Page 40 of The Bride
Again, BDD I didn’t think much of it. Certainly I knew I had to respect it. Dad had taught me that much. Winters were no joke—snowstorms could be deadly to people as well as cattle, and as a ranching family our livelihood depended on having the cattle survive each season.
So yeah, weather was something I understood. Now it was something I obsessed about. How cold could it get? What could cattle survive in and what couldn’t they? How many calves could we store in the barn, how many head could survive in the pen? When did we hook up the running line from the house to the barn and the barn to the pen? Before it started snowing, or could I wait to see how bad it got?
All of these things were new to me. Things I had always trusted my dad to take care of for me.
“Colder than a witch’s tit,” he said as he came into kitchen.
“I don’t even get that. You’re saying what? That witches have cold skin in general or is it just their tits?”
He thought about it. “Yeah, I don’t know either. It’s October. It’s cold, kiddo. What do you want me to tell you?”
I glared at him. “You know I hatekiddo. You know I hate it. Every time you say it I tell you I hate it, and you still say it.”
He smiled fiendishly. “Chill out, kiddo. It’s a term of affection.”
“It’s a term that identifies me as a child, which I’m not. One hundred and eighty-nine days, Jake.”
“Yeah, yeah. What’s for dinner?”
It was my night to cook so I was standing at the kitchen island, mincing garlic. That’s right. This girl could mince garlic with the finest chefs in the land. Inseminate cows, heard cattle, mince garlic.
It was an all-around education I was getting.
“Steak and mashed potatoes.”
“Awesome. I’m going to go up and take my shower. I’ll be down in ten.”
“You have to use my shower.”
“Why?”
“I’m cleaning yours with special stuff that gets mold off the tile. You should have told me how gross it was getting in there.”
“What were you even doing in my room?”
I looked at him then. It wasn’t an accusation. Like,how dare you, what the fuck were you doing in my room, but I could hear the surprise in Jake’s voice.
We’d lived in the same house together since last January, and I had never been in his room. Because I wanted him to know he had his privacy. Because I was afraid if I walked in there it would no longer smell like my dad, and that would make me sad.
It didn’t smell like my dad. It smelled like Jake. It was a little sad.
“You said you wanted me to pick up cotton swabs. I shopped today and went to put them in your vanity. Then I saw how dark the corners of your shower were. I have this stuff that will take it off, but you have to give it twenty-four hours to sit.”
“Okay. You have extra towels in your bathroom?”
“Yes, I put one up there for you. The green one. Do not use my blue one or I will kill you.”
“That seems a little extreme over a towel.”
“I’m very particular about my towels, and I don’t want your man parts touching the blue one.”
He shook his head, but didn’t argue and left. A couple minutes later I heard the water turn on overhead and went back to chopping garlic. I was running the knife over what I had already cut to make it even finer, and I slipped and caught my thumb with the knife.
Instantly the blood started to gush, and I quickly set it under water before it ruined the work I had already done. Only the damn thing kept bleeding. I wrapped a towel around it and that helped, but if I was going to finish cooking I needed a band aid. I listened for it and I could hear the water was off upstairs. Jake was finished with his shower. Hopefully back in his room already.
I jogged up the stairs and froze.
I froze because as I was rounding the steps Jake was leaving my bathroom with a towel around his waist, and as he took a step the towel came loose and I saw it.
