Love Drunk Cowboy

by Carolyn Brown

  Felix nodded. “That will be very fine.”

  They walked away speaking in rapid Spanish. Lobo, a tall thin man with skin the color of coffee with lots of cream, a hook on his pointed nose, and firm skinny lips laughed and said, “Rye está hechizado por la morena que todos quieren.”

  Rye took a step out of the shadows and yelled, “I can hear you, Lobo.”

  Lobo looked back over his shoulder and grinned.

  “What did he say about you?” Austin asked. Not one thing about the cowboy had changed. His eyes were just as green in the bright sunlight as they’d been in the dimly lit café and his hair was even blacker. That tattoo beckoned to her to touch it and she had trouble keeping her eyes off the big silver belt buckle.

  Rye wasn’t about to tell her that Lobo had said that he was bewitched by Austin. His palms were already sweaty just standing there in her presence. He was more than just bewitched by her. There was an itch so far down in the middle of his heart that there was no way he could scratch it. And the physical reaction quivering behind his Wrangler zipper said he’d best get his mind on ranchin’ instead of Austin Lanier.

  “I asked you what he said,” Austin said.

  “I’m sorry. I was translating it from Mexican slang into English,” Rye said quickly. He’d deal with Lobo later when he was flirting around with some local chica. The only one of the crew who wasn’t married, he was tall, thin, and would be playing in Mexican movies if a talent scout ever visited his village.

  “Hey, Rye, no quiero bronca contigo,” Lobo yelled.

  “And what was that?” Austin asked.

  “He made a remark about me and then said that he didn’t want to get into a fight with me,” Rye said with a grin. Damn! His face was going to hurt by nightfall if he didn’t wipe that constant smile from it.

  Austin had sent thoughts racing around in his brain that he had no business entertaining. Someone who worked in a high-powered office in Tulsa wouldn’t be staying in Terral, Oklahoma, with a population of four hundred if you counted half the dogs and part of the stray cats running around town. Without them the total was probably closer to 350.

  Austin opened the front door and said, “Okay. Guess I should’ve taken Spanish in college rather than French. Did you need something or were you just checking up on the hired help?”

  “Felix asked me to be here when you arrived. They’ve been spooked about meeting you for fear you’ll decide not to put in a crop this year. It’s their means of living for the whole year. They work hard, send their money home, and then live on it until the next spring. They’re afraid you are going to tell them to go home and their families will go hungry his winter,” Rye said.

  “Well, thank you. Looks like I’ve got to hit the ground running if I’m going to get their checks written and taken to the bank.”

  Send them home to starve kept running through her mind. She could never do that. If they knew a year ahead of time there wouldn’t be work for them at Verline Lanier’s then they could make arrangements elsewhere. But how could she run a watermelon farm and work in Tulsa at the same time?

  “I’ve got to go to Ryan to the feed store and tag agency. I’ll drive you up there,” he said quickly.

  Austin nodded before she thought about it because she was worrying with the idea of those men and their families going hungry all winter.

  “Okay, I’ll go get my truck and come right back.”

  Chapter 2

  Austin inhaled deeply before she opened the front door into the small white frame house and went inside. She hadn’t been there since her grandmother died back in the fall. There had been no need. The tumor wasn’t something they could surgically remove. She’d opted for no treatments and taken her last six months with no chemo. They’d talked every Thursday night and she’d visited Austin twice, both times in Dallas when Austin had trips there.

  She’d decided early on how she wanted things done. No funeral. Cremation. No fuss and no need to come to Terral. Pearlita would keep the ashes until Easter. She died on a Thursday and Rye had called. They’d talked every week since then and that had filled the space when she normally talked to Granny. Except Austin thought she was talking to a much, much older man all those months.

  The windows had been opened and cool spring breezes pushed the lace curtains out away from the window in the living room. The house had been built the first year Verline and Oscar got married back in 1947 and reflected the simplicity of the times. The living room took up the first quarter of the house with a bar separating it from the kitchen. A short hallway to the left had doors that opened into a small bathroom and two equal sized bedrooms. The washer and dryer were in the garage off the kitchen. It had been years since there was enough room out there to park a car. Now it housed the overflow of Verline’s love for pure old junk.

  Austin turned around slowly and took in every nook and cranny filled with stuff. Getting through it all would take every waking hour for the next two weeks. Maybe she should have taken her mother’s offer to come and help her. Barbara would have gone through the place like a whirlwind and in two days it would have all been relegated to the trash bin. Austin wanted to take her time and make decisions about what to keep and what to toss.

  “Granny was a junkie of the purest kind,” she mumbled.

  Granny’s business desk was in the corner of the living room, back behind the recliner that faced the small television set. A letter bearing her name rested on top of a business checkbook, lying in plain sight on top of an antique desk. The oak chair squeaked when she sat down as if it realized the wrong woman was using it. She recognized the spidery handwriting on the letter as her grandmother’s and held the letter to her chest before she opened it and read,

  Hi honey,

  If you are reading this then my ashes are floating down the Red River and I’m already sliding down a rainbow or chasing raindrops. I’m writing this today because I know the time is nearing. Don’t know how, but it is, and I don’t want you to cry for me, Austin. Just pick up the reins and run this old ranch like it was the love of your life and it’ll give back to you a hundredfold. The lawyer will come soon and you’ll see just how prosperous good old hard work will make you. But in case you need to take care of business before he gets here, the checkbook will tell you what I pay the hired hands. Felix will tell you how we do business. Rye will help you with anything he can. He’s a damn fine young man and he’s been good to me. Do whatever you want with the farm and the house. I’d love it if I could see what you decide, but I trust you to do what’s best for you. Remember I love you and the times we shared were the highlights of my life… Granny

  Austin wept until she got the hiccups. She finally got it under control enough to look through the checkbook, find the amount owed each hired hand from the previous summer, and write out six checks, but when she signed the last one she swallowed hard past the lump still in her throat. Verline Lanier had lived in this little house, less than half the size of Austin’s Tulsa apartment, for the majority of her life. She’d lived in Terral all eighty-three years. Could Austin really sell a lifetime to strangers looking for a good deal at an auction?

  “They wouldn’t even realize how many hours Granny spent sitting in this creaky old oak chair or why there’s a chunk out of the corner of the desk.”

  Austin rubbed her upper arm at the memory of the summer when she was running through the house and stubbed her toe on a throw rug. It sent her flying into the desk, knocking out a chunk of wood and putting a gash in her arm that required five stitches at the Nocona hospital emergency room. Granny hadn’t even told Barbara and Eddie about it until it was time to send her home. The scar was barely visible, nothing more than a tiny white line that showed up when she had time to get a tan. Barbara had said her daughter would never go to that godforsaken place again and Eddie had said it wasn’t any big deal. Barbara had asked him what he was going to do the next time when it scarred Austin’s face.

  Austin’s father had said that they’d hi
re a damn good plastic surgeon if that ever happened. She didn’t even know what a plastic surgeon was and wondered that day why a doctor would ever work on plastic people.

  She went from the desk to the kitchen. The sink was on the right-hand side with a window above it looking out over acres and acres of freshly plowed earth. Cabinets running the length of the west wall with the bar made an L-shaped leg. The refrigerator was on the east wall: one of those old rounded top things that Granny said was irreplaceable because it didn’t circulate air like the new ones, therefore it didn’t circulate odors. Trash can to the right of the refrigerator. Granny said that way the icebox, as she always called it, hid the ugly thing from anyone sitting in the living room. A sugar bowl, salt and pepper shakers, and a bottle of pepper vinegar was arranged in the middle of a chrome-legged table with a red top. Four red padded chairs were pushed up under the table. A ceiling fan above the table was turning, slowly stirring the breeze from the windows into the kitchen.

  Red and white checkered curtains hung on the window above the sink with matching ones on the back door window that led out into the garage. Austin stared at that window for a long time, trying to figure out if they’d built the garage years after they’d put up the house, since the door had a window. Probably so, since Granny would have needed a place to store her extra stuff after a few years of marriage. She’d always had a penchant for keeping every single thing that came through the front door.

  She started a pot of coffee and opened the refrigerator to find it filled with crates and crates of eggs. She counted twelve with two dozen eggs in each one. That was twenty-four dozen eggs. Why on earth would there be more than two hundred eggs in the refrigerator?

  “Easter!” she moaned.

  Granny always ordered eggs for the hunt. She’d gotten them from Martin’s Grocery down past the school. It was the only one in town other than the Mini-Mart, a convenience store that also sold gas and diesel.

  “What am I going to do with all these eggs? And why are they here? Granny’s been gone six months. Surely she didn’t order them before she died. I’ll call Pearlita and see if she knows who will take them off my hands tomorrow, but right now I’ve got to go to the bank as soon as my hired hands get in here and sign the checks.” She talked to herself as she listened to the gurgling sounds of the ancient percolator.

  Her grandmother had hated the newfangled drip machines and had said that they were the beginning of the ruination of decent coffee. Give her a good percolator and plenty of strong dark roast coffee to go in it and they could take all the fancy machines at Walmart and bury them in the nearest landfill or cram them up their asses. She didn’t care which just so long as they didn’t expect her to use one of the gadgets.

  A gentle knock on the door brought her back to the present. She motioned for Felix and the other men to come inside. They lined up right inside the door, hats in hands, and waited. She brought the checks over to them and handed Felix the ink pen. He went to the bar and laid his check down, signed the back, and left it lying. The rest of the men followed his example just like they did every Friday.

  “Would you all like a cup of coffee? Will the bank know the right place to send the money?” Austin asked.

  “We are fine and Miz Verline always took care of it for us so I hope they know what to do,” Felix said.

  “Okay. I want you guys to know that I’m not sure what I’m going to do with the place but I appreciate you staying on until I get it figured out. I gave you each a ten dollar raise. Do you want that brought to you or sent home?”

  “Please bring it back to us. Our families will be looking for a set amount. We will take care of the rest and thank you,” Felix said, then fired off rapid Spanish to the others.

  “¡Este padre!” A wide grin split Lobo’s face.

  “He says that’s awesome.” Rye walked right in without knocking. “I forgot to tell you about the eggs I put in the fridge this morning. The grocery store called yesterday and said they were there. Granny had ordered them six months ago so I picked ’em up and stored them in her fridge. Didn’t have room in mine. We’ll color them tomorrow. I’ll be here early. What time do you get up?”

  Felix headed toward the door. “Lots of cháchara.” He motioned at all the knickknacks sitting everywhere on every single flat surface in the room.

  “What?” Austin asked.

  “Cháchara. Junk.” He waved again at it all.

  “You got that right.” She smiled. “I’m going to the bank now. I’ll be back as soon as possible.”

  “Si. We can take the pickup to town for food when you get back, yes?”

  “Did Granny let you do that?”

  He nodded and wiped his eyes. “Yes. Once a week on Friday night we go to town and buy food.”

  “Then that’s fine.”

  “We thank you, Miz Austin,” Felix said.

  “How long have you been working here?”

  “Forty years. My father was here before me. Estefan and Lobo are my nephews.”

  “Then you knew her well.”

  He nodded and said on his way out the door, “Miz Lanier was a great lady even if she did like the cháchara.”

  “Are you ready?” Rye asked.

  She picked up the checks. “What makes you think I’m going to dye Easter eggs tomorrow? I’ve got enough to do without that on my plate too. You can come and get them in the morning and do them yourself, but not before ten.”

  Rye didn’t argue but held the door open for her. Her heel sunk into the dirt when she stepped off the porch and he quickly slipped an arm around her waist to keep her from falling. She looked up with those big round blue eyes and he had to stop himself from kissing her right there. It was a crazy feeling: If the woman was drugs, he’d be addicted the first time his lips met hers.

  “That was almost a disaster. I guess high heels aren’t any good on a watermelon farm, are they?” She blushed.

  “Guess not.” He grinned.

  But if they make you fall into my arms, then by all means wear them every single day. I’ll take a chance on the addiction.

  He drove back into town, past the cemetery, the watermelon shed, the grain elevator, the school that had had a much needed face-lift, the Baptist church on the left, the community center beyond that with the old boarded-up Methodist church on the next corner, and then the funeral home. On the right was the Church of Christ and the grocery store, then a building that Granny said the Watermelon Jubilee crew had bought to rent out for special occasions like birthday parties and baby showers, and then the Mini-Mart on the left facing Highway 81, with a fire station, a car fixing place, the telephone company, and a café in between. When he reached the highway he turned right and pointed the car to the north.

  “It hasn’t changed a lot since I was a kid,” she said.

  “People move in and move out. Population stays about the same.”

  “Didn’t there used to be a grocery store on the other side of the street? Somewhere about where the fire company is now?”

  “That’s right. When I was a kid, my folks brought us over the bridge to the Fourth of July festival. Terral always had the best fireworks show in this area and there was a store there that still sold penny candy and put it in a little brown paper bag.”

  If he didn’t look at her, he felt like they were back on familiar ground. Talking about things like they did on Thursday nights but one glance and poof! Every intelligent thought slipped right through his mind and he wanted to touch, taste, and feel. All of which would most likely bring about one reaction and that was a solid slap on the jaw.

  “I was here one time for that. We sat in lawn chairs up by the Methodist church and I got all sticky eating cotton candy,” she said.

  She looked out the side window at the cattle, the fields of alfalfa, and the barbed wire fence. It was easier if she couldn’t see him; then he was the same man she’d pictured to go with the voice on the phone. An elderly gentleman who was kind enough to oversee her grandmother’
s place across the road. How in the hell had she not realized from his deep Texas drawl and his laughter that he wasn’t seventy years old?

  He was tempted to drive slower so he could keep her beside him longer but the nine-mile trip to Ryan went fast even at the speed limit. He turned left at the flashing light, made a U-turn at the end of the street, and parked beside the bank. “Here we are. If you’ll wait at the drugstore over there on the corner across the street, I’ll pick you up there when I get my feed and tractor oil.”

  He opened his door but she shook her head. “Don’t get out, Rye. I’m able to open a door and shut it all by myself. I’ll get my business done and then wait for you at the drugstore. Do they still have a soda fountain?”

  He nodded. “Probably in the same place at the back of the store as it was last time you were here.” He was disappointed. He’d wanted to help her out of the truck so that he could touch her again. Maybe it had been like a flash in the pan: instant, fiery heat that burnt itself out in a few minutes.

  The heat in the pickup came close to blowing the windows out, so it was not a flash in the pan, he thought as she slid out the door.

  “Then that’s where I’ll be.” She slammed the door shut and walked across the sidewalk into the bank.

  He watched her until she was inside the bank and slapped the steering wheel. If he’d parked a half a block away he could have watched that cute little fanny a helluva lot longer.

  The lady who waited on her knew exactly what Verline did on Friday with the checks and the transaction went smoothly. She put a twenty and a ten dollar bill in each of six bank envelopes and handed them to Austin.

  “We all sure do miss Verline. We always looked forward to seeing her on Friday afternoon. She was an institution in this county and a pillar down in Terral. You going to sell the farm or run it?”

  “I’ll probably hang on to it until the end of the season so the hired hands won’t be without work.”

  “You are a good woman. I see a lot of Verline in you.”