Page 3 of Rough
Wilder cups his hands around his mouth, shouting, “Clyde!” Then waves him over to us.
My two friends look like they’d rather be anywhere than right here while we wait for Clyde to join us. When he does, he looks between all of us, then sighs. “Ya’ll told her?”
“Nobody’s told me a thing!” I shout, holding my arms out to my sides. Panic at losing them swirls through me like a raging current, and I can’t stop the tears from pooling in my eyes.
“Oh, don’t cry on us, Bets!” Remy complains.
Narrowing my eyes at him, I let one of them fall down my cheek, refusing to wipe it away. “I’ll fuckin’ cry if I want to. What are you all doin’?”
“Country,” Clyde calls to me, pulling my attention to him. “We got a job further east at one of those big ranch places.They’re gonna teach us the ropes so we can learn how to run one on our own.”
Next, Remy’s uncaring words have me swallowing down bile. “It’ll be good for us to gain experience. Would have thought you’d have been happy for us to get this kind of opportunity.”
“I’dneverwish for you to miss out on somethin’ like this, but I thought we’d be doin’ this together. I thought you’d all at least wait until I graduate…in two months.” My breaths are coming out heavily, like I can’t catch them and I’m in a full-blown panic. I just want to sit down and put my head between my knees.
This isn’t happening, is it?
The three of them look at each other like they’re waiting for one of the others to speak first when it finally dawns on me.
“You all weren’t plannin’ on waitin’ for me, were you?” Staring each of them down, I have my answer. The guilt is pouring off all of their faces, and I’m fucking devastated. “But… I thought we were in this together.”
“Bets,” Wilder says in an attempt to placate me, taking a step closer, but my glare stops him. “It’s not that we didn’t want to include you, but you can’t… I mean, it wouldn’t have…”
Holding up my hand, I stop his excuses. “This’ll be okay. I’ll just come out the day after I graduate and meet you all wherever you’re at. You can let them know I’ll be comin’ too, right?”
Looking between them, I pray I’ll get the answer I want. That they had planned for that to happen, they just hadn’t gotten that far yet in their explanation.
“You can’t come out with us. They’re not gonna want… It was talk, Bets, just talk. You had to know that.” Remy’s words did it. They’ve ripped my heart in two; torn right down the middle like it was as frail as a measly piece of old paper.
Holding back a sob, I look at him, so he knows how I’m feeling right now. “What were you gonna say? They’re not gonnawant agirl?It wasnotjust talk, and you know it, Remington Landry.”
“Country, we don’t mean nothin’ by it. We were comin’ by tomorrow to talk to you, so you’d know,” Clyde tries to explain.
“Much appreciated, especially since you’resogreat at talkin’ about things,” I bite out, then shake my head at him. “So that’s what all of this is tonight? The bonfire? Your friends?”
Wilder at least has the decency to look ashamed, taking off his hat to run his hand through the thick locks I’ve loved running my fingers through when he gets one of his heat migraines. “Itsagoodbyeparty,” he mumbles out, words all jumbled together, but I understood them perfectly.
“Which I wasn’t invited to,” I tack on, knowing deep down they truly didn’t want me here.
Crickets.Fuckingcrickets.
Nodding my head at them, I turn to make my way back to Frank.
“Bets!” Remy calls out to me.
I stop and turn back around, forcing a smile onto my face. They all know I’m hurt, butdamn it, I’m not going to fall apart in front of them.
“If you all wanna stop by before you leave tomorrow, I’m sure Pap would love if you said goodbye to him as well.” I don’t know if I could stand by and watch them say goodbye, so hiding in the barn may be in order. I don’t know anything right now except that I absolutelyhaveto get out here.
Remy takes a step toward me, saying, “Don’t be like this Bets. It’s really nothin’ personal. We just gotta do what’s right for us.”
Nodding my head quickly, I clench my cheeks harder to keep the smile there. “No, no… Seriously. I’m good. I’ll just head on out so you… well… okay, so, bye?”
Spinning, I run like a rabbit from its predator, hearing a soft, “Fuck,” before I’m out of earshot.
I don’t catch who said it, and it brings little consolation knowing one of them is upset.
Hauling ass on the back of Frank, I turn him in the direction of home…myhome that will forever see me turn up on its doorsteps. I let fat droplets of tears fall as I harden myself, determined that I can do this myself. It’s okay to go it alone sometimes. It’s okay to be angry.
