Percival Everett - Wounded

All day long woolly, white clouds had clumped together over the mountains and I expected rain, so I worked like mad trying to get my hay in. But there would be no rain that night. The clouds had already rolled past and so I left off with the last of the hay and saddled my Appaloosa. I packed a canteen and a little food and rode out the south gate and toward the creek. I had to admit to myself that I was bothered by my failure with Wallace’s brother, but I had only said I would call, not that I would get him to come. I was also bothered by my decided lack of interest in Wallace Castlebury’s predicament. I am by nature loyal and it felt bad simply to abandon the man, despite his brief presence on the ranch and despite the fact that I found the man generally objectionable. I didn’t know if Wallace was guilty or not and I didn’t care. He was nothing to me. I wasn’t his lawyer or a cop. I’d made the call and that was it. I hoped the ride would clear my head. Zoe trotted some yards ahead of me and darted off after the occasional rabbit.

The creek was late summer low, a couple yards wide. The Appy crossed it without hesitation, which was unusual, and I took it as a good sign. I had an hour of light left and so I decided to ride all the way to the mouth of the cave and ride back in the dark. I’d discovered the cave several years into living in the area. I happened on it while chasing down a cagey bull back when I ran cattle. The cave was deep enough that I didn’t know how deep it was. Susie and I had taken picnics and camped there regularly for a while. She’d never liked it.

“I don’t want to go any farther,” Susie said.

I turned to her. She was backlit by the entrance to the cave. Still, I could see the fear, if not on her face then by her posture. A chipmunk had found the picnic we’d set up some yards outside the cave.

“I don’t like it in here,” she said.

I pointed the beam of my flashlight into the darkness, showing a twist of passage. I realized that once we made that turn, the outside light would be lost and Susie would really become frightened. “You go on back, I’m going to look a little deeper,” I said.

“No.” She shook her hands at her sides. “This makes me so nervous.” Her voice broke. “I’m scared.”

I went back to her. “I’m sorry, Susie. Come on, let’s go back and have some fruit. If that chipmunk left us anything.”

“I don’t mean to be such a baby,” she said.

We walked out and Susie sat cross-legged on the blanket.

“If it scares you, it scares you. That’s pretty simple. There’s absolutely nothing to apologize about.” I sat and leaned back against a large rock. “I can come back here some other time.”

“I don’t want you to,” she said. “Just the idea of your being in here terrifies me. Really, I’m not making it up.”

“Okay, honey.”

Susie stood. She trembled as she looked down the slope then out over the Red Desert.

I got up and put my arms around her. “Everything’s okay,” I told her. “Everything is just fine.”

“No, it’s not,” she said. “Can we go back to the house now?”

“You bet.”

“I’m sorry, John.”

“Don’t be silly,” I said. “We’ll go back home. What’s the big deal? Come on, let’s pack up.”

Zoe was back from chasing a rabbit, heeling to the App. I had sneaked back to the cave many times while Susie was alive. She must have known, but she never said anything. I stopped going shortly before her death, feeling that somehow I was cheating on her by being in the cave.

The sun was gone by the time I reached the entrance. I still hadn’t been back in. But I wanted to explore it. I got off and looked into the dark mouth while my horse rested. Then I mounted and started back.

It was good and dark when I loosened the horse’s cinch and walked him the last hundred yards to the hitching post beneath the flickering vapor lamp on the barn. A hatch of white flies darted in and out of the glow well above me. I took off the saddle and took my time brushing the horse. I had started cleaning out a hoof when I noticed a car parked in front of the house. It was a light-colored convertible, seemingly new, that I didn’t recognize. I cleaned all the hooves, led the horse to her stall, and walked to the house. My body felt creaky.

“Who goes there?” Gus called as I stepped into the kitchen.

“Who does the fancy chariot belong to?” I asked.

“That would be mine.” It was Morgan Reese from the neighboring ranch. She was a frequent visitor.

“Hey there, Morgan,” I said. “What’s up with the new wheels?”

“I got sick of driving a truck to Billings,” she said.

“How much will it tow?” I asked.

“Who cares,” she said, “it’s a guy magnet. So where were you? Scaring cougars or kissing elk?”

“A little of both.” I moved to take a seat at the table across from her, but I remembered and felt how dirty I was. “Are you going to stick around and have some dinner with us?”

“Gus already asked and I said ‘you bet.’”

“Well. If you two will excuse me, I’ll go upstairs and try to get cleaned up. It’s one thing to come in after a ride and settle down to chow with a scraggly old geezer, but it’s something else to sit down to a meal with a spiffy cowgirl who drives up in a white convertible.”

I walked up the stairs, undressed, and left my clothes on the bathroom floor. I stepped into the shower and found myself thinking about Morgan. She was around a lot. I wasn’t stupid or blind and so I knew she had a crush on me. I didn’t mind her presence, in fact, it was sort of nice, and I tried to rationalize that by recognizing her as a good friend for Gus. Susie had been dead for six years and I know that most people would have moved on in that time, but I couldn’t seem to. I missed my wife and I knew that wouldn’t go away; I honestly didn’t want that feeling to pass. But I had trouble imagining myself close to anyone again. My clumsiness around Morgan made me feel tense, uneasy, and my defense was to step away and the step away made me feel bad and so I felt more awkward still. While I dried, staring at my face in the mirror, I was amused by my all too apparent observation that I wasn’t getting any younger.

“Hey, Hunt!” Morgan called up the stairs.

“What do you want?”

“Get your fanny down here!”

“I’m coming. Just let me put some pants on.” I pulled on a clean pair of khakis and a white shirt and walked down the stairs and into the kitchen.

“You clean up real nice,” Morgan said.

“Thank you ma’am,” I said.

Gus shook his head over by the sink. “Don’t lie to the poor bastard. He’ll start to believe it, then he’ll think he can stop trying.”

“What’s to eat?” I asked.

“Meat and taters,” Gus said. “And a leek, watercress, and endive salad.”

I sat down at the table with Morgan. “You’ve been reading the magazines at the doctor’s office again.”

“What if I have?” he said. “Anyway, this just happened to be one of my favorites when I was in prison.”

Morgan laughed.

Gus was not shy about the fact that he’d been locked away for a while. He didn’t broadcast the information, but he never hid it.

Morgan drank from her water glass. “That Castlebury is going to get more than prison.”

Gus put the rest of the food on the table and sat down.

“I guess somebody saw him kill that boy,” Morgan said. “That’s what I heard anyway.”

“What else did you hear?” Gus asked.

I took some potatoes from the dish.

Gus gestured toward me with his fork. “Mr. Above-It-All over there thinks it’s none of our business.”

“It is now,” Morgan said. “The boy he killed was gay and the word is Castlebury got mad when he made a pass at him. We’re in the news because of all this. It’s awful. Imagine that poor boy.”