Rustic Hearts

Sophie

 

“Sophia?” My mom’s relieved voice comes over the line.

“Hi, Mom.”

“I have been calling and calling you, and your line goes straight to voice mail. I’ve been so worried. Haven’t you been getting my messages?”

“I’m sorry. My phone reception is so spotty up here in the mountains. Calls don’t come through. Ask Charlotte. We’ve had the worst time trying to talk without getting cut off,” I lie.

“It doesn’t surprise me. You’re basically stuck in the middle of nowhere. That town has always been in the dark ages.”

“It’s definitely a simplistic way of life down here.”

“So, how have things been?”

I can hear the shakiness in her voice.

“Fine. More or less.”

“Don’t be vague, Sophia. Tell me how it’s really going.”

I sigh. My mother has always been able to tell when I’m evading her questions.

“It’s fine, Mom. I don’t know what else to tell you. Aunt Doreen and Aunt Ria are just as you remember them. Emmett is still hanging in there, and he is still crushing on Aunt Doreen. Pop is a little melancholy, but he just lost Gram, so that’s expected. Dallas and I reco

“Soon? Aren’t you coming home tomorrow?”

I take a deep breath and brace myself for her freak-out.

“No. I’m staying through the end of the month.”

Silence.

“Mom? You still there?”

“What did your father tell you?” she calmly asks.

That’s not the reaction I was expecting. I guess she assumes that Daddy and I made up, and he talked me into staying.

“Not much,” I grumble.

“You have to give me a chance, Sophia.”

“A chance for what?” I ask, confused.

“To explain.”

“Mom, you don’t have to explain why I need to come home. I know I need to get back to the city, but Charlotte has everything covered at the office, and my houseplants are probably already dead. I’m getting plenty of time to design here. I think the fresh air and the peace and quiet have renewed me and gotten my creative juices flowing because I’ve filled two sketchbooks with new designs this week.”

I stop babbling and wait for her to give me the thousand other reasons she has thought up. She gives me nothing.

“Mom? You still there?”

“Yes, darling, I’m still here. I just thought …”

“What?”

“Nothing. Why are you staying until the end of the month?”

“The attorney handling Gram’s estate is out of town and won’t be back until then, and I just thought, instead of flying home just to have to turn around in a few weeks and fly back, I’d stay and spend a little more time with Dallas and my aunts.”

“All right.”

Hmm, that seemed a little too easy.

“Are you okay, Mom?”

“Of course I am. I just miss you, is all.”

“I miss you too. And I promise to try to call and check in more often. By the time I settle down at night, it’s so late in New York with the time difference.”

“It doesn’t matter how late you call. I’ll always answer,” she says, and I feel even guiltier for letting her calls go to voice mail.

“Then, I’ll call before I go to bed at least a couple of times a week.”

“Promise?”

“I promise. But I do have to go now. I love you.”

“I love you too, my onliest only.”

I disco

I shove my phone into my back pocket and hop off the porch. It’s like a weight has been lifted from my chest as I make my way to the barn.

I find Braxton with a rake and bucket, cleaning out the first stall. I swear, the man never stops working.

“Hey,” I call as I approach.

He stops and looks over his shoulder at me. “Hey.”

“Do you think it would be okay for me to brush down Huck? I want to build a little trust with him.”

“I told you, he’s temperamental.”

“I’ve visited him every day this week, and he hasn’t been the least bit aggressive with me. I think he’s getting used to me. I thought maybe, if he gets comfortable enough, I might be able to saddle and ride him.”

“You know how to ride?”

“I knew how to ride before I knew how to walk.”

“You still ride?”

“Not as often as I’d like, but I’m a member of a riding club in Manhattan, and I help instruct the children during their summer camps.”

That seems to appease him.

He chucks a heap of dirty hay into the bucket at his feet. “Suit yourself. Just be careful and move slowly with him. He hasn’t been ridden often, and we don’t saddle him much.”

“I will.” I start to walk off, and I change my mind. “Can I ask you a question?”

“I don’t know. Can you?”

Grr.

“What’s with the ball cap?” I ask as curiosity gets the best of me.

“What do you mean?”

“It’s a Red Sox hat,” I explain to him u

“Yeah, so?”

“Well, speaking as a New Yorker … who is required to hate the Red Sox on principle alone … how do you not get your ass kicked by Rockies fans, wearing that thing around town?”

He gives me a knowing look. A look that says, I’d like to see them try.

“We aren’t as damn redneck as New Yorkers are, apparently.” He smirks at me, and his rarely seen dimple peeks out.

“Riiiiight.”

He seems to stop and contemplate the question for a moment, and then he confesses, “It was my dad’s. He was born in New England. Landed in Poplar Springs after he met a raven-haired beauty from here at Arizona State University. He was there on a baseball scholarship, and she was visiting a cousin on campus for the weekend. Her name was Lily. He followed her home and never left.”

“Not even to finish school?”

“Nope. He married her six weeks later, began working at a local farm, bought a little house out at Willow Gap, and started making babies.”

“Six weeks. Wow, that was fast.”

“He always said, ‘When you meet her, you’ll know. No use fighting it.’ ”

“That’s a great love story.”

He snorts. “Except for the part where a drunk driver runs a red light and T-bones the SUV his family is in, and those babies have to watch as their mother bleeds out at the bottom of the gap, unable to get free of the backseat and help her.”

Dear Lord, I’ve never heard that part of their story before. He had to actually watch his parents die?

He gets a faraway look, and I know he is reliving the nightmare in his mind.

“Dad reached and took this hat from his head. He put it on mine right before he stopped breathing. So, no. No one in this town gives me shit about being a Red Sox fan.”

A tear escapes as I bring my hand to my chest to touch the small rose-gold dandelion pendant my daddy gave me for my twelfth birthday. The necklace that I’ve held so dear to my heart because it contains a part of him. The pendant that lit a fire inside of me and inspired me to handcraft jewelry with heart. The one I never take off.

“I’m glad you have something of his. Something to make you feel close to him.”

He shakes his head, uncomfortable with the sympathy from me. Then, he grabs a bucket and disappears into one of the stalls, ending the conversation.

I grab my own bucket and brush, and then I walk in to start brushing Huck down as I wonder to myself if Elle has anything special to remind her of her mom and dad.