27. Christian
Christian
I can’t wait for the season to be over.
Don’t get me wrong, I love it. I love what it means to be up on this farm this time of year, with the smell of pine sharp in the air and the ground frozen solid beneath my boots.
I love watching families pile out of their cars, some of them driving hours just to wander through rows of perfectly imperfect trees.
Kids dart ahead, little hands stuffed into mittens, while parents follow behind with thermoses of coffee and that slightly frazzled look that comes with the holiday season.
They’re all searching for that one special tree—the one that’ll sit in the corner of their living room, lit up and loved, for a few precious weeks.
But managing a Christmas tree farm alongside a working cattle ranch means juggling two completely different rhythms, and it’s harder to keep the animals in check when you’re selling Christmas trees by the hundreds.
If I didn’t have the help I’ve got up here—people who understand both sides of this operation—it’d be damn near impossible to pull off season after season.
Standing at the edge of the pasture with my hands wrapped around a steaming mug of black coffee, I stare out over the cattle as the first light of sunrise spills over the mountain ridge, stretching long shadows across the fields.
I hear Preston’s voice break through the morning quiet beside me. “What are you thinking about out here, son?”
I keep my gaze fixed on the horizon, watching the sky slowly transform from deep indigo to streaks of pink and gold that paint the mountain peaks like watercolors.
Morning, Mama, I think, the way I always do when the sun rises over our land.
“What do you think my old man would say about all this?” I ask, gesturing with my mug toward the sprawling ranch that stretches out before us. “This place and the way I’m running things.”
Preston shifts beside me, his hands gripping the fence rail tighter. The old wood groans under his weight as he hooks his boot on the bottom rail, settling in like he’s got all the time in the world to listen.
“He’d be damn proud you’re running it the way he did, the way his daddy did before him.
” I let the words settle deep in my chest, warming a part of me that still aches for a father I’ll never hear them from.
“Of course, he’d probably tell you to hire more hands so you don’t work yourself six feet under before you’re fifty. ”
“I just like things done a certain way,” I say, chuckling as I turn my face toward the man I owe more to than I could ever put into words. “That’s why you’re still kicking around up here—you do as you’re told.”
Preston huffs a quiet laugh. “You’re lucky I like Piper too much to mess up that pretty face of yours,” he mutters, but there’s no heat in it.
I bark out a laugh and clap a hand on his back. “Don’t know what I would’ve done without you all these years, Pres. But you gotta start listening to Ivy and take it easy. Look at you out here at the crack of dawn with me—you’re not twenty anymore.”
“I’m old, not dead. This is what I do, and I’m not slowing down till the good Lord makes me.”
“Fair enough,” I say, leaning my arms across the fence, watching the cattle move slowly through the frost-covered grass.
Despite everything that’s happened with Travis and all the mess and hurt he left behind, I’ve never felt more at peace.
I have my family who’d ride through hell for me.
I have this land that flows through my veins like blood.
And most of all, I have Piper—my home in every way that matters.