This Cowboy's Son. Mary Sullivan

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СКАЧАТЬ settling on this one. He thought that maybe he remembered when this photo had been taken.

      He remembered his shock later, after his mother had changed.

      “MATTHEW, WHAT IS THIS?” Mama held up a pair of pants with holes in the knees. He’d put them in the laundry basket on the floor of his closet, with all his other dirty clothes, just the way he was supposed to.

      “Well, what do you have to say for yourself?” Her voice sounded funny, like one of the bad ladies in the Cinderella movie. She sounded mean.

      “Those are my jeans.”

      “I know that, you little moron.”

      His mouth dropped open. Mama called him a name. She never did that before.

      “I mean, why do they have holes in the knees?”

      He shrugged. “I don’t know. I must have falled down.”

      She hit him across the face. He fell on the floor and cried. Where was the mama he liked? Where was the mama who loved him?

      MATT CAME OUT of his memory with the question he’d asked himself so many times as a child. Where was the mama who loved him?

      It had started the day she’d slapped him and had gone downhill from there, with Mama becoming more and more demanding, her demands more and more unreasonable.

      Then Pop started to stay out later and later, coming home only long enough to make sure his kid idolized him and then running off to another rodeo or another ranch or another bar.

      To another woman, Missy Donovan from Ordinary.

      When Pop did come home, he was angry and drunk and ready to leave again, but not before he and Mama tore each other apart in the bedroom. They went at it like animals.

      When Matt was old enough, he got out of the house before they started, and stayed out until long after they finished.

      Matt’s shell threatened to crumble now, to let the emotions free to kill him with their poison.

      He set the old photo on the scarred countertop, facedown because he couldn’t stand to look at him and his mother happy. What kind of weird compulsion had driven a warm, loving woman mad?

      Was it inside him, too? Was there some sort of double curse in his life? He’d learned too much of the wrong things from his father. Love ’em and leave ’em. Don’t let a woman get her hooks into you. When things get too tough, run scared.

      Was he also eventually going to lose his mind the way his mother had?

      And now he had a child to worry about.

      What on earth had he ever learned here that would help him to be a parent?

      JENNY HAD BEEN POSITIVE Matt would run, had known it in her marrow. Then why did she feel so disappointed that he had? It was nuts. She didn’t want Matt sticking around or deciding that he should have a hand in raising her son.

      She and Angus would do just fine raising Jesse. Angus knew how to be a good father.

      She sat down on the top step beside her son and took the small spoonful of custard he offered her.

      “Do you want to play in the backyard when you’re finished?” she asked, smoothing his bangs away from his face.

      “Yeah.” He lapped up more of his custard.

      Angus drove into the yard in his big silver Cadillac. When he got out, he looked tired. Frustrated.

      As she’d done so many times lately, Jenny wondered what was going on with him. What was distracting him? He approached the veranda with heavy steps.

      His face lit up for Jesse, though.

      “Hey, little buddy,” he said and tickled the boy.

      Jesse giggled then offered him custard.

      “No, thanks. You finish it.” Angus turned his attention to Jenny. “How did it go?”

      “About as well as I expected. He lit out of here twenty minutes ago. Barely hung around long enough to find out his name.” She tipped her head toward her son.

      Jesse finished his custard.

      “Take the container to Angela in the kitchen and head out back,” Jenny told him. “I’ll be there in a minute.”

      The screen door slammed shut behind him. Jenny smiled. Kids made so much noise.

      Angus put one foot on the bottom step. On his face, Jenny read a disappointment in Matt that ran much, much deeper than her own.

      Angus had always wanted to think the best of Matt, and he hadn’t had Jenny’s firsthand experience with Matt’s leaving.

      “Angus, I hate to say ‘I told you so,’ but this is exactly what I expected.”

      “Where did he go?”

      “I haven’t a clue.”

      Angus glanced around the grounds. “I guess he’ll come back for his stuff later.”

      Jenny smiled grimly. “Oh, yeah, he’ll be back for Master.”

      He didn’t think twice about leaving me behind, but he would never forget his horse.

      “Then he’ll go for good,” she continued. “I’m sorry, Angus.”

      Angus mounted the stairs and rested a heavy hand on her shoulder. If she could ease his disappointment, she would, but the truth was the truth.

      She stood and walked around to the backyard where Jesse played on the jungle gym. She helped him across one part that his arms weren’t long enough for.

      Jesse put his small feet on her shoulders and she held his waist. They’d played this game so many times in the past year, but they never grew tired of it.

      Jesse squealed and giggled and Jenny laughed. The world felt right again.

      Matt knew about his son now, but he wouldn’t stay. Jenny could get on with her plans. She could marry Angus and raise her son on the ranch that was in her blood, that she’d wanted to live on her whole life.

      She used to sit up by the cotoneasters as a child and look down on the ranch with such a swell of pride, knowing that someday it would all be hers.

      Her dreams had started when she was little more than nine or ten. At the time, her world spun on an axis that was sure and constant.

      Her parents loved her. One day, she would have a nice man like Daddy to love her. They were going to build a house on the banks of Still Creek.

      Mom and Dad had shown her the piece of land they would give her. It was beautiful. She would raise her family there until the house felt too cramped.

      Then they would all move to the big house and Mom and Dad would take СКАЧАТЬ