Page 39 of There I Find Hope

“All right, let’s go to the tack room, and I’ll show you how to mix this up. That’s if you want to know.”

“I’d like to know everything. I’m here. I might as well be put to work.”

“You might regret saying that. Sometimes when you’re on the farm, you get sucked into the strangest things.” She laughed. “I remember one time when we had guests at the bed-and-breakfast, and the cows got out. Mom had all of the guests in the yard, plugging the holes in the fence and chasing the cows out of the garden. It was...quite an experience for them, I’m sure. Several of them said they’d never had so much fun, but there were a couple who didn’t have much to say.”

“Well, it wasn’t like you held a gun to their head and forced them to do it.”

“No, but they weren’t getting breakfast until Mom got the cows back in, so you know...”

He laughed. “Holding their breakfast hostage is pretty serious stuff.”

“Right? Who needs a gun?”

They laughed.

She showed him where the bucket of milk replacer was and scooped out the correct amount, putting it in the bottle.

“Eventually it won’t have to be warm, but I like to make it warm because they drink it better that way.”

“But not too hot.”

“No. Just like a baby. Too hot, it will burn them, although when we’re feeding such a small amount, I might make it slightly warmer than I normally might, because it will lose some heat between here and her stall. And I don’t want it to be cold.”

“That makes sense. There’s a lot of surface area for the heat to leak out.”

“That’s right.” She filled up the container with water, used a whisk to stir it, and poured it into the bucket. “Eventually we can eyeball it and not have to measure it. But I haven’t done it enough to feel like I can just put the exact right amount of water in. That’s why I put it in that container to measure it first.”

He nodded, thinking that Sunday felt a lot more at home in the barn than what he expected. But it made sense that she had grown up on a farm. He had a tendency to forget that, since the bed-and-breakfast seemed to be the main business she was involved in, along with the candy store. Before that, she’d moved away entirely, with Glenn.

Still, every interaction with her made him want to be with her more.

Chapter 16

Sunday walked with the bucket toward the foal, very aware of Noah walking beside her.

He had been attentive and sweet, interested and helpful. He seemed to understand that her grief was still there, even though she was trying to push past it and focus on the good.

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