Scarlett Rose's Arc

Chapter 20 of 57

Rose stayed the week. By Thursday morning Scarlett couldn't stand up without the room tilting sideways. She made it to the kitchen sink before the toast came back up. She rinsed her mouth and tried again with a cracker. That went the same way. The barn was already waiting. The mare needed grain. The bloodhound needed water. The hens needed feed and the eggs pulled before the heat spoiled them. Scarlett pulled on her boots and made it as far as the porch step before she had to sit down with her head between her knees. Rose came out in a turquoise blouse and no shoes. She looked at Scarlett once and picked up the feed bucket. "Tell me what goes where," Rose said. "You've never fed a horse." "Then today I learn." Scarlett tried to argue. Rose held up one hand covered in bracelets and shook her head. "Sit. Point. Talk. That's your job." Scarlett sat on the step and pointed. Rose carried grain to the mare with her arms held out like the bucket was radioactive. She came back for the hens and dropped half the feed in the yard. The bloodhound followed her everywhere, delighted. By ten o'clock Rose had straw in her hair and a smear of something down her jeans, and every animal on the property had been fed. She came and sat beside Scarlett on the step. "Call him," Rose said. "He's branding today." "Call him anyway. You can't do this alone and I have a return ticket Sunday." Scarlett called. Clayton picked up on the second ring. She told him plain. She couldn't keep water down. She couldn't work the barn. Rose had done the morning feed and it wasn't going to hold. "I'm coming," he said. "Twenty minutes." "You're branding." "Duke and I are done branding for today." He was there in eighteen. He came up the porch steps and put a hand on her forehead like he was checking a calf. Then he sat down on the step below her so their eyes were level. "Here's what happens," he said. "I move in tonight, not next month. I take the barn morning and evening. Rose stays through the weekend and cooks what you can hold down. Monday I call Maya to come sit days while I'm out working." "Clayton." "You're carrying our kid. You don't muck a stall until the sickness passes." She wanted to argue and couldn't find the words. She nodded instead. He went back to his truck and came out with a duffel he'd already packed. He hung his hat on the hook by the door and carried the bag inside without looking back. Rose watched him go and squeezed Scarlett's knee. "Well," Rose said. "That's one thing solved." Scarlett closed her eyes against the sun. The land was covered. She was not.