Page 122 of The Fire Line

“That road we came in on,” Jay said eventually. “How far does it go?”

“East gets you toward Bozeman. South loops through three ranches before pavement.”

“And you know all of it.”

“Pretty much.”

Jay took a drink. “How far away have you lived?”

“Bozeman.”

“For college, right? And then you came back.”

“Yup.”

“That’s it?”

Harris gave him a look.

Jay raised one hand. “Not judgment. Genuine question.”

“I’ve traveled. Just never lived anywhere else.”

Jay nodded, content with the answer, but Harris looked down at his plate.

He wasn’t some asshole who had never crossed the county line. He’d traveled, seen enough of the world to know there were other ways to live. He had simply always come back here.

Argentina. Iceland. Greece. New York. Jay named countries the way Harris named towns. Even the films Harris had watched made his life seem enormous—airports, unfamiliar roads, people speaking languages Harris could not understand. Harris had lived almost entirely within the same fence lines, county roads, and mountain ridges.

He knew the land better than Jay would ever know an airport. That did not prevent the difference between them from feeling suddenly visible.

“My whole life fits on one little map,” Harris said.

The words sounded too much like an apology once they were spoken. Harris wished he could take them back without making that obvious.

“That isn’t a small thing,” Jay said.

“Didn’t say it was.”

“No. You said it like you were waiting for me to think it.”

Harris looked at him. “Wasn’t.”

Jay’s expression suggested otherwise, but he didn’t push. “I’ve been a lot of places. That’s not the same as belonging to them.”

Harris looked up.

“I know airports. Hotels. How to find food near a film festival at midnight. I know how to arrive somewhere, convince strangers to trust me, and leave again.” Jay turned the glass once between his hands. “You have people who expect you to come back.”

Harris thought of Evan calling to settle an argument with Walt, Della setting food aside whether he said he would be there or not, Rain watching the fence line until he returned to the barn.

“You make that sound better than it is.”

“Sometimes it probably is. Sometimes it probably isn’t.” Jay did not romanticize it, which helped. “My family expects me to come back too. They just haven’t developed livestock emergencies as an enforcement method.”

“Give ’em time.”

“My mother would purchase cattle tomorrow if she believed it improved attendance at Sunday dinner.”