“Then you’re on your way back to civilization. It hit us last night but we only got the tail end of it. A couple of inches on the ground and the sun is out so it’ll melt soon. Jasmine and Lucy are outside building a snowman about waist high. They plan to take pictures of it with Jazzy. She says this is the baby’s first snowman even if she can’t see it. I told her to pull up her shirt. Maybe the baby can see it through her belly button, kind of like a camera lens.”
Creed laughed. “I bet that got you a slap on the arm. How is Jasmine? Things going all right?”
“Oh, yeah. We can’t wait until spring for her to be born. I swear, Creed, there is nothing like the feeling or the fear of being a father. I don’t know how Dad did it seven times. I hear you got holed up with the granddaughter of the ranch owner. How’d that work?”
“Not so bad. Could have been worse.”
“Good-lookin’?” Ace asked.
“Oh, yeah!”
“Do I hear something in your voice?”
“I couldn’t answer that, brother.”
Creed heard a commotion in the background.
“I miss Lucy’s giggles. Tell Jasmine I’ll send her a picture of a whole snow family as soon as I get my phone and laptop charged.”
He put the receiver back into the base and it rang again before he could turn around.
Sage reached over his shoulder and grabbed it.
“Hello.”
No more than two seconds clicked off the clock.
“Oh, Grand, I’m so glad you called. The electricity is back on. We have puppies and I named the girls Blue and Crosby and the boy Elvis, and Creed says their poppa is a bluetick hound. And the kittens are named after Santa’s reindeer. I can’t wait for you to see them. Creed says they’ll all have their eyes open by Christmas and he’s going to build a doghouse and a cathouse…”
A short pause and some laughter. “I know it’s funny, but what else would you call it? Bet you never thought you’d have a cathouse on the Rockin’ C, did you? Anyway, he’s going to run an electric cord out into their little houses on the front porch and we’ll keep them warm with a lightbulb. Kind of like you do in the spring to hatch out the chickens.”
There was silence for a while and Sage wiped a tear from her eye. “I miss you. My cell phone will be charged up by noon and I’ll have it with me all the time.”
Creed’s heart went out to her. Should he back out of the sale? She’d never be happy without her Grand close by, and her happiness was more important than anything.
* * *
“You miss her bad, don’t you?” Essie asked.
Ada nodded. “But she needs to cut the apron strings and realize that just because someone leaves her doesn’t mean they are gone forever. I’ll go back and visit the ranch often and you’re going with me.”
“Not in the summer. I’d die in that godforsaken place in the summer. My poor little fat cells would all melt and there’d be nothing left of me but wrinkled skin and brittle bones.”
“We’ve got an air conditioner. You can take your knitting and sit in the living room all day, but we’re going back every three months. After the first year, you can play with the great-grandbabies. Until then you’ll have to make do with puppies and kittens.”
Essie shook her head. “Don’t like cats and barely tolerate dogs. When the boys were grown, I said no more pets in this place.”
Ada slapped the kitchen table. “Looks like you’d best learn to tolerate them because the choice you got is a week out of every three months in Texas with me or a nursing home with a whole new set of friends.”
“You are a hard woman, Ada Presley.” Essie pouted.
“I learned it from you.”
Essie stuck out a hand. “Deal.”
Two hardworking, veined hands clasped together in an unwritten agreement that was as binding as ink on paper.
When the hand shaking was over, Essie laughed. “I would have gone for two weeks four times a year.”
Ada smiled. “I would have settled for three times a year.”
“You know she’s enough like you that you can’t force her into doing what you want, right?” Essie said.
Ada threw an arm around her sister. “She gets that from you.”
* * *
Noel and Angel both had clean beds, and two sets of sheets were in the washing machine. Sage and Creed carried their overflowing laundry baskets to the kitchen and set them on the floor.
She dumped hers. “Might as well combine the loads. It’ll take less time.”
He dumped his on top of hers. “I agree.”
Putting her underwear in with his was the hardest thing she’d ever done in her life. It seemed so personal, so symbolic. Not even a long morning of sex had made her blush scarlet. But she did as she sorted clothing and visualized their personal things tangled up in the washing machine together.
When the kitchen floor looked like an explosion in a Goodwill Store, she poured a cup of coffee and carried it to her easel. The canvas looked different with overhead lights, and lamps added to the sunshine pouring in from the window.
“That sun promises warmth, but if you poke your head out the door that cold wind will freeze your nose off,” Creed said.
“It’s better than snow falling so hard that you can’t see your hand in front of your face. Aha! I can turn on the radio. Six days and I’d already forgotten what all electricity does bring in the house.”
She picked up the remote, hit a button, and music instantly filled the room.
Creed exhaled loudly.
“What?” she asked as she poked a button on the stereo unit inside the cabinet with the television.
“I liked the feeling of no technology. It’s crazy, but I did. It’s the same feeling I got when I first came out here.”
“Want me to turn it off?”
“No, I’d like
