Page 13 of Believe in Caloosa Springs

He reached into his back pocket and grabbed his cell phone as the breeze picked up and ruffled the loose-fitting material of his shirt, showing off a strip of pale skin on his flat tummy. There was more line-work on his abdomen, and I shamefully caught myself staring. He was on the thinner side, and a little shorter than me… maybe 5’8”? His hair hung down around his neck to the tops of his shoulders. The black makeup around his eyes made the blue of his irises shine. I mentally kicked myself again for having been the slightest bit ‘scared’ of him. He was… just a guy. I’d never seen a guy who chose to dress and decorate himself like that, true, but wasn’t that all just window-dressing? I had no idea who he was. I didn’t even know his name.

We all turned at once as a group of people arrived. They were led by a very short black-haired girl that looked like she was a matching set with the guy standing beside us.

Henry leaned over and whispered into my shoulder, “Oh, sweet Lord, they all look like him.”

“Okay, so everyone has their keys?” the girl asked briskly as she turned back to face the group. Of the people behind her, two were dressed like cowboys, and another one was wearing a plain white t-shirt and jeans. The last guy was younger, and smaller in stature than the others.

One of the cowboys stepped up next to the girl-leader and spoke. “Okay, if you follow the driveway around the back of the house, there’s a dirt trail we dug to get to the residences. You can’t miss it. I’d say, everyone, come back and meet at the barn in ‘round an hour or so for some food.”

“Can I help?” the smaller guy asked.

“That’s very nice to offer, Max, but you just worry about getting settled in. There will be plenty of cooking to do tomorrow.” The guy smiled, and the group began making their way past the girl and down the steps. A few of them piled into a Toyota and drove off towards the back of the property.

“They were wondering what they should do,” the vampire boy said, gesturing towards Henry and myself with his phone.

“I’m Tyler,” the dark-haired cowboy said, extending his hand. “Are you Henry?”

“I’m Henry,” Henry said.

The guy turned. “Sorry about that. I’m Tyler,”

Henry shook his hand.

“That means you must be Porter,” Tyler said, turning to shake my hand as well. “Welcome to Caloosa. Thank you guys for coming. It means a lot. Looking forward to a great year.”

I nodded. “Thank you.”

“Okay,” the girl began, "If you guys want to go get settled into your cabins, we are just finishing up in the kitchen, and then we’ll have an early lunch in about an hour in the main barn.”

“Thank you, ma’am.”

She cringed, wrinkling the thick black makeup around her eyes.

“Please just call me Mandy. Thanks.”

I nodded and turned to get back in the car.

“Uh, Porter? Was it?” Mandy spoke up again.

I turned back to face her.

“Your keys,” she said, holding two key rings. I walked over, and she set the keys in my hand. “I figured you guys, being family, would want to be closer to each other. Oliver put you in cabins six and seven, if that’s okay.”

“I appreciate that, ma- Mandy.” I caught myself before thema’amslipped out.Good thing her name started with M.

“The larger key will unlock the handle and bolt to your cabs. The smaller key is to the barn, where everyone has access. You’ll see it here in a bit, but it’s mainly a big eating and hangout room. That’s kind of how we imagined it, anyway.”

I nodded again and when I felt like she wasn’t going to say anything else to me, I turned around and climbed back into the car.

The small road to the other side of the property was easy to find once I had driven past the main house. I followed the trail as a massive red barn came into view. Thirty seconds later, I could see the outline of smaller structures peppered around the barn like tiny moons orbiting a planet. Each cabin was separated by a good chunk of land on all sides. As we began passing the small structures, I remembered reading in the contract, months ago when we started planning all of this, that we would each have roughly an acre of land to do whatever we pleased with throughout the duration of our stay on the Baker farm. I had assumed they would just assign each of us a small plot in the middle of a field they weren’t using. I never imagined I would be getting my own little cabin and have the surrounding land. Not that I was much of a planter. I wasn’t shy when it came to hard work, however, and I didn’t mind getting my hands dirty. Thosewere about all the qualifications I had. I’m amazed they even hired me.

I squinted through my sunglasses at the white numbers painted on the railing of each little porch we passed. Cabins one and two seemed about double the size of the rest of them—I wondered if the managers slept in those. We passed by cabins number four and five and then the road curved to the left before I pulled the car in front of cabin number six and put it into park.

“They look nice,” Henry said, craning his neck to get a better look at the cabin.

“Yeah, they do,” I agreed, feeling myself smile for the first time in the last 24 hours.

I reached down, pulled the release for the trunk, and got out of the car. November was still fairly warm in southern Colorado, and the sunshine on my face was a grounding force.

---