The Longest Ride (8 page)

She stood without moving – again picturing Marcia’s skeptical face – but then decided, Why not? The whole night had felt slightly surreal, so finding herself sitting in a lawn chair in the bed of a pickup owned by a bull rider was an almost natural extension. She reflected on the fact that aside from Brian, the last time she’d been alone with a guy was the summer before she first came to Wake, when Tony Russo had taken her to the prom. They’d known each other for years, but past graduation, it hadn’t amounted to much. He was cute and smart – he was heading to Princeton in the fall – but he was all hands by their third date, and —

Luke set the other chair beside her, interrupting her thoughts. Instead of sitting, however, he hopped down from the bed and went around to the driver’s-side door and leaned inside the cab. A moment later, the radio came on. Country-western.

Of course, she thought to herself, amused. What else would it be?

After rejoining her, he took a seat and stretched out his legs in front of him, crossing one leg over the other.

“Comfy?” he asked.

“Getting there.” She squirmed a bit, conscious of how close they were to each other.

“Do you want to trade chairs?”

“It’s not that. It’s… this,” she said with an all-encompassing wave. “Sitting in chairs in the back of your truck. It’s new to me.”

“You don’t do this in New Jersey?”

“We do stuff. Like see movies. Go out to eat. Hang out at a friend’s house. I take it you didn’t do any of those things growing up?”

“Of course I did. I still do.”

“What was the last movie you went to?”

“What’s a movie?”

It took her a second to realize he was teasing, and he laughed at her rapidly changing expression. Then he motioned toward the rails. “They’re bigger up close, don’t you think?” he asked.

When Sophia turned, she saw a bull lumbering slowly toward them, not more than a few feet away, chest muscles rippling. Its size took her breath away; up close, it was nothing like viewing them in the arena.

“Holy crap,” she said, not hiding the wonder in her tone. She leaned forward. “It’s… huge.” She turned toward him. “And you ride those things? Voluntarily?”

“When they let me.”

“Was this what you wanted me to see?”

“Kind of,” he said. “Actually, it’s that one over there.”

He pointed into the pen beyond, where a cream-colored bull stood, his ears and tail switching, but otherwise unmoving. One horn was lopsided, and even from a distance she could make out the web of scars on his side. Though he wasn’t as large as some of the others, there was something wild and defiant in the way he stood, and she had the sense that he was challenging any of the others to come near him. She could hear his rough snorts breaking the silence of the night air.

When she turned back to Luke, she noticed a change in his expression. He was staring at the bull, outwardly calm, but there was something else there, something she couldn’t quite put her finger on.

“That’s Big Ugly Critter,” he said, his attention still on the bull. “That’s what I was thinking about when I was standing out there. I was trying to find him.”

“Is he one of the bulls you rode tonight?”

“No,” he said. “But after a while, I realized that I couldn’t leave here tonight without getting right up close to him. Which was strange, because when I got here, he was the last bull I wanted to see. That’s why I parked my truck backwards. And if I had drawn him tonight, I don’t know what I would have done.”

She waited for him to continue, but he didn’t. “I take it you’ve ridden him before.”

“No,” he said, shaking his head. “I’ve tried, though. Three times. He’s what you call a rank bull. Only a couple of people have ever ridden him, and that was a few years back. He spins and kicks and shifts direction, and if he throws you, he tries to hook you for even trying to ride him in the first place. I’ve had nightmares about that bull. He scares me.” He turned toward her, his face half in shadow. “That’s something almost no one knows.”

There was something haunted in his expression, something she hadn’t expected.

“Somehow, I just can’t imagine you being afraid of anything,” she said quietly.

“Yeah, well… I’m human.” He grinned. “I’m not too fond of lightning, either, if you’re curious.”

She sat up straighter. “I
like
lightning.”

“It’s different when you’re out in the middle of a pasture, without any cover.”

“I’ll take your word on that.”

“My turn now. I get to ask a question. Anything I want.”

“Go ahead.”

“How long were you dating Brian?” he asked.

She almost laughed, relieved. “That’s it?” she asked, not waiting for an answer. “We started going out when I was a sophomore.”

“He’s a big fellow,” he observed.

“He’s on a lacrosse scholarship.”

“He must be good.”

“At lacrosse,” she admitted. “Not so much in the boyfriend department.”

“But you still went out with him for two years.”

“Yeah, well…” She pulled her knees up and wrapped her arms around them. “Have you ever been in love?”

He raised his head, as if trying to find the answers in the stars. “I’m not sure.”

“If you’re not sure, then you probably weren’t.”

He considered this. “Okay.”

“What? No argument?”

“Like I said, I’m not sure.”

“Were you upset when it ended?”

He pressed his lips together, weighing his response. “Not really, but Angie wasn’t either. It was just a high school thing. After graduation, I think both of us understood that we were on different paths. But we’re still friends. She even invited me to her wedding. I had a lot of fun at the reception, hanging out with one of her bridesmaids.”

Sophia looked toward the ground. “I loved Brian. I mean, before him, I had these little crushes, you know? Like when you write a boy’s name on your folder and draw little hearts around it? I guess people tend to put their first loves on pedestals, and in the beginning, I was no different. I wasn’t even sure why he wanted to go out with me – he’s good-looking and a scholarship athlete, and he’s popular and rich… I was so shocked when he singled me out for attention. And when we first started going out, he was so funny and charming. By the time he kissed me, I was already falling for him. I fell hard, and then…” She trailed off, not wanting to go into the details. “Anyway, I broke up with him right after school started up this year. Turns out he was sleeping with another girl from back home, all summer long.”

“And now he wants you back.”

“Yeah, but why? Is it because he wants me, or is it because he can’t have me?”

“Are you asking me?”

“I’m asking for your perspective. Not because I’ll take him back, because I won’t. I’m asking you as a guy.”

When he spoke, his words were measured. “A bit of both, probably. But from what I can tell, I’d guess it’s because he realized he made a big mistake.”

She absorbed the unspoken compliment in silence, appreciating his understated ways. “I’m glad I got to watch you ride tonight,” she said, knowing she meant it. “I thought you did really well.”

“I got lucky. I felt pretty rusty out there. It’s been a while since I’ve ridden.”

“How long?”

He brushed at his jeans, buying time before he answered. “Eighteen months.”

For an instant, she thought she’d heard him wrong. “You haven’t ridden in a year and a half?”

“No.”

“Why not?”

She had the sense he was debating how to answer. “My last ride before tonight was a bad one.”

“How bad?”

“Pretty bad.”

At his response, Sophia felt it click into place. “Big Ugly Critter,” she said.

“That’s the one,” he admitted. Warding off her next question, he focused on her again. “So you live in a sorority, huh?”

She noted the change of subject but was content to follow his lead. “It’s my third year in the house.”

His eyes glinted mischievously. “Is it really like people say? All pajama parties and pillow fights?”

“Of course not,” she said. “It’s more like negligees and pillow fights.”

“I think I’d like living in a place like that.”

“I’ll bet.” She laughed.

“So what’s it really like?” he asked with genuine curiosity.

“It’s a bunch of girls who live together, and most of the time, it’s okay. Other times, not so much. It’s a world with its own set of rules and hierarchy, which is fine if you buy into those things. But I’ve never really drunk the Kool-Aid… I’m from New Jersey, and I grew up working in a struggling family business. The only reason I can even afford to go to Wake is because I’m on a full academic scholarship. There aren’t a lot of people in the house like me. I’m not saying that everyone else is rich, because they aren’t. And a lot of the girls in the house had jobs in high school. It’s just that…”

“You’re different,” he said, finishing for her. “I bet many of your sorority sisters wouldn’t be caught dead checking out a bull in the middle of a cow pasture.”

I wouldn’t be so sure about that, she thought. He was the winner of tonight’s rodeo, and he definitely qualified as eye candy, in Marcia’s words. For some of the girls in the house, that would have been more than enough.

“You said you have horses at your ranch?” she asked.

“We do,” he said.

“Do you ride them a lot?”

“Most days,” he answered. “When I’m checking on the cattle. I could use the Gator, but I grew up doing it on horseback, and that’s what I’m used to.”

“Do you ever just ride for fun?”

“Every now and then. Why? Do you ride?”

“No,” she said. “I’ve never ridden. There aren’t too many horses in Jersey City. But growing up, I always wanted to. I think all little girls do.” She paused. “What’s your horse’s name?”

“Horse.”

Sophia waited for the joke, but it didn’t come. “You call your horse ‘Horse’?”

“He doesn’t mind.”

“You should give him a noble name. Like Prince or Chief or something.”

“It might confuse him now.”

“Trust me. Anything is better than Horse. It’s like naming a dog Dog.”

“I have a dog named Dog. Australian Cattle Dog.” He turned, his expression utterly matter-of-fact. “Great herder.”

“And your mom didn’t complain?”

“My mom named him.”

She shook her head. “My roommate is never going to believe this.”

“What? That my animals have – in your mind – strange names?”

“Among other things,” she teased.

“So tell me about college,” he said, and for the next half hour, she filled in the details about her daily life. Even to her ears, it sounded dull – classes, studying, social life on the weekends – but he seemed interested, asking questions now and then, but for the most part allowing her to ramble. She described the sorority – especially Mary-Kate – and a little about Brian and how he’d been behaving since school started. As they talked, people began to drift through the lot, some threading among the trucks with a tip of their hats, others stopping to congratulate Luke on his rides.

As the evening rolled on and the temperature dropped, Sophia felt goose bumps form on her arms. She crossed her arms, hunkering down in her chair.

“I’ve got a blanket in the cab if you need it,” he offered.

“Thanks,” she said, “but that’s okay. I should probably be getting back. I don’t want my friends to leave without me.”

“I figured,” he said. “I’ll walk you back.”

He helped her down from the pickup and they retraced their earlier path, the music growing louder as they approached. Soon they were standing outside the barn, which was only slightly less crowded than it had been when she’d left. Somehow it felt as though she’d been gone for hours.

“Do you want me to come in with you? In case Brian is still around?”

“No,” she said. “I’ll be fine. I’ll stick close to my roommate.”

He studied the ground, then raised his eyes. “I had a nice time talking to you, Sophia.”

“Me too,” she said. “And thanks again. For earlier, I mean.”

“I was glad to help.”

He nodded and turned, Sophia watching as he started away. It would have ended there – and later she would wonder whether she should have let it – but instead she took a step after him, the words coming out automatically.

“Luke,” she called. “Wait.”

When he faced her, she raised her chin slightly. “You said you were going to show me your barn. Supposedly, it’s more rickety than this one.”

He smiled, flashing his dimples. “One o’clock tomorrow?” he asked. “I’ve got some things to do in the morning. How about if I pick you up?”

“I can drive,” she said. “Just text me the directions.”

“I don’t have your number.”

“What’s yours?”

When he told her, she dialed it, hearing the ring a few feet away. She ended the call and stared at him, wondering what had gotten into her.

“Now you do.”

I
t’s growing even darker now, and the late winter weather has continued to worsen. The winds have risen to a shriek, and the windows of the car are thick with snow. I am slowly being buried alive, and I think again about the car. It is cream colored, a 1988 Chrysler, and I wonder whether it will be spotted once the sun has come up. Or whether it will simply blend into the surroundings.

“You must not think these things,” I hear Ruth say. “Someone will come. It won’t be long now.”

She’s sitting where she’d been before, but she looks different now. Slightly older and wearing a different dress… but the dress seems vaguely familiar. I am struggling to recall a memory of her like this when I hear her voice again.

“It was the summer of 1940. July.”

It takes a moment before it comes back.
Yes
, I think to myself.
That’s right. The summer after I’d finished my first year of college.
“I remember,” I say.

“Now you remember,” she teases. “But you needed my help. You used to remember everything.”

“I used to be younger.”

“I was younger once, too.”

“You still are.”

“Not anymore,” she says, not hiding the echo of sadness. “I was young back then.”

I blink, trying and failing to bring her into focus. She was seventeen years old. “This is the dress you wore when I finally asked you to walk with me.”

“No,” she says to me. “This is the dress I wore when I asked you.”

I smile. This is a story we often told at dinner parties, the story of our first date. Over the years, Ruth and I have learned to tell it well. Here in the car, she begins the story in the same way she’d always done for our guests. She settles her hands in her lap and sighs, her expression alternating between feigned disappointment and confusion. “By then, I knew you were never going to say a word to me. You had been home from university for a month, and still you never approached me, so after Shabbat services had ended, I walked up to you. I looked you right in the eyes and I said, ‘I am no longer seeing David Epstein.’”

“I remember,” I say.

“Do you remember what you said to me? You said, ‘Oh,’ and then you blushed and looked at your feet.”

“I think you’re mistaken.”

“You know this happened. Then I told you that I would like you to walk me home.”

“I remember that your father wasn’t happy about it.”

“He thought David would become a fine young man. He did not know you.”

“Nor did he like me,” I interject. “I could feel him staring at the back of my head while we walked. That’s why I kept my hands in my pockets.”

She tilts her head, evaluating me. “Is that why, even when we were walking, you said nothing to me?”

“I wanted him to know my intentions were honorable.”

“When I got home, he asked if you were mute. I had to remind him again that you were an excellent student in college, that your marks were very high, and that you would graduate in only three years. Whenever I spoke with your mother, she made sure I knew that.”

My mother. The matchmaker.

“It would have been different had your parents not been following us,” I say. “If they hadn’t been acting as chaperones, I would have swept you off your feet. I would have taken your hand and serenaded you. I would have picked you a bouquet of flowers. You would have swooned.”

“Yes, I know. The young Frank Sinatra again. You have said this already.”

“I’m just trying to keep the story accurate. There was a girl at school who had her eye on me, you know. Her name was Sarah.”

Ruth nods, looking unconcerned. “Your mother told me about her, too. She also said that you had not called or written to her since you had returned. I knew it was not serious.”

“How often did you talk to my mother?”

“In the beginning, not too much, and my mother was always there. But a few months before you came home, I asked your mother if she would help me with my English and we began to meet once or twice a week. There were still many words I did not know, and she could explain their meaning in a way that I could understand. I used to say that I became a teacher because of my father, and that was true, but I also became a teacher because of your mother. She was very patient with me. She would tell me stories, and that is another way she helped me with the language. She said I must learn to do this myself, because everyone in the South tells stories.”

I smile. “What stories did she tell?”

“She told stories about you.”

I know this, of course. There are few secrets left in any long marriage.

“Which was your favorite?”

She thinks for a moment. “The one from when you were a little boy,” she finally says. “Your mother told me that you found an injured squirrel, and despite the fact that your father refused to let you keep it in the store, you hid it in a box behind her sewing machine and nursed it back to health. Once it was better, you released it in the park, and even though it ran off, you returned every day to look for it, in case it needed your help again. She would tell me that it was a sign that your heart was pure, that you formed deep attachments, and that once you loved something – or someone – you would never stop.”

Like I said, the matchmaker.

It was only after we were married that my mother admitted to me that she’d been “teaching” Ruth by telling her stories about me. At the time, I felt ambivalent about this. I wanted to believe that I’d won Ruth’s heart on my own, and I said as much to her. My mother laughed and told me she was only doing what mothers have always done for their sons. Then she told me that it was my job to prove that she hadn’t been lying, because that’s what sons were supposed to do for their mothers.

“And here I thought I was charming.”

“You became charming, once you were no longer afraid of me. But that did not happen on that first walk. When we finally reached the factory where we lived, I said, ‘Thank you for walking with me, Ira,’ and all you said was, ‘You are welcome.’ Then you turned around, nodded at my parents, and left.”

“But I was better the next week.”

“Yes. You talked about the weather. You said, ‘It sure is cloudy,’ three times. Twice you added, ‘I wonder if it will rain later.’ Your conversational skills were dazzling. By the way, your mother taught me the meaning of that word.”

“And yet, you still wanted to walk with me.”

“Yes,” she says, looking right at me.

“And in early August, I asked if I could buy you a chocolate soda. Just like David Epstein used to do.”

She smooths an errant tendril of her hair, her eyes holding steady on my own. “And I remember telling you that the chocolate soda was the most delicious that I had ever tasted.”

That was our beginning. It’s not a thrilling tale of adventure or the kind of fairy-tale romance portrayed in movies, but it felt like divine intervention. That she saw something special in me made no sense at all, but I was bright enough to seize the opportunity. After that, we spent most of our free time together, although there wasn’t much left of it. By then, the end of summer was already approaching. Across the Atlantic, France had already surrendered and the Battle of Britain was under way, but even so, the war in those last few weeks seemed far away. We went for walks and talked endlessly in the park; as David once did, I continued to buy her chocolate sodas. Twice, I brought Ruth to a movie, and once, I took both her and her mother to lunch. And always, I would walk her home from the synagogue, her parents trailing ten paces behind, allowing us a bit more privacy.

“Your parents eventually came to like me.”

“Yes.” She nods. “But that is because I liked you. You made me laugh, and you were the first to help me do that in this country. My father would always ask what you had said that I found so funny, and I would tell him that it was less about what you said than the way you would say things. Like the face you made when you described your mother’s cooking.”

“My mother could burn water and yet never learned how to boil an egg.”

“She was not that bad.”

“I grew up learning how to eat and hold my breath at the same time. Why do you think my father and I were as thin as straws?”

She shakes her head. “If your mother only knew you said such terrible things.”

“It wouldn’t have mattered. She knew she wasn’t a good cook.”

She is quiet for a moment. “I wish we could have had more time that summer. I was very sad when you left to go back to university.”

“Even if I’d stayed, we couldn’t have been together. You were leaving, too. You were heading off to Wellesley.”

She nods, but her expression is distant. “I was very fortunate for the opportunity. My father knew a professor there, and he helped me in many ways. But the year was still very hard for me. Even though you had not written to Sarah, I knew you would see her again, and I worried that you might still develop feelings for her. And I was afraid that Sarah would see the same things in you that I did, and that she would use her charms to take you away from me.”

“That would have never happened.”

“I know this now, but I did not know it then.”

I shift my head slightly, and all at once there are flashes of white in the corners of my eyes, a railroad spike near my hairline. I close my eyes, waiting for it to pass, but it seems to take forever. I concentrate, trying to breathe slowly, and eventually it begins to recede. The world comes back in bits and pieces, and I think again about the accident. My face is sticky and the deflated air bag is coated with dust and blood. The blood scares me, but despite this, there is magic in the car, a magic that has brought Ruth back to me. I swallow, trying to wet the back of my throat, but I can make no moisture and it feels like sandpaper.

I know Ruth is worried about me. In the lengthening shadows, I see her watching me, this woman I have always adored. I think back again to 1940, trying to distract her from her fears.

“And yet despite your concerns about Sarah,” I say, “you didn’t come home in December to see me.”

In my mind’s eye, I see Ruth roll her eyes – her standard response to my complaint. “I did not come home because I could not afford the train ticket,” she says. “You know this. I was working at a hotel, and leaving would have been impossible. The scholarship only covered tuition, so I had to pay for everything else.”

“Excuses,” I tease.

She ignores me, as always. “Sometimes, I would work at the desk all night and still have to go to class in the morning. It was all I could do not to fall asleep with my book open on the desk. It was not easy. By the time I finished my first year, I was very much looking forward to coming home for the summer, if only to go straight to bed.”

“But then I ruined your plans by showing up at the train station.”

“Yes.” She smiles. “My plan was ruined.”

“I hadn’t seen you in nine months,” I point out. “I wanted to surprise you.”

“And you did. On the train, I wondered whether you would be there, but I did not want to be disappointed. And then, when the train pulled into the station and I saw you from the window, my heart gave a little jump. You were very handsome.”

“My mother had made me a new suit.”

She emits a wistful laugh, still lost in the memory. “And you had brought my parents with you.”

I would shrug, but I am afraid to move. “I knew they’d want to see you, too, so I borrowed my father’s car.”

“That was gallant.”

“Or selfish. Otherwise, you might have gone straight home.”

“Yes, maybe,” she teases. “But of course, you had thought of that, too. You had asked my father if you could take me to dinner. He said that you had come to the factory while he was working to ask his permission.”

“I didn’t want to give you a reason to say no.”

“I would not have said no, even if you had not asked my father.”

“I know this now, but I didn’t know it then,” I say, echoing her earlier words. We are, and always have been, the same in so many ways. “When you stepped off the train that night, I remember thinking that the station should have been filled with photographers, waiting to snap your picture. You looked like a movie star.”

“I had been in the train for twelve hours. I looked terrible.”

This is a lie and we both know it. Ruth was beautiful, and even well into her fifties, men’s eyes would follow her when she walked into a room.

“It was all I could do not to kiss you.”

“That is not true,” she counters. “You would never have done such a thing in front of my parents.”

She’s right, of course. Instead, I stood back, allowing her parents to greet and visit with her first; only then, after a few minutes, did I approach her. Ruth reads my thoughts. “That night was the first time my father really understood what I saw in you. Later, he told me that he had observed that you were not only hardworking and kind, but a gentleman as well.”

“He still didn’t think I was good enough for you.”

“No father thinks any man is good enough for his daughter.”

“Except David Epstein.”

“Yes,” she teases. “Except for him.”