up with him.”
Cade corrected her. “She’s a girl.”
Izzy asked, “What’s her name?”
“Sunday Best.”
Nora’s face instantly changed. “That is not a good name.”
Izzy elbowed her. “Nora, that’s rude.”
“He looks like a Cocoa.”
“She.” Izzy corrected again then rolled her eyes. “Mr. Jesse, can we pet her?”
“If she wasn’t in the chute, I’d say yes.
” Hollie hopped onto the platform, and my eyes followed her.
She still wore what she’d had on at breakfast—brown tank top and high waisted jeans.
Her skin looked warm in the sunshine. Light make-up, messy hair.
I had to force my eyes back to the kids.
“They get a little excited when they know they’re about to work.
So if a horse is in the chute, we don’t really pet it. ”
“Like a service dog?” Izzy asked.
“Yeah, kind of. They can get distracted. Or they might accidentally hurt you.”
“Oh, I wanted to pet a horsey.” A dull stomp filled the air as Nora stamped her foot.
“We can be patient, Nora.” Hollie said.
“After we get done, you can say hello to Tillie. Sound good?”
Nora beamed, happy with that answer.
Hollie’s eyes found mine as she asked, “So, do we need to get down? I don’t want to be in the way.”
“Not at all. Do you guys want to see how they buck?”
The girls were very enthusiastic.
So I launched into an explanation about the flank strap, how it’s placed between their belly and their hindquarters and squeezes just a little.
I put the black box dummy on Sunday Best’s back and showed them the remote I had.
“When she gives us a good buck, I’ll hit the button and the box will release and fall off simulating when a cowboy falls off. ”
Hollie smiled. “So positive reinforcement.”
“Exactly. We don’t just want her to buck, we want her to throw off a cowboy that knows how to hang on. So part of training is waiting for her to give us the kind of bucks that bring in the money.”
“That is really cool.”
I looked at the girls. “Ready to see her go?”
They bounced up and down with excitement. I glanced into the arena to see Harlan waiting—our pickup man for the day. Then I hopped onto the chute wall, pulled the lever, and out went Sunday Best.
The girls squealed as Sunday Best put on a real good show.
A small cloud of dust formed under her feet, and at the five second mark when she twisted to the right and threw up her hindquarters at the same time, I hit the remote.
The release on the dummy snapped and the box rolled to the ground.
Instantly, Sunday Best stopped bucking and excitedly pranced around the arena, giving Harlan a time at corralling her again.
I turned back to the audience to find Hollie beaming down at me. “That was amazing! You hit the button when she”—she dipped her right shoulder to show me, lacking the words—“did that.”
“Sure did.”
The girls peppered me with questions as Rock-A-Bye and Hell Bent both got their turns. Hollie pulled out her phone and did a little filming. I needed to get them to a rodeo—this wasn’t even the real fun. Finally, a red mare, Breakneck, was loaded into the corrals and led to the chute.
“This is Breakneck.” Hollie narrowed her eyes at the name. “She is what cowboys call rank, meaning she’s got a vicious buck. She’s almost three and we usually wait until a horse is about four or so to compete, so next season she’ll be ready.”
I loaded her up, pulled the lever, and out she went.
Her first buck was a winner and every buck after was equally strong. I let her go the full eight seconds because I knew she could handle it. When the box rolled to the ground, I smiled. Meadowbrook had high hopes for her.
When we finished up, Harlan toted all the equipment and tack to the barn.
Cade led the girls to pasture one to visit with Tillie.
Which, conveniently, left Hollie and I alone for a minute.
I hopped the fence and circled the chute to where Hollie stood on the platform.
I lifted my hand to help her jump down, and she slipped her fingers into mine.
Her tennis shoes hit the dirt with a thud.
“That was incredible, Jesse. I think we need to go to a rodeo.”
“You definitely do. Meadowbrook horses are so fun to watch.”
She turned her shoulders toward the pasture where the kids were hanging on the fence. Slowly we moved that direction. “So what makes them buck in the first place? I’ve always thought they were afraid, but all of them seemed really calm.”
“A lot of people think that, but scared horses are dangerous. They have to have decent manners to make it on the circuit.”
“So you just train them somehow?”
I nodded. “They do have to have a little bit of bucking instinct in them, and Tag is really good at figuring out which ones have it then drawing out their full potential. Some of our champions are big teddy bears once you take that flank strap off.”
“Bea told me Tag’s very gifted with them.”
“He is. I wish I had his skill.”
“What are you good at?”
I gave her a sideways glance, finding her eyes on me as we walked. “With the horses?”
“Yeah.” She shrugged. “Or something on the ranch.”
I hummed as I thought. “Roping. I grew up chasing cattle, and I loved it.”
“Like using a lasso?” Her eyes brightened and she bit down on her bottom lip with a smile.
“Well, we don’t call it a lasso, but yes.”
“What do you call it?”
I huffed a laugh. “Just a rope.”
“Oh.” She laughed too. “I would love to see you do that sometime.”
“I could teach you. It’s not hard.”
“That sounds fun.” She looked toward pasture one and hung her hands on her back pockets. “Do you guys have any horses that you just…ride? I mean, you have trail horses, right?”
“The guests ride our pets and some of the older horses.”
We chatted some more about the looming financial burden of retiring horses.
Then I explained the typical schedule at Meadowbrook: riding the walking or roping horses, making sure our champions get exercise, getting stalled horses to pasture and back, desensitizing the skittish ones, getting a dummy on the trainees.
We stopped a ways off from where the kids were giggling and just talked.
She asked questions, and I answered them, proud to tell her about the work I did every day.
The kids had moved down the fence toward Windy Foot, our gentle giant who was getting up in age. They held handfuls of grass out to him, which he dutifully munched.
“Can we come out and watch tomorrow?”
I smiled, thrilled she would want to. “Whenever you want. We are always doing something in that ring.”
“We’ll have to do that.” Her eyes roamed over to the kids and she took a heavy breath. “This has been so nice. The girls are going to be upset when I call them.”
“You guys need to head?”
She tipped her head side to side. “We need to get out of the way.”
“You’re not in the way, Hollie. I promise.”
She narrowed her eyes. “I recall you working past ten o’clock the past few nights. I would say you’re plenty busy without us slowing you down.”
“I like slowing down when you’re involved.” Part of me cringed because that sounded like a lame pick-up line. But, the other part was glad I said it. Since I’d met Hollie, I took minor chances with my words, just to see what would happen.
Her reaction was always the same: shy and uncertain, but reciprocating. She didn’t know how to take me, but her twisting lips and small smile said everything I needed to know—she liked my attention. And that was the reason I hadn’t stopped yet.
She tipped her chin toward the ground, a bit of color rising to her cheeks. “I—I honestly need to check the roast.”
My eyebrows lifted. “Did you say roast?”
Her shy laugh broke some of the tension. “Yes. And potatoes, carrots, and salad. I’ll stick some in your fridge for later.”
I died a little at those words, but smiled and thanked her. Then my phone rang, the sound cutting through the pastures. I pulled it out of my pocket to see Tag’s name on the ID.
“It’s Tag,” I said.
Hollie’s eyes went wide and she bit her bottom lip, worry etching into her forehead. I held my breath as I swiped, hoping for good news. “Hey, Tag.”
His voice rasped. “Hey, Jesse.”
I heard Tag’s tears through the phone, loud and clear. My knees felt weak as dread barrelled through my gut. I gripped the phone harder, willing Cooper to live for Tag’s sake. Bracing myself, I asked, “Everything okay?”
“Yeah. Everything’s alright.”
“What’s going on?”
“Cooper woke up.”