Borrowed Horses (31 page)

I said, “Aren’t you curious about why he did that?”

He stopped and looked at me. “Do you want me to know?” Softly illuminated by moonlight, his eyes rested on me with absolute trust.

“Eventually,” I said.

He wrapped his arm around me, strong inside its thin jacket. Though I was shivering inside my heavy wool coat, Timothy’s arm was steady. We walked on together through the darkness.

The mariachi music from El Mercado blared through doors shut fast against the Idaho night. Walking in was like crossing a continent in a step. In the tropical heat, a man speaking heavily accented English asked if we wanted a table for two, but Dawn had already spotted us and came to fetch us to the table.

Dawn’s smile stretched so broadly that I was immediately embarrassed by her joy. She asked the waiter to add another seat to the table, then nudged me in the ribs mouthing, “Is this him?”

I stood by Timothy as we waited for the extra chair. “This is Timothy.” Jenny and Dawn exchanged smiles.

“And do you work with Joannie?” Jenny was fishing. Dave looked Timothy over once, up and down, then stared like a stoic out the glass door that fronted the restaurant, his face unreadable. He wore the Hemingway sweater again.

“I work at Rosauer’s,” he said. Dawn was almost bouncing in her chair. Timothy’s hand brushed the edge of mine. All I had to do was take it.

I shot another glance across the table at Dave, but he wouldn’t look at me. “We’re friends,” I said. I regretted the words as soon as I said them. I’d come to set things right, but I’d ducked out around the first obstacle I came to.

“Friends?” The word dropped from Dawn’s mouth like something foul-tasting.

“Good friends,” I added lamely. It wasn’t enough. Timothy raised an eyebrow at me but said nothing.

The table wobbled, and Dave disappeared underneath it to shove beer mats under the high leg. Refried beans and Spanish rice filled the air, their warmth couldn’t fight the coldness in my belly. I had dodged the fence when it was time to jump. I had run out.

Dave checked for stability, and sat up. Whether the sudden rush of blood to his face was anger or simply the result of sitting up, I couldn’t tell. He began folding the corner of his napkin. The action chilled me—among all the possible reactions I’d imagined, the calm folding and refolding of a napkin was not among them.

Timothy had asked Russ where he worked, and the two began comparing past jobs in construction.

“I didn’t know you’d worked construction,” I said. I pictured Timothy in an orange helmet and vest, driving the roller. It fit. I pictured him in a tweed jacket teaching a class of college students, and that fit too. I could as easily see him in a suit and tie, arguing a case to a jury in the style of my father, or working the register at my mother’s co-op like he now did at Rosauer’s, or in a lab coat dosing liquid from pipette to Petri dish. “What’s the worst job you ever had?” I asked, wanting to know what he couldn’t do.

“The casino,” he said. “No contest.”

“I thought casinos paid well,” Dawn said.

“Yeah. I was the whitest Indian on the place, so I got plenty of tips, but I hated taking people’s money—which I guess sounds funny from a guy who works as a cashier, but at least at Rosauer’s, they’re getting something out of the deal. And I hated watching people lose. I knew too many of the ones losing.”

Jenny reached her hand across the table and squeezed his hand, a gesture of comfort which made Dave flinch.

Timothy turned to me. “What was your worst job?”

“Hardee’s, hands down.”

“Always fast food,” Dawn sneered. “That’s everyone’s worst job.”

“Actually, that isn’t what made it bad,” I said. “I worked 5 a.m. to 1 p.m., but getting up early never bothered me. The job itself was kind of fun. I had the corner where I made biscuits all to myself for the first few hours, and then, when the manager pulled me over to flip burgers, I’d just shoot the shit in the kitchen with the boys, making the sandwiches and putting down fries. It was the manager who was the problem. He was really sleazy. Nothing I could prosecute or anything, but he was always untying my apron strings while I was cooking and standing way too close to talk to me. He even invited me to his house a few times, but I wouldn’t go.”

“Trying to get in your pants,” Russ laughed.

“Yep.”

“You should’ve worked that shit for some raises.”

Dawn slugged Russ in the arm and rolled her eyes. He looked entirely pleased with himself.

“What’s your worst job?” I asked him.

Russ leaned back and stretched as he pretended to think. “I’m going to go with Bonanza.”

Dawn yelped in protest. “That’s where you met me, you fucker.”

He turned to me, eyebrows raised. “Need I say more?”

Jenny had never had a job, and the server came to get our drink order before we got to Dave. I doubted he would have answered; he hadn’t said a word all night. Margarita called, but one would lead to more, and I needed a clear head. “Water,” I said.

Dawn stared.

“Eddie and I are taking Zephyr to Deep Creek first thing in the morning.”

“You
do
have a death wish,” she said.

The boys ordered beers, but Dawn surprised me by ordering water and Jenny, not one to break from what other women were doing, followed suit. I turned to Dawn. “I know why I’m not drinking,” I said, “but I never thought I’d see the day when you didn’t order a Bud.”

Dawn tilted her chin down and smiled toward Russ. “We’ve got some news to share.”

I looked at Jenny to see if she knew anything about this. Her face was blank at first, but almost immediately she flushed and smiled. “You’re pregnant!”

Dawn’s smile turned beatific.

Jenny squealed and clapped her hands while I sat there absorbing. “You never told me you and Russ were thinking about kids.”

Jenny launched into a barrage of questions. When was she due? How long had she known? Were they going to find out the baby’s sex? Did Dawn want a boy or a girl? What did Russ want? How was she feeling? Then suddenly, she paused, and her smile fell slightly. “You won’t be able to ride now.”

“Like hell.” Dawn scowled.

“You can’t ride pregnant.”

“You bet your sweet ass I can.”

“Isn’t that a bit, well, dangerous?”

Dawn’s eyes narrowed. “Are you saying I can’t manage my horse?”

Jenny hadn’t ever dared Dawn’s ire since her fall from Zip, and she didn’t know what to do in the face of it. I merely smiled encouragingly. It was Dave who spoke, like a forgotten giant everyone had come to mistake for a mountain. His voice was barely audible, each word filled with ice. “Aren’t you two supposed to ride tomorrow morning?”

Jenny looked from Dawn to Dave, then gazed, pleading with her wide blue eyes, at Russ. I waited to see which would win out: Dawn’s adamancy or Jenny’s mewling persuasion. Russ wouldn’t meet Jenny’s eyes. He just stared at the table smiling, and in the moment I saw his smile, I knew the victor. Jenny was up against an army. Dave, dark with treason, would be no help. Jenny had never won a fight on her own. She’d always had a man to enlist, but her father was not here.

Dave’s question hung unanswered in the air. It was Dawn who spoke, “Damn it, yes we are.”

Jenny again looked to Russ who was shoving a lime section down the throat of his Corona. When he finally looked up, it was not Jenny but Dawn who smiled on. It was the final blow. Jenny said, “As long as you think it will be all right, then I guess we can go.”

“Have you ever seen Sunny spook?” Dawn asked.

“You told me all horses spook.”

“They do,” I said. “But you’ve got to let Dawn decide her own way. Right, Russ?”

“Boy howdy.”

Timothy, meanwhile, was reading the menu and staying well clear of this discussion, a sensible course. I put my hand on his thigh, rubbing the soft cotton of his worn blue jeans. He glanced up at me and gave me a sliver of the warm, slightly surprised smile that first drew me to him. Desire stretched like a sun-warm cat along the inside of my thighs.

Dave broke a tortilla chip in two, and I jumped. His eyes locked on mine as he scooped salsa onto a single half and tossed it back like a shot of bourbon, crushing it between his white teeth. I had been wrong to think that his eyes were the color of ice. Their clarity had gotten me, had made me think in terms of refraction and of depth. Fixed by them now, I understood that they were the color of a magnifying glass when it tilts to the sky to catch the sun and blister an ant. And I, for all my bold bravado, looked away.

Dave could do nothing to me, I reminded myself. He was just a man, only a man, but now, fear sprouted within me. Our showdown would not be here, and I would not decide its terms. The sun was hours from high noon. When Dave was ready, he would pull it off the horizon. God damn it, where was the cowboy in me? Where was the Clint? Why hadn’t I found a better word than “friend”?

Dave didn’t break his gaze. I took a long slow drink of water. They were only eyes. Why was I so afraid?

“Where are you guys riding tomorrow?” I asked.

“Over the hills, wherever.” Dawn snuck a sip of Russ’s beer and Jenny made another little yip. Dawn rolled her eyes. “One sip ain’t going to hurt anything. Joannie’s the one you should be worried about. Deep Creek on Zephyr?”

“Thanks for the vote of confidence.” The waitress passed plates of food.

“Foxy’s going to be a mess when he sees you hauling off that mare.” She turned to the table. “You never saw a horse so attached to anybody in your life. It’s crazy.”

“Foxy loves Joannie as much as she loves him,” Jenny said, all sappy.

Dave snorted. “A horse can’t love.”

Timothy’s eyes rested thoughtfully on him, but it was Dawn who spoke. “If they can’t, then Foxfire sure puts on a good imitation.”

“We’ve been together a long time,” I said. The words were dishonest in their insufficiency. I owed Foxy more than that. “He’s always been the one great love of my life.” Dave’s face darkened and his lip curled in a sneer; Timothy’s was unreadable.

I looked away. In the corner, a green plaster parrot perched on a brass ring, the hard gloss of its plumage reflecting the track lighting with gaudy brightness: heavy, flightless wings. Its beak curled to a sharp yellow point. The beak would never open to speak or bite. I needed to be like that: hardened, content to perch in the center of a small, reliable circle.

Jenny broke the silence. “I can’t believe you’re going to have a baby. I’ve been trying to convince Dave that it’s time to start a family, but he wants to put it off.” She shot him a sly glance. “Maybe this will change your mind.”

He said, “Having kids isn’t something you do because everyone else is doing it.”

I flinched at his cruelty, but Jenny showed no signs of hearing it. She slid her hand into the crook of his arm. “He thinks we need to build our nest egg up before we have kids.”

“Getting you a horse was supposed to put a stop to all this baby talk,” Dave muttered.

“He’s always so practical.” Jenny’s lipstick cracked against a smile pulled so tight. “Did I tell you I trained Fritz and Shirley to run on the treadmill?”

Timothy looked to me. “Fritz and Shirley?”

“Her basset hounds,” I said. Jogging along on the treadmill, they’d trip over their own ears as they paddled along on too short legs. Was it funny or tragic?

Russ cracked jokes about doggy aerobics. “Your dogs could be the next Jane Fondas.”

“Shit, are you out of touch,” Dawn said. “Jane Fonda hasn’t made a tape in years.”

Russ ignored her. “How long does it take to get a basset hound in swim suit condition?”

“They could make pin-up shots,” Timothy suggested. “Maybe a calendar.”

“They could go into adult film!” Russ shouted, causing Jenny to blush from the roots of her thin blonde hair straight down her neck. “Can you imagine the titles? Tits and Bassets. Doggy Style.”

“Rabid Love,” Timothy suggested. Why on Earth had I said we were just friends? I wanted to turn back; I wanted a do-over. Mouse and the glass boy hovered before me: There is only ever one chance.

Russ was laughing too hard to speak for a moment. Dave, on the other hand, shoveled his food in with steady, mechanical diligence. Jenny looked desperate. I changed the subject. “Eddie call you?”

“No,” she said. “I haven’t seen him since my last lesson.”

I ate
pollo asada
to postpone the words I couldn’t believe I was actually going to voice. The charbroiled chicken rested on my tongue, the taste of mesquite smoke. “There’s a schooling show in January. If you want to show, I’ll haul Hobbes.”

“A show?”

“It’s just a small one.”

“Would I have to jump?”

“There’s flat and jumping classes. Don’t you want to jump?”

“I’ve only done cavaletti so far.”

“If Eddie didn’t think you’d be ready, he wouldn’t have suggested it.” They were the words I expected a friend would speak. “It’s not until the first of January. New Year’s Day. The new barn in Lewiston. There’s plenty of time to decide. Just think it over.”

Eddie would make her jump. Now that she had Hobbes, there was no reason not to. The fences would be small. All she had to do was stay in the saddle and remember the order of the fences. For me, on the other hand, a lot depended on tomorrow’s ride. I ran my finger over the week-old laceration; the flesh had began to knit under fresh bandages. The bandage with the boy’s blood was in the drawer of my bedside table, close at hand if I needed it.

Jenny said, “Are you thinking of Foxfire?”

I started. Dave’s lips stretched into a thin, terrifying smile.

“Are you wishing you could show him there?” Jenny asked.

“No. We won’t show again now. I’m going to ride Zephyr for Eddie.”

“I’d love to come and watch you,” said Timothy.

“Zephyr’s a waste of pasture space,” Dawn added. I ignored her.

“I’d love it if you came,” I said.

The smile still hung on Dave’s lips, but it was a shark’s cold, joyless smile.

We paid our checks. Outside, the icy air cut into our lungs. Timothy and I broke from the others, waking toward home. “They’re nice, your friends.”