My Own Ever After: A Memoir

by Heather Huffman

  For much of their childhood, I worked too many hours in a never-ending battle to keep the bills paid and the pantry filled. Even after Adam had his degree, he struggled to put it to use. Every time he would find a job, he’d get laid off and would have to go back to bartending or waiting tables.

  I went back to college when I was pregnant with Blake. I remember taking my art history final the day after I gave birth to him. The kid next to me said, “Whoa, I partied too late last night.”

  I responded with, “I gave birth yesterday.”

  “You win.” He’d ducked his head down and went back to his test.

  It would be 2007 before I finished my degree in Communications. I’d chosen that and a marketing emphasis because it was the most logical thing I could think of that would use my love of writing.

  Things got a lot better for us financially by 2008. Adam had found his way to a good job as a project manager, and I had a job in the Communications Department at Scottrade. We moved from poor to middle class that year, and we even bought a house in Eureka, the town I’d graduated from. In 2007, we had tried unsuccessfully to move to the Ozarks. It lasted about six months, ended in disaster (literally, a tornado), and we’d spent six more months in my parents’ basement recovering financially from the decision.

  So, when we had our act together in 2008, we decided Eureka was the compromise between Adam’s suburban upbringing and my deep-seated desire to return to my rural roots. The house we bought was much cheaper than the realtor and bank were telling us we could afford; we wanted to play it safe. Besides, it was more than twice the size of the house we’d been living in for years. It felt like a mansion. In many ways, it was my dream house.

  Moving into that home began a period of rest for us. Aside from marriage trouble, we were happy. The bills were paid. My relationship with God had flourished in the years since Christopher’s birth. We had a passel of rescued dogs. Our kids were content. Adam worked from home by that point, so he was there to get them off the bus. I loved my job. Things were good. So good, we finally had the money to realize a childhood dream that had eluded me thus far: we bought horses.

  I found Rollins Ranch through Craigslist when I answered an ad for horseback riding lessons. Dylan had been in lessons off and on for a couple of years. He was a natural, and I got to live vicariously through him. I’d wanted horses since, I don’t know, birth. No, it was more than a want. It was more like a deep yearning. Every time I had begun to realize my horse dream, something horrific happened to keep me from it.

  As a child, my fondest memories were of my grandpa’s farm. Roaming those 200 acres freely with a pack of dogs in tow was the highlight of my summers. I even had two pet calves one summer, Jacob and Henry. The summer I turned fourteen was the year my grandpa said we were going to start horse shopping. Only what he thought was a stiff neck turned out to be bone cancer, and I instead spent the summer taking care of him as he faded under the weight of an illness that had been too far advanced to mount much of a fight against it.

  Grandpa said he wanted to see the trees turn one last time. He died October 29th that year, just after the peak weekend of fall in the Ozarks. The farm I loved so dearly was sold because his heirs couldn’t agree on anything else, and my childhood dreams of living there someday were gone. Ah, but I can still see those wild and gnarly hills in my mind. I can still remember running through those woods with my ragtag pack of four-legged friends.

  My grandpa cultivated my faith as a child. He answered countless questions about God as we’d sit on the porch and watch the deer graze in our meadow. It was the farm that cultivated my imagination and my love of adventure.

  For a while, as a teenager, I found my horse fix in the form of my sister’s father-in-law. He had eight, all wild as fox hairs. He allowed me to hang out with them whenever I wanted in return for me watching them when he was away. He even said I could have the youngest filly to keep if I would gentle the others in to make them more marketable. Being young and invincible, I’d done it. How I didn’t break my neck or get my head kicked in, I have no clue. I’m sure my guardian angels will tell me all about it someday.

  I had no idea what I was doing with those animals. I’d never had the first horseback riding lesson or ridden a horse outside of trail or pony rides. Instinctively, I communicated with them the way I saw them communicate with each other and, by some miracle, it worked. They were all gentle as lambs with me by the time they were sold, even the stallion. (That statement right there is enough to make people who know horses wonder how I’m alive.) When the farm’s owner remarried, the first thing to go was the horses. I couldn’t afford board in St. Louis at the age of seventeen, so my beautiful Wildflower was sold with the rest. I can still see her standing on a hilltop with the sunlight making her mane shine gold. That little red roan mountain pony had become my best friend in the four years we’d known each other. I tell myself someday I will see her again, even if it’s on the other side.

  The third time I toed up to buying a horse was on our previously-mentioned attempt to move to the Ozarks. A voice in the back of my mind told me to hold off on buying the filly I’d had my eye on. When we lost our home and most of our belongings to the storm, I realized why. It was hard enough being homeless without a horse in tow.

  When we started lessons at Jack’s barn, it was a godsend. He raised phenomenal quarter horses. In addition to the lesson horses he had on hand, there were always a handful of babies to dote on. Dylan and I both took lessons from a teacher who’d worked out an arrangement with Jack, the owner. For some reason, Jack took us under his wing, and the relationship deepened. It was more than a barn. It was a family. The boys and I were there every spare moment―especially Dylan and me. We leased a horse from Jack and eventually bought two: Samson and Sassy.

  Samson was a weanling foal we bought so Dylan could be part of the process of raising and training him. We all adored that colt and his comical personality. He was amazing, his conformation was perfect, and his red coat shone like a copper penny in the sun. Dylan and Samson were the best of friends from the start. Everyone who watched those two together knew they were witnessing something special.

  Sassy, a tall and classy bay, was my girl. I was crazy about her, even though she made me earn every inch of our relationship. I learned so much on that horse. Most of her siblings were competing in cutting and reining competitions; she’d missed her chance to train because she’d had strangles as a foal. But she was the best trail horse I’d ever seen. I trusted her in woods and on hills. Oh, the ground we covered together.

  I eventually took over as a barn helper for Jack. I gave his beginner lessons; he only worked with advanced students. I exercised his horses for him, and we helped clean stalls. One of my favorite memories of that time was trot races in the golf course, a particularly well-manicured front pasture that doubled as Jack’s driving range when he didn’t have horses on it. Dylan and I would saddle a couple of horses and “race” at a trot, up and down the field, laughing until our sides hurt. We’d always find out afterward that Jack had been watching from the windows in his kitchen. He’d tease us as we’d stop in for goodbyes.

  Jack was a hard mentor–always demanding better, never failing to rail at you for the slightest wrong move. Dylan and I both hate to ever do anything wrong, so the time we spent under Jack’s tutelage was intense. And, even though Jack was quick to chew us out if we overcorrected or missed a cue, he was also quick to boast to anyone who’d listen that Dylan and I had the most natural seat on a horse that he’d ever seen. Sometimes I wish he’d boasted less; I could feel the weight of his praise every time I’d ride there–people watched, constantly and intently, to see if we’d live up to it.

  But I loved that hard old cowboy. Maybe it was because I never stopped missing my grandpa, or because my relationship with my dad was a bumpy one. Or maybe it’s because Jack had given me the gift of horses, but I loved him fiercely. Sometimes, I think it would baffle Adam how loyal the rest of us were to
the barn. The place stressed him out. He sometimes tried to be a part of our love for horses, but his infrequent visits always left everyone tense.

  There were two other important things happening in this period of rest and happiness in our lives. The first was that I’d decided to pick up my pen again and write. I’d always loved writing, but I’d never been comfortable sharing my words with others. I did once, in fourth grade, and had been ridiculed by my peers for it. After that, I only shared my words under duress. No amount of praise from those peers could erase that first reaction, though, and for years I would write entire books and screenplays, only to pack them away when finished. I stopped writing before Blake ever came along.

  But one day, the stories swirling around my brain just refused to be quiet any longer. I decided to not only give writing another go, but to get serious about trying to publish those words. I came close to realizing that dream fairly quickly, in the grand scheme of things. It didn’t feel quick at the time, but looking back, it was. Within a year of setting my mind to it, I’d had multiple conversations with agents–no small feat–and even found myself sitting face to face with the president of a major literary agency in New York. She told me, point blank, that I would have to choose: Either keep writing the books I’d been writing or pick a style that was easier to sell and have a successful career. The books I wrote were apparently too much of a paradox to properly market. They were too much a mix of light and dark, too hard to classify.

  I cried for a solid day after that conversation. Then I decided I cared more about telling the stories I wanted to tell than I did about a career, so I decided to self-publish. By spring of 2011, I had four books self-pubbed. I gave the eCopies away for free to help raise awareness for human trafficking. I thoroughly enjoyed the process of publishing those books, and they’d done surprisingly well since their release. The girl too shy to share an essay in class suddenly had over 10,000 readers from all over the world. I got fan mail. It was crazy.

  The other big thing that was happening at that time was my job at Scottrade had shifted, and I was working in their training department, building and teaching communication and writing classes. That job meant I traveled, often to Denver and sometimes to Arizona. I adored both places, but by March 31 of 2011, the travel was starting to wear thin. I’d just gotten back from a trip. I missed my kids like crazy. I remember Blake had had a bad day at school; some kids had been bullying him. I picked them up and Adam took off work early and we decided we’d go as a family to the barn before trying the Culver’s that had opened in town while I was away.

  We never made it to Culver’s that night. Instead, my happy little world came crashing to my feet.

  Chapter Two

  It was over a month between writing the first and second chapters of this book, despite the constant urging in my soul to tell our story. I don’t have to think too hard as to guess the reason for my procrastination—reliving that night is exhausting, and so I find excuses to avoid writing it down. Even though I know better, Blake’s story—our story—should be told. It deserves to be told.

  The night I first wrote this chapter was the culmination of a particularly awful week, month, year. Our heater—and backup heater—decided to quit on the first truly cold night of winter. Something about it had a “last straw” kind of feeling to it. And then I stumbled across a post from a friend on Facebook mentioning the hospital in Washington, Missouri that Blake was first taken to that night. She and I got to talking and realized she worked there at the time. On top of being a, “wow it’s a small world” kind of moment, it was the reminder I needed of the amazing things God has done in my life. Had I really been feeling unloved and forsaken just hours ago? Had I really forgotten so quickly what God has done in my life? So, I will wade back into the memory. Perhaps it’s time.

  Some nights, my mare Sassy would be a total heifer and make me earn any good that came from our rides. That night was not one of them. She’d moved like a dream all evening long, responding to the slightest pressure from me. We were so in sync that I could think left and she’d feel it and move left. When kids are about four, they go through a real “look at me” stage when they want to show their loved ones every single thing they accomplish. I remember feeling like that as I told Adam, “Look at how beautifully she’s moving! She’s such a good girl.”

  I could tell my kiddos were beyond ready to go. They lined the gate of the arena, trying to be patient, but not really—dinner at Culver’s was on their minds. Blake begged to be the one to cool Sassy down after her workout. He’d ridden her a hundred times before so I obliged, sliding off the saddle to hold her while he mounted. The smile on his face as he slipped through the gate is forever etched in my memory. It was that smile that would replay through my mind over the coming days, taunting me with the question “Would it be his last?” I remember worrying in the days to come that I might forget it. Perhaps that’s why I can still so vividly recall that smile even now.

  As Blake settled into the saddle, I tied his reins to create a continuous loop—just in case he dropped them—before handing them to him. We ambled around the arena, me walking just slightly in front and to the side of Sassy. My darling girl could sometimes be a doll for me and a brat for lesser riders, so I stayed close, watching them interact and offering feedback as needed. That night, it wasn’t really needed. He was every bit as in sync as she was.

  When my kids are on or near a horse, I watch the animal’s body language closely. I always have–even more so now. That night, her body was relaxed, her ears loose. She didn’t seem to have a care in the world. We’d just walked past one of the gates leading outside when it happened. I’ll never know what caused her to spook. Was it me walking in the wrong spot? Something outside? Did the barn dog yank her tail without me noticing? (He was notorious for that kind of thing.)

  Whatever the cause, my calm horse morphed into a creature running for its life in the blink of an eye. She spun on her hindquarters and bolted, causing Blake to tumble backwards. About the time I breathed a sigh of relief because he’d landed in the sand, seemingly unharmed, her hoof connected with his forehead hard enough that it flipped him. I screamed and fell to his side, turning him so he was no longer face down. I cleaned the sand out of his mouth in preparation for CPR, but it felt hopeless. He wasn’t breathing. He was completely limp in my arms.

  In the days since that one, I’ve encountered death more than once on our farm. It’s only served to strengthen my conviction that in that moment, I held my dead son in my arms. I vaguely recall the look on my other children’s faces as they watched with horror. I remember Sassy coming to a halt in the corner and dropping her head, much as a football team would take a knee while waiting for word on the condition of a fallen teammate.

  The hopelessness, the disbelief, the complete lack of acceptance welled up in me. I placed my hand on Blake’s forehead and begged with every fiber of my being, “Jesus, bring him back to me.”

  He took a breath. I could feel it, the breath returning to his body. His eyes didn’t open, but he was most definitely breathing again. In the chaos to follow, I clung to that: God gave my son breath again. It would not be for nothing.

  That’s when my family sprang into action. Adam went to call 9-1-1. Dylan went to get Jack. Chris asked what he could do—I asked him to come pray with Blake. Dylan, who was eleven at the time, had returned to retrieve the horse and took her to put her tack away, check her over for injuries, and put her in the stall so she’d be out of the paramedics’ way when they arrived. Chris, who was six, fell to his knees beside his brother in the sand, took his hand and prayed. Fervently.

  The paramedics came, after struggling to find the farm, and took him to the nearest hospital. I called my dad, though I was sobbing so hard it took three tries for him to understand what I was saying. And all I could think about was that smile. I was so scared it would be his last.

  The first hospital stop was a bit of a blur. They cut his clothes off—jeans and a plaid flanne
l shirt. I still have them. His face was mangled and swollen. His eyes still had not opened. It was there they stabilized him in preparation for the MedFlight to Cardinal Glennon, a nearby children’s hospital. Just before the helicopter arrived, they cleaned Blake up as best they could and offered us a chance to bring the boys in to say goodbye. I knew from the way they didn’t quite meet my eyes they didn’t expect him to survive the flight.

  Christopher hadn’t lost his look of stunned disbelief. Someone in the ER gave him a stuffed puppy and asked him to take care of it for his brother. He clung to that puppy the rest of the night. It got him through. Even in my own shocked state, I noticed the kindness and was grateful for it. That’s the thing about kindness—you never know when your simple act will be the very thing someone clings to just to get through the night.

  Blake was loaded onto the helicopter, and we were told to meet him at Cardinal Glennon. As we were leaving, we were met by one of our friends from the barn. She’d heard and had come to check on us. Another kindness.

  The ride to the hospital felt infinite. Adam drove. I rode in the back, a son tucked under either arm as we cried. My favorite praise CD was playing in the background. To this day, Third Day’s “Cry Out to Jesus” takes me right back to that car, that moment. I can’t listen to it.

  We arrived just after the helicopter. There was a line at security, but the guard took one look at us and knew we belonged with the child who had been flown in, so he waved us through. Another kindness.