“No, of course not. You’re not melodramatic,” Jesse said under his breath as he took the CD spawned in hell away from me.
“You can call me melodramatic when it comes to country music,” I replied. “In fact, I’m almost certain the term ‘melodramatic’ was invented in response to the birth of country music. That was, as the song goes, the day the music died.” I was lukewarm about most things in life, reserving my passion for a rare few. Country music, and the eardrums it damaged both near and far, was one of those rare few.
Then, fast as I’d moved removing it, Jesse popped that CD back into the player and twisted the volume dial until it could twist no farther. Before I could ear-muff my ears with my hands, music exploded. Some dude with a deep, Elvis-esque voice started going off about walking and lines.
“Not funny, Jesse!” I hollered above the music, dropped a hand from my ear, and chanced the inner ear damage the hellfire music would cause in order to try to wrestle his hand away.
“It’s pretty darn funny from where I’m sitting,” he shouted, welding his hand over the CD player so I couldn’t budge it. The harder I tried, the harder he laughed.
Just as I contemplated throwing myself out of the truck to be free of the whole walking lines shit, the most welcome/unwelcome sight I’d ever seen came into view: a white, two-story farm house, complete with a freshly painted, big red barn beside it.
“Oh, thank sweet baby Jesus.” I gave up my hand war with Jesse to grab the door handle. Once was one time too many when it came to riding in Old Bessie with Johnny Cash on full blast.
Right before we rolled to a stop in front of the house, Jesse mercifully turned the music off. But the damage had been done.
I would never be the same after that. Never.
“Do me a favor, will ya?” I said, shoving open the door.
“If it involves snapping in half or burning my favorite CD . . . sorry. No can do,” he replied, his own door creaking open.
“Next time I need a ride, don’t offer. I’d rather run, walk, or bloody crawl twenty miles than listen to that shit-for-music for another twenty seconds.” Once I was out of Old Bessie, I turned to look at him. His hat was back in place, and he studied me again with that same knowing smile. “Capiche?” I added, pretending like staring at Jesse staring at me didn’t make my knees feel a bit out of whack.
“I don’t speak melodramatic city girl talk, but how about if I promise to not force Mr. Cash on you again if you need another ride from me?” He slid out of his seat without taking his eyes off of me, and he slammed the door closed. Both dimples were buried in his cheeks. “Just please, promise you won’t do anything to my favorite CD? It would break my heart.”
“Even if I tried, that sucker is so chock-full of black voodoo magic it would take a dozen witches to destroy it,” I replied, arching a brow at him, which only made his smile go higher.
Jesse was just opening his mouth when a screen door screeched open behind me.
“If you aren’t the spitting image of your mom,” the woman coming down the porch steps said, smiling at me like I could have been her long-lost daughter.
I felt my face pinch together. Not because the woman looked like a modern version of the women on Little House on the Prairie, but because she’d said I looked like my mom. No one said that because we had no similarities. On the exterior or the interior.
“Rowen Sterling, it is so good to finally meet you,” she said, and just as I extended my hand to her, she wrapped her arms around me and pulled me into a solid hug. “I’m Mrs. Walker, but if you know what’s good for you, you’ll call me Rose.” Giving me a final squeeze, she lowered her arms. “My mother-in-law is Mrs. Walker.”
“Okay, Rose,” I said. “I think I can manage that.” Especially since the only time I called people Mr. or Mrs. was when it involved a hefty dose of sarcasm.
She tucked a few curls of hair that had escaped her ponytail behind her ear. “We’re all so glad you’re here. When your mom called and asked if you could spend the summer with us, I don’t think I gave her a chance to finish her sentence before I said yes.”
Rose and my mom had grown up together back in Portland. Mom went off to college, and Rose went off to Willow Springs after marrying Mr. Walker, whose first name I’d also forgotten. Examining the warmth and simplicity that was Rose Walker made me wonder how, in our universe or the next, my mom and her were childhood best friends.
If two people could get more opposite, I hadn’t seen it. Mom was tall, platinum blond (thanks to her stylist), believed makeup wasn’t only a tool but essential to everyday life, and didn’t wear an article of clothing that wasn’t expensive and in season. Rose was shorter, had dark brown hair, didn’t wear a smudge of makeup from what I could tell, and her flower-print dress looked like it could have been homemade.
From what I knew, mom and Rose didn’t keep in touch all that often, but every year, we got a Christmas card from Willow Springs Ranch. They had to be good enough friends that mom would entrust her only child to a family a couple of states away.
When I thought of my mom and Rose, the phrase “oil and vinegar” came to mind.
“Thanks for having me,” I said, reminding myself to be gracious. Rose didn’t have anything to do with Mom’s nutso idea to send me off to Ranch Responsibility School for the summer.
“Are you kidding me? A chance to have another woman on a ranch overrun with men who think a decent conversation consists of a half a dozen words?” Rose patted my arm. “Thank you for having us.”
Either she was high on the latest and greatest mood-enhancing pharmaceutical, or she was just plain high on life. There was no arguing she was high on something.
Behind us, Jesse cleared his throat. I hadn’t forgotten he was there. It seemed, I couldn’t.
“I’m going to run Rowen’s bag up to her room. Then I’ve got to get back to work on that fence.” He pulled the giant-sized bag out of the truck bed in one seamless move, and he flashed that dimpled smile at me as he passed by.
“Have fun with those fence posts,” I said, meeting his smile with an overdone one of my own.
“Oh, I will,” he said, continuing up toward the front door. “I’ll think of you and your excellent taste in music the whole time.”
Rose watched Jesse disappear through the screen door. When her gaze shifted back to me, noticing that my eyes had also watched Jesse’s entire journey, she gave me a knowing kind of smile. “He’s a good looking kid, isn’t he?”
I bit the inside of my cheek to give myself a moment to recover. “I suppose,” I started, giving a small shrug. “If you’re into that whole Brad Pitt in Legends of the Fall thing. Which I’m not.” That was true. I never went for the blond-haired, blue-eyed, sexy-shmexy, boy-next-door-to-the-tenth-power guy. I went for the dark-haired, pale, lanky, brooding type. “I was more team bear-that-tried-to-kill-Brad-Pitt-in-the-end.”
Rose didn’t bat an eye. Instead, she laughed an honest to goodness one as she weaved her elbow through mine. “My,” she said, leading me up the front steps, “the ride from the bus station must have been interesting.”
“Interesting is a good word for it,” I said, taking a closer look at the farm house. Even for all my doom and gloom preferences, I kind of dug the place.
It was old, from the intricate, beveled windows to the way the wrap-around porch creaked when we walked over it, but it had been well preserved. The front door was cobalt blue to match the shutters, and there was a porch swing on either side of the door because one just wasn’t enough, I guess.
It was a house that was “lived in.” It had history, and I could only imagine the number of stories and moments that had been shared inside its walls.
“I imagine after your day, you’ll have just enough energy left to take a bath and crawl into bed.” Rose swung the screen door open and waved me inside. “So I’ll send a dinner plate up to your room later if you like. Tomorrow, after you’ve had a good night’s sleep, we can settle you into the routin
e here at Willow Springs.”
After she’d said the word, my muscles almost ached for a bath. “That sounds great.”
“But I’m afraid three young ladies are very eager to meet you before you escape,” Rose said as she led me into a living room with robin egg blue walls and white crown molding. A few antique looking pieces of furniture were mixed in with a few more contemporary pieces. It was a mish-mash of decor, a designer’s worst nightmare, but somehow, it worked. I’d barely taken five steps inside the room, and I already felt comfortable enough to plop down on the floral couch and kick my feet up on the distressed coffee table.
“This is really nice,” I said truthfully. Everything about the room, from the bold use of color to the window of walls, was a stark contrast to my room back in Portland. My walls were a deep aubergine purple, the ceiling, too, and I kept the lone window covered with a black-out curtain. I liked to keep the light out—except for when I was drawing or painting—while Rose preferred to let the light in.
Before I could get too deep down that thinking well, three figures hovering off to the side caught my attention.
“These lovely, eager girls are my daughters,” Rose said, waving at the three girls looking at me without blinking.
“Hey,” I said awkwardly, flashing them just as awkward a wave. I wasn’t sure how much my mom had told Rose about my life and the “mess” (Mom’s term, not mine) I’d made of it. From the looks of it, those girls either knew everything and were wide-eyed in terror or knew nothing and were under the impression I was as cool as chocolate ice cream.
“I’ll make the formal introductions since everyone seems a little tongue-tied,” Rose said, giving her daughters a confused look. “This is Lily.” Rose motioned at the tallest girl, a clone of her mom right down to the flowery dress and the long, dark hair and eyes. “She’s sixteen, and if she goes missing, the first place to look for her is hiding in the barn loft devouring her latest book.”
Lily smiled shyly at me before dropping her eyes. Quiet, a little awkward, and liked to hide away from the rest of the world whenever she got the chance . . . I liked her already.
“This is Hyacinth.” Rose moved on to the next girl who was yet another clone. “She’s thirteen and every bit of thirteen.” Rose lifted her brows and gave her daughter an equally maternal and amused smile.
Hyacinth gave me a smile and a wave. She had none of the pissed-off-at-the-whole-world attitude I’d possessed at thirteen, but I guessed Rose’s and my definition of a teenager were a wee bit different.
“And the little one is Clementine. She’s seven.” Rose bit her lip as she inspected her youngest daughter dolled up in head-to-toe princess garb. Even though the whole princess thing was pretty much my arch nemesis, I had to give the girl credit. She was going to be the best damn princess she could be.
“Mom,” Clementine said, sighing in exasperation, “I’m not little.”
Rose lifted her hands in apology. “You’re right. Forgive me, Your Highness.” Nudging me, Rose cleared her throat. “This is Clementine. She’s my big girl.”
Clementine rolled her shoulders back and gave a small nod, obviously appeased. “How do you do?” she said formally, capping it off with the best curtsy I’d ever seen.
“Nice to meet you, Your Highness.” I gave her my own sucky attempt at a curtsy. Clementine, no big surprise, was yet another mini-clone of Rose.
“And I know you already know, but just to make the introductions formal, this is Rowen,” Rose said, glancing from her daughters to me. “My girls have been crossing off the days on their calendars since they learned you were coming. We don’t get female company out here very often. Especially female company from a big city.”
I suddenly became very aware of myself. My outfit, my eyebrow ring, my dark lips. What a disappointment I must have been. No doubt those girls were looking forward to some chic, trendy girl plucked straight from the pages of Cosmo, not a troubled girl who lived dark like it was a religion.
Oh, well. It wasn’t the first or the hundredth time I’d disappointed someone. I cleared my throat and tried to forget about it.
“Rose,” I said, pointing at her. “Lily.” I pointed at the one still diverting her eyes. “Hyacinth.” My finger moved to the next sister, who was still smiling at me, before ending on the littlest “big” girl of the bunch. “And Clementine?” They must have run out of flower names by the time she came along.
“My husband wasn’t too big on the names Peony or Iris, so we compromised and went with a name just as sweet and delicate as the rest of ours,” Rose answered. Clementine stood a couple of inches taller.
“It’s nice to meet you all,” I said, really needing that bath and bed. The crack-of-dawn wake up, the twelve hours of nose rot, the ride in Old Bessie with the cowboy I already both loved and hated, and meeting the mini-Rose clones who were overwhelming me with a skewed version of hero worship . . . I was spent.
“Let me show you up to your room,” Rose said, steering me out of the living room. “You and the girls have plenty of time to get to know each other this summer.”
We were almost out of the living room when something caught my attention. I came to an abrupt stop. So abrupt, Rose continued all the way into the hallway before she noticed I wasn’t with her anymore.
“Rowen?”
I didn’t reply. All my attention was concentrated on the mantle where four framed portraits highlighted four smiling faces: three dark-haired girls I’d just been introduced to . . . and one light-haired boy smiling that dimpled smile. He was in the same sort of outfit he’d worn earlier: a snug white tee, tighter than tight jeans, a simple belt, cowboy boots, and that light straw cowboy hat. Leaning into the side of Old Bessie, his eyes twinkled behind the glass of that frame like they had at me.
“What is it?” Rose asked with a hint of concern as she made her way back to me. Taking a look at what my eyes were bored into, she gave me a gentle nudge. “He’s a good looking kid, isn’t he?” Even if I wanted to agree or disagree, that was beside the point.
“Why do you have a picture of Jesse on your mantle?” I asked, my voice a couple notes higher. “Next to the pictures of your daughters?” I didn’t really need the confirmation, because my thought process had already traveled from A to B to arrive at C.
“Jesse’s our son, silly,” she said, giving a small laugh. “Didn’t he mention that?”
Great. Cowboy Infuriating Jesse wasn’t just a ranch hand; he was the ranch owner’s son. He didn’t only work here, he lived here. He’d grown up here. Which meant . . .
He had a room somewhere inside the suddenly small-seeming farmhouse. Somewhere, he took a shower at the end of a long day before crawling between his sheets and falling asleep. For all I knew, his room could be a piece of drywall apart from mine. I wasn’t sure if the knowledge of Jesse buck naked a room away or the possibility of waking up to Johnny Cash blasting every morning unsettled me more.
“Shit.”It slipped out before I could catch it. Covering my mouth with my hand, I shot Rose an apologetic look. “Sorry about that.” I looked over her shoulder at the girls doing such an overdone job at playing ignorant to what I’d said, I knew they weren’t.
“It’s all right,” she said. “Lord knows with the men we have working around here, they’ve heard worse.”
I felt better knowing I hadn’t just introduced the Walker girls to a new four letter word, but I felt nothing better about Jesse being a Walker. “So Jesse’s your son?” I guess hearing it once just wasn’t enough to convince me. Really, other than the country attire and warm personality, he had no physical similarities to tie him to his mom and sisters. Maybe Mr. Walker was tall, built, and blond like Jesse.
“He’s our son,” she said, smiling affectionately at Jesse’s photo. “At least on the days he remembers to pick up his wet towels from the bathroom floor.”
Super. After she mentioned Jesse and wet towels, my mind went to him all wet and soapy in the shower.
“A
re you surprised?” Rose asked, looking from his photo to me.
“Maybe a little,” I said, at the point where I was ready to forfeit the bath and just head straight to bed. I needed to put the day on pause before it got any more trippy.
“Well, now you know.” Rose patted my arm before heading back into the hall. I followed her because if I stared at that picture for another second, I wasn’t sure I’d be able to look away. “Jesse’s a hard worker, a good son, and an even better person. If you ever need something, Jesse will be the first in line to help you out.”
I felt a twinge of pain hearing the way Rose talked about her son and watching the affection on her face. No one had ever talked about me that way, like I was so close to perfect the imperfections were washed away.
I followed Rose up the staircase to the second floor. The hall walls were painted a Tuscan gold, and on the outside of each door, a letter made out of heated and formed horseshoes swung from a piece of rope. An L and an H hung from the first doors we passed. Then a C.
I swallowed and felt my stomach coil as we approached the next door. I blew out a rush of air when Rose stopped. No letter swung from it. So I had Clementine beside me and Lily across the hall and down. My room was the last room at the end of the hall. Wherever Jesse’s room was, I could sleep easy knowing it wasn’t anywhere near mine.
I wasn’t sure whether to be happy or disappointed.
Rose opened the door. “This will be your room for the summer. It’s not much, but if you think of anything else you need, just let me or Neil know—”
“It’s great,” I interrupted, stepping inside the room. “Really. It’s great. I wasn’t sure what to expect when I came here today. I was half expecting I’d be sleeping out in the barn.”
“Why ever would you think that?” she asked, lingering in the doorway. “You’re our guest here. We’re happy to have you, Rowen, and I don’t know how you big city people do it, but we certainly don’t put our guests out in the barn.” A smile pulled at the corners of her mouth. “At least not on the first stay.”