2. Dalton #2
I followed but stood to one side, since this had very little to do with me. I was just along for the ride. With my arms crossed, I watched Jake point out brown boots and black ones, and then I looked at his feet and wondered when was the last time he’d bought himself a new pair.
Distracted by the smell of fresh popcorn and wondering where I might go to get some, I almost missed Jake gesturing me over to him.
“What’s up?” I asked, adding, “I’m not going to buy boots,” in the hope of shutting that conversation down right quick.
With a quick shake of his head, he dipped his chin, and I had to step closer to hear him. “These kids, they don’t have anything,” he said, his voice low, rumbly. He smelled like aftershave worn down by a hard day’s work, and sweat, and soap, and something sweet that drew me in. “They just told me.”
“What?” I asked, concentrating like any of this made sense to me.
“They get a list, see.” He caught my eye like he wanted me to focus, so I had to tip my head back to look up at him. “The ranch sends them a list.”
“Okay, a list.”
“But they don’t have anything on it.” I must have looked confused, because he added, “It’s a list of stuff to bring with them. Socks. T-shirts. Jeans. Briefs. Toothpaste. You see?”
“They don’t have those?” I asked, thinking of the backpacks they’d thrown on the bunk beds.
“One of ’em has a blanket that he brought from home. The other one has two sweatshirts. I don’t think they have a toothbrush between them. But Lucas just said to buy boots and hats.”
There was a line of worry between his dark brows. This guy was a rule follower, though I expected he would not follow any rules he felt were foolish. Even now he was pulling out a credit card and showing it to me like a ticket of admittance.
“I’d like to get them what they need, but I’ll need Lucas’ okay. This here’s a company credit card.”
Now I understood. “Got it.” I pulled out my phone. When Lucas answered, I explained the situation.
“They don’t have anything?” Lucas asked. There were sounds in the background, and I suspected he was distracted.
“Nope,” I said. “We’ll go ahead and get them the basics, and then we can figure out what happened on their end.”
“Good plan,” Lucas said. The appreciation in his voice was sure and solid, as it always was. “Thanks for being there.”
“No problem.”
As I headed over to where Dillon and Cameron were goofing around with the bootjack, Jake was right there at my shoulder. Maybe to make sure I didn’t mess up, or maybe for moral support.
“Hey guys,” I said, bright and friendly. “What happened to the lists the ranch sent you?” I asked, getting straight to the point. “Any reason you didn’t bring that stuff with you?”
Cameron laughed and tossed his hair out of his eyes, but the reaction seemed forced to me. I sat on the chair closest to Dillon and leaned forward to pull them into a kind of circle.
“What happened?” I asked because something had.
With another fake sound, Cameron nudged Dillon with his elbow. “I just aged out, and my foster mom laughed and said she didn’t have to pay for anything anymore.”
“My mom laughed, too,” Dillon said. “Then she ripped the list into little pieces and said I had to leave. That day.”
“We’ve been staying at the Center,” Cameron said. “Something happened to the things we brought with us.”
Along the way, as these two had made the transition from being minors to the over-eighteen crowd, they hadn’t gotten the help they needed.
I was sure the Center had done what it could, and maybe neither of them had wanted to complain that someone had stolen their belongings, in case the complaint got them kicked out of the ranch program.
These were nice kids, and they didn’t have anything except what they wore on their backs. Maybe they could have been at some fast-food joint earning money to buy those socks, but they were here, about to join in the fun and games at the ranch. It was Lucas’ responsibility now.
Rubbing my forehead, I looked up at Jake. He held his hat propped on his knee, fingers laced along the brim. His eyes were very dark, like he didn’t like what had happened but didn’t know what to think about it.
“We should get them what they need,” I said, making it a bit of a question, a bit of direction.
“Yes,” Jake said, because obviously he was not one to mince words.
“Can you take the lead?” I asked. “I have no idea what’s on that list.”
Using even fewer words than before, Jake nodded and began to direct the young men around the store with brief instructions to get what they needed and to not go overboard.
He was trusting them to shop for themselves, which made sense, given their ages and the goal of the ranch. Which was to instill a good work ethic, among other things.
Jake knew the drill, and he presumably knew how to herd cattle.
He used that knowledge to guide the shopping in the way it ought to go.
Good blue jeans, not overly fancy ones. Plain socks and briefs and t-shirts.
Sensible boots. A good straw cowboy hat, which turned out to be the most expensive article of clothing.
After paying and placing the purchases in the truck bed, Jake led us to the market up the street, where the boys got basic toiletries and sunscreen.
“We can always come back,” Jake said, sensible and steady the entire time.
As we returned to the truck, Jake dipped his head to me. “Thanks for your help earlier.”
“Sure,” I said, though I’d not done much besides make a phone call.
This time I sat in the truck’s cab with Jake, and Cameron and Dillon shared the truck bed with their goodies. The truck had a bench seat that was a tad slippery, but it smelled clean, and it was nice to be out of the wind.
Jake drove silently, both hands on the wheel, using the long stick shift to change gears. It would have been simpler to have an automatic, wouldn’t it?
But that, evidently, was not Jake’s style. A flip phone, a truck with a manual transmission, and a job that probably involved almost no technology at all. That seemed to suit him.
Which made me wonder about what was underneath that flint-edged exterior of his. And what might make a smile dance in his strange blue–and–glass green–flecked eyes.
Not that I was going to ask. Try to work my way past that glower? No thank you.