Just a Cowboy

“I plan to ask him. But, as I said, the real estate business isn’t exactly booming around here. We got that new semiconductor plant five years ago, and for a while it looked like we were going to become the kind of town people didn’t keep leaving.”

“But?”

“But they laid off about two hundred people last fall. Doesn’t seem like much until you see all the empty apartments and houses, and see the way local businesses are struggling again. Boom and bust. Story of this town from the beginning.”

That at least gave her an opening. “How’s that?”

“Well, first they found gold up there on Thunder Mountain.” He pointed to the looming mountain range. “That played out in about ten years. Then came a kind of heyday for ranching. Lots of cattle, lots of wide-open space, enough water, believe it or not. Those were the days of the big spreads, and folks in town were just here to supply ranchers’ needs basically.”

Kelly nodded. “And then?”

“Raising cattle got out-of-sight expensive, people wouldn’t pay the price, beef got shipped in from Argentina and things turned kind of black around here for a while.”

“And now?”

“The ranches are mostly smaller, some folks still make money off beef, some are raising sheep, others horses. Then we got the semiconductor plant, and for a while there were plenty of jobs for young folks, and people with special skills moved here and we kinda grew again.”

“But now it’s bad.”

“Now it’s rough. The way it is everywhere, it seems. We thought we might get a ski resort up in the mountains, but that folded up pretty fast. We aren’t close enough to a major population center to have a load of people drive out here, and while we’ve got an airport, it would need a major expansion to bring in enough skiers. I guess you could say we didn’t have the kind of money necessary to make ourselves attractive.”

She nodded, absorbing what he was saying. “So everyone here is hurting?”

“Not really. We’ve just gone back to our belt-tightening ways. We get by on what we have—it’s not like we’re going to dry up and blow away. I guess it’s just kind of an interest of mine, to think about how this town starts to grow and then shrinks back again. It’s almost like breathing.” He chuckled quietly.

“That’s a different way of looking at it. But I agree. This place doesn’t look like it’s going away. The first thing that struck me about it is that it seems to have always been here.”

“Not quite always, but well over a century now. Was that what made you decide to stay here? Because we sure don’t seem to have a lot to offer most people, at least ones who didn’t grow up here.”

She hesitated, trying to find a way to put into words what had made her pause here in her journey, without revealing too much. “I guess…well, the place just feels…” She hesitated again and then gave a nervous laugh. “It’s sounds stupid, but when I got here what I felt was reliability. You know, like you could always count on this town.”

He turned into the grocery store lot and parked before he spoke. “Maybe that’s a good word for it,” he said finally. “Reliability. There’s a lot of that around here.”

Then he paused. “Well, except for Ben Patterson. I told him that place isn’t safe yet.”

“Maybe he just figured it wouldn’t be a problem because I wanted it for such a short time.” She bit her lower lip. “Look, if you want me to move, I will. But it’s just so hard to find a place that doesn’t want to tie me into a long-term lease.”

His gray eyes focused on her with an intensity that made her nervous. As if he were seeing things she was sure she hadn’t revealed. Then came the question she had hoped to avoid but had known, deep in her heart, she wouldn’t be able to.

“Why do you want to keep moving?”

It was, however, a question for which she’d already thought up the answer, weeks ago, just in case. “I’m traveling around the country is all. I finally reached a point where I could do it, and so I just decided to do it.”

To her it almost seemed as if he frowned, though she couldn’t point to a single thing in his face that changed. After a moment he shrugged. “Some folks have wanderlust, I guess.”

“It’s not exactly wanderlust. It’s just that…well, I might never get the chance to do this again. It seemed like a good time.” She hoped she never had to do this again, but that was a different story, one she wasn’t prepared to discuss with a stranger. Nor was she about to tell anyone that the only hope she cherished was that she had covered her tracks well enough. Sometimes she feared she hadn’t.

He seemed satisfied, though, and climbed out of the truck. She came around from her side and watched him stretch a little, as if things ached.

“Being a cowboy is hard work?” she asked, deciding to let him explain it any way he wanted.

“It can be, but damn, it’s great. Wide-open spaces, sleeping under starry skies, cooking over campfires. I like it.”

“Do you do it all the time?”

He twisted his back a little then shook his arms. “When there’s work. When I can.”

The answers sounded short, so she let it go. She was hardly likely to press him to go places when there were plenty of them she didn’t want to go herself.

They shopped separately and met back at the truck. She had only bought enough for a couple of days, but he seemed to have bought considerably more. She helped him load bags into the back of the pickup, and then they headed back to the house.

“You need anything else,” he said after he helped her carry her stuff inside, “you let me know. And don’t go scratching at the walls. God knows what’s under that paper.”

At that she laughed again, suddenly feeling better than she had in a couple of months.

“What’s so funny?” he asked.

“The idea of what could be under that paper. You’ve been talking about this house like it’s a ticking time bomb.”

A smile lit his face. “Maybe it is. Admittedly, the last folks who lived there made it to their nineties, so for all I know it’s the Fountain of Youth.”

She had a nice laugh, he thought as he headed back to his place, focused on finally getting that hot bath and that shot of bourbon. Or maybe he’d go over to Mahoney’s tonight instead and shoot the breeze with some of the regulars.

Of course, the problem with that was, inevitably, someone would get drunk enough to ask him about his firefighting days. And no matter how often he made it clear that he was just a cowboy now, there was always some jerk who didn’t get the memo, at least once he was a little drunk.

Most folks hereabouts had gotten the memo and didn’t bring up the subject anymore. And that was just the way he wanted it.

He shook the thought away. One of the best things he could say about Conard County was that folks tended to drop things you wanted dropped. At least to your face. They might gossip like mad among themselves, but they wouldn’t keep bringing it up to you.

And he didn’t want to think about that right now. In fact, he’d have been happy not to think about it at all.

Settling into the tub full of hot water, he released a sigh and turned his thoughts in other directions. Like Ben Patterson, with whom he was going to have more than a couple of words soon. And his new tenant.

Kelly Scanlon. He liked the name but her very presence raised a lot of questions. He had honestly believed that Ben wouldn’t be able to rent that place at any price, warnings attached or not. It was barely livable, and just knowing there was someone over there now made him feel like a grade-A slumlord.

He’d agreed to list it because Ben had been full of talk about how people never moved overnight, that listing it would be good because the place was going to be ready in a couple of months.

That had made sense to Hank. Let people know the property would be available down the road. He’d agreed when Ben had said most people planned their moves in advance anyway.

So, yeah, it had made sense. Certainly, he’d never expected a total stranger to turn up out of the blue wanting the place right now, in its current condition, for only a couple of months. Weird.

And that weirdness made him think about Kelly Scanlon. Her nervousness when she’d opened the door. That haunted look in her eyes. That kind of woman seldom went begging for anything. Men would trip all over themselves to look after her.

Or maybe not.

He sighed, let his head fall back against the rolled-up towel he’d strategically placed on the edge of the tub, and closed his eyes.

Something was not right over there. The thought drifted through his mind, and since he hadn’t poured that shot of bourbon, he knew he couldn’t blame it on anything except instinct.