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“I’m not depressed.And I don’t have a phobia of singing my songs in front of people.If I wrote good songs, I’d gladly sing them.But no one wants to hear the garbage I’ve written while in Nashville.”
Cloe looked at her with sympathetic eyes.“What about the songs you’ve written here?You have dozens of notebooks filled with them, Sweetie, and none of us have heard a one.”
“I’m not hiding them.You can look at the notebooks anytime.”
“I tried once,” Hallie said.“I could decipher your early songs about Major, but once you learned cursive and started writing in your chicken scratch, I couldn’t read a word.Besides, this isn’t about us reading your lyrics.It’s about you being unable to sing them—at least in front of people.The only person I ever heard you sing them around was Decker and we all know he’s really a robot so that doesn’t count.”
Decker had been a pretty robotic teenager who didn’t show his emotions.Maybe that was why Sweetie had been able to sing her songs to him.He didn’t give her any kind of feedback whatsoever.He just listened quietly and kept working.She hadn’t realized until now that her barn concerts were probably the reason he hated country music.
She sighed.“Okay, maybe I am depressed.But anyone would be depressed if they’d spent the last twelve years at a career that has gone absolutely nowhere.But y’all don’t need to worry about me.You know I always figure things out.What wedoneed to worry about is what’s going on at this ranch.Have you noticed that there are no cattle grazing in the pastures?”
“It was the first thing I noticed on the drive in,” Hallie said.“I tried to talk to Mama about it when I got here, but then Daddy walked in and she clammed up.I tell you what, I will never marry an arrogant man I have to walk on eggshells around.”
“She’s just worried about upsetting him after his heart attack,” Cloe said.
Hallie snorted.“As long as I can remember, Mama has worried about upsetting Daddy.”
“I don’t think she was worried about upsetting him when she brought up selling the ranch,” Sweetie said.
Hallie stared at her.“Selling the ranch?You’re kidding, right?”
“I wish I was, but Mama and Daddy have decided to sell the ranch.After talking to Mama, I understand why.Running a ranch isn’t easy, and Mama, Daddy, and Mimi aren’t getting any younger.”
“I don’t think that’s the only reason.”Cloe glanced back at the screen door before she continued.“I think the ranch is in trouble, which is why Daddy’s been selling off the cattle.I tried to talk to him about it, but he’s still mad at all of us for moving away and refused to tell me anything.He said if I cared about the ranch so much, I should’ve stayed and helped take care of it.And we all know that Mama and Mimi have never cared about the business side of things.So neither one of them could give me any details about what was going on, except that money has been tight.”She paused.“So I did a little snooping.”
Cloe might be quiet and introverted, but she could also be devious when the situation called for it.
“Why, you little sneak, Clo,” Hallie said with glee.“What did you do?”
“I called Gilbert McWilliams at the bank and said I was doing Daddy and Mama’s taxes and needed their account information.”
“So what did you find out?”Sweetie asked.
Cloe leaned in closer and lowered her voice.“There’s only a few thousand in the ranch checking account—no doubt due to the large monthly payments he made last year to Oleander Investments.I googled the name and discovered it’s an investment company that gives loans to businesses.If Daddy took a loan out, he must have finished paying it off.There were no payments to Oleander for the last six months.”
“Well, that’s a relief,” Hallie said.“At least they don’t have a huge loan hanging over their heads.”
“But they still don’t have enough money to keep the ranch going,” Sweetie said.
All three of the sisters stood there for a long time without saying a word.Sweetie knew they were all thinking the same thing.How could they let the ranch go when it held so many memories?
Behind the house was the big red barn where she and her sisters had groomed horses, helped deliver foals, milked cows, and played in the hayloft.Next to the barn was the chicken coop where they’d collected eggs and been chased by a mean rooster they’d named Mister Hastings, after their strict grade school principal who had a head of red hair that looked like a rooster comb.
Beyond the barn and the henhouse were acres of land that had been their own personal playground.Riding, roping, and herding cattle hadn’t been work to them.It had been a daily adventure.
When they weren’t helping on the ranch, they’d had campouts in pup tents, built campfires, and then told ghost stories as they gorged themselves on burnt marshmallow s’mores.They’d spent the sizzling Texas summers at Cooper Springs, playing Marco Polo, doing cannonballs, and picnicking beneath the huge cypress trees.In the fall, they’d carve pumpkins Mimi had grown in her garden and enter them in the Fall Carnival Pumpkin Carving Competition.Hallie had won almost every year for most terrifying pumpkin while Noelle had won for most creative.
In the winter, Daddy had hitched up the hay wagon to a couple horses and driven them around the ranch with them singing “Jingle Bells” at the top of their lungs.
In spring, they would pick wildflowers and make flower crowns and pretend they were all fairy princesses who had accidentally slipped through a portal and were stuck in a human’s world and the only way to get back was to swing as high as they could on the rope swing on the old oak tree.
That was how Hallie had broken her nose.
Mama and Mimi had been in town at the time.Daddy and the ranch hands, including Jace, had been branding cattle.It had been Sweetie’s responsibility to watch her younger siblings.Instead, she’d been in her room scribbling down a song called “Shirtless Jace” when she heard her sisters’ screams.She’d raced outside to see her other sisters in a panic and Hallie holding her nose ...along with a handful of blood.
Sweetie had frozen.
Thankfully, Decker had been working in the barn.He hadn’t been more than thirteen, but as soon as he came out, he’d taken charge, sending Sweetie for a bag of ice and calming down the rest of her sisters.Now that Sweetie thought about it, Decker had always been calm and collected in a panic situation.He’d grabbed the hose the time Liberty had set off a firecracker and the sparks caught some dead grass on fire.He’d scooped Noelle out of the way when a stallion had broken out of his stall.He’d been the first one to reach Sweetie when Major got spooked by a firecracker in the Fourth of July parade and tossed her off.She had been in a lot of pain and he had told her some silly story about the pet hamster he had as a kid to keep her mind off her arm as he carried her three blocks to Doc’s house.
