2. Beau
Beau
I’d been working with teenagers for a hot minute, and I could clock grief on a kid from a mile away. It usually looked like defiance, or sullenness, or some unpleasant combination of both.
River Jensen was exactly such a teenager. Given his funereal punk attire—complete with an ebony wood walking stick—he must’ve lost something or someone important.
Since he was here with his dad, I was guessing his mom.
The dining room, usually bustling with early morning conversation, went silent as he walked in. He reminded me of my early college days, when I had spiked my hair, worn black eyeliner, and rebelled against the narrow world view my parents tried to force down my throat.
Most people looked at me now—a true-blue cowboy, tall and broad enough to fill a doorway—and had no idea that my angry nineteen-year-old self wore pleated skirts and combat boots.
I stayed in the kitchen during breakfast, observing from a distance. River was determined to be the one dark cloud on this sunny morning. More than just his gloomy aesthetic, though, he’d barely said two words to anyone as he downed a pile of pancakes and bacon.
It was noticed.
Meanwhile, his dad, Clark, who stuck to coffee, tried throughout breakfast to find the words to connect with his son.
Oooh, look. Home fries, just like you like them.
Want some syrup for your pancakes?
It’s a really pretty morning, isn’t it?
That kind of effort from a parent was foreign to me, and it sent a dull ache through my chest. Clark looked like the kind of man who tried to think his way through his problems. The kind of man who’d stay up late searching for the words to make things right.
I only had my assumptions about River, but even I knew that approach would never work.
Not that it was any of my business.
Afterward, I trailed behind as father and son made their way to the round pen for some training. It wasn’t just River. Despite the mild weather and the gorgeous day, a sad sort of brittleness clung to both of them.
Jesse liked to remind me that my job was to coordinate the youth activities, not fix people. Something about those two, though, tugged at my heart. Occupied my thoughts as I went to the barn to grab their ride for the morning, Betty.
Jake, our frequently ill-tempered horse guy, intercepted me at her stall.
“You with the Jensen boys this morning?” he asked, as though he didn’t know.
I grabbed the mounting block, just to give my hands something to do. “Yeah … not sure what’s going on. The dad looks lost.”
“Like he couldn’t find his own ass with two hands and a flashlight.” Jake shouldered me. “Just your type.”
“Shush, you.”
Jake wasn’t wrong, though. Lost, kinda fussy city boys were a particular weakness of mine. But, like most guys in his tax bracket, I doubted Clark Jensen thought much of the likes of me.
“Welp.” Jake handed over the bridle. “Good luck with all of that.”
I shot him the finger, then led Betty over to the round pen, where they had their arms crossed on top of the fence like real cowboys. It was cute.
Kinda.
River was snarling at pretty much everything. The fence, the sun, the dirt, his dad. I nearly laughed when he snarled at Betty. Betty was a quarter horse with a past, and she would not give one solitary shit about his rancid attitude.
Clark, on the other hand, gave several shits. After breakfast, when I’d first registered the rolling disaster, I looked him up. He was the CEO of a midsize tech company. Wastewater management software, or somesuch.
That sort of careful practicality in his choice of business bled out into everything else about the man.
He wasn’t a small guy, exactly, just a lot shorter and leaner than me.
A little shy of six feet, a runner’s build to my bulk.
Chocolate-brown hair that fired red in the morning sun.
Olive-brown eyes with a preppy style that stood out in the sea of Wranglers almost as much as his son’s punk-noir aesthetic.
This morning, he was sporting a rolled-sleeved, blue-checkered button-down tucked into sharply creased knee-length khaki shorts. He accompanied this with brown leather tennis shoes that probably cost him more than my rent. He also seemed to have forgotten his socks.
His footwear was a bold choice, given the number of times he’d be encountering horseshit today, but to each his own, I guess.
I clapped my hands together. Time to make the magic happen.
“Clark and River, right?” I asked, slowing my approach, giving them time to face me and adjust to my height. Between my hat and boots, I towered over them.
River’s eyes widened, but a heartbeat later, he resumed his I-hate-everything glare, lest anyone mistakenly think he actually gave a damn.
Oh, right. Punk as fuck, this one.
Clark fidgeted next to River. After staring up at me for an uncomfortable moment, Clark stuck out his hand. “Yep. Um. I’m Clark, and this is my son, River.”
“It’s nice to meet you two,” I said, shaking his proffered hand. Firm grip. “I’m Beau Rawlings, and I’m in charge of the youth activities.”
River gave me a look that would peel the paint off the side of a barn.
“I’m eighteen years old, Dad,” he said, looking like he’d been sucking on a Sour Patch Kid. “I’m too old for this shit.”
Clark opened his mouth but not much came out.
“Actually,” I said, stepping in. “I work with folks fifteen to twenty years old. So, you are the exact right age for this shit.” I waited for the retort, and when none was forthcoming, I continued, “We have a youth group joining us tomorrow, but for today, I wanted to get y’all comfortable riding a horse. ”
River, who’d been leaning against the fence, was passive-aggressively slow to approach me, then fumbled his walking stick.
Way to assume the worst of the kid, I thought, remembering a second too late that I’d read about his physical limitations just last night.
When River tried to lean down to retrieve his walking stick, he grabbed his hip, cursing under his breath.
“Son, stop. I’ll get the cane.”
“It’s not a cane, Dad.” He wobbled, and I held out my hand. He grabbed my arm and stabilized himself. “It’s a walking stick. And I only need it because we just spent two fucking days in the car.”
Clark looked horrified.
Hoping to help, I tried distracting River with a question. “Your intake form said that you suffered a fractured hip and a broken ankle six months ago. Is this part of that injury, or do you have a more recent injury I should be aware of?”
River turned on his father, nearly losing his balance again. The wind whipped his hair around, almost obscuring the pain and anger on his face.
“You told them about the accident?”
Clark glanced at me like he wished I wasn’t here to witness this exchange. “The form asked if you had any major injuries in the last year, and I couldn’t lie, Riv.”
“PT cleared me for the stupid horses, Dad. That’s all they needed to know.” River scowled. “Besides, getting on a horse isn’t a bad idea because of my hip. It’s a bad idea because I’m not a cowboy.”
He gestured to me as if my Wranglers made the point for him.
“Are you sure you don’t want to at least try?” Clark leaned forward. “You know, if you want, we can push this off another day. We’re here for two weeks.”
Another acid-stripping glare from River. “I’m fine. Let’s get your queer son on the horse and see if that makes a man out of him.”
“River!”
Clark shot me another sidelong glance, and I waved him off. Instead of giving River more of a chance to build up a head of steam, I undid the button on my right cuff.
“Hey, kid. You’re gay, right?” I asked, rolling up the sleeve.
That stopped both of them in their tracks.
“Yeah. Obviously.”
“Good. I get why you might think a place like this is meant for the straights.” My sleeve gave way to the pinup on my arm, two cowboys kissing.
“But, when your dad paid for this immensely expensive vacation, he had to sign a document stating that he understood this was a queer-run, queer-friendly ranch, and that homophobia and bigotry of any kind was grounds for cancellation and immediate dismissal without a refund,” I said, using the legal jargon I’d memorized.
“Just in case you thought he was trying to … I dunno. Butch you up.”
River’s mouth dropped open, but he promptly closed it. He looked to his dad, who nodded.
“Then why are we here?” River asked, frustration and, just guessing here, sadness leaking out of his words. “Like, you keep trying to fix me, and maybe I can’t fucking be fixed.”
Clark stepped back as if those words had hit him like a series of bullets to his chest. I was surprised the man was still breathing.
“Riv, no.” Clark’s eyes reddened as his voice wavered. “There’s nothing wrong with you. I’m trying to fix us.”
River took this in with a slight quiver in his jaw.
“Son, I promise, I didn’t tell them about the accident. I just told them about your injuries in case we needed to make modifications.”
I stilled, my sleeve still rolled up, not sure how to proceed.
“What kind of modifications?” River asked. It sounded like he wanted to know how many of his organs we planned on harvesting.
They both looked to me, and I held up my hands. “I brought a mounting block in case you need it.”
“A what now?” Clark asked, his brows arched.
River bit back a laugh.
Do. Not. Make. A. Mounting. Joke.
I took a moment to find my professionalism and answered, “It’s just a block you can step on so that you don’t have to mount the horse from the ground.
” I pointed to the mounting blocks I’d dragged over the night before.
“It’s also really helpful if you’re a shorter person, or if the horse is especially tall. ”
River snorted, then wrapped his arm around his dad’s shoulders, as if to highlight the fact that he was a couple of inches taller. “So, if my dad’s too short to get on a horse, he’ll hafta use one of those blocks?”
“Hey!” Clark went beet-red as he snuck another glance in my direction. “I’m not that short.”
“You’re not short at all.” I thought about it. “To be clear, we don’t make fun of short people at the Snow Creek Ranch,” I said, if only to prevent Jake from kicking my ass.
“Whatever.” River straightened his shoulders. “I’m tall enough, and my hip only hurts like that when I stand or sit funny. I’m fine.”
I was tempted to bring over the mounting block anyway, but River might not have appreciated an immediate show of no-confidence.
“Okay, then. Let’s give Miss Betty a try.”
“Fine,” he said, shoving his walking stick at Clark before walking up to Betty.
“Excellent. Now, to mount a horse, what you need to do is—”
Before I could get all the words out, he’d slipped one foot into the stirrup and jerked his leg over. He nearly fell off the other side, but somehow managed to stay upright on top of Betty. She let out a snorty huff, pawing out a warning that she wasn’t impressed with his technique.
He winced but kept his seat.
“Well, I guess you already know everything, dontcha?”
River sent me a death-to-all-cowboys scowl while muffled laughter filtered in from behind my shoulder. I turned to find Clark standing there, closer than I realized, amusement firing up his eyes. I’m guessing he hadn’t laughed in a while.
“I’ve seen enough movies,” River said in that know-it-all tone that teenagers specialize in. “I know how to get on a horse.”
“If you wanna do it a little more smoothly next time, let me know. I’ll tell you what you did wrong.”
“I didn’t do anything wrong.” He smirked. “I’m here, aren’t I?”
I rubbed my hand over my scruff and then let go of the reins. “Okay, fine. Do one lap around the pen and meet me back here.”
I would normally walk alongside an obviously unskilled rider, but something told me that River needed the space more than he needed an overcautious youth activities coordinator.
“Fine,” he said, reaching for the reins. Before nearly falling off again.
Betty looked back at me, unimpressed, but then River squeezed her sides with his feet, and she moved forward. Slowly. He nudged her again, and she picked up the pace a little. After about ten feet of that business, he began to cant off to the side.
Shit. I should’ve warned him that the saddle might be loose. That’ll learn ’im.
“Fuuuck,” he muttered as he was being dumped onto the dirt.
I chuckled and turned to Clark to make a joke about whether his son learned all his lessons the hard way, but Clark wasn’t laughing. He dropped the stick and raced to River’s side, his face as white as chalk.
I got there as quickly as I could, and Clark was definitely plotting my murder. He closed the distance between us in a second, poking at my chest hard enough to bruise. “He has a broken hip,” he said through gritted teeth.
Shit, shit, shit. We were just talking about River’s injuries.
“It’s fully healed, Dad.” River rolled his eyes, pushing himself off the ground with a grunt. “Or at least as healed as it’s gonna get.”
“Do you want your walking stick? How’s your hip?”
“Dad. I’m fine,” he said, dusting himself off. “Stop hovering.”
Clark pressed his lips together, then reached out as River winced through a few practice steps, retracting his fingers at the last second. Trying desperately to look as if he wasn’t hovering.
Boy, do I suck.
I held up my hands. “I royally fucked that up,” I admitted.
“It’s usually pretty safe to let teenagers figure things out on their own, but given River’s injuries, I shoulda insisted that he dismount and explained that the first thing you do before getting on a horse is to check the saddle to make sure it’s nice and tight. ”
Clark stared at my forehead like he was trying to burn a hole through it. Meanwhile, Betty had circled around and nudged River’s butt, knocking him off balance. Thankfully, he managed to grab a post and remain upright. While looking bored.
Meanwhile, Clark’s face had turned a remarkable shade of red.
What a fucking mess.
“We can cancel the session, if you’d like,” I offered, feeling like a real shithead.
River, for whatever reason, decided to rescue me. “No, that’s dumb. Just show me how to tighten the saddle.”
I looked to Clark, who gave me an angry nod.
This time, when I went through my spiel about rider safety and mounting techniques, River listened carefully and asked questions. He did a good job tightening the saddle, and when he mounted Betty again, it was a much smoother process.
Thankfully, Clark seemed relieved that River was still willing to give it a shot.
“Now, make your way around the pen and back to me, and let me know if you have questions.”
Gone was his certainty. River looked at the relatively small circumference of the pen, nerves tightening his shoulders. He took a moment and nodded to himself.
“Okay.”
He cantered off, and I let out a heavy breath. Way to make a first impression.