Николас Спаркс - The Longest Ride

“I’ll take care of it,” he said. “Is the layout still in the desk drawer?”

“Assuming you put it back last year, it should be.”

Luke buttered and jellied his toast, neither of them saying anything.

In time, his mother sighed. “You got in late last night,” she said. She reached for the butter and jelly when he was finished with them.

“You were up? I didn’t notice any lights on.”

“I was sleeping. But I woke up just as your truck was pulling in.”

He doubted that was the complete truth. The windows in her bedroom didn’t face the drive, which meant she would have been in the living room. Which also meant she’d been waiting up, worried about him.

“I stayed late with a couple of friends. They talked me into it.”

She kept her focus on her plate. “I figured.”

“Did you get my text?”

“I got it,” she said, adding nothing more. No questions about how the ride went, no questions about how he felt, no concern about the aches and pains she knew he was experiencing. Instead, her aura expanded, filling the room. Heartache and anger dripped from the ceiling, seeped from the walls. He had to admit, she was pretty good at administering the guilt trip.

“Do you want to talk about it?” he finally asked.

For the first time, she looked across the table at him. “Not really.”

Okay, he thought. But despite her anger, he still missed talking to her. “Can I ask you a question, then?”

He could practically hear the gears beginning to turn as she readied herself for battle. Ready to leave him alone at the table while she ate on the porch.

“What size shoe do you wear?” he asked.

Her fork froze in midair. “My shoe size?”

“Someone might be coming by later,” he said. He shoveled some eggs onto his fork. “And she might need to borrow some boots. If we go riding.”

For the first time in weeks, she couldn’t hide her interest. “Are you talking about a girl?”

He nodded, continuing to eat. “Her name is Sophia. I met her last night. She said she wanted to check out the barn.”

His mom blinked. “Why does she care about the barn?”

“I don’t know. It was her idea.”

“Who is she?” Luke detected a flicker of curiosity in his mother’s expression.

“She’s a senior at Wake Forest. She’s from New Jersey. And if we go riding, she might need boots. That’s why I was asking about your shoe size.”

Her confusion let him know that for the first time in forever, she was thinking about something other than the ranch. Or bull riding. Or the list of things she wanted to finish before the sun went down. But the effect was only temporary, and she concentrated on her plate again. In her own way, she was just as stubborn as he was. “Seven and a half. There’s an old pair in my closet she’s welcome to use. If they fit.”

“Thanks,” he said. “I was going to split some wood before she gets here, unless there’s something else you want me to do.”

“Just the irrigation,” she said. “The second pasture needs some water.”

“I got it going this morning. But I’ll turn it off before she gets here.”

She pushed a pile of eggs around on her plate. “I’m going to need your help next weekend with the customers.”

It was the way she said it that made him realize she’d been planning to bring it up all along, that it was the reason she’d stayed at the table with him. “You know I’m not going to be here on Saturday,” he said deliberately. “I’ll be in Knoxville.”

“To ride again,” she said.

“It’s the last event of the year.”

“Then why go? It’s not like the points are going to matter.” Her voice was starting to acquire a bitter edge.

“It’s not about the points. I don’t want to head into next season feeling unprepared.” Again, the conversation died away, leaving only the sounds of forks against plates. “I won last night,” he remarked.

“Good for you.”

“I’ll put the check in your account on Monday.”

“Keep it,” she snapped. “I don’t want it.”

“And the ranch?”

When she looked at him, he saw less anger than he’d expected. Instead he saw resignation, maybe even sadness, underlined by a weariness that made her look older than she really was. “I don’t care about the ranch,” she said. “I care about my son.”

After breakfast, Luke chopped wood for an hour and a half, replenishing the pile on the side of his mom’s house. Since breakfast, she’d been avoiding him again, and though it bothered him, the simple activity of swinging the ax made him feel better, loosening his muscles and freeing him to think about Sophia.

Already, she had a hold on him – he couldn’t remember the last time that happened. Not since Angie, at least, but even that wasn’t the same. He’d cared about Angie, but he couldn’t remember dwelling on her the way he was on Sophia. Until last night, in fact, he couldn’t even imagine it happening. After his dad died, it took everything he had to concentrate enough to ride at all. When the grief eventually faded to the point where he could go a day or two without thinking about his dad, he poured himself into becoming the best rider he could. During his years on the tour, it had been all he could think about, and with every success, he’d raised the bar, becoming even more intense in his pursuit to win it all.

That kind of commitment didn’t leave a lot of room for relationships, except the short-term, meaningless kind. The past year and a half had changed that. No more travel, no practice, and although there was always something to do on the ranch, he was used to that. Those who succeeded in the business of ranching were good at prioritizing, and he and his mom had a pretty good handle on it. That had given him more time to think, more time to wonder about the future, and for the first time in his life, he sometimes finished his day yearning for someone to talk to over dinner, other than his mom.

While it didn’t dominate his thoughts, he couldn’t deny the urge to try to find someone. The only problem was that he hadn’t the slightest idea how to go about doing such a thing… and now that he was riding again, he’d gotten busy and distracted.

Then, out of the blue and when he’d least expected it, he’d met Sophia. Although he’d spent most of the morning thinking about her and wondering what it would feel like to run his hands through her hair, he suspected it wouldn’t last. They had nothing in common. She was in college – studying art history, of all things – and after graduation, she’d move away to work in a museum in some faraway city. On its face, they had no chance at all, but the image of her sitting in the bed of his truck under the stars kept replaying in his mind, and he found himself wondering if maybe, just maybe, there was a chance that they could somehow make it work.

He reminded himself that they barely knew each other and that he was probably reading too much into it. Nonetheless, he had to admit he was nervous at the prospect of her visit.

After chopping the firewood, he straightened up around the house and rode the Gator out to turn off the irrigation, then made a quick trip to the store to restock the fridge. He wasn’t sure if she’d come inside, but if she did, he wanted to be prepared.

Even as he got into the shower, though, he found he couldn’t stop thinking about her. Lifting his face into the spray, he wondered what on earth had gotten into him.

At a quarter past one, Luke was sitting in a rocker on the front porch of his home when he heard the sound of a car slowly pulling up the long dirt drive, dust rising into the treetops. Dog was at his feet, next to the cowboy boots Luke had found in his mom’s closet. Dog sat up, his ears cocked before glancing at Luke.