“Mine,” Retta said. “Now get what belongs to you and get it taken care of. I want underwear, bathing suits, and everything that isn’t supposed to be on a hanger folded neatly and put into drawers. Anything that needs hanging up should be neat and not sloppy. I’ll have a room check every day for the first week before we go to breakfast. Beds will be made and the room in order.”
“This is like prison,” Faith muttered.
“No, darlin’.” Retta giggled. “The food is better and you get more than an hour a day in the sunshine. And you get a nice bed instead of a cot in your own private room rather than sharing it with someone else.”
“Yeah,” Gabby said. “So stop your bitchin’.”
“Cussin’ gets demerits,” Retta warned.
“Sorry about that, but I’ve been waitin’ for weeks to get to come here. I ain’t never been out of Dallas and I’m not goin’ to let her ruin it for me,” Gabby declared.
She watched as they carried their baggage to their rooms and then went out on the porch to catch a breath of fresh air. This wasn’t like any leadership conference she’d ever held and she’d never had a Faith in her Sunday school classes.
“Got ’em unpackin’?” Cade asked as he sat down on the porch steps.
Retta nodded. “I already settled argument number one.”
“I heard some pretty loud yellin’ when I passed by a while ago.” He chuckled. “They just think they’re tough. We know we are.”
“I’m not so sure I’ve got enough tough in me,” she whispered.
“Then bluff and never let them know. Little bit of advice. Take the two that square off to argue and fight the most and put them together when you need a two-person team for events.”
Retta’s eyes felt like they might pop right out of her head. “Are you kiddin’ me? I put Gabby and Faith as far apart as I could when I assigned rooms. They’d scratch each other’s eyes out if I paired them up.”
“Give it a try. Make them depend on each other. Better get back to the house. I’ve got a little paperwork to do in the office before Mavis calls dinner. I stopped by to tell you that everyone has to be in the living room thirty minutes before dinner today for a little group session. I ask them each to tell me something about themselves kind of like an ice breaker. Today it’ll be what part of Dallas they’re from and who they lived with,” he said. “See you at noon.”
“How often do you do the group thing?” she asked as he was walking away.
He turned around and smiled. “Whenever I think we need it.”
She marched back into the bunkhouse. “Hey, you girls come on out here in the living room when you finish.”
Alice poked her head out of her door. “Why? Did we do something wrong?”
“No, darlin’, you didn’t. I just wanted to get to know each of you a little better and thought maybe we could have a visit.”
Alice came out of the room and sat down in a recliner. “Is that basket of stuff on my dresser really for me? I can open it up and use it?”
“Yes, it is. I chose a different color for each of you so you wouldn’t get things mixed up,” Retta answered.
Gabby came out next. “Thank you for the basket and that note. I’ll keep it forever. I still can’t believe that I get my very own room.”
The other two joined them and stood in the middle of the floor. They eyed the sofa but none of them took a seat on it. Fear? Stubbornness?
Retta pointed to the end of the sofa. “That’s your spot for our group visits, Faith. Gabby, you sit in the middle, and Sasha can have the other end.”
“I’m not sitting beside that…” Faith’s mouth was pursed to say bitch but she stopped.
Gabby moved to the sofa and plopped down in the middle. “She’s afraid of me, Retta.”
“I’m not afraid of anything.” Faith quickly sat down but moved to the corner so that she wouldn’t touch Gabby.
Sasha shyly eased down on the other end. “I love my room and purple is my favorite color. Did you know that when you got the basket for me?”
“No, I didn’t but I’m glad that I chose it,” Retta said. “Alice says she’s happy to have her own room. I want each of you to tell me if you share a room at your house.”
Alice nodded. “I share with three sisters.”
“Share, he…heck,” Faith stammered over the cuss word. “I sleep on the sofa in the foster home where I stay.”
Sasha went next. “I share with my sister. She’s sixteen but we got a baby bed in our room too, because she’s pregnant. Mama says she can’t marry her boyfriend because they’re too young.”
“Gabby?” Retta asked.
“I sleep on the sofa like Faith does. Me and Mama only got a one-room place with a twin bed,” she answered.
“So are you going to like having your own space?” Retta asked.
“It’s like heaven. I already wish I never had to leave,” Gabby answered.
One child wanted to stay on the ranch forever. Retta looked forward to maybe getting her old job back in the city. It was a crazy world for sure.
Chapter Six
Cade needed to get a new tire on the tractor before the hayride with the kids that afternoon. Seeing the ranch for the first time through the eyes of the kids was an experience that he loved, but when he went to hitch the wagon up to the tractor, he’d discovered a flat tire.
If Retta hadn’t been busy with the girls he might have called her to help him. The whole attraction he felt for the woman was a lot like the kids who came there for a few weeks. They arrived, had a good time, and went home. Anything that would develop between him and Retta could be just like that—have a good time and then wave good-bye the day after July Fourth.
They both knew what they wanted, and their paths were as far removed from each other as Longhorn Canyon and the moon. He was thinking about that almost-kiss when the wrench slipped, splitting the skin on one of his knuckles and making him swear loud enough that it almost blistered the paint off the side of the old tractor.
He quickly wrapped his hand in a handkerchief and hurried back to the tack room where he ran cold water over it. A little cleaning with hydrogen peroxide and some antibiotic ointment and a Band-Aid fixed it right up. Levi was leaning on the side of the tractor when he returned.
“I heard that yellin’ all the way out in the yard. My poor little donkey don’t know whether he’s welcome in this barn or not,” Levi said.
Cade held up his hand and growled. “Donkey can’t take a little cussin’, he’s comin’ to the wrong ranch. So you brought him home, did you?”
“Yep, I did, and the kids are goin’ to love him. It’s goin’ to be an interestin’ summer,” Levi said. “You think Benjy is better or worse than he was last year?”
“Too early to tell. Help me get this tire on and the wagon hitched and I’ll give you a ride back to the house,” Cade said.
“You got it.” Levi pushed his cowboy hat back on his head and shoved his hands down into a pair of work gloves.
When the job was done, they drove across the pasture to the house in the old truck. They barely had time to wash up before it was time to sit down to the table. Skip said grace and immediately after the last amen, Benjy took a hot roll from the platter in front of him and bit into it.
“Yes, Mavis. Just like I remembered. Sugar mixes with yeast and that makes carbon dioxide and that makes the dough rise,” he said.
“Thank you, Benjy.” She smiled.
“How do you know all that stuff you know?” Alice asked.
“I read books,” he answered.
“You smell like tractors, Cade,” Benjy said.
“I’ve been workin’ on one all mornin’,” Cade told him.
“Will you teach me to do that?” Gabby asked.
“Why would you want to do something stupid like learn about tractors?” Faith popped off.
“If I know how a motor works then I’ll be able to fix my mama’s car so she don’t have to walk to work every morning
,” Gabby answered.
“Sounds like a smart girl to me. I wish I would have made my daddy teach me about cars,” Mavis said.
“I’m glad he didn’t.” Skip chuckled. “If you’d known anything about cars, you might’ve left this old cowboy that first year we were married.”
“You got that right.” Mavis nodded.
Faith cocked her head to one side and frowned. “So y’all had some arguments?”
“Honey, marriage is a partnership and sometimes it takes a while to get all the whats, hows, wheres, and all the rest ironed out,” Mavis answered. “It’s teamwork like you kids are going to learn while you are here.”
Cade forked a steak onto his plate. “Anyone who is interested can come to the barn next time I work on a tractor.” Being surrounded by kids would sure enough curtail any bad language.
“And those that don’t want to do that can help me fix fences,” Justin said.
Benjy raised his hand. “I will help Justin. One post every twenty feet for barbed wire fence with two spacers in between and a wood post every fourth one so the fence don’t sag.”
“You really are smart,” Gabby said.
Benjy ducked his head and set about eating his steak, laying his fork and knife down between bites and wiping his mouth with his napkin.
“I’ve got a pasture full of small bales of hay that need brought in…” Levi started.
“Slave labor,” Kirk smarted off.
“No, it’s not,” Skip said. “And you best get that kind of thinkin’ out of your head, son. Anyone who wants to do a little farmwork in their free time will be fairly compensated.”
“You mean we get paid if we work?” Faith asked.
“Sure you do,” Mavis answered.
Cade passed out straw hats to everyone as they filed out to get on the hay wagon, and Retta was more than glad to settle her new straw hat on her head. It didn’t feel as good as the one she’d left behind at the farm but with sweat and time it would shape up and fit right well.
“I like my hat. It’s like Cade’s.” Benjy plopped the one with his name on the inside down on his head.
“Me too.” Alice crammed hers down on her braids. “Do we get to come back next year?”
“I need to draw the wagon. Some hay wagons have wood wheels.” Benjy walked away and chose a seat at the back of the wagon.
“Once you turn thirteen, you don’t get to come back,” Retta explained in a low voice.
“I’m only ten so that means I might get to do this again.” She beamed as she skipped down the porch steps.
The tires on the old wooden wagon made the ride a little less bumpy. But the wagon itself was the same as she’d been in dozens of times as a kid. Open air, benches on two sides, and hay strewn on the floor. She spotted a cooler at the back and figured that it was full of either water bottles or cold drinks.
She sat down beside Alice, and Sasha quickly sat on the other side of her, which meant again that Gabby and Faith had no choice but to sit together. Maybe Cade was right about making them learn teamwork.
Skip pointed toward the pasture where Levi was baling hay. “This is a self-supporting ranch as much as possible. We grow our own hay for the cattle in the winter.”
Retta listened with one ear but if she leaned far enough to one side, she could see Cade’s face reflected in the side mirror on the tractor pulling the wagon.
“Those are some whompin’ big hunks of hay to be picking up,” Faith said.
Retta quickly jerked her head back. “Those will stay in the field. They’ll line them up against the far fence line and then bring them to the cattle as they are needed.”
Skip nodded. “Look over in that field at those small bales. Those are the ones that we take into the barn. We don’t make a lot of the little ones, but sometimes they’re needed in the stalls if we’ve got a cow or a bull that has to be kept up for a while.”
“I could get them bales to the barn,” Nelson said.
“Yeah, right,” Kirk smarted off.
“I can and if I do, then I make money to take home, right, Skip?” Nelson asked.
“That’s right, and we can always use all the help we can get.”
Retta could see dollar signs dancing in all of their little eyes as they thought about helping haul that hay to the barn the next day. When she looked at the mirror again, she caught Cade’s eye and he winked at her, causing a blush so deep that she removed her hat and fanned with it.
“Little warm back there?” Cade called out.
“Hot as hell. That’s what Levi says,” Benjy said.
Nelson pointed a finger. “He cussed.”
“He ain’t smart enough to even know that he cussed,” Kirk sneered.
Benjy turned his head and shut his eyes. “Kirk is an idiot. Statistics say that an idiot is someone with an IQ of less than twenty-five.”
“I am not!” Kirk raised his voice. “And besides what’s an IQ?”
“It’s a number that shows how smart you are,” Skip said.
“What’s Benjy’s number?” Kirk growled.
“Way higher than an idiot,” Skip said.
“Then why don’t he act like it?”
“He does,” Alice said. “He’s been tellin’ us lots of things. You just need to listen to him.”
Benjy’s expression didn’t change a bit but he did nod slightly.
“Now all of you look that way.” Cade raised his voice and pointed behind the boys. “That’s Justin and his crew puttin’ up fences. We have to keep good fences up so we can control the pastures for the cattle. Do any of you know why we stagger the planting?”
No one answered.
“Benjy?” Cade asked.
“To give the cows good green grass all summer. When they eat what’s in one pasture then it’s all gone so they move them to another place.”
“Smart answer, Benjy. Thank you,” Cade said loudly.
“See, he’s smarter than you are.” Alice glared at Kirk.
“Yeah, did you see them pictures in the house that he drew? I bet you can’t draw like that,” Gabby said and turned toward Faith. “I can bring in more hay than you can.”
“But not me. I’m strong.” Kirk puffed out his chest.
“Bullsh…crap,” Faith hissed. “I can outwork all of you if I want to.”
Kirk stretched his foot out across the space separating the benches and touched her toe. “You’re just a girl. I can do more than both of you put together.”
“Yeah,” Nelson agreed.
“Us girls will work together tomorrow,” Sasha said. “And we’ll show you that girls are just as tough as boys.”
“Yes, we are.” Gabby did a head wiggle that dared them to say anything else.
“When we get done, y’all girls will be whinin’ like puppies with no mama,” Kirk bragged.
“Well, y’all will be passed out colder’n a homeless drunk man down in the ghettos,” Gabby said.
“Right,” Sasha agreed.
“I can help,” Benjy said.
Ivan barely nodded. “Me too. Me and Benjy will work together.”
“Y’all can do that. I want to help Mavis in the kitchen and have food ready when y’all come in the house,” Alice said.
Faith shrugged. “I’m going with Alice to the kitchen.”
“No fair,” Gabby said. “That means there’s four boys and only two girls.”
“You can have Benjy and Ivan, and me and Nelson will still beat y’all,” Kirk said.
“Good. I don’t want to work with you,” Benjy said.
Skip chuckled and nodded at Retta. It didn’t take much to read his mind. The hay ride had already begun to whip the kids into shape.
Retta glanced at the mirror but Cade had turned around slightly so she couldn’t see his face. Then suddenly he made a wide turn, started back toward the house and yelled above the noise of the tractor engine. It was midafternoon when they got back and Retta’s girls made a beeline for their bunkhouse where Gabby and
Sasha plopped down on the sofa to figure out ways that they could work harder than the boys. Faith stormed off to her room and slammed the door. Alice picked out a book and carried it to her room but she didn’t shut the door.
Retta moved out to the porch where Gussie was sprawled out on the top porch step with Hopalong right beside her. Beau came bounding around the corner but neither of them even opened an eye. She sat down in a chair and propped her feet up, and Beau sat down beside her. But then his ears perked up and he jumped over the cat and the rabbit and headed toward the house. That’s when she saw Cade coming toward her with two bottles in his hands.
“Thought you might like a cold root beer,” he said when he reached the porch. “It’d be even better if it was real beer, but…” He shrugged.
“Thank you. Can’t be havin’ what we can’t let the kids have.” She took it from him and ran the icy cold bottle over her forehead. “Settin’ an example isn’t always easy, and those are my dad’s words, not mine.”
“Wise man.” Cade sat down on the shady side of the porch in one of the two rocking chairs. “Did you go back and visit often after you’d left home?”
“Every time school was out for holidays and all summer. He needed the help.” She twisted the lid off and drank deeply. Cold soda pop and a hot cowboy sitting with her. It didn’t get better than this. “Tastes pretty good on a hot day like this.”
“It really does.” He nodded. “Levi wants us to take the kids out to the barn after supper and let them see the new little donkey.”
“Sounds good to me. Right now I’ve got two in there plotting against the boys, one who can’t wait to get in the kitchen, and another one slammed the door to her bedroom. I hope she’s reading.” She eased down into the rocker, kicked off her boots, and propped her feet up on the railing.
“Faith will come around. She just needs time to find her calling,” he said.
“You ever had one like her or like Kirk before this bunch?”
“Last year we had two girls and two boys who were complete hellions the first couple of weeks. Thought for sure I’d have to send them home, but they did a complete turnaround when they found their place. Guess who cried the most when it was time to go home?”
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