Page 9 of Apex of the Curve

I watched her as she went over to the newish baby who wasn’t more than a month old, her little tail set to wagging as she soaked up the pets Aspen gave her.

I couldn’t help but find myself thinking that that was one of the things this place lacked – a woman’s touch. Watching her unfurl, open up and flower with joy at the sight of the goats made putting up with the storm inside earlier worth it. It was like watching a damn rainbow arch across the sky real-time, watching her smile and laugh with the baby and I was almost sad to break it up, but I had to finish feeding the meat stock and get her home at some point today.

“So, what’s your story?” I asked as we made our way to the second, larger pasture across the property.

“Oh, um, geez… where do I even start?” she asked.

“The beginning is as good as place as any innit?” I shot back.

“Um, well, my mom died about a month and a half or so ago,” she said quietly. “Cancer, a long battle with it.”

“Shit, I’m sorry to hear that.”

“Oh, that’s just the tip of the iceberg, I’m afraid,” she said with a bitter chuckle.

“My brother died exactly a month after she did, a freak thing – car accident.”

“Fuck, you kidding me?” I asked, looking back over my shoulder at her as I set down the buckets of grain just the other side of the fence.

Feeding these guys was easier, just had to dump it in the trough over the fence line. Didn’t actually have to go in.

“It gets better,” she said with a dubious tone. “The day after my brother’s funeral, I caught my husband cheating… with other men… I’m going through a divorce right now.” She sniffed and stared off over the rolling green grass and into the tree line of the woods that edged our property.

“The day after?” I asked, stopping and setting the first empty orange bucket down on the ground so I could pick up the other, full one.

“Yep,” she said with a heavy and exhausted sigh.

“What the fuck?” I asked, looking her over. She was fucking gorgeous – why any guy on the planet would pass that shit up for a fuckin’ sausage party was beyond me. He had to be crazy. “He bi and just didn’t want to tell you or something?” I asked.

She pursed her lips and shrugged miserably.

“I don’t know,” she said softly. “I don’t know if anything about our relationship is—” She stopped herself, stumbling over her words. “Or was true anymore.”

“Shit, I’m sorry to hear that.”

“You know, I didn’t even want to go out last night,” she confessed, covering her face with her hands. Her next words were half muffled when she said, dragging her hands off her face, “Lindsay practically dragged me out.”

I gave a sardonic half-smile. “And ditched you like that?” I grunted. “You need new friends, baby girl.”

She smiled slightly and bemused asked, “What did you call me?”

I chuckled. “Sorry, force of habit.”

“It’s alright,” she said dismissively, and it was in that way that told me she’d sort of liked it – at least judging by the slight smile on her lips.

“Where you live?” I asked. “I’ll run you home after I’m done here.”

“Oh, I’m all the way over in Tacoma’s north end,” she said. “Um, you don’t have to go to all of that trouble. You’ve already done so much.”

“It’s no trouble.”

She gazed off into the distance again, her green eyes vacant as she thought about it. Finally, she gave me a wan smile and nodded, looking like she was on the verge of tears all over again.

“Okay, then,” I said and gave a quick nod.

* * *

I took her home.The neighborhood was a shitty one; Hilltop. I didn’t like a lot of what I was seeing, but I kept it to myself. This was the type of hood me and the boys belonged in, not someone sweet like Aspen.

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