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I shook my head, looking down at Bessie as she finished up the bottle. “I can’t imagine,” I said before thinking better of it, then announced, “All done!”
Bessie was still bumping her nose at the bottle and trying to suckle it.
“Here, trade off,” Reece said. “You see if you can help her stand up and walk around while I prepare the second bottle.” He let go of Bessie and she actually wobbled forward a few steps uncertainly.
“Way to go, baby!” I cooed.
Then she stumbled backwards and went down again, landing on the soft hay. Reece took the bottle from me. “Keep working with her,” he said, walking back to the other side of the barn.
“Uh,” I started saying, but he was already turning on the spigot.
So I hauled a leg to straddle the calf like he had, then reached down and picked Bessie up, stabilizing her between my legs. When I let go, she stood for a little bit and took another step furtively forward.
It was amazing. Human babies took months to learn how to walk, but cow babies somehow came out just knowing how to do it? I’d had no idea.
And as if invigorated by the first bottle, she stayed on her feet, awkwardly stumbling forward on her long, coltish legs. By the time Reece got back with the second bottle, she was moving around the pen like a little champ.
“Look!” I said.
Reece grinned. “I leave you ladies alone for two minutes and look at this.”
I giggled, delighted even though I knew I hadn’t really done anything.
“You want to feed her again?” he asked, holding out the bottle to me.
Was he kidding? Of course I did. I took the bottle and Bessie was getting along with the program at this point. When I went over to where she stood, she latched right on and started suckling.
I thought she might get full and not finish the whole thing, but nope, she sucked down every last ounce of liquid from the bottle, and then trounced with a little more sturdiness with each step.
“Oh my gosh, look at her go.”
When I looked over at Reece, expecting him to be watching Bessie like I was, instead his eyes were on me, and they were quizzical.
I immediately felt self-conscious. I’d forgotten myself. For the first time in… well, years, I hadn’t been stuck in my head. I’d just been in the moment. In the wonderful moment, present with the animal, and the crisp morning air, and with him, unselfconsciously.
But now I was entirely self-conscious again. I handed him the bottle and hugged my arms around me, suddenly very aware that I was in another woman’s coat. Wearing the only pair of clothes that I had. Standing somewhere I didn’t belong.
“Well, I should go back and see to the dishes,” I said. “Thanks for letting me tag along and see how Bessie is.”
I turned to go and was almost at the open edge of the barn when Reece called out, “Wait!”
I paused, looking over my shoulder. He strode forward, his eyebrows drawn.
When he got to me, he had to lift a hand over his eyes to block the bright morning sun that had crested with a vengeance over the hill behind the house.
“Look, I didn’t mean to eavesdrop, but I overheard what you said to Ruth. That you were hitch-hiking and heading into Austin without any friends or family there. That doesn’t— I mean… Do you even have any money? What are you gonna do when you get there?”
I felt all the blood drain from my face. I suppose it was better than blushing with embarrassment, but the mortification was no less humiliating.
I tried to wave a hand. “I’ll be fine. Don’t worry about it.” I tried to turn to go again but he put out a hand to stop me. Though he stopped short of actually touching my arm or grabbing me.
His hand just paused, hovered in the air. “Wait. Sorry, I’m saying all this badly. I’m not always so good with words. What I’m trying to say is, I’ve been where you are. Or shit, no. I have no idea what your situation is. Just that me and Jer…”
He huffed out a quick breath like he was frustrated at himself for not being able to get out the words he wanted to. “We haven’t always been… this. We grew up shit poor, bouncing from foster home to foster home. And when we were seventeen, we split altogether. Lived on the streets for a few years.”
I paused, my need to flee the conversation at all costs suddenly withering up.
“You?” I asked incredulously. “But you guys seem so…” I trailed off, looking out towards the horizon where Jeremiah was out with the tractor on a hill, unwinding a bale of hay in a long line behind him, cows trailing after him for their morning meal. I met Reece’s eyes. “You guys have your shit so together.”
