I smooth my face and continue spreading fresh hay in Felix the Black’s stable. “It’s still there.”
The ladder squeaks with her descent. “I don’t really have anywhere to keep these.” Her rubber boots scrape the ground as she sets the old horseshoe on a small shelf. “But I don’t want to toss them out. We need someplace to keep these things, if we’re going to be taking any more down.”
Taking any more down? We’d have to do that only if . . . a slow smile stretches over my lips. Only if Ginny allowed more horses here again. “I’m sure we can come up with something,” I say, my voice trembling with exhilaration. For Ginny, because this is a big deal. A huge deal. I keep my head down because I don’t want her to see the sheen coating my eyes.
The wall she has built, enclosing her in a self-prescribed solitary confinement, may finally have a structural crack in its foundation.
“Hello, Ginny,” Meredith’s smooth voice calls out.
“I thought you were working all night. Shouldn’t you be asleep?” Ginny answers.
“Soon.” I turn in time to see Meredith step into the barn, the circles under her eyes darker than usual. “I just had an . . . unusually difficult shift. I need to decompress a bit. Hello, Water. I hope you had a good night’s sleep.”
“I did.” I feel my cheeks heat again.
“Good.” She nods, a secretive smile on her thin lips. “I was thinking that the two of you should come over for dinner tonight.”
“What for?” Ginny honestly looks perplexed.
Meredith shrugs. “To eat. To talk. To spend time together. I thought it’d be fun. I mean, I’m not the best cook, but I . . .”
“You’re right. You’re not.” Ginny’s head shakes with force. “No, I don’t think that’ll work. Felix is old and blind and won’t know where I am.”
“So bring him along.”
“I like Water’s cooking.”
“Yes, I hear she’s a good cook. Maybe she can help me.” Meredith winks at me. “Gabe really appreciated the dinner last night.”
“That’s right. The lasagna. It needs to be eaten tonight and there’s not enough for everyone. ” Now Ginny’s just lobbing over excuses at Meredith.
“Actually, we’re saving that for tomorrow because I won’t have time to cook. I’m going to the rodeo, remember?” I pipe up.
Ginny glares at me. I sympathize with her; I really do. But she’s only alienating herself. Before I got here, the woman had dinner conversations with a dog. For years. Every single night. How does someone not go insane without human companionship?
I shoot a responding glare back at her, if only to keep the grin from my face—that would irritate her more—as I say, “We’d love to come, Meredith. What can we bring?”
“Just yourselves. And Felix, I guess. I’m sending Amber out later for groceries. Jesse said he’ll be home by six.” With a knowing glance my way, she says, “I’m going to catch some sleep now, so I don’t cut my hands off with a kitchen knife tonight. I’m excited. It’s been a while since we had a family meal.”
A family meal.
Because that’s what we all are. A family.
Meredith leaves as quickly as she came. Ginny doesn’t utter a single word in the five minutes it takes me to finish up with the stall. “I need to get a shower before work,” I say, propping the rake against the wall. “So, I’ll come get you when I’m back. We can head over together?” I stroll past Ginny, feeling her sharp glare skewering my back.
“Have I ever told you about the time Meredith cooked dinner and gave everyone food poisoning?”
I stop. “Is that really true, Ginny?”
She pushes the broom across the floor, muttering, “It will be after tonight.”
The pent-up excitement that’s been building inside me all day, that began heating my body when I heard the Barracuda pass by the house on its way to the garage, finally bursts as Jesse steps into the Welleses’ kitchen.
“I thought we’d have dinner together since we’re all home tonight,” Meredith announces, standing next to me, chopping the last of the parsley while I stir the pot.
My heart flutters as his dark eyes settle on me. “And Water’s making it?”
“I think that’s for the best, don’t you?” Ginny mutters from the corner, where she’s stitching her latest quilt.
Amber and Sheriff Gabe both snort.
“That was one time, Ginny!” Meredith exclaims with exasperation. “And it was the salmon, not my cooking. And you weren’t even here!”
Amber and I share a secret look and smile. I got a text from her around one o’clock, presumably when she woke up, begging me to come by early to cook because Meredith decided that making paella for dinner would be “adventurous.” Apparently, Ginny’s comment on food poisoning wasn’t so far-fetched after all. The last time Meredith felt “adventurous” with a casual dinner for friends, two people ended up in her hospital with food poisoning.
“We know.” Sheriff Gabe comes up behind to place a kiss on his wife’s cheek, a rare sign of affection that’s heartwarming to see. Then he leans over and mock-whispers to me, “We’re so glad you’re cooking tonight, Water.”
Laughter fills the Welleses’ kitchen. I realize that it’s the first time I’ve seen them all together, ever.
“Could you set the table, darling?” Meredith says to Jesse.
He rounds the counter to squeeze her shoulder. “Sure, Mom.” On his way to the sink, I feel his hand graze my back. It’s so quick, I write it off as an accident.
“I can’t remember the last time we set this table,” Sheriff Gabe says, helping his son by placing the cutlery.
“It sure looks different.” Ginny’s eyes finally lift to scan the kitchen—a fusion of modern and country, with stainless-steel appliances and smooth granite countertops mixed in with plenty of wood grain and bull horns mounted on the wall. “I haven’t been here since your daddy died.” She purses her lips together. “He was a good man.”
Jesse takes the seat next to me, pulling my chair out when I come to sit. Ginny sits across from me, next to Amber, looking wary. Of the food, the plates, the faces. The change from eating alone to sharing meals with me on her porch was hard enough.
I catch Meredith’s eye and nod toward the door, where Felix sits outside on his haunches, peering in.
“Oops! We forgot someone.” She pushes open the door, letting in the dog—who’s not quite so mangy or scrawny now that Ginny has taken to brushing him daily and his diet isn’t limited to dried-out chicken.
Ginny’s bobbing knee immediately quiets.
“Wine, anyone?” Meredith holds a bottle up, taking her seat at one end.
Amber shoots a stern look of disapproval. “Mom, it’s Tuesday.”
“It is,” she agrees, tipping the open end into her glass. “And tomorrow is Wednesday, and the next day is Thursday, and one day you’ll learn that none of the names really matter. What matters is that you make the most of every day while you still can.”
A solemn silence falls over the table.
“Your mother lost an eight-year-old girl last night,” Sheriff Gabe explains, watching his wife take a generous sip of her wine.
She stares hard at the glass. “I keep thinking that I could have done something differently.” Her hoarse whisper cuts through the room and settles in a painful knot at the base of my throat. It’s a pinprick next to what she must feel. What any surgeon must feel, stepping into a day with hope and ambition and a wealth of skill, only to lie down at night having witnessed that sometimes none of that matters.
“I’m sorry.” Amber reaches over to squeeze Meredith’s shoulder.
I wish I knew what to say to comfort her. Instead, I push my chair out, making a move to at least fill people’s plates.
“Sit back down,” Ginny barks, standing fast enough to make Felix scamper back. “You cooked.” Grabbing the serving spoon, she starts digging into the pot.
“Oh, thank you, but that’s too—” Amber begins, her hand up in protest as Ginny dumps enough for three people onto her plate.
“No it isn’t. You need to fatten up. So do you.” She scoops a heap onto Meredith’s plate. Mine follows. “And you.”
She sticks her hand out. “Pass your plate on over here, Jesse.”
I think that’s the first time I’ve ever heard Ginny call Jesse by anything besides “that damn boy.”
We all stare at one another, wide-eyed, until Amber quickly starts a conversation about the upcoming rodeo weekend. That segues into tales about the Welles and the Fitzgerald families, and soon the room is filled with laughter. Even Ginny cracks a few smiles.
And I can’t help but beam.
When we’ve all eaten what we could, Sheriff Gabe and Jesse start collecting dishes. “How was it?” I ask Jesse. In one corner of his plate, a pile of chopped vegetables sits, having been picked through. “That’s right, you don’t eat vegetables,” I tease. But then I pause. We’ve never eaten together before, so how would I know that?
“I’ve been trying to get him to eat them for years, but it’s useless,” Meredith jokes. “Unless they’re stuffed in pizza pockets.”
“Right. Pizza pockets.” That’s it. Meredith has made comments about his poor diet in the past. I must have just assumed that included avoiding vegetables.
Meredith and Gabe sit in the gray Adirondack chairs just outside, drinks in hand, talking quietly, as the sun sets over the mountain range.
“This was a great idea, Meredith. Thank you,” I say, pulling my sweater around my body against the evening’s chill.
“Yes,” Ginny echoes, her lips puckering. She slaps her thigh, beckoning Felix to follow. “You coming, Water?”
My eyes wander to the lit garage, the black car pulled in, its hood up. Jesse’s phone rang when we were cleaning up the last of dinner and he headed back there. “In a bit.”
“Suit yourself.” Felix trails Ginny as she makes her way along the foot-worn path, evidence of the long-standing connection between these properties.
“Did you get enough of the leftovers?” Meredith asks. “We never seem to finish them.”
“That’s because they’re never that good,” Sheriff Gabe mumbles.
She smacks her husband across the arm playfully.
“I did. Thanks.” I glance over again in time to see Jesse step out, looking over at us. Is he waiting for me? Or am I just hoping for it? “I need to go ask Jesse for some help. Something for Ginny.”
“What exactly—” Sheriff Gabe begins to ask but then stops, Meredith’s hand on his wrist.
“You have a lovely night, Water.”
“You too. And I hope you get some sleep tonight.” I begin taking steps but then hesitate. As pleasant as tonight was, Meredith’s earlier words still linger in the recesses of my mind, her own silent struggle weighing on me. “For what it’s worth . . . you saved me. You may not be able to save everyone. But I’m standing here because of you.”
A tear slips from her eye. “You saved yourself, Water. With your strength and your determination. You are such a strong girl.”
With a slight nod of good night, I walk toward the only other place I want to be.
We stand side-by-side, staring at the old piece of barn board that we found tucked inside one of the empty stables, Jesse with a hammer in one hand. “Are you sure she’s going to be okay with this?”
“Yes. No. Yes.” I bite my lip with a touch of worry, tapping the horseshoe against my thigh.
He shrugs. “I guess she’ll learn to be okay with it, if she’s not right away.”
“Right. And we can always put them back if she’s really mad.”
“Right.”
I hold the horseshoe up. “Start here. That way we can fit them all in.”
He shifts to stand behind me, his arms circling me from either side as he takes over holding the shoe, fitting a nail into the hole and hitting it with the hammer to fix it into place. “Like that?”
I smile. “Exactly like that.”
He slides a finger around my ear, tucking my hair back, exposing my scar, before leaning in to kiss my temple. It’s like a silent communication, telling me that he knows it’s there, he sees it, and it won’t deter him.
He grabs another shoe and nail.
“Does it really not bother you?” I ask. “You can tell me the truth. It bothers me. A lot.”
He sighs, moving back to stand with me just like before, lining the next shoe up. “Not in the way you think it does.”
“What do you mean?”
“It’s a constant reminder to me.” He pauses as he hangs another shoe. “That someone hurt you like that.”