She really didn’t want to. She knew that as soon as she connected with their voices, opened her eyes, she would feel a billion times worse than she already did. Which was very damn bad.
She heard Josie and a man, probably Sam. She decided to stay safely behind her eyelids, in the dark, but Josie said, “Honey, wake up. You’re scaring Gulliver.”
Bright, scalding light, divided into sharp spikes of color, snatched at her temples. Gulliver sat on the bed beside her, staring at her. His paw rested on her forearm. Josie stood beside the bed, looking blurry.
“I bet your head hurts,” Josie seemed to scream. “You’ve got to have an epic hangover.”
Billie wanted to throw up. Instead, she faded out.
She woke later, feeling like shit. The horses were hungry. She could cope no matter how badly she felt. She had fed with the flu and injuries; she could feed with a hangover. At least she was alone.
She was disappointed not to find her truck outside the casita. That meant someone had driven her home, got her into the house, and put her to bed. She hoped it was Josie, but Billie wasn’t up to calling her yet to find out and maybe thank her. She trudged down the hill to the barnyard, each step sending shards of glass through her eyeballs. The truck was parked beside the hay barn. Billie found the keys under the floor mat with a note:
I think I understand how you feel. I’d like a chance to explain and defend myself. When I call you later, please don’t hang up on me. Richard.
Billie considered lying down on a hay bale and going back to sleep. But Starship banged his feeder against the fence and whinnied. The pain of that noise propelled her through her morning chores.
She and Gulliver got back to the casita a little after eleven, much later than usual, but at least the horses were all fed and watered. Billie poured herself a glass of ice water and sipped it. Halfway through, she swallowed a couple of Advil, promising herself two more in a couple of hours. She’d worry about liver damage later. She just wanted the pain to ease. She turned off the house phone and switched her cell to vibrate. When it went off a little before noon, its motion felt like an assault.
“What?” she groaned.
“This is Richard. How are you feeling?”
“Fine,” Billie said. “How are you?”
“Fine.” He didn’t say anything else. Then, “Did you find my note?”
“Yes.”
“Well…?”
She didn’t answer.
“You still up for dinner like we’d planned?” he asked. “Say at seven? That’ll give us both time to get our horses fed.”
Absolutely not, she thought, but before she could stop herself, she asked, “What can I bring?”
“Could you pick up some milk for the kids? That way I won’t have to go out for anything.”
Milk for the kids? Was that a dig at her drinking? What about a bottle of wine for the adults?
She hung up and noticed that the light on the answering machine signaled three messages waiting. She played them.
She was into her overdraft protection.
She hadn’t paid her Visa bill.
The charitable donation she had promised to make to a horse rescue in Colorado was past the date she had promised it by.
She shut her eyes.
Later, when Billie returned to the barnyard to feed, she crawled up the haymow and dragged three bales onto the truck bed. She drove around the barnyard and fed each horse, throwing huge flakes of hay over the fences into the feeders. Each twist of her body, each grunting effort, made her feel like she was going to pass out or be sick. She promised herself she would never get drunk again. While she fed, Gulliver waited in the passenger seat, one paw on the dashboard, braced.
When Billie had finished feeding, she climbed into the truck, turned on the air conditioning, pulled Gulliver onto her lap, and cried.
“Can I help?”
Gulliver looked at Ty leaning against the truck door next to him and wagged his tail.
“I’m fine,” Billie said
“I can see that.”
She hadn’t even heard him drive in. She wiped her eyes with the heels of her palms.
“How about I give you a lift up the hill to my folks’ and make us some dinner?”
“I’ve got a date. I’ve got to get dressed.”
“Oh.” He stepped away from the truck. “Well.”
Her head still hurt. Her stomach still felt churned up. “I’m never drinking again,” she said.
Ty turned back to his truck. “Might not be a bad idea. Have a nice night.”
She thought there was an edge to his tone, maybe irony, or sarcasm.
For a few moments, she sat in her truck while memories ganged up on her. She was putting up roadblocks as fast as she could, but the images were sliding around them. The light she saw as she rode home on Starship. The flames. Hope dead in her stall, her legs pulled tight as if she were running. The smell.
CHAPTER 12
BILLIE SHOWERED AND dressed in a pair of navy shorts and a fitted white T-shirt. Her buzzed hair dried fast and in spikes, and she wished she’d remembered to use conditioner. Instead, she squirted hand lotion onto her palm, rubbed her hands together and finger-combed it through her hair. Not great but better.
There was no time for makeup, but she grabbed a tube of tinted lip gloss and swiped it over her lips.
She quickly rubbed cream on her arms and legs and found her flip-flops under the futon. Sunglasses hid her puffy eyes. She was still full of resolve and righteous anger, still ready to fight. But she wondered about his house, his horses, his kids. Him. She gave Gulliver a bowl of water and a beef-basted chew, stuck a steno pad into her handbag, made sure she had some pens and her cell phone, and headed out.
She almost forgot the milk and had to double back to the Depot, hoping Ty would have some in the cooler.
