Chapter Twenty #3
“And everyone from William to the ranch hands helped out. West, too, once he was old enough.” Mama chuckles. “Don’t let this one fool you”—she tilts her head in my direction— “he’s not as hopeless with babies as he thinks he is. He’s just forgotten how to do it, is all.”
“Thank you, for everything. Y’all really helped a lot.”
“I just put dinner on, sweetheart,” Mama says. “I didn’t invent a cure for cancer.”
“Well, I sure do appreciate the thought anyway.”
“We’ll get out of your hair now, but if you need anything at all. You just call.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“I’ll be there in just a minute,” I say, as Colt, Lemon, and Cash say their goodbyes and see themselves out.
Mama nods and follows suit. I rub the back of my neck and glance nervously at Daisy. “I’m real sorry about calling everyone over. I didn’t know what to do.”
“No. It’s my fault. I shouldn’t have fallen asleep. I’m sorry I left you to tend to a screaming infant.”
“Well, Lemon is my sister, so I’m pretty used to violent, tiny humans hollering until the cows come home.”
Daisy laughs and then glances down at the baby fussing at her clothes. “I’m gonna feed him, but did you wanna maybe stay for dinner?”
“Er, I can’t. I gotta get Mama home.”
“Oh.” Her smile fades.
“Yeah, I think everyone already left.”
“Of course. Well, maybe you’ll come another night. So I can say thank you for all you’ve done.”
I shake my head. “You don’t need to do that.”
Her lips thin, and she gives me a tight smile. Shit. I just went and hurt Daisy-Mae’s feelings. “Please don’t leave me alone with him another night.”
I chuckle and have to stop myself from saying she’s got eighteen years of nights with this kid, but I don’t think that’s what she needs to hear right now. “You’ve got this, Dais. And you don’t need to thank me, darlin’ ... but I’d like that.”
“Yeah?”
“At least let me bring the food to you.”
“No. I want to cook. I need to cook. I’m going stir crazy feeding and burping and rocking and ... I need this, West.”
“Well, alright then. You don’t gotta twist my arm.”
“Friday. Seven thirty.”
“It’s a date.”
Her brows shoot skyward. I need to get the fuck outta here before I say something I truly can’t take back. When in the hell did I turn into a blubbering idiot around the fairer sex? Around Daisy-Mae of all people?
“Friday it is.”
I nod and turn on my heel, closing the front door behind me before I can do or say anymore stupid shit. Mama’s already waiting in the car when I climb in and I can just feel her eyes on me, needling in that way that she does without even needing to say a word.
“It ain’t like that, Mama.”
“Are you sure?”
“It’s Daisy-Mae. I’ve known her since we were in kindergarten.”
She pats my arms and gives me a “bless your heart” type of smile, as if I’m all foam and no beer. “Son, you can see someone your whole life and still never really know them until you open your eyes.”
“What the hell is that supposed to mean?” I shake my head. “Mama, nothing is going on with Daisy-Mae. She just had a kid.”
“And? Women with kids are somehow seen as less to you?”
“No. That’s not it at all.”
“Then what is it?”
“She’s vulnerable right now, and I don’t have time for relationships. You know that. I’m so busy organizing everyone else’s lives, I ain’t got time for one of my own.”
“You can’t put a boot in the oven and call it a biscuit, son,” Mama says.
I shake my head. “Did Daddy ever really know what you were talkin’ about?”
She chuckles. “God rest his soul, William Winchester knew me like no one else on earth. And I can assure you, he didn’t look at me any differently after I’d had a child ... or four.”
“That’s different. You were married.”
“West William Winchester, I am surprised at you.”
“What?”
“Are you honestly telling me you couldn’t love a child who didn’t share your DNA?”
I frown. “That’s not what I said. Hell, I already love that kid like my own, in spite of his father, or maybe it’s because I know Eddie’s never gonna be there for him.
I don’t care that he’s someone else’s DNA.
I’m still gonna teach him to ride, and rope cattle when he’s old enough.
But Daisy and Waylon are a family, and I ain’t a part of that. You’re seeing things that ain’t there.”
“Maybe I’m just seeing what you can’t, because you’re walking round with your damn head up your ass.”
I wince at the mental image that produces. “Mama! What would the ladies at church say?”
“They’d say I’m right, and you’re a fool if you don’t think you’re family to Daisy-Mae and her baby.”
“I’m her best friend. Nothing more.”
“Exactly when did you go blind, West? Because I don’t think you’re seeing clearly, son.”
Is she right? Does Daisy feel like I do? Does it kill her to watch me leave the way it kills me to walk away? Or is this just wishful thinking on mama’s part ... on my part?
I shake my head and grip the steering wheel. “I got enough people needin’ me, Mama. I don’t need to add two more.”
“Maybe you ought to start needing someone, did you ever think of that?”
I shake my head and press my foot to the gas, trying to outrun this conversation before Mama gets any other clever ideas, but what she said stays with me long after I sit at her table to eat alongside my family.
And as I drive away from the main ranch house, take the dirt road through the southern pasture, and then pull up in front of my darkened barndominium, I can’t help but imagine what my life would look like if there were someone to come home to. Someone who’d leave a light on for me.
Would she race out to greet me, a baby on her hip, another tearing by her ankles just to jump into my arms?
I sigh and climb out of my truck, but I don’t go inside.
Instead, I stare up at the oil-black sky and the stars dotting out a roadmap to .
.. what? Fate? My destiny? Assuming I have one beyond working my fingers to the bone on a land that’s as unforgiving as it is plentiful.
Or maybe they point to a woman, one who could put up with my shit, but who probably deserves better than to be stuck with a rough and bitter bastard like me.
This town, this ranch, is all I’ve ever known.
My blood, sweat, and tears are mingled with the soil.
I’ll die here on this land, alone, long after my mama has passed away and siblings have moved on.
And I don’t need Daisy-Mae or any other woman having to take on this burden.
Mama’s wrong. I don’t need no one, and Daisy sure as hell don’t need me.