Page 42 of There I Find Hope

Sunday petted the foal’s neck, feeling such a strong kinship with her. The filly had lost her mother, she had lost her child. She wanted to hold her in her arms and never let her go. Comfort her and keep her and make sure she had every advantage she needed to grow up to be a good horse.

She was so silly.

“No. I never did.”

“Goodness. I thought about having children when I was still a child myself. That’s the difference between boys and girls, I guess.”

“Maybe. I wanted to get the relationship thing down first. I didn’t want to have a child with someone who wasn’t going to be around to help me raise it. Maybe I was too picky.”

His words made her hand freeze. That wasn’t a slam; he was just telling her how he had run his life.

“Maybe being a deep thinker is a good thing. After all, if I had thought about that, I wouldn’t have chosen Glenn as a father. Look at me now. I have nothing.”

“You have a family who loves you. You have a friend who thinks pretty highly of you too. At least one. A whole town of them really. And this foal, who really needs a name, is depending on you too. For today at least.”

“Yeah. If I had a house with even a little bit of acreage, I would be asking Matt if I could buy her from him. I don’t think he’d charge too much for her, since he saved the mare from the kill pen, and we don’t even know what breed it is. Although the mare looked like she might have had some draft in her. Maybe something fancy, like a Friesian or a Gypsy Vanner, with her long mane and tail.”

“I didn’t even notice the mane and tail.”

“Maybe because I grew up with animals. Anyway, I’ve always loved horses. I knew a lot more about them when I was a kid, though.”

“You’ve probably forgotten more than I ever knew.”

They laughed a little together as she stroked one side of the foal’s neck and he scratched the other.

“This little gal really loves attention,” she murmured.

She had not responded to his comment about the people who loved her. He had called himself a friend who thought very highly of her. She wasn’t quite sure exactly what that meant. Maybe nothing. Maybe he was just trying to make her feel better.

“I didn’t mean to make you feel bad. That’s what I meant. I think about things that nobody else does. Maybe I shouldn’t have said boring as much as weird.”

“No. Not at all,” she said quickly. She didn’t want him to think that she thought there was anything wrong with him. Because she didn’t. Actually, she admired him. “It’s good that you have the foresight to think about those kinds of things. I wish I had.”

“I didn’t mean to make you sad. I wasn’t thinking about that. I was just...explaining why I was boring. I guess I think too much.”

“I guess we can argue about this if you want to, but I believe that what you did was smart. Maybe, maybe it held you back a little,” she acknowledged. “After all, no one is perfect, and a woman who doesn’t look like she would be a good wife and mother today might grow into one.”

“There’s no guarantee of that.”

“Right. There is no guarantee in life at all.”

“Maybe I wasn’t quite honest.”

“What?” she said, her fingers stopping on the smooth, silky fur of the foal as she looked at him. “You lied to me?”

“No. Not like that. I just... I think about things. And it’s true that I didn’t want to be involved with anyone I didn’t think was going to stay with me. But there was a second reason why I’d never thought about having children.”

“Okay?” she said, her fingers moving slowly, as she wondered if she really wanted to know this.

His eyes moved back to the foal, and he watched his hand as it lifted from the short mane and settled on the wide forehead, scratching gently. “You know how sometimes you know someone, and they’re just so...not perfect. You know they’re not perfect. But they’re just perfect for you. Or, I don’t know. You hold them up as a standard, no one else quite reaches that standard. I kind of had that issue too. I knew everyone I dated wasn’t quite what I wanted, because I’d already met the person who was exactly what I wanted. It’s kind of hard to lower your standards after that.”

She laughed. “I don’t have that problem. Glenn was me scraping the bottom of the bucket. The only way I have to go is up, but I don’t really want to go at all.”

“You don’t want to get married again?”

“No. I mean, especially since I lost Blake, I’ve been lonely. But I don’t think being lonely is a good reason to get married. After all, you can be lonely in a marriage. And that’s probably a worse loneliness than being lonely and single, because you can’t really do anything about it.”

“You can go out with friends. It doesn’t have to be a romantic relationship.”

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