Or maybe her seeming removed and preoccupied had nothing to do with her and everything to do with me. I certainly wasn’t the carefree Jesse everyone was used to, although I tried to play the part. Most people accepted the facade, but a few—my mom, Lily, and Josie—saw through it. They’re too perceptive, and part of me was irritated by that. And part of me was grateful because I knew if and when I did need to talk to someone about my reincarnated demons, I’d have someone. Of course Rowen was the person I’d go to first with anything. . . but not that. I didn’t want her in that world. She’s been through so much, and it was my job to protect her from any more darkness.
So, yeah, the last two weeks had been bad, but things were looking up. The next day was Friday, and I had the weekend off to go visit Rowen. I would work through whatever was going on in my head, Rowen would be none the wiser, and everything would be just fine.
It sounded easy enough, but I knew doing it would be the opposite.
The afternoon chores were done, and I was up in my attic bedroom changing into fresh clothes. After Jolene had stumbled in on me three different times while I was changing in the laundry room, Mom and I decided my bedroom might be a better place to change. At least until Jolene learned to knock.
After clasping my belt into place, I grabbed my wallet out of my dirty pants. I was about to slide it into my back pocket when I paused. For months, I couldn’t go longer than an hour without checking to make sure it was still there. Then I’d gone months without checking. I couldn’t even recall the last time I’d checked to make sure it was still tucked into the last card slot of my wallet. I had a sudden urge to check. That unsettled me. A lot. The frantic feeling jolting through me was foreign, yet familiar. I’d lived that frantic feeling in a past life. I didn’t want to live, or even revisit, it in this life.
I inhaled as I opened my wallet. Slipping my little finger into the last slot, I slid it along the bottom. My throat went dry. I slid my finger back again, making sure I hadn’t missed it. Surely it was still in there. After sliding my finger back and forth a couple dozen times, I emptied the entire contents of my wallet. Maybe it had fallen into a different slot. My driver’s license, a few dollar bills, and a photo of Rowen fell to the floor. My wallet dropped beside the mess a moment later.
Hitching my hands on my hips, I scanned my room. It wasn’t meticulous, but it was clean by guy standards. Something that small could be anywhere though: buried in the floor planks, hidden between the sheets of my bed, hiding beneath my boots in the closet. It could have been anywhere, but I didn’t unleash a full-fledged search and rescue because I knew it wasn’t there. I could feel it. Or I suppose what was more true was that I couldn’t feel it.
The connection between myself and an inanimate object making itself known again terrified me more than any of my nightmares. Unlike the nightmares, that was real. That was happening. I was feeling a familiar pang of obsession, my heart racing as I grew more frantic, feeling an actual connection to something I didn’t want to feel a connection to.
If ever a person could regress so quickly, it was me. Weeks ago, I wouldn’t have believed it, but there I was living it.
I didn’t know how long I stood in my room, inhaling and exhaling, trying to fight back the feelings crashing over me like waves, one right after the other. But I failed. Nothing could pull me off the runaway train I was on, at least not yet.
The next night, though . . . the next night, I’d be with Rowen. If anything or anyone could get my mind off of it and give me some clarity, it would be her. I’d be okay. Tomorrow, things would be so much better.
Having no other assurances to give myself, I put my wallet back together, slid it into my back pocket, and left my room. I had an hour before dinner, and I was going to use it to clear my head. In Rowen’s absence, the best substitute was saddling up Sunny and tearing through a few miles of countryside.
I was just shoving through the front door when Dad called me into his office.
“Hey, Dad. What’s up?” I hovered inside the office doorway, trying to sound and look like carefree Jesse Walker.
“I was just talking to your mom, and she mentioned you were planning on heading to Seattle for the weekend.” Dad slid off his hat and dropped it on the desk. “Is that right?”
I nodded. “That’s right. I figured I’d leave as soon as we finished up tomorrow afternoon.” Just thinking about spending the next night with Rowen beside me calmed me. Not all the way, but enough so I felt like I could breathe again.
Dad sighed. “I was afraid of that. It’s probably my fault for not coming out and saying it, but, Jess . . . this is calving season. I know it’s early this year thanks to the warm weather, but nonetheless, this is when I need you most, son. It’s go time now through the end of summer, and after fifteen years of this, you know there’s no such thing as days, let alone weekends, off.” Dad’s hard words were softened by his voice and expression, but still . . .
“Wait. What? Are you saying I can’t leave to see Rowen tomorrow?” That’s what it had sounded like, but in my current state, I needed everything spelled out.
Dad’s forehead lined. “I’m sorry, Jess.”
I braced myself in the doorway. “Just like that? You’re going to tell me I can’t go see her? Dad, I’m not a little boy you can tell what to do and not to do. I’m twenty years old. I get to decide who I want to see and when I want to see them.” I’d never spoken to my dad like that before. I might not have been blatantly disrespectful, but I was bordering on it. I didn’t look up to anyone on earth as much as I looked up to my dad, but him telling me I couldn’t see the person I wanted to see, fresh on the heels of that wave of emotions, made me feel like a cornered dog. I needed out of the corner no matter what.
“I’m not telling you this as your father, Jesse. I’m telling you this as your employer. The height of our season has started, and I need you here. You’ve got responsibilities and obligations to fulfill, Jess.”
“I’ve got responsibilities and obligations to Rowen, too.”
“That’s right. You do. And you’ve got them here at Willow Springs.” Dad stood behind his desk chair, his arms folded over the top of it, watching me carefully. “Life’s about figuring out how to manage and balance your responsibilities and obligations.”
“How do I balance the fact that Rowen is expecting me in Seattle this weekend and you’re expecting me here?”
Dad quirked a brow. “Son, that’s easy. Rowen, thank god, loves you so much she’ll forgive you and wait for you. The cows? They won’t wait when a hundred-pound calf is ready to push its way into the world.”
I thought about that for a minute. As much as I didn’t want to admit it, I knew Dad was right. I’d been the idiot for thinking that even though Willow Springs was in firing-on-all-engines mode, I’d be able to take a few days off and head to Seattle. I’d ignored or played ignorant to the truth because I hadn’t wanted to see it. I didn’t want to think that anything would keep me away from Rowen. I still didn’t want to think about it, but I couldn’t claim ignorance anymore.
“Shit,” I muttered, propping my forehead on the doorway. That pretty much summed up the whole day.
“Jesse—”
“Sorry. I just . . . Today hasn’t exactly been made of win, if you know what I mean.”
“First, no need to apologize. Shit, and worse, pretty much sums up the difficulties of a long-distance relationship.” Dad moved to the front of his desk and leaned into it. He’d had the chair and desk for over a decade, and I’d never once seen him actually sit in the chair. We were too restless a breed to sit comfortably behind a desk. “Second, is something troubling you, son? I know I may not be the most sensitive person on this ranch, but you’ve seemed a little . . . off lately. Anything you want to talk about?”
There was so much I wanted to talk about, but I didn’t know where to begin. Once I opened up about it, I couldn’t pretend it would all magically disappear. “No, I’m good. You know how it is sometimes. Too many thoughts, too little gray matter.” I tapped my temple and forced a smile. I was just heading off to make my nightly call to someone—the first nightly call I wasn’t looking forward to—when dad cleared his throat.