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Copyright © 2017 by Catherine Alene
Cover and internal design © 2017 by Sourcebooks, Inc.
Cover design by Kerri Resnick
Cover images © ESB Professional/Shutterstock; Grisha Bruev/Shutterstock
Sourcebooks and the colophon are registered trademarks of Sourcebooks, Inc.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems—except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews—without permission in writing from its publisher, Sourcebooks, Inc.
The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious or are used fictitiously. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental and not intended by the author.
This book is not intended as a substitute for medical advice from a qualified physician. The intent of this book is to provide accurate general information in regard to the subject matter covered. If medical advice or other expert help is needed, the services of an appropriate medical professional should be sought.
All brand names and product names used in this book are trademarks, registered trademarks, or trade names of their respective holders. Sourcebooks, Inc., is not associated with any product or vendor in this book.
Published by Sourcebooks Fire, an imprint of Sourcebooks, Inc.
P.O. Box 4410, Naperville, Illinois 60567-4410
(630) 961-3900
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication data is on file with the publisher.
Contents
Front Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Roundup
Sagebrush Afternoon
Bone-Tired
It Seems
My Dog
After the Fact
Tradition
Fugue
Perfect Remedy
Unexpected Visitor
Mine
Almost
Tipping Point
The Morning After
Trample and Sample
Warning Bell
Second Block
Turn and Burn
My Competition
Cool Down
Just Think About It
Intention
Daddy’s Little Girl
My Wrong to Right
Rain Check
Topography
What If
Monarch Wings
Incrementally
World Geography
Picture Perfect
Attention Diverted
Passing Period
Ice-cube Popsicle
Schizo
Second Time This Week
A.M. Routine
Rainstorm
The List is Long
Meeting Adjourned
Better Left Unsaid
Tiny’s Hardware and More
Easy Out
Broken Bales
Temperature, Pulse, Respiration
Time Stops
Blue Yips
Don’t be a Hero
That is the Question
Cluttered
Delivery
A Few Alterations
Impromptu Meeting
Fashionably Late
Never Ever
Forever Indebted
Almost
A Moment Too Long
If I Were
I Know What I Saw
Just Tell Him
What I Didn’t See
Teddy Bear Buddy
That Kind of Friend
Just Confused
Somehow
Dislocated
Does it Matter?
Asphalt Gossip
My Share
Pleasure Reading
Set-up
Wardrobe Malfunction
Quick Change
Perfect
Mother-to-be
Wrong
Macaroni
By Any Other Name
Wild Turkey
Dry
Dinner for Two
Truly
Photographic Memory
Alarm Clock
More Than a Chance of Rain
Lines Shall Be Drawn
Welcome Interruption
Dancing on Dirt
Plastic-cup Tea Party
Lunch Line News Flash
Unexpected Out
First One of the Year
Waiting Game
Flinch
Portend
An Accident
Transparent
Feeling Dad’s Arms
Monday Morning
I Should
Safety First
I Better
So Brave
Hooky
Hindsight is Better
Insomnia
A Hundred Reasons
Everything in its Place
Falling
Aftermath
Exit Stage Left
Stripped Bare
Role Play
Delivery
Unexpected Gift
Kinetic
Wake-up Call
Blackout
Poison Control
Roller Coaster Road
All Fall Down
911
Next Please
If Only
Spare Change
Waiting—Still Waiting
Why Can’t They See?
Sink or Swim
News of the Day
Hallway Confessional
Special Day
Insurmountable
Should-Would-Could
Cheese Sandwiches
Follow-up Exam
On Second Thought
Slight Variation
Doctor’s Orders
The Question
Day One
Gone
Left Unsaid
Present Tense
Exit Stage Left
The Great Unknown
Cement Words
Fifty Minutes
Awkward Silence
If You Are, Am I?
Cody Says
Culpable
Change
Rude Awakening
Follow-up Exam
Backward
Expectations Shattered
When They Ask
Ambivalence
After Hours
Friday Night
Second Half of the Night
Empty Saddle
Tabitha Twitchet’s Tea Party
Blank Pages
Paper Packages
Reputable Sources
Roundup
Happy Ending
Statistics
Author’s Note
Ack
nowledgments
About the Author
Back Cover
For Lin Casciato
Roundup
We started this morning
Before the sun leaked across the sky
While the steers were stiff and slow with cold
It was as it has always been
Men and women and kids
Slumped against pickup trucks
Inhaling the steam off their coffee
All in chinks and boots with jingling spurs
Horses tacked up
Lead ropes looped through the slats of stock trailers
And the dogs zipping in and out of it all
Heeler dogs
Cow-eating machines
Asia and me
Best friends since forever
First to be mounted up and ready to go
Same as we have since we were three
Old enough to ride
Old enough to work
Sixteen now
Still riding
Still working
Asia with her white-blond hair and Scuba, her palomino paint
Her little sister, Alexi, on her horse named Putty right behind
Me and Asia are whoopin’
At the cattle to get it all started
When Dad lopes up on his fancy new bay and joins in
Lanky arms waving
Hand slapping his leg
Horses stomp themselves awake as riders swing into the saddle
Neighbors, parents, brothers, sisters, aunts, uncles, cousins
It’s all the same today
That’s only a pair
Like me and Dad
Suddenly have more family than we can count
Sagebrush Afternoon
Rawhide daydreams
Spun
Beneath a sky burned
White
Trailing cows
Between
Snarls of sage
Fastest way to move cows is at a walk
So we do
Fanning out around
behind
beside
The cattle coming in to be
Doctored
Dad’s voice pulls me out of my daydream
Back to the cows
“Ride ahead and make sure the gates are set.”
Asia’s dad flicks Scuba’s hindquarters with the tip of his reins and
Laughs as Scuba pricks his ears
“Help her, Asia.”
That’s when I see
The two-tone horse trailer
Hitched to the rusted-out
Dented-in
Orange truck
Pulling up to the barn
I know it’s bad
Terrible actually
To let your horse run back to the barn
But I can’t help it
I lie
Against Fancy’s neck
Clamp my hat to my head with my hand
Lean into the wind we’re creating
Cody and Micah see us coming
Pull their horses’ heads out of the grass
Catch their stirrups with their left legs
Swing up and on
Their horses already running
Into a game of chicken
We never let
Go wrong
Micah at Asia
Cody at me
Knowing the horses will swerve
Fancy’s already pulling to the left
Her strong lead
As Cody bears down
Riding the thunder rolling
Under his horse’s hooves
My eyes fill with dust so sharp
I’m blinking across sandpaper at Cody
His horse the color of a chocolate bar
Wearing marshmallow socks
Swerving to his left
I to mine
Corkscrewing around
Toward each other
We lean out of our laughter
And into each other
For a kiss shared behind the cloud of dust
Kicked up by the cattle coming our way
And we’re off again
Leaning into the same wind this time
As we ride to the herd
Where Asia and Micah are already slapping their ropes
Shimmied round
Against their legs
Limbering up for the roping
That comes with the sorting
Just before the chute
Bone-Tired
Dust starched jeans in a crumpled heap
Blue turns around
once
twice
three times
and calls them his bed
Wind-singed cheeks
Eyes blown red
I surrender
Tired limbs luxuriating in the embrace of flannel sheets
My stomach snarls
Angry
Empty
Breakfast
Coffee
Black
No time for much else
Lunch
Chased a calf down from the mesa
No time for much else
Dinner
Cody and Micah in their orange Ford
Come to help in a spray of gravel
I was so busy talking to Cody
Fireflies in my chest
No time for much else
Palm
Pressed flat
To my stomach
And the hunger
Is gone
It Seems
It’s the dust and the noise
Cattle bawling
Squeeze chute clanging
Dogs barking
Snapping at the air
As they heel right
Push left
Neighbors, parents, brothers, sisters, aunts, uncles, cousins
All working hard again
Same as they did yesterday
Sorting the cattle we brought in
For the ear tagging and doctoring that will come today
I know them all
Close as family
Except this new girl
With gold hair chasing down her back
Riding up to the pens
Coming in through the gate
I would have noticed
That girl
Any girl
On a buckskin gelding as fancy as that
Working with us
Especially since she wasn’t here yesterday
Showed up this morning
Midway through roundup
But she’s doing fine
Moving fast
Someone’s cousin maybe
No time to wonder
In the middle of all this work
That needs doing
Asia and I ride through the crush of
skunk-backed
bald-faced
solid-blacks
Pushing and bawling
In and out and through the pens
Even my dog’s working
Fills me up
Makes me proud
To watch Blue run the cattle
Runs them tight to the chute
Then ducks under the fence
Races around to pick up more
Races right behind that girl
That girl on the buckskin horse
That buckskin horse whose hind hoof comes flying
Sends Blue flying
Hittin
g the dirt with blood running into his eyes
I’m off my horse
Slapping at the cattle to get past
Screaming
At those cows
Trampling him
Knowing that I can’t do life
Without him
Not without Blue
My Dog
Blue
Pulling himself under the fence
Crying
Crying
I catch him up
Hold him close
Blue’s eyes are all wrong
One pupil bigger than the other
Blood rolling
From the half-moon kick
Just below his ear
Dad saw it too
Is here now
Running his hands over Blue’s sides
Cody passes him a bandanna through the fence
Dad presses it against Blue’s head
Then we’re all in the truck
Cody’s talking into his cell
Calling ahead to let Dr. Katy know we’re coming
Blue
His head pressed into my lap
Shaking with pain that shivers along his sides
Absorbs through my legs
Fills up my chest
Makes it hard to breathe
To hear Dad’s voice
Over the sound of my heart breaking
Hearing only my dog, my dog, my dog crying
Ragged tears fall
From my eyes that can’t see
So full of saline and fear
But know we are here
Spraying gravel ’round the drive
At the part-house, part-clinic
Dr. Katy’s resting place healing space
Where she takes Blue from my arms
It’ll be okay, she says with her eyes
His wound
My heart
Dad’s hand on my shoulder guides me through the living room
Down the hall
Into the room smelling of Betadine and gauze
Holds me strong
Alongside the exam table where she lays Blue
My heart
So broken and small beneath her plastic-gloved hands
Dr. Katy pulls the bandanna off Blue’s forehead
Stiff with blood dried black
Cold hot cold behind my eyes
My legs are liquid
One hand on Blue’s shoulder
The other curled around the edge of the table
Squeezing the metal
So tight my knuckles go white
So tight it hurts
So tight that I almost don’t have to think
About the fact that this is what I do
Break everything I love
Then cry when it’s gone
This is
My fault
I should have watched him closer
Especially around a new horse
Because I know horses