Page 7 of Wed By the Lumberjack

Chapter Three

Heath

Dixie did take me up on that offer of sleeping in the treehouse and making it her safe space for an entire year, until one day, she never showed up again.

Rumors flew around Moonshine Creek, but I never could decipher the truth from the tall tales.

Some people said Dixie and her father went on the run after Douglas had a brawl at the Watering Hole that cost the owner over ten thousand dollars in damages. Another rumor said they’d inherited a chateau in the south of France where Douglas’s grandfather was from.

I never believed either story, but I kept on believing that wherever they were, they were apart, and Dixie was okay, because thinking of the alternative would shatter me.

But now that she was right in front of me, I wouldn’t have to guess about what had happened. At least, not after she got her memory back.

I stay by Dixie’s side until she drifts off into some much-needed rest. It’s only when I’m sure she’s sleeping deeply enough to not rouse, that I begrudgingly leave her.

She isn’t the only patient I need to keep tabs on. Uncle Oliver, or rather Buckee, from his bull-riding days was admitted to the hospital yesterday for another suspected lung infection. With the changing temperatures as winter approaches, his health seems to be taking a turn for the worse.

Last winter, we nearly lost him.

Buckee always thought it’d be a bull that took him out, not the pneumonia that’s plagued him for the past few years.

“At least I’d die doing what I love instead of being hooked up to all these contraptions,” he grumped this morning when I’d checked up on him.

Despite all the injuries his first love caused him, Buckee’s still heartbroken that none of the younger generations of Foresters took up the sport. Instead, we all chose woodworking, with the treehouse being our first major project. I can’t help but wonder if Buckee's drama surrounding the family homestead has a little to do with his resentment.

He’d recently put a new clause into his will stating that only married Foresters or those with children would inherit portions of the Forester ranch. That would cut out me, and my cousins Cole, Ash, and Kai all together. As a man who never married himself or sired children, Buckee has to see how ridiculous this all is.

I just need to make him see reason.

When I get to room 114 just up the hall, I pause to knock before letting myself into the room.

Buckee’s wide awake like the true night owl he’s always been, watching some family sitcom from the 1970s.

From the looks of it, someone, maybe the adult daughter, has just had a baby. The father’s holding him or her and giving a little monologue in front of the hospital’s glass window where the city looms outside. I can tell it’s symbolic of the big wide world that’s ready to retrieve the newborn in due time.

Buckee, a man I’ve never seen cry a day in my life is staring up at the TV utterly transfixed with watery eyes.

I know he knows I’m there, so I pull a chair up to his bedside and wait for a commercial break when he finally mutes it.

“That was beautiful wasn’t it?” Buckee says, turning to me. “That’s what life’s really about. Family.”

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