Chapter 34
We spent most of Tuesday being lumps. J.D.
showed us the couch, the massive TV he'd bought his mother, and the collection of movies.
At one point, the dog had hopped up to cuddle with the three of us.
That evening, Isabella had claimed the chair at the side, picking on her brother until he kicked her out. Then we'd all passed out early.
But when I woke up on Wednesday, it was to birds singing on the balcony. It was also nearly noon. I crawled my way out of bed, and into some clothes. By that time, the guys were stirring too, so we headed down together. Maria met us with fresh coffees, then quickly put J.D. to work.
With nothing else to do, Tanner and I headed out back, to the little table on the porch. The weather was cooling off, but the sun was so nice. I stepped into the grass to enjoy a moment of it, and caught something off to the side.
"Hey, J.D.?" I called back to the house. "Is that pond safe?"
"Safe?" he called back.
"Snakes or the like," I clarified.
Which made him head to the back door to peek his head out so he wouldn't have to yell. "Naw, it's good. There's some chairs and a table there too. Y'all gonna go see the turtles?"
"Turtles?" Tanner asked.
J.D. just nodded. "Yep. Ain't no fish - that I know of.
Frogs aren't so much fun, but we got lots of turtles down there.
Mama likes to sit and think out there. You can go hang.
Might be quieter." And he tipped his head back, making it clear that whatever his mother had him doing might not be so quiet.
"Waking up by the pond sounds perfect," Tanner decided, scooping an arm around my shoulders and turning me that way. "Have fun, babe. We're going to be lazy."
I glanced back to see J.D. giving us a sweet smile, then he vanished back inside. Yeah, this was nice. Everything about this slow, calm, and luxurious lifestyle was the sort of thing I could get used to. It also was the type of thing I never thought I'd be able to afford.
"You know," I told Tanner as we meandered that way, "my big dreams were about half as nice as J.D.'s reality."
"His mom's, you mean," he corrected.
I shrugged that off, because the difference didn't really matter. "Well, yeah. I just mean..." I paused as we reached a pair of wooden chairs, claiming the one on the right. "Tanner, I looked at my bank account yesterday."
"And?" he asked.
I took a sip of my coffee, debating whether or not saying this would be bad. "Um, I kinda have to have a sit down with Dad after finals. He told me going to finals counts, but after that, he's calling in our deal."
"Deal?"
I looked over to see him cradling his own cup against his chest, looking more relaxed than I'd ever seen him before.
The breeze ruffled his strawberry blonde hair, and I was pretty sure there were a few freckles across the bridge of his nose.
Pale, and not easy to see under the fluorescent lights, but they were visible in the sunlight.
"Dad made me promise that when I earned a million dollars, we'd sit down and talk about what came next. See, I told him I wanted to prove myself, and he pointed out that I already had. He said it's easy to get caught up in doing more and more until I end up breaking myself and losing it all."
"Yeah, it is," he agreed.
"So, once I got a million, we'd talk about when it would be enough. What my next step was. That sort of a thing. He didn't say a million was the goal. Just the point for us to reevaluate."
Tanner looked over with a sweet little smile on his lips. "And you have a million now?"
"No!" I huffed. "Not yet, but I mean..." I looked back down to my cup. "I will. Like, there's no way I won't make it. Even if I spend it all, I'll still have made it, and that's our deal. My partial season with the Pbr will be enough for me to make more money than I can even understand."
"Nice," he breathed. "So, are you quitting after finals then?"
I sat there for a long minute, thinking about that.
Part of me didn't want to. I wanted to shove it in everyone's face that I - a woman - could do this.
I wanted to win a gold buckle of my own.
I'd had all these dreams, and I still longed to actually accomplish them, but they'd all pointed at the same end goal.
I'd reached that goal: making enough money to buy myself a chance at a different life.
I didn't have to do the others, but I wanted to.
I also hated the way the Pbr felt right now.
I was so tired of being pissed about one thing or another.
I despised the way my boyfriends were being treated just because of who they loved.
I was sick of that shit, and wanted to say "fuck it," but I couldn't exactly do both.
"Cody?" Tanner asked when I was quiet for a little too long.
"I don't know," I finally admitted. "I mean, I love bull riding.
I also don't want to end up like J.D., you know?
I don't want to limp for the rest of my life.
I don't want..." I paused, watching the sunlight ripple across the pond before us.
"I always imagined chasing after my kids.
Riding horses. Working the cattle, or the equipment.
Farming, basically. Granted, it's also the only thing I've ever known. "
"I grew up in a city," he reminded me. "I had to work hard to get a taste of this country life. To me, it feels like a dream. The pace is slower. The work is easy and hard at the same time. The sort of thing you can keep doing without getting bored of."
"Yeah, it kinda is," I agreed.
"And I'm ok with not going back," he said softly.
Which made me look over quickly. "You're done fighting bulls?"
He made a little noise and canted his head. "Not really? I mean, I love that too. I do, Cody, and if I can do it again, I definitely will. But this little break they made me have? I just..." He swallowed hard. "Cody, it's no longer the most important thing to me."
"Yeah," I breathed. "I know what you mean. Retiring from it, settling down, and starting the next stage doesn't sound as bad as I'd thought it would."
"Exactly!" he said, sitting up and turning sideways in his chair so he was facing me.
"And I get that you and J.D. are still going places.
All I'm saying is I'm fine with being the guy you leave at home.
I do know how to cook and clean. I'd actually be pretty happy cutting hay or feeding cows.
" Then he chuckled once. "I also can't afford to do it on my own. "
"Ok?" Why would he need to do it on his own?
"Cody, I'm saying I'd make a damned good house husband," he told me.
"My panic about not working? It's because I don't want to work in a mail room.
I hate the idea of an office job. But farming?
That requires land, and land isn't cheap.
It requires cattle, tractors, and a whole lot of shit that's not cheap.
It requires money, but you and J.D. make money.
I mean, I could handle things while you're on the Tough Enough series tour, and then when you two retire, we'd already have it all set up. "
"Yeah?" I asked, feeling my heart doing some silly things in my chest. "Like, you'd want to keep doing this when we're not in a different city every week?"
"I would," he breathed. "I..." His hazel eyes found mine.
"This thing we have? Cody, I like it. Fuck, I love it.
I like how the three of us never seem to step on each other.
I can't get enough of how our fights - if you can call them that - don't pull us apart.
It's never me against my partner. It's me and you and J.D.
There's always a middle ground, and in all the time we've been together, though all the shit we've already handled, neither of you have done a single thing to make me wonder if this is the right place for me. "
"I know what you mean," I agreed. "And Isabella said something when we got here.
I've been thinking about it since. It's like.
.." I pressed my lips together, trying to put this big feeling into simple words.
"She asked me what was more important, basically.
Bull riding or J.D. Now, she was testing me, but I immediately thought of both of you - and I couldn't pick. "
"Between us and bull riding?" he asked.
I nodded. "If I had to choose, Tanner. If the Pbr makes me pick between one of my boyfriends - either one of you - and it?
The Pbr is losing. I made the money. I can have the life I'd always dreamed of.
I'm not stuck anymore. And sure, I'd like to have more money, because a million dollars doesn't buy a lot of land, not to mention cattle. But... I mean, it's not just me."
"It could be us," he said, then flinched. "I mean the three of us, because that came out wrong. But I kinda wanted to talk to you about this because - "
"Well, this looks serious!" J.D. called across the yard.
We both flinched, turning around to see him sauntering across the grassy patch that separated the house from this little pond. A wave of guilt hit me, because what we'd been talking about had been serious. When I glanced over at Tanner, he looked like he'd just been busted.
It made J.D. move a little faster. There was a bit of a skip to his step.
It wasn't quite a limp, but it proved he was hurting.
I also couldn't remember him hitting his vape this morning, which would explain that.
Still, if he felt good enough to go without it, even if he ached a bit, that meant he was doing a lot better than I'd expected.
"What's wrong?" he asked when he was close enough.
"We were sorta talking about the future," I admitted.
J.D. let out a heavy sigh, then claimed the end of the chair where Tanner's legs should've gone. Like this, that put both of them facing me, so I twisted a bit, sitting more on my hip than my butt. That meant I could actually watch them as we talked.
"The Pbr isn't the most important thing to me anymore," I said, deciding to start this off bluntly.
J.D.'s eyes narrowed. "What is?"
I glanced at Tanner, then back. "I think it's us, J.D."
His head snapped over to Tanner, then back to me. "Like... For real?"
I nodded. "Is that ok?"
"So are you quitting?" he asked.
I murmured and tilted my head, weighing that. "I don't want to."
And J.D. instantly relaxed. "Gotcha. So, the Pbr is still important, just not the most important?"
"I started this," Tanner fessed up. "I was telling her that I'd be ok with staying home. You know, getting something ready for us for when you two are done chasing bulls across the country. Maybe haying, maybe ranching. I dunno, but I can't afford to do it on my own, J.D."
"Naw, I got it," he said so casually.
But that was the thing. J.D. agreed to pay for an entire farm, livestock, and equipment with as much care as he did buying one of us a drink. That one little phrase, and his lack of concern or thought before he'd tossed it out? It made me realize exactly what all his money meant to him.
Nothing.
Once, he'd told me he understood where I was coming from when I said I had to do this.
That I needed to ride bulls because I needed the check.
When I'd bitched because I wasn't playing around, and I wanted to actually win, get sponsors, and make money at this.
He'd understood, and now here he was, acting like money didn't fucking matter at all - because it didn't.
We did. This did. I couldn't even imagine how much he'd paid for this place, and he was adamant it wasn't his. This was his mother's home. He wanted one of his own. A different one. For him, money was a way to make life comfortable, nothing more and nothing less.
And I liked that. I wanted that. I longed for that sort of life, so long as it came with comforts, not worry.
I didn't need to be rich. I didn't give a shit if anyone else thought my house, or truck, or stuff was fancy.
I just wanted a place where I could wake up happy, and these two men had become it.
They'd become my goal, not some entertainment along the way.
"The real question," I said, watching J.D. closely, "is what you want."
"And not knowing is a fair answer," Tanner added.
J.D. just looked down at his hands.