Percival Everett - Half an Inch of Water - Stories

Jake nodded. “Lunge him a bit and get him warmed up.”

She walked over and took the lunge line and whip from the cabinet by the gate. Jake opened and closed the gate for her and she let the horse go. He kicked out and made some dust fly, then settled into a crazy trot. Jake watched his hindquarters. Sarah caught him staring.

“Something wrong?” she asked.

He shook his head and waved her off. “No, he’s just loose in his caboose. Like an Arabian.”

“Is that bad?” she asked.

He was sorry he’d said anything. “No, it’s not bad.”

“Is it good?”

“It’s not anything. It’s just an observation.”

She reversed the horse’s direction. Jake watched for a while and told her that was enough. She took the lunge line off, bridled the animal, and led him to the mounting block. She walked clockwise around the arena.

“Lazy walk,” Jake called. “You’re sitting, not riding.”

The woman put her heels down and straightened her back. She exaggerated the straightening.

“You look like you’ve got a pole up your ass,” he said.

She relaxed her body, but reddened slightly. She asked for a trot. She posted around twice. The horse was big, strong, but not the most beautiful mover in the world. Sarah cranked him around again.

“You see,” she called out. “He’s late on the turns.”

As dumb as most horses are, they are never the problem, he thought. She rode past him once more.

“Tell me,” he said. “What are you doing?”

The question embarrassed her. “Trotting,” she said.

“No, he’s trotting. What are you doing?”

She stopped the horse on the far side of the arena and turned to face Jake. “What are you talking about?”

“Imagine you’re in your car, driving down the road,” he said. “Do you look at the road or your hood ornament?”

“What?”

“Sarah, you’re staring at his ears. His head is not going anyplace. It’s going to be right there at the end of his neck. You’re not watching the road. Listen, that animal can feel a fly land on his back. You weigh one hundred thirty pounds.”

“One twenty.”

“Anyway, he can feel every little thing you do up there, saddle or no saddle. He knows where you’re looking and where you’re not looking, but he cannot read your mind.”

“What are you telling me?”

“If you’re not looking for the turn, then why should he? Exaggerate it. As you come down the rail, fifteen yards before the turn, turn just your head, almost put your chin on your shoulder and see what happens.”

“I’m just trying to get his head set right,” she said.

“Forget that. Just try what I said.”

Sarah started the horse. She did what Jake had suggested and the horse smoothly moved into the turns.

“How’s that?” he asked.

“That feels great.”

“You don’t have to move your head so much. He can feel it all through your seat. Keep going.”

They finished the session and Jake left Sarah with her horse at the wash rack. He walked back to the pasture gate and watched the new mule. He had settled down and was grazing by the far fence.

Jake went inside for a cup of tea. He drank while he sat on his front porch. Beyond his garden, he could see the pasture and the mule. He looked at his poor, neglected roses. He could see the pale masses of aphids crowding the blooms from twenty paces. Sitting out here with tea seemed the only civilized thing he did anymore. He hardly ever listened to music, though he heard tunes in his head from time to time. He seldom read for pleasure these days, though he would buy an occasional book and add it to his stack. It wasn’t as if he had been devastated by his wife’s leaving or even by the fact that she had left him for another man. He was, in fact, in a way, quite relieved. They had both been unhappy, miserable, in fact, and he had been either too strong or too weak to end it, telling himself every day that he could make it right. In truth he knew it was the latter, that he was weak. The sad part was he’d become comfortable with the unhappiness, perhaps the unhealthiest of states. He was lonelier since she’d left, perhaps messier, in some ways at loose ends, but he was unquestionably happier. He was thankful to his ex-wife for that. At least she’d had the strength to leave. He did not feel the sort of shame or embarrassment his family and friends seemed to think he felt or maybe believed he ought to feel. He kept up with his work, his animals, but apparently not his garden.

“Jake,” Sarah greeted him from the bottom of the porch steps. She was wet from hosing down the horse.

“Packed up?”

“I put him in the round pen.”

“That’s fine,” he said.

She looked around the garden. “This is a great garden. I’ve always loved your roses.”

“I’m glad you do. Apparently I’m not loving them enough. I’ve got deadheading to do, powdery mildew, aphids.”

“You’re awfully hard on yourself,” she said. She sniffed a wide-open lavender bloom.

“That’s a Whisky Mac,” Jake said. “It’s the only hybrid tea in the place. That one smells just wonderful.”

“What’s wrong with hybrid tea roses?”

“Just a prejudice,” Jake said. “Like some people don’t like Appaloosas. I don’t like hybrid teas. You know why god gave Indians Appaloosas, don’t you?”

Sarah shook her head.

“He did it so they would be plenty good and mad by the time they rode into battle.”

She smiled.

“I know it’s not the best joke. Sort of politically incorrect, I guess.” He paused. “Pardon my manners. Would you like a cup of tea?”

“That sounds nice, thank you.”

Jake left her on the porch and walked through his living room and into the kitchen. He put on the water and stood waiting. He glanced around. His ex-wife was now two years gone and still the place looked like her. He wondered briefly what the ranch house of a single man should look like. Army surplus forks and knives that didn’t match. Lots of leather, chairs and sofa. A Lucite table with barbed wire suspended inside it. He’d seen one once. The kettle called.

Back on the porch he found Sarah sitting on the top step. He sat beside her, handed her the mug. “It’s a warm day. Maybe I should have offered you something cold.”

“It’s never too warm for tea,” she said.

Jake looked at the hills beyond the pasture again.

She looked where he looked. “Not too shabby,” she said.

“I like it.”

“So, why do you like mules so much?” Sarah asked.

Jake sipped his tea. “They’re smart. I like them because they’re really smart. That trait makes them a challenge to train.”

“I thought they were stubborn.”

“That’s because they’re smart. You tell a horse to walk off a cliff, off he goes. You tell a mule to do the same thing and he’ll just look at you like you’re a fool. More, he’ll never listen to another thing you say.”

“So, what happened to your wife?”

Jake stared ahead. “That’s direct.”

“Sorry. It a nervous tic.”

“I don’t mind,” he said. “It’s refreshing. She left me.”

“Why?”

He nearly chuckled. “Because I wasn’t a very attentive husband. It seems I’m attentive in many ways to all sorts of things and not in some others. She left me because I was a lousy husband.”

“That’s redundant.”

“Perhaps.” Jake finished his tea and set down his mug. “So, what do you do when you’re not hauling that beast around and riding?”

“That’s the first question you have ever asked me that didn’t involve horses and it kind of did,” she said.

“I like horses.”

“I used to be a middle school teacher,” she said. “I got laid off. Laid off. Sounds like it should feel good.”