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And over the last thirteen years I found I’m really good at pushing those kinds of feelings way down.

How do I convince them I’ve changed?

How do I make them believe me? And more importantly, how do I thank them for . . . everything?

The thoughts make my head ache, and I squint as I pass by a little blue shed out by the side of the road. It looks like the kind of structure that converts into a farm stand, and there’s a sign over the door that says “Rowena’s.”

I slow my truck. I could keep driving. Head straight out of town. Get a hotel in Missoula or somewhere and come back just before the wedding.

But I stare up at the brass sign over a gravel road: Copper Ridge Ranch, and something inside me settles.

The years I spent here were, to this day, the best years of my life.

Briggs’ voice wanders into my thoughts—“Doin’ the right thing isn’t the same as doin’ the easy thing.”

“Yeah, yeah,” I mutter to myself, knowing he’s right even though he’s not even here. “I hear you, old man.”

I turn onto the gravel road, instantly transported back to a time when things were easy. In my mind, every memory I have here happened on a hazy summer day. The stables are set away from the road, and I can see cows grazing in the field behind it, horses lazily flicking their tails just inside.

I pull up to the main house and park between the blue Bronco and a red pickup truck, and I realize I’m nervous. It’s not the first time I’ve seen the Holbrook family since I left—most of them have come out to watch me compete over the years—but it’s the first time I’ve been back at Copper Ridge.

I’m struck with memories of bonfires and lake days and mucking horse stalls and mending fences. I’m hit with the smell of homemade cinnamon rolls and family dinners and stargazing down on the ridge.

It’s overwhelming—and I have to take a second.

After a breath, I open the truck door and grab the bottle of wine, and as I walk toward the house, I see Quent and Boone on the wide wraparound porch.

They stand.

“As I live and breathe, the prodigal son has returned,” Boone quips, not missing a beat in the thirteen years I’ve been gone. The analogy feels appropriate.

“Welcome home, buddy,” he says.

Home. I hold onto the word for a beat.

He reaches out to shake my hand, and as I grab it, he pulls me into a bear hug and lifts me off my feet.

“Geez, you’re skinny! What they got you on, some crap vegan diet where you only eat kale and birdseed?”

I bust out and push him away, “Better than the forty pounds you put on, Chunk.”

“Oh Chunk, huh? That’s how it is?” He squares up, dancing to my left, fists up.

“That’s how it is.” I square back.

We pause, hold up open hands at one another, then burst out laughing, slapping our right hands together and pulling into a hug.

We push each other away, and he makes sure to get the last punch in as Quent steps forward and puts a hand on my shoulder. “Momma made your favorite⁠—”

“Tell me it ain’t pot roast and mashed potatoes?” I say.

“With homemade biscuits.”

“Oh, man.” I rub my belly, mouth watering at the mention of it.

“Yeah, we’re all going to eat good on account of your homecoming,” Quent says.

“Rowe baked you some oatmeal butterscotch cookies,” Boone says. “They’re better than Momma’s, but don’t tell either of them I said so.”