Hoyt
I’d walked out of the ring.
I’d gotten into the ambulance under my own volition.
Hell, I’d even ridden out that bumpy trip to the nearest hospital without passing out from the pain in my left shoulder.
If that ain’t cowboy then I don’t know what is.
So the fact I was made to stay overnight in this dimly lit room with my arm in a sling as nurses came in every two hours to shine a light into my eyes was overkill.
My head was fine. I’d had a helmet on. Given how fucking hard my skull was, suffering a concussion was doubtful.
Ask anyone who knew me and they’d say my head was crafted of pure concrete.
Which was why I had argued up one side and down the other that I was pretty sure I didn’t need surgery for the broken collarbone tomorrow. Today. Whatever.
I wasn’t a doctor, nor had I ever played one on TV.
I knew little about such things despite visiting every ER on the ISbr Rodeo circuit.
What I did know was surgery involved plates, screws, months of PT, and a loss of winnings.
Given that my sponsors were dropping me like a leaky transmission, being out of commission for who the hell knew how long was not happening.
And I had said so loudly but then the pain meds began to wear off and I’d crumpled like the little daisy that my daddy always called me whenever I dared to cry over a skinned knee.
That had been last night. This morning was a whole different dish of fajitas.
This morning I was checking out of this damned shitty hotel and heading to Arizona.
Sure, the pain was making me queasy but then again so did gas station sushi and I still ate that.
The only thing slowing me down was the fact that I couldn’t find my fucking clothes.
And that my left arm hurt so bad every time I took a step I wanted to throw up.
The door to my room opened with a soft whoosh.
I let the nurse—probably the same one who had argued with me not twenty minutes ago—stare at my backside through the gap in my ugly gown as I rummaged around in a wardrobe looking for my fucking pants.
My boots and hat were there, as was my belt, just no pants or shirt, or underwear.
Whatever. It was Texas. I’d walk out with my balls swinging in the warm air.
“Hoyt, what the fuck are you doing?” I heard the craggy voice of my chute man behind me.
Fuck. Clayton was here. Super. Well, he worked for me—sort of—so if he got lippy I would just withhold his paycheck.
Not that I could. The ISbr paid his wages.
Part of this new age buddy system they’d instituted about five years ago.
Coaches, support staff, trainers, agents.
All working together to support the bull rider.
Not that this whole group dynamic thing did shit really.
My agent wasn’t here. He was more than likely drawing up a letter of resignation after seeing me eat dirt then get tangoed on last night.
“I’m looking for my pants,” I ground out as I turned to gaze upon a man who was only late thirties—two years younger than my thirty-nine—but appeared to be at least sixty.
Rodeo life aged a man in many ways, not all visible from the outside.
His face was deeply tanned, wrinkled, and bore scars from one too many close encounters with bulls.
Which was how I would look in another ten years or less.
Shit, I looked and felt eighty this morning.
“They don’t allow you to wear pants in surgery,” he noted calmly as I clutched at the wardrobe door with my right hand.
“Yeah, about that…” I replied, easing one foot in ugly gray socks with rubber nonslip strips ahead of the other. “I’m not having surgery. It’ll heal.”
“You’re about the most pigheaded fool I have ever had the misfortune of knowing.” He tossed a cloth shopping bag on the bed. “Those are your clothes. I washed them at a laundromat last night.”
“You were here last night?” I didn’t recall that. Just the doctors tutting, the nurses probing, and the white-hot pain in my shoulder.
“I was, and you were out of your head in pain. Why don’t you stop being a fucking jackass for five minutes and listen to your body. Just this once?”
“Clay, I have to be in Arizona. My team, our team, has three sponsors left. Three.” I shuffled to the bed, the room blurring, and flopped down beside the dusty duffel bag of clothes with a groan. “If I don’t ride I’m done.”
“You can’t ride with that busted shoulder. The league won’t allow it.” He grabbed a chair then dragged it to the bed, the metal legs grating across the non-slip floor.
“The league won’t know,” I said then reached into the duffel for my jeans. The agony of even that made my gut roil. I’d skip the boxers.
“They already know.” I whipped my attention from my old worn Wranglers to my chute man. He lifted a shoulder. “As does the team. Hoyt, we love you, we do.”
“Got a funny way of showing it. Bunch of fucking traitors.” I snapped my jeans out of the tight coil Clay had rolled them into. They flew out of my hand. “Fucker. Fucking. Fuckers. Fuck!”
I had a moment. I flipped over a tray holding a pitcher of water, which landed on my jeans, soaking them through. The clatter brought Nurse Ratched in, big eyes bulging at the mess I’d made.
“Sorry,” Clay offered the woman in the light blue uniform. “I’ll clean it up.”
“I’ll call someone from housekeeping. Mr. Knox, are you still planning on leaving?” She seemed kind of pissed at me. Not sure why. I was an American with rights. I could walk out of here if I wanted.
“Yes,” I snapped.
“No,” Clay barked. We stared at each other.
“Well, I hope you can talk some sense into him,” the nurse said.
“I’m going to try, ma’am,” Clay said as she headed out to find a janitor with a mop. Or a brick to clobber me over the head with. It was a toss-up probably. Clay threw me a dark, dark look. “Okay, so here’s the deal. I’m going to call your brother—”
“No. Fuck no, leave him alone. He’s living his own life without a care for me.”
Well didn’t that sound pitiful. Poor Hoyt, nobody loves me, everybody hates me, guess I’ll go eat worms. Christ, grow the hell up and stop being such a pussy ass.
And there was Dad. Uninvited but showing up when you least wanted him. Like the clap only with a heaping helping of homophobia.
“Hoyt, if you walk out of here without that surgery you’re never going to ride again. Now that is a fact. Your shoulder is bruised and your collarbone is busted.”
“I’ve had worse,” I mumbled, wishing I could make the room stop pulsing. It was freaking me the fuck out.
“No, buddy, you haven’t. Not since I’ve been on your team. You need to get fixed up, recuperate, and figure out if this is the life you want for yourself.”
I glanced up at him, suddenly weepy, my body slowly folding in on itself like a wet envelope, whatever the shit that meant.
“I don’t know nothing else. This is what I’ve done since I was sixteen and lied on my application to get into the rodeo,” I confessed, praying to whatever gods looked over men who rode bulls and lied about just about everything in their lives to give me the fortitude to not pass out in front of Clayton.
“If I don’t do this what the hell do I do?
World don’t seem to have big demand for washed-up cowboys who like to read poems about strawberry roan ponies. ”
“There’s more out there than rodeo, Hoyt. Don’t you ever get lonely? I know you’re not big on buckle bunnies…”
Not big on them. Nope. Not at all. He’s big on the men who wear the chaps and spurs. Unnatural as a two-headed calf is what he is.
“Nah, I’m not lonesome.” I lied. Flat-out lied a lie as big as the Grand Canyon. I longed for something, someone, somewhere safe where I could just be. Him and me. Happy. But that wasn’t happening anytime soon because I had bulls to ride.
“Well, I am. And I’m handing in my notice at the end of this season.”
I gaped. Then I started to cry. Big, gruesome tears.
Unstoppable heaving sobs as if someone had run over my dog.
Shit. I wished I had a dog. All I had that was mine was my clothes, a trailer that used to have horses but now had all my belongings—sponsorships drying up had drained my meager bank accounts—and my little collection of poetry books.
Sissy books, my father would call them, but I liked them.
I liked to read them over and over, sometimes even jot down my own verses on napkins when I had time to kill.
So what if they were gay. So was I. Not that anyone knew.
Hell no. Queers did not ride steers. Well, bulls, unless they were in a queer rodeo, which was not where a Knox boy would ever find himself.
“Shit, Hoyt.” Clay moved to me then took a step back as I dropped to my side, face wet, chest heaving, room blinking in and out of existence.
How fucking sad that my friend was too worried about touching me in a kind way that all he could do was stand there, wringing his hands, as I had a breakdown.
God damn rigid rules of masculinity. This was a new thing for me.
Never quite experienced something like this.
Wasn’t sure I liked it, but after a few minutes I felt cleansed.
Vacant of just about every emotion. An empty bottle floating down the river, ending up who the hell knew where.
“Hoyt, it’s okay. We’ll get you some dry clothes then maybe the doc here can write up a prescription for some pain meds and—”
“Nah,” I sniffled, lying on my side, cheeks slick, staring at the air conditioning unit that was blowing mediocre cool air.
“I’m…I’m going to have the surgery.” Might as well let them end it now.
Why put it off? If I were a dog I’d have been put out of my misery long ago.
Might as well cut my losses for good and ride off into the sunset.
Oops, sorry, got no horse. Fuck me and my life.