Page 5 of Spring Forward

I can practically feel my brother rolling his eyes. “I saw the sign, Dela,” he grumbles, but there’s a hint of a tease there too.

I’ve been seeing these little glimpses of the teenager he’s about to be. I’m not thrilled about it, but at the same time I know it’s part of him growing up. My heart aches for a moment with the thought of our parents missing out on seeing him become the young man he’s supposed to be.

What if I fuck him up? What if I’ve already done damage with all the moving that we’ve done? What the hell am I supposed todo? I wasn’t supposed to become a parent to my little brother at the age of 20. There are times when I’m not sure how we survived the last eight years.

But here we are.

There’s not much traffic on the road which allows me to slow down and take in the town as we drive through. Petit Squared, a little bakery we drive by, looks adorable. I can only hope their treats are delicious. If they are, then I’ll be stopping in frequently.

I’m not a baker no matter how hard I’ve tried. I realize it’s all about following a recipe, but I always manage to screw it up somehow. August has learned to stay far away from any kitchen I’m baking in when I get a wild hair up my ass to try again.

It’s a shame because our mom was an amazing baker. I would spend hours in the kitchen with her, especially during the holiday season, and make all sorts of cookies. The first few years after she passed, I tried to keep the tradition alive. It was a bust, and it felt like I was losing her all over again.

Honestly, I’m kind of a disaster in the kitchen all the way around. I try, but there are only a few edible things I make. Barely edible.

It’s a good thing we’ve lived in a lot of places, and I always include room and board in my contract. We’ve been able to eat a lot of amazing food, some refined and some rustic, throughout the years. Even better, I didn’t have to cook any of it.

If I hadn’t thought that through, August would have grown up on fast food and frozen meals. Popping something in a microwave isn’t something even I can screw up. But the options are not as appetizing as a home cooked meal.

Trudy’s Diner, which is close to the bakery, looks like it’s busy even in the middle of the day on a weekday. That’s gotta be a good sign. Right across the street is Brewbirds Coffeehouse. If they can make a good latte, I’ll be there.

Just because I can survive on a regular cup of coffee doesn’t mean I don’t like something with a little more oomph. But when you live on ranches across the country, you adapt and normally a cup of coffee is about as good as it’s going to get. Sometimes you might even get a flavored creamer. That’s living the high life when it comes to some ranch refrigerators.

The post office, school, and library are all next to each other and I’m pleasantly surprised to find that the library is a good size. We’ll have to stop in and get a library card because August loves to read. Having a physical book isn’t really conducive to the way we’ve been living, which is why he has a reading app on his tablet. Still, he prefers to hold the book, and I can’t say I blame him much.

There’s something special about holding a book in your hands. I remember being caught by our parents reading under the covers with a flashlight on more than one occasion. Swallowing hard, I try and embrace those memories whenever they slam into me instead of pushing them away just because they’re painful.

I don’t think the pain will ever go away. Talking about them may not be helping, but I don’t do it for me. August doesn’t remember them, but I want them to be able to live on for him. All I have left of them is the memories I can share with him.

Maybe I’m just doing more harm than good. I have no fucking idea what I’m doing most of the time.

As the town fades and the landscape shifts to something more open, I know we’re heading in the right direction just by the landscape alone. It reminds me a little bit of the land around the ranch we had to give up. That was a painful as hell decision, but there was no way I could have maintained it.

Our parents weren’t prepared for their deaths; not like I think they should have been. They had taken out a second mortgage around the time August was born and when they passed, the ranch was barely worth more than what they owed.

Not only was it difficult to give up something our dad put so much into, but I hated having to lay off all the ranch’s employees. When you grow up in an area which thrives off ranch life, you know how valuable the work is and you’re close to the families who rely on those jobs. I had to disappoint the fathers of some of my friends, the same people I grew up with and went to school with. Hell, we were like one huge family.

I can only hope that they understood that it wasn’t an easy decision for me. If there was any other way, I would have gladly taken it.

“The town wasn’t very big,” August sounds pensive and I glance at him out of the corner of my eye while making a humming sound in agreement.

No matter where we go, he doesn’t usually spend very much time in town. He doesn’t like the attention and, unfortunately, he learned quickly that his slight limp puts him in the spotlight. Then if anyone talks to him and he needs to take a little time to answer, it brings on questions. Why can’t people just accept someone different from them? Why do they need to know all the details and feel like they should be able to ask intrusive questions as if it’s any of their business?

I’ll never understand it and I’ll always have August’s back when it comes to situations like that. I’ve gotten damn good at putting people in their place over the years. Usually, the attention isn’t so bad on the ranches where we work. Maybe it’s because they know I’m there for the sole purpose of equine therapy. Or maybe they’re more used to minding their own damn business.

Either way, it’s kept August on the ranches through the years instead of roaming around whatever towns we’re close to.

“It is pretty out here, though,” he muses as he watches the world go by.

“It is.” I sigh, “Something about it reminds me of our old ranch.”

He swallows hard, his voice comes out as a hoarse whisper, “I was thinking the same thing, I just wish I had more than photos of it.” He glances at me, and I catch a glimpse of the sadness in his eyes before he looks out his window again. “It’s too bad you can’t just beam your memories to me.”

I giggle because that is the kind of ideas August has all the time. “Once someone invents a way for me to do it, I’ll be the first in line so I can share all those memories with you.”

When I glance at him again, he’s grinning from ear to ear, the sadness of what we’ve both lost no longer darkening his features. It makes my heart happy to see him like this. For just a moment, the pain, the loss, the hurdles he’s had to overcome, disappear. He’s just a kid; and a damn good one.

As we pull up to a large farmhouse similar to other ranch houses, including the one I grew up in, the front door opens and three men, a woman, and a small boy step out onto the porch.August twists his fingers together in his lap as I park. When I reach over and cover his hands with mine, he looks at me.

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