The Long Dry [lexingtons]
Oct 12, 2018 0:56:56 GMT -5
Post by Deleted on Oct 12, 2018 0:56:56 GMT -5
| WillowAnnLexington 35 | Auntie | D10 |
 |
Nights spent dripping in the muggy heat of August fell to the whispering cool of September, and all too soon October plodded along in days of gray and rain. Cow tracks dotted the mud along the ranch, with steers careful not to dip into the puddles that looked convincingly shallow. Willow Ann liked to say the cows were twice as smart when no one was watching, and half as dumb when you were. That evening she’d had to go and retrieve a lost calf that had ambled up a ways, toward the old Tansy homestead. His big black eyes had been stuck watching the caved in roof, as though he could see the ghosts peering out from broken windows. She’d had to whisper sweetly into his ear, and give a gentle tug at his neck before the spell seemed to be broken. She found Joshua tacked up in the barn. He’d sprung up a whole foot in the past year and a half. His hair a mess of cowlicks and curls, would that he’d make something out of it. He was like his father, a man that cared as much about his appearance as he did the clothes on his back, which was to say not at all. Briar clucked her tongue and hawed about how he wasn’t never gonna find a girl to marry him if he let himself look like a gooch. To which he’d reply that he wasn’t looking to get married, and if that was all that she ever thought about, then she could go on and get, then. Willow Ann would hush them both, and try not to smile. They’d gone and lost their mama not long after they’d been born. Could have been worse, Willow Ann’s father would say, they could have been left for dead. Willow Ann had known Noreen—Nonnie—since the two could walk. She remembered how the two of them had been afraid of the dark, and shrieked at the shadows of sheep that stalked the fields at night. Or the time she’d been sick with a fever, and Nonnie’d come and spent an afternoon reading stories to her. They’d been the type of children that shared a heart—two little bodies barreling toward adulthood made strong by one another. The calf stomped its foot, and Willow realized she’d been standing in the doorway for too long. “You looking at something in particular, or just having yourself a little stroke, Wills?” Joshua hung his body over the edge of the partition for the stall he was cleaning. Every day he looked more like her. “Just been thinking, your birthday’s coming soon,” Willow moved to open the stall and tapped her willing companion on its way. She gave a pat on its head and turned to face Josh. “You eighteen now—thought that’s old enough to have your first drink.” She tried to catch his eyes, which were firmly watching the ground. Cracking a smile, she gave a shove into his side, and Josh let out a little snort. “I know it ain’t your first, I wasn’t born yesterday.” She pressed her hands into her pockets and gave a shrug. “But you know I got to look after you the best way I know how. And that means it’s time we started acting like adults. And I can’t have you going out there embarrassing the Lexingtons with some sorta weak stomach. Last thing I need to hear is that you couldn’t handle a sip of moonshine from the Longhorns or a bum wine from the Olentzeros.” She gave a grin. |
