Page 101 of The Auction
“What are you going to do?”
“There’s a tarp in the barn,” he shouted over the downpour. “I’m going to try and cover the crop.”
I grabbed his arm to stop him. “A tarp isn’t going to do anything. If it’s flooding like this, the creek is already overrun. There’s no way you’re going to protect the crop.”
He seemed to weigh my words. “I can’t do nothing!” he shouted.
I shook my head. “There’s nothing to do but wait it out. It will drain, and then we’ll see what we’re left with.”
“When?”
“When the rain stops,” I said, looking out over the porch.
We made our way back inside the house.
“I need a towel,” I said, not moving off the welcome mat. “I’m coveredin mud.”
“You need a shower. There should be enough hot water left for both of us.”
He moved toward me like he was going to pick me up again, but I stepped back.
“No, get Patch.”
“Patch is fine, we need to get you warmed up.”
“No, we need to be upstairs. Just to be safe. Get Patch.”
“Stubborn as fuck,” he muttered, under his breath. But he made his way back through the living room to the hallway that led to our bedroom. A minute later he came back with the laundry basket, except it was filled with folded towels, what looked like clean sweats, and Patch sitting on top of all of it, howling in distress at the direction the night had taken.
Carefully, I made my way up the stairs, knowing I was leaving a muddy mess behind me, but messes could be cleaned. The important thing was for us to get clean, dry, and warm. Eventually the rain would stop, and when it did, we would need all our energy for what was to come.
Creed popped Patch onto the pillow on my twin bed and shut the door behind him, so he wouldn’t escape.
Together we stripped and got into the small upstairs shower, letting what was left of the hot water tank wash away the mud. The tub was brown with dirt, but that was another thing to worry about…after.
Creed rubbed us both down with clean towels. I didn’t own sweats, but he put me in one of his sweatshirts that fell down to my knees and a pair of his socks that covered me up to my shins.
We stepped across the hall back to my bedroom. I was pleased to see Patch had settled down into a ball on the pillow.
“You take the bed,” Creed said.
“No, we’ll fit.”
“We won’t.”
“We will,” I insisted, taking his hand. I scootched to the far end of the bed and carefully laid my head on the section of pillow AP wasn’t occupying. Creed was right. He didn’t really fit. But I’d left him enough room so he could lay on his side, his face just skirting the edge of the pillow where AP slept in a ball between us.
“Go to sleep,” he muttered.
“Can’t. The rain’s too loud.”
“Whatever needs doing, we’ll do it. You don’t have to worry about that,” he said.
I believed he meant that.
But a part of me, deep down, believed that once he saw the damage, once he understood the impact of it, once he understood this farm could suck up all his savings and leave him with nothing, he would leave.
TWENTY-FIVE
