Page 278 of The Texas Sterling Collection
“Okay, Felix.” Joey let out a ragged sigh. “I thought maybe you felt the same way.” He stood and left the room, closing the door behind him.
Felix lay wrapped in his grief for a long time, wailing at his loss. He saw no other way. Supper came and went, and still, Felix sobbed into his tear-soaked pillow. A knock at the door happened again, and Felix uttered, “Come in,” his voice shaking and his mind foggy.
Ma Sterling opened the door. “Honey, I’m worried about you. You ran from the porch after reading the letter from your father. You’ve been up here in your room ever since, and you missed supper. I can see you’re upset about something. When I came up the stairs, I heard Joey in his room sobbing too.”
She came and sat down on the edge of the bed. She put her hand on Felix’s shoulder, and he sat up and wrapped himself around her as she embraced him in her arms. He sobbed more, and she rocked him back and forth in comfort.
“What’s the matter, honey? Is it Joey? Did you two have a fight or something?”
“It’s not Joey. It’s my father.” Felix whined. “He can’t even call me by my name. He never asks how I’m doing. He never says he loves me. He only wants to control me. I never realized that until I came here, and family and love surrounded me.” Felix coughed out sobs. “It hit me when I read his letter, and I don’t know what to do.”
“Honey…we do care about you and love you. Sterlings are a family, and you are part of our family. We all survive this big old world together.”
“I love you and Pa, too.” He sniffed and gasped for breath. “And Joey is so good to me. He’s like a brother to me, and I don’t want to hurt him.”
“Honey…Joey is a big boy. I’m sure he’s upset at seeing you so upset, but he can take care of himself.”
“Ma Sterling?”
“Yes, Felix?”
“Thank you,” he said. “I’ll be fine. Now I need to sleep.”
“Alright, honey. We’ll see you at breakfast.”
“Okay.” Felix lay back down on his wet pillow. Mabel left his room and closed the door.
He must make Joey hate him. It was the only way to keep Joey from loving him more. Then Joey could go and find that little filly he mentioned. Yeah, he must push Joey away. He lay there trying his best to convince himself despite the ache in his chest.
Chapter Ten
Joey remained heartbroken for two weeks. He thought Felix loved him, but then he became cold and uncaring. He couldn’t figure out what he did to make Felix hate him so much. He didn’t care what anyone else thought. He wanted Felix to be his best friend again.
When they did chores together, Felix mostly communicated with single words, such as "yes"and "no." He never returned Joey’s gaze. He never touched Joey and kept his distance so Joey couldn’t touch him. The wall between them grew wider each day, and Joey couldn’t understand why the man he thought he loved didn’t love him back. Maybe he didn’t understand love. Perhaps he wasn’t in love with Felix, but for the first time in his life, he enjoyed a close friend, or at least that’s what he thought, and he mistook it for love.
The anguish tore him apart, and he needed to talk to someone. One afternoon, he hurried to finish his afternoon chores, then went into the house. Pa was on his horse checking the herd, and Felix insisted on riding fences alone.
He peeked into the sitting room, where his mother worked on a quilt. “Ma…can I talk to you?”
“Sure, Joey. Come in and sit down.” She paused her sewing and focused on her son. “You have been depressed for two weeks now. I know you and Felix are having a fight or something. Aren’t you two friends anymore?”
Joey sat and nodded, not knowing the truth.
“Talk to me, son.”
Joey took a deep breath. “Ma…how do you know when you love someone?”
“You mean like how you love me and Pa and Jacob?”
Joey pondered for a moment. Loving his family was not the issue. He knew about that. But loving someone else? Like Felix? How could he know if that love was real? “Ma…I don’t have any idea what love is. Can you tell me what it is and what it feels like?”
“You have not been around anyone but Felix. Are you pining for one of the girls at school?”
Joey shook his head. He remembered thelittle fillycomment that made Felix pull away. Did that cause Felix to distance himself? “Ma, I’m trying to figure out what love is, so I’ll know when it happens. I’m going into my last year of school, and—well—you know, young men get feelings. I remember the boys at school talking about it, and I'm not sure what they meant.”
“I see. I was curious as a teenager, too, but I didn’t have strong feelings for my high school classmates. Then, your pa and I were in college together, and when we started seeing each other, all I could think about was him. When his eyes caught mine, I got a funny feeling in my stomach. When he touched me, it was like an electric shock or something. He was always on my mind, and I longed to be by his side.”
Joey’s stomach clenched. She described what happened to him around Felix. Even telling themselves it was wrong, those feelings were real, and he couldn’t get enough. But he had to know. “Was that love, Ma? Did you think Pa felt the same way?”
