AllFreeNovel
Share Us
I feel like a fool and wish I had been able to get out of here before I have to explain my mistake to a stranger yapping at me through a speaker. I'm tempted to ignore the voice, but my good manners tell me to do otherwise.
He called me ‘miss.’ Can he see me?
"Oh hi", I say. "I'm just trying to find someone but I have a feeling I missed a turn somewhere. I'm sorry to bother you."
"It's no bother at all, darlin’." The voice is rich and full and sounds like a genuine cowboy. "Tell me who you're looking for. I know about everybody in town so if you've missed your turn I'll be able to send you where you need to go."
I smile. I have a feeling he's not kidding about knowing everyone in town. "I'm looking for a friend of mine. Her name is Boone. Boone Starr. Do you know her?"
"Well, of course I do," the mysterious voice in the box boomed. "Everybody knows Boone. Come on in. Follow the driveway until it stops in front of the main house."
The next thing I know the massive gates swing open and I drive through, my jaw hanging down. Boone lives here? Well, there’s probably more houses on this side of the big gate. That would explain it.
Still, I'm mystified by the whole thing as I put the car in drive and cross over the threshold into the ranch.
I continue to wind my way up the hill, waiting for the driveway to end as the voice in the box assured me it would. There’s much more activity on this side of the gate. Trucks and tractors move between buildings as well as a number of people hustling about doing whatever sort of work people do on farms. Milking cows, maybe? Churning butter? Gathering eggs? What do I know?
I don’t see Boone anywhere and I slow my pace to almost a crawl so I can look around for her. Honestly, even here she’d be hard to miss with her wild mane of auburn hair and outsized personality.
Then it hits me. It would be just like Boone to prank me like this. Sending me to the biggest house in town to embarrass myself.
She’s a prankster.
After she had sent my mother from our dorm room in a near apoplexy, Boone dropped her cowhide satchel on the bed, grinned at me and said, "TJ Maxx. I got a great deal. Only $75."
In that moment, I knew I was in for an adventure. And I was right.
But she is still a prankster and my Spidey Sense is on full alert as I come to a stop in front of the massive log home with huge two story windows.
* * *
I sit in my car for a minute carefully looking around waiting for whatever prank Boone has planned for me.
It's probably silly for me to think I can simply wait here and nothing will happen. If Boone wants something to happen, it does.
I take the time to study the house and I must say I'm impressed. Whoever lives here has a lot of money. And not just d’Winter money which my father has accumulated over the years.
Despite my mother's pretenses, she and my father both come from working-class backgrounds. They were the first in their families to go to college. These are facts my mother likes to conveniently ignore.
They met and fell in love. Both were ambitious and had a mutual goal of bettering themselves and providing for their family.
I'm sure my father would have prospered regardless of what he had done, but with the added bonus of my mother's drive behind him, he became more successful than either of them might have anticipated.
However, our upscale family home in the posh gated community was like a Fisher-Price dollhouse compared to this monster of a home on a hill overlooking acres and acres of wide open Montana prairie.
Still admiring the house with its two-story columns at the entrance and a bank of solid glass around one side to maximize the view, I decide to take my chances and get out of the car. No one is concerned with my presence and so I shut the car door and stretch for a minute after the long drive.
I gaze up into the clear blue sky that spreads for miles and miles in all directions.
Boone used to say she felt like she couldn't breathe sometimes and then she'd be gone for a several hours off into the woods around campus. When she came back she’d be in better spirits. She told me she had to go and sit in the quiet and breathe in the fresh air.
After visiting her hometown, even for only a few moments, I could understand why the hustle and bustle of the Northeast felt a little bit overwhelming for her. Boone gave off the impression that nothing got to her, but I knew different.
Cautiously, I look around, waiting for someone to come out with a shotgun and tell me to get the hell off their land. I wonder where Boone is hiding, waiting to jump out just in the nick of time to save me from being shot or arrested.
So far, no irate farmers have noticed me.
Wait…what the hell?
