“Oh wow. Um, yeah. Give me a few minutes.”
She hangs up. Holden and Rosie live a mile down the road on the ranch in a house they custom built. It’s nice, being so close to my nieces. Considering Holden and I are the only two left who work full-time on the ranch, we’ve had to hire more hands than ever.
I scratch the back of my neck, watching my dad surf through the channels for a few minutes before deciding I should put a shirt on before Rosie gets here. We dated in high school. I thought she was my first love, so when she and my oldest brother started hooking up, I was royally pissed. We were broken up by then, but I’d be lying if I said I didn’t have a tiny shred of hope that maybe, one day, we’d get back together.
I’m over it now. I was nowhere near ready for a serious, long-term relationship at that point. And Rosie and Holden make a great couple. Without them, we wouldn’t have Birdie and Bonnie, the two best girls in the world.
I go back to my bedroom and grab a T-shirt. As I’m walking out, I hear the back door opening. Holden and Rosie are both there, but the twins aren’t with them.
“Where are the girls?” I ask.
“My mom is in town,” Rosie says.
Holden’s face is solemn as he walks up to me. “So, what happened?”
“I was just making him breakfast. He got his cup of usual whiskey and coffee, but he hardly ate anything. Then he clutched his stomach and stumbled out of the chair. Fell right on the floor before I could catch him.”
Rosie is checking on Pops. She’s not technically a nurse, but she was in school for a while, studying it, and she’s been our resident ranch nurse ever since. She’s stitched up more cuts and treated more injuries here than an ER sees in a year.
I start washing the frying pan I made breakfast in to busy myself. My stomach is tight with concern. Holden disappears into the hallway before he comes back with Rosie’s bag ofsupplies she keeps here at the main house. He sits back to observe his wife take Pops’s heart rate and blood pressure in the living room.
After a few minutes, she joins us in the kitchen.
“I think we should take him in to have him looked at.”
“What’s wrong with him?” Holden asks the question I can’t voice.
She’s gnawing on her bottom lip, glancing from my face to her husband’s. “I don’t know. I just think with the years of heavy drinking, it could be something serious.”
Holden and I both pause, letting her words settle over us.
After a beat, he finally clears his throat. “Can your mom stay with the girls today?”
She nods.
Holden faces me. “We really need that fence mended so more cows don’t get out on the road. The surveyor is coming this week for some state-mandated work from the county. Can you handle that today while we take Pops in?”
I feel my head bobbing in agreement, but my body feels numb and disconnected from the moment.
Holden squeezes my shoulder. “I’ll call you when we get an update.”
Cancer. Pancreatic. Stage four.
The words ricochet around in my head like a gong being smashed repeatedly in my ears.
I’m holding a pair of bolt cutters, standing on the northern fence line. I’ve been working on autopilot for hours, despite the steady drizzle of December rain.
My buddy Grady is next to me, cranking the barbed wire taut with the fence stretcher. A few of the other ranch hands are down the line, installing new posts.
“Duke? You all right?” I hear someone ask—probably Grady.
“All right,” I say into the phone pressed against my ear. “So, how long?”
“Three months at most.” Holden’s voice has a rough edge to it. “The dementia will only get worse from this.”
“Okay,” is all I can think to say.
“We’re bringing him home for now, but with the pain he’s experiencing, they said he’ll probably need to be admitted soon. I’m calling a family meeting with everyone for tonight.”
