Page 20 of Prophet
Cinnamon and I smiled but kept quiet otherwise.
“Ma, really, I’m not injured,” Prophet tried again to get out of it. “Just scrapes really.’
She stared at him. “Sit.” She was not backing down.
With a sigh, he finally sat in the chair she pointed at.
Ma cleaned his so called scrapes with alcohol wipes and checked the cuts she felt might need stitches.
Prophet whined a bit about the sting of her wipes and her poking at him.
She scoffed at his complaints. “Oh, you’re a big baby now, aren’t ya? Where was that little cry-cry boy when you stepped in the ring and duked it out with the Claw, eh?”
He again winced as she spread some cream over the red area on his neck. “The Claw?” he asked.
“Heck, yeah. That’s what his name stands for, ya know? Talon’s meaner than a wet panther when he steps into a ring, son.”
“Yeah, Hawk and another guy warned me about that,” Prophet replied.
“But ya didn’t listen.” She shook her head.
“No,” Prophet replied. “Remember your advice?”
Shrugging, Ma pulled some tape off and snipped it. “I give lots of that, but it’s not always followed. And in your case, you must have had cotton in your ears when I warned ya about this.”
“This was aboutnotbeing crazy,” he stated quietly.
Pausing, she looked at him, face to face. “Well, you done jumped that ship named crazy, didn’t ya?”
Cinnamon and I giggled. This was great for me, because maybe she could get him to see that he shouldn’t be doing dangerous things. I sure couldn’t seem to get through to him.
“I needed to scrap, Ma,” he tried to explain. “This whole thing made me like one of those bulls in a rage. I’m not used to that. I was gonna probably do something stupid.”
I opened my mouth to tell him fighting like that was stupid.
Grabbing my hand, he said, “Stupider than fighting Talon, Jewel.”
Ma nodded. “Hmmm, well, that’s different.”
I looked up at her.
Shrugging, she explained, “We women got tempers, we yell or cry, maybe pout? I’ve been known to throw a pan or two.” She grinned at me. “But for a man? No matter how docile he might seem to be or sweet…” She gave Prophet a wink. “There are times when nothin’ will do, except for an all out fight. They gotta let their beast out to play, so to speak. If they don’t, well he’s right, his brain will rattle around like a BB in a boxcar. If’n he don’t get that thunder out, he’ll die in the rain.”
We all stared at her.
She laughed. “I’ve been around strong men all my life. They can be hard to handle when the fire is too hot. A real man will do just what the cowboy here did. Get that fury gone, so they don’t hurt nobody innocent.”
Prophet stood from the chair and grabbed Ma to kiss her on the cheek. He looked relived that someone understood it.
With a gasp, Ma placed a hand on her chest. “My oh my, you are the charmer.” She looked over at me. “He’s a keeper, girl.”
Nodding my head, I looped my arm through his. “Oh, I plan on keeping him.”
Prophet shook his head and asked me, “Even if I do stupid things?”
Ma laughed heartily. “You wouldn’t be a man if ya didn’t.”
He stared at her as he raised his brows. “I’m not sure if that was an insult or not?”
