20. Gage
Gage
" S o here's the thing about women, Bullet," I said, leaning against the fence post in the pre-dawn darkness. The horse stood a few feet away, close enough now that I could have reached out and touched his neck if I'd wanted to. "They're complicated as hell."
Bullet's ears flicked forward, like he was actually listening to my rambling. Maybe he was. God knew he was a better audience than most humans I'd encountered.
"Take Billie, for instance." Her name still did things to my chest that I wasn't entirely comfortable with.
"She's been watching my therapy sessions from the observation window every morning for three weeks.
Laura mentioned it last week, like it was no big deal.
'Oh, by the way, your former therapist has been checking up on your progress. '"
I pulled an apple from my pocket, one of the Honeycrisps from Delaney's orchard that Bullet had developed a fondness for. He stepped closer, accepting the treat with the kind of careful trust that had taken weeks to build.
"But then yesterday, I saw her at the grocery store," I continued, scratching behind his ears the way he'd started to like. "And the second she spotted me in the produce section, she turned around and left. Didn't even finish her shopping."
The horse made a soft nickering sound that could have been sympathy or could have been a request for another apple. I chose to interpret it as sympathy.
"I don't get it," I admitted. "If she cares enough to check on my progress, why won't she just talk to me? I mean, I know why. I'm the asshole who left her with nothing but a letter when she was seventeen. But still. I thought we were going to try to be friends."
The eastern sky was starting to lighten, painting the edges of the clouds with soft pink and gold.
I'd been coming out here every morning for two weeks now, talking to Bullet about things I couldn't say to anyone else.
It was becoming a routine, this dawn confession to a horse who couldn't judge me for my mistakes.
"Xander confirmed he's ready to take my cast off next week," I said, settling in the grass.
My leg barely protested now, a small miracle that still caught me off guard.
"A month ago, I could barely walk across a room without crutches.
Now I'm thinking about asking Booker if I can help with the house renovation.
It's my house after all, and I'm bored with being the guy that's just writing it all down and sketching plans. "
Bullet moved closer, until he was standing directly in front of me. Close enough that I could see the faint scars on his legs, the evidence of how he'd saved my brother's life.
"You know what the crazy part is?" I asked, looking up into his dark, intelligent eyes.
"I bought that house for her. Not consciously, maybe, but.
.. every choice I make, every room I imagine fixing up, I was picturing her in it.
Her coffee cup on the kitchen counter. Her books on the shelves.
Her laughter echoing through rooms that have been empty too long. "
The admission hit me harder than I'd expected. I'd been telling myself the house was about putting down roots, about proving to my family that I was here to stay. But the truth was simpler and more complicated than that.
I'd bought the house where we used to dream about our future because some part of me had never stopped hoping we might still have one.
"Pathetic, right?" I said with a laugh that came out more bitter than I'd intended. "Twenty-nine years old and still pining after the girl I loved for my entire childhood. Still believing in fairy tales and second chances."
Bullet lowered his head until his muzzle was inches from my face. His breath was warm against my cheek, sweet with the scent of hay and apples.
"The worst part is," I whispered, "I think I'm falling in love with the woman she's become, too.
She's even more incredible now than she was as a kid.
Stronger, more confident, more beautiful.
She puts broken things back together for a living, and she's so damn good at it that watching her work is like watching art. "
The horse didn't move, didn't step away from my whispered confessions. He just stood there, solid and patient and accepting in a way that made my chest tight.
"I know what you're thinking," I said. "If you love her so much, why don't you tell her? Fight for her? But here's the thing, Bullet, I already had my chance with her. I had everything I could have wanted, and I threw it away because I was too much of a coward to fight for it when it mattered."
I closed my eyes, remembering that night eleven years ago. The taste of her lips during our first and only kiss. The way she'd felt in my arms, like she belonged there. The letter I'd written instead of the conversation I should have had.
"Maybe Laura's right," I said quietly. "Maybe she transferred my case because she cares too much. But caring too much about me has never ended well for anyone. Just ask my family how that worked out."
"Actually," a familiar voice said from behind me, "your family turned out just fine."
I spun around so fast that Bullet startled, taking several steps back. Booker was standing by the gate, two cups of coffee in his hands and an expression that was part amused, part exasperated.
"How long have you been there?" I asked, scrambling to my feet as fast as my cast would allow.
"Long enough to hear you wallowing," he said, holding out one of the coffee cups. "Which needs to stop."
I accepted the coffee, heat flooding my cheeks. "I wasn't wallowing."
"You were whining to a horse about a woman who already told you she wants to be friends again." Booker's voice was matter-of-fact. "She cares about you, Gage. She said so herself when she transferred your care. Stop overthinking it and ask her out."
"It's not that simple..."
"It is exactly that simple." Booker cut me off with the no-nonsense tone that had kept the ranch running smoothly for years. "You like her. She likes you. You're both adults. Ask her to dinner."
"She said friends," I protested.
"So start with friends and see where it goes." He shrugged. "But sitting out here every morning talking to Bullet about your feelings isn't going to get you anywhere except more conversations with a horse."
Bullet snorted, as if in agreement.
"Pull your head out of your ass, little brother. Life's too short to waste time on maybes."
With that characteristically blunt advice, Booker headed back toward the house, leaving me standing in the pasture with my coffee and the uncomfortable realization that he was absolutely right.
Maybe it was time to stop talking and start doing.
It was time to ask Billie Schulster out on a date.
Twenty minutes later, I was walking through the doors of the rehabilitation center before I could lose my nerve. My hands were sweating, my heart was racing, and I felt like a teenager working up the courage to ask his crush to prom.
Which, given the history, wasn't entirely inaccurate.
The receptionist looked up in surprise. "Gage? You don't have an appointment today, do you?"
"No, I..." I cleared my throat. "Is Billie available? I just wanted to talk to her for a minute."
"She's between patients. Let me check." She picked up the phone, and I used the thirty seconds of her conversation to question every life choice that had led me to this moment.
"She'll be right out," the receptionist said, hanging up with a smile.
Right out. No time to escape. No time to change my mind. No time to...
"Gage?"
I turned to find Billie standing in the doorway to the therapy rooms, looking professional and beautiful and slightly confused. She was wearing scrubs that should have been clinical but somehow made her look softer, more approachable.
"Hi," I said, then immediately felt like an idiot. Hi? That was the best I could do?
"Is everything okay? Did you hurt yourself at the ranch?" She stepped closer, her professional instincts kicking in as she scanned me for obvious signs of injury.
"No, no. I'm fine. Physically, I mean. My leg's good, shoulder's good, everything's..." I gestured vaguely at myself. "Good."
She raised an eyebrow. "Okay. So...?"
This was it. This was the moment where I either found my courage or spent the rest of my life wondering what might have been.
"Would you like to get coffee with me?" The words came out in a rush, all tangled together.
Billie blinked. "Coffee?"
"Or tea. Or lunch. Or..." I ran a hand through my hair, feeling heat creep up my neck. "I'm asking you out, Billie. As friends, I mean. Like we talked about. Being friends."
"You're asking me out as friends," she repeated slowly.
"Yes. No. Maybe." I took a breath and tried again. "I'm asking if you'd like to spend time together outside of professional settings. To see if we can actually manage this friendship thing we talked about."
She was staring at me like I'd grown a second head, and I was beginning to think this had been a terrible idea when her expression softened into something that looked almost like fondness.
"You came all the way over here to ask me out for coffee," she said.
"I figured if I called or texted, you might think it was about physical therapy stuff. I needed to ask you in person."
A smile tugged at the corner of her mouth. "You hobbled over here on crutches to ask me out for coffee."
"Is that... is that a yes? Or are you just documenting my pathetic attempt so you can tell the story later?"
"It's a yes, Gage." Her smile widened, and suddenly she looked like the girl I remembered instead of the careful professional she'd become. "I'd like to get coffee with you."
Relief flooded through me so fast I almost forgot how to breathe. "Really?"
"Really. But not during work hours," she added quickly, glancing around the waiting area where several people were pretending not to listen to our conversation.
"Of course. When works for you?"
"Saturday morning? Books and Beans?"
I was grinning like an idiot, but I couldn't seem to stop. "Saturday morning. It's a date."
"It's coffee," she corrected, but she was still smiling.
"It's coffee," I agreed. "Between friends."
"Between friends."
We stood there for another moment, both of us smiling and neither of us quite sure how to end this conversation, until the receptionist cleared her throat.
"Billie? Your next patient is here."
"Right." She turned back to me, her cheeks slightly pink. "Saturday morning, then."
"Saturday morning."
I walked out of that rehabilitation center feeling lighter than I had in weeks. Maybe months. Maybe eleven years.
Booker was right. Sometimes the simplest solutions were the best ones.
Sometimes you just had to ask.