Pt. 8 You can never go back...

The break had lasted longer than lunch demanded, Tom thought, but the rest of the ride was to be short today he knew. He was alone in his thoughts for now, Jake riding Stormy with the rest and Ann joining them on the gelding while an older couple on a wagon further back. The mule team set the pace now, and Tom hardly had to do anything with his team other'n keep them from riding the teenagers ass. "I wonder what the boy's gonna do?" was his most prominant thought. Jake had said nothing when he came back from talking with Ann, just "She took it O.K." Tom doubted that, as he'd seen the girl turn away as Jake walked back, watched her head go down and shoulders heave a bit. She took it ok, sure she did. The girl cared too much, Tom could read that in her. After all these years, Tom could read most folks easy. He couldn't read the boy right now though, and that bothered him. What he'd told him, about Lilly, bothered him too. Maybe he was wrong about the boy, maybe he'd said too much. "Well, I can't un-say it if I did!" he muttered to himself.

Ann rode the gelding back a ways from the line of riders, wondering what was wrong with her. "It's not you," he'd assured her, "I'm just not in the same place about you." If it wasn't her, he would've been, she thought. She'd asked him, foolishly, if there was someone else. A woman wants to know though who her enemy is. "There's no woman more important to me Ann. I love you, just ain't in love with you. Yer like a sister to me, really. I've never had a sister before." She didn't want to be a sister damn it! Little sister to her dead husbands team, big sister to the man she loved! She was tired of being a sister! "I wish I'd never told him how I felt! Wish I'd never felt it!" She was tearing again, shaking a little too. She pulled herself up in the saddle, straightening her shoulders, and dried her eyes with the back of her hand. "Fuck it! You're better than this Ann!" She told herself silently,"You're a Green Berets' wife, after all!" But still, it hurt.

Jake, riding Stormy at the lead of the line, wasn't thinking much. He was strangely at peace, like some weight had lifted off his shoulders. He'd settled things with Ann, he thought, but that wasn't it. There could still be complications there, especially if he lost her friendship he decided. Still, he felt light riding along. He'd had more questions for Tom while he helped him harness and hitch the percherons, but had decided it wasn't time to ask them. Tom had wanted to say things too, he thought, but he didn't want to hear them yet, and had cut the older man off each time he'd started to speak. "So why am I feelin' so good?" He wondered aloud. He looked down on the horse beneath him. Her muscular neck with the red mane was so beautiful. Her ears, one turned back to him, the other swinging back and forth like a radar dish, had such shape, sexy and inviting a loving whisper. He wished he could see her eyes right then, those deep, soulful eyes! "No woman" he had told Ann. No, no woman, but there was Stormy! "I love you girl," he bent a little to say it, "I've never loved anyone more!" And he knew, and there was no going back from that.

Pt. 9 The end of the trail... and the beginning of another.

The ride ended at a big campsite near the main road, where families and horse-trailers waited. A friend of Jakes had brought Toms small trailer hitched to Jakes old truck. Setting beside Toms big diesel rig and the draft rig with room for the wagon and the percheron pair, it looked dwarved though. Others varied between shiny new stock trailers to a funny one-horse rig that made Jakes truck look new. A camp, with two big fires and a chiken-grilling rig, had already been laid out, and Jake worked to find a more private spot big enough for him and his friend to set up. When he did, over near his truck, he decided it was big enough for Ann and Julies tent too, and called Ann over.

Ann, walking the gelding to cool him down, wasn't thrilled with the idea but, after looking the already crowded camp over, thanked Jake and took the offer. Toms hired man had taken off after driving the rig up, his friend Pete told Jake, so he'd likely want to pitch camp there too. Jake knew Tom, who slept in his wagon the night before, would likely sleep in his truck tonight or maybe load up and leave. Still, there was room, and the horses'd be hitched to the trailers sides tonight anyway. The wagons were rolling in as Jake and Ann finished setting up, and Jake helped Tom make quick work of unhitching and loading the wagon. Ann shocked them by starting to unharness the big draft team, though she'd started at the wrong end. Tom thanked her anyway, and he and Jake finished the job. It was then Tom suprised them both by jumping at the idea of camping with them for the night! "The only thing is, I'll have to share the tent with one'a you, since I ain't got my own!" he laughed. It was quickly decided he'd tent with Jake. Ann politely put her foot down there.

Ann was still cool toward Jake, but it was hard not to laugh with Tom, wether you liked him or not and she wasn't sure she did. She blamed him for Jakes talk with her earlier, she just wasn't sure how or why. Julie, calling him "Uncle Tom" already, did like him though, and that scared her a bit. He was pretty good with kids, Ann thought. Like now when he picked Julie up and put her on the back of the draft mare, telling her stories of how he'd rode a plow-horse to school out in Wyoming. She chuckled herself at some of the out-and-out lies he spun, or were they true. He was so good telling, he could almost make her believe.

Jake too, after fetching water himself for all four horses, listened to Toms tall tales for a while. He'd heard most of them as a sweaty teen-ager mucking out stalls on Toms farm, and didn't believe half of them then. Julie sat wide-eyed and listening though, he tender years making them more real. Jake laughed to himself, but then wondered if Tom was just telling stories again to him and grew quiet.

Tom turned out to be the entertainment of the night as more kids gathered round the draft pair listening. He finally lifted Julie from the mare and moved them all over to the bigger of the campfires. That left Jake and his friend to take care of the horses, Tom realised, but hoped he wouldn't mind. As the night grew longer, parents and other adults joined the group and Toms stories grew bigger. Ann had joined them at the call for food, bringing Julie hers and suprising Tom by going back unbidden to get his. Jake stayed with the horses, though his buddy Pete had joined the fire long ago. Other folks threw stories in here and there, but it always came back to Tom. As children were pushed off to bed, Tom's stories became more adult, like running off at 14 to join the Rodeo and what a fiery woman his ex-wife had been. He smiled at Ann as he described her red haired beauty and Ann blushed. He talked too of his time in Korea during the war, and being called back up for Viet Nam. There were a lot of vets here who understood, though many didn't want to say. It was still hard, 15 years later, to talk about that much.

As it got later, and the kids noise lessened, Jake could hear Tom from where he stood next to Stormy. He stayed with the horse though, grooming and then just talking to her. He emptied his head and his heart with how he felt, and the worries he had about it. The horse, seeming to understand, knickered and pushed his shoulder with her nose. He kissed her nose lightly and began scratching her chest. She liked that, he knew, and she put weight against him as she got into it. He moved back across her stomach til his hand was against her udders, now loose and baggy though tight to her body. She didn't seem to mind, so he fondled them a bit. She took some of that, then pushed away, hitting Jake with her long tail. "Alright girl, alright." He moved back to her head, rubbing her neck as he talked some more. After a bit, Stormy neighed lighty and put her head down to the hay. He looked over at the gelding he'd be hauling home for Ann, then around the big trailer to check on the percheron team. All seemed good for the night. Toms voice still came over the light breeze. "Toms in his element," he thought, "and with Stormy, I'm in mine." He hadn't eaten yet, as late as it was, so reluctantly headed for the fires himself. He thought more about him and the horse as he grabbed cold chicken and beans. The salads and such had already been put away. "I don't know where I'm going here," he pondered, then surer, "but I'll go whatever trail she leads!"

To be continued, maybe...