Page 26 of His Eighth Ride

She started with Tag, because right now, those would be the easiest messages to get out. It’s Monday today, Opal said. You’re not going to Coral Canyon until next week. Again, I babysit my nephew during the day, and I throw feed to chickens twice a day, and I might have a date with the barn cats I’ll have to move around, but I think I can reschedule with them.

She tapped back to her texting app, where she had a family thread. It included Mike and Gerty, Easton and Allison, and Momma and Daddy. And Opal. The single one. The outlier. Tag’s words about feeling on the outside of his family struck her heart like a gong. Even her pulse reverberated through her body.

They hadn’t texted on the string in a couple of days, and Opal didn’t always respond to every message her brothers or parents sent out. Allison and Gerty sometimes sent pictures of the kids, and Opal would long-hold and add a heart to those.

I have some news, she said, and once she got going, Opal’s fingers could fly, fly, fly. I have decided not to return to my job in Burbank. In fact, I quit several months ago; I’m not on sabbatical.

She took a deep breath, hoping her father didn’t call and imply she’d lied. She’d started on a sabbatical; she just hadn’t continued it, and she hadn’t told anyone otherwise.

I have decided to move to the Ivory Peaks area of Colorado. I don’t know what I’ll do, but there are hospitals and colleges here. Right now, I’m helping Gerty with her baby and spending my evenings with chickens, and I’m looking for a place of my own so Mike and Gerty can have their house back.

She sent that, then realized she’d told another small fib. Nothing she couldn’t fix.

Actually, I’m hoping to be spending less evenings with chickens and more evenings with Taggart Crow. We finally went out over the weekend for the first time, and he’s asked me on a second date.

She hit send on that and read back through her three messages. “Anything else?” she asked herself. She didn’t think so, and she exhaled heavily as she let her cell fall to her chest. Exhaustion pulled through her from her night on the purple blow-up couch. It currently rested against the wall behind her, and Opal imagined herself there, wrapped up in Tag’s arms.

Her phone beeped once, twice, three times in a row, and Opal didn’t immediately lift her device to read the incoming messages. Mike would give her nothing but support. Easton and Allison too, because they lived all the way across the country, living almost completely different lives than everyone else.

Opal wasn’t worried about her siblings or their spouses. No, Daddy was the one Opal feared hearing from, and Momma might even text something that seemed supportive but actually held a lot of questions.

Her phone rang, and Opal couldn’t put off answering it. She’d literally just texted, and everyone knew she’d been put back on rib-rest, because Gerty had texted them after her appointment last week.

Daddy sat on the screen, and Opal swiped to answer the call. She tapped the speaker icon to get it to play through the speaker, and she set her phone on her chest as she said, “Hey, Daddy.”

“Can you hear me?” he asked.

“Yes,” she said with a smile, because he always asked if she could hear him, as if he didn’t trust cellphones to work. “Can you hear me?”

“Yes,” Daddy said. “Momma’s on the call with me.”

“Of course she is.” Opal didn’t mean to sound so belligerent. “Sorry, I didn’t mean it like that.”

No one said anything, and Opal certainly wasn’t going to start. They’d called her. “Opal-baby,” Daddy started, so he was going to tiptoe around her.

Opal couldn’t have that. “Daddy, I’m not a little girl. You’re not going to hurt my feelings.”

“I’m surprised you quit your job,” Daddy said. “You were—are—such an amazing doctor. You loved living in California.”

“Yes, I know,” Opal said. “You’re right. That’s all right.”

“So…help us understand why you’re moving to Ivory Peaks.”

“Because,” Opal said. “God told me to.”

They couldn’t very well argue with that, she knew, and she added, “I resisted Him for a long time, but Gerty’s baby was the impetus that gave me enough courage to finally do it. And it turns out that I love that baby, and I love this farm, and I love being close to Mike and Gerty, and Jane and Cord, and I want to stay here.”

A long pause filled the space between them, and then Momma said, “That all sounds right too.”

“I’m happy here, Momma,” Opal whispered. “I’ll find a nice place to live, and maybe I’ll start thinking about some foundation or starting a business. You know, use that money you guys blessed me with. I still haven’t done that.”

“You’re my absolute favorite daughter,” Daddy said.

Opal smiled. “I’m your only daughter.”

“We love you,” Momma said. “We’ll see you in a few weeks for Christmas.”

“Yes,” Opal said. “Love you guys, too.”

---