The morning sun shone on the green pasture and freshly painted barn, making the pastoral scene so cheerful it could have sprung to life from the pages of a Little Golden Book. Of course, in a Little Golden Book, the horse in the pasture wouldn’t be quite so swaybacked.
The old chestnut gelding’s spine dipped in the shape of a horseshoe. “This ole boy was treated awful mean by his owners,” Jack said. “I figured the least I could do was let him get old and fat.” The horse nuzzled the pocket of Jack’s coveralls in search of sugar cubes. Jack fished out a cube and handed it to Lily. “Here, feed it to him. Just hold it in the flat of your palm. Not that he’s got much teeth to bite you with.”
Lily offered the sugar cube and scratched the horse’s velvety nose.
As they walked across the farmland, they were assailed by dogs— brown dogs, black dogs, yellow dogs, and spotted dogs, all of questionable breeding but unquestionable devotion. Jack led Lily into the barn. A black streak shot past them. “That was D-Con,” Jack explained. “Barn cat. Standoffish.”
“Runoffish, more like,” Lily said. “Thing took off so fast I wouldn’t have known it was a cat if you hadn’t told me.”
Jack laughed. “I told you about my one-horned goat, didn’t I?” She led Lily to a stall, the home of a black-and-white ram with a single, curlicued horn. Seeing company, he rested his front hooves on the fence. His eyes, like all goats’ eyes, were innocent and knowing at the same time.
“Well, aren’t you cute?” Lily scratched his bony back. “You might just be making a cameo appearance in my new book.”
“Ole Pan here’s the way I got Sandy to come to my place the first time. I told her I had a unicorn and asked her if she wanted to come see it. Pretty slick, huh?”
“Pretty slick indeed.” Lily was attempting to rescue her shirttail from Pan, who was nibbling it as though it was a delicacy. She finally pulled it out of his mouth and, laughing, turned toward Jack, who was looking at her with a hard-to-read expression.
“Was Charlotte pretty?” Jack asked.
It took Lily a moment to get her bearings. “Um, yes, I thought so. She wasn’t that emaciated, doe-eyed kind of pretty that you see in the magazines. Hers wasn’t a fragile beauty ... but bigger and stronger.”
“Butch?”
“Yeah, I guess you could call her that. She wasn’t butch in the same way that —” She started to say that “you are,” but stopped herself. “In the same way that Mick is, but yeah, you could call her butch.
Why do you ask?”
“I don’t know. I guess I was just curious about your...type.”
They walked out of the barn and into the sunlight. “Well, Charlotte was definitely my type.” She thought of Charlotte in her various guises — in her jeans and blazer, in her motorcycle jacket, in nothing at all. “I miss her so much.”
“I know you do.” Jack draped a companionable arm over Lily’s shoulders. “I know you do ’cause I miss Daddy. I know it’s not the same thing, but I did live with him my whole life except when I was off at school. ’Course, it was easier for me. I was expecting him to go.”
Lily was sobbing now. She was embarrassed to be doing it, but embarrassment wasn’t enough to stop her.
“I’m sorry, Lily. I didn’t mean to upset you. I just...you mentioned Charlotte earlier, so I thought it was okay to talk about her.”
“It is okay. Sometimes, though, this wave of loss just sweeps over me.”
“I know. And if I hadn’t brought her up, it wouldn’t have happened.” She produced a clean white hanky from the pocket of her coveralls and handed it to Lily. “I want to make you feel better, not worse.”
“You do make me feel better. Thanks for the tour ... and the peaches.. . and the snot rag.” She wiped her eyes. “I’ve gotta go, though. I’ve got to meet Ben so we can pick up Mimi, after our alleged overnight trip.”
“Don’t forget those books you left on the porch.”
“Thanks.” Lily retrieved the books and opened her car door. “Well...see ya.”
“Yeah. You still wanna go see those mares this week?”
“Sure.”
“Okay, I’ll carry you there, then?”
Lily smiled at Jack’s Southern speech. “That’d be great.” Lily backed out of the driveway and watched as the receding figure of Jack stood in front of the farmhouse, watching Lily drive away.
CHAPTER 15
When Lily came into the living room to announce that dinner was ready, she found Jack lying on her back on the floor, holding up Mimi, whose little arms were outstretched like the wings of an airplane.
“She’ll play airplane forever,” Lily said. “My arms get tired before she does.”
“Not mine. If I can carry a calf, I can play airplane with a baby girl.”
Lily and Mimi had gone with Jack this afternoon while she vaccinated the mares. Mimi had played in a pile of sweet-smelling hay while Lily had sketched the beautiful animals.
Lily had been planning on cooking dinner for Ben and Ken tonight, and so she had invited Jack to join them. She was making ratatouille with fresh vegetables Granny McGilly had brought them from her garden. A one-dish meal could always be stretched to feed one more person.
The only creature in the household who seemed to object to Jack’s presence was Mordecai. When he saw his veterinarian walk in the door, he had slunk down the hall and hidden under Mimi’s crib. Jack had lured him out with Milk-Bones and assurances that she was not there in an official capacity.