This is a short story that appeared in Illustrated Men, a published collection of stories each written to a painting by Michael Breyette. This is the full-length version, which includes all the scenes cut for publication. Hope you enjoy it. Gabriel
Texas Twilight by Gabriel Morgan
1875, somewhere in west Texas...
One white foot, buy a horse Two white feet, try a horse Three white feet, look well about him Four white feet, do well without him
You'll maybe think me a foolish man, or blind, but it was the horse I noticed first. I've always been partial to a fine piece of horseflesh, and the bright chestnut stallion with the wide blaze and one white stocking was hard to miss. He was drinking deep from the cool, clear water of the creek, the damp outline of a saddle still visible on his back.
It was only when the horse tossed up his head to snort at me that I noticed the cowboy hunkered down on the other side of him.
His black Stetson was wide-brimmed and trail-worn, but the silver workings on the band weren't the cheap stuff the peddlers had been hawking when I'd ridden through Waco a month or so earlier. When Smokey nickered at the stallion, the conchos winked with a dull shine as he angled his head up to look at me, eyes narrowing against the sun low in the sky behind me.
But my eyes were drawn away from the Stetson because that was the only thing he had on. Other than his dusty black hat, he was naked as a jay bird, hunkered down there beside the stallion, splashing creek water on his face. The dark hair on his chest and stomach was wet, clinging to his skin in a way that tightened my belly and made me glad the sun was at my back so he couldn't see my eyes. Lower down, the hair thickened, darkening to black in the join of his thighs where the dark pink weight of his privates swayed slightly as he washed. He was squatting in only a few inches of water, perched up on his toes to keep the blunt tip of his soft cock from a dunking in the creek. His stomach muscles were tense with the effort of keeping his balance, looking like biscuits lined up in a pan, two to a row. As I stared at him, safe under the brim of my hat, I felt a stirring in my pants and shifted slightly in my saddle.
When he looked up at me, droplets sparkled on his black eyelashes and dripped from his heavily stubbled chin to land in the water between his spread knees. I was far enough away that I doubt he heard the little breath I hitched in at the sight of him.
"Evenin'," he said. "Where you headed?"
The way he spoke, we could have been chatting in the lobby of a fine hotel, dressed in our Sunday best, instead of talking around a horse in the middle of a swift-running creek with him bare as the day he was born.
"Nacogdoches, more or less," I replied, urging Smokey down the shallow bank and into the creek. The stallion snorted again and tossed his head, but Smokey ignored him.
The cowboy nodded and then came to his feet in one smooth motion to drape a sinewy brown arm across the stallion's back. "Shot a rabbit back a ways. Want some supper?"
"That'd be neighborly. Thank you."
The cowboy turned and splashed toward the far bank of the creek, leading the horse by one rein. As I followed, I watched him walk to where he'd dropped his gear. His legs were long, and corded with muscle that shifted under his skin as he moved. His ass...well, his ass made me light-headed and finished the job of hardening me that the front view of him had begun. One rarely encountered a man like this, and it had never been my luck to find one naked.
As he stepped into his pants, I turned away to climb off Smokey and loosen his cinch, giving myself a minute to put my company face on. Riding alone for nearly a year as I'd been doing makes you forget, a little, how to be sociable. He'd pulled his boots on and was kicking some dried scrub into a pile for a fire. The hard slant of light from the setting sun glistened in the damp hair of his bare chest and reflected in his eyes when he glanced at me. I put an easy smile on my face while I took the rest of that morning's flat bread out of my saddlebag, wishing he'd put on a shirt and praying that he wouldn't.
I busied myself gathering up more wood from a downed tree a short way upstream, and when I got back to camp, he'd donned a shirt, faded and worn, but left it unbuttoned so that the soft old fabric draped open across his chest. The fire was burning nicely, so while he readied the rabbit for roasting, I poured coffee grounds into my pot, added water from the creek, and sat it to heat at the edge of the fire.
"Well, what in tarnation happened to that?" he laughed, looking at the coffee pot. "Didn't like the taste one mornin', so you stomped it to death?"
I was so used to the pot that I'd forgotten how it must look to a stranger. "Smokey took a notion one morning and kicked it halfway to Missouri. We were in a weedy stretch of country, so took me an hour to find it and another hour to beat it back into shape so it would stand up by itself. But it doesn't leak, so I haven't bothered to buy another."
"Smokey, huh? Wonder how many grey horses're named Smokey?" He'd come around the fire for a closer look at the pot. Now he turned to me, a crooked smile on his face, and stuck out his hand. "Carson Alexander. Pleased to make your acquaintance."
"Reuben Thomas," I replied. His hand was firm and warm, and held mine for what seemed like an overly long moment as we smiled at each other. "Likewise," I managed.
As the rabbit sizzled and the coffee began to steam, we talked back and forth across the fire.
"Where back east you from?" he asked.
"New York. How could you tell?"
He chuckled then, deep in his chest, making me smile in spite of myself. "Way you talk. You're educated."
His voice was neutral, but I had met too many people who assumed I was a greenhorn and was therefore useless on the trail, if not actually a danger to myself and others. My slight build and tender age no doubt contributed to that assumption.
"I do just fine, education notwithstanding," I stated a little hotly.
Carson raised one eyebrow and said mildly, "I'm sure you do. Little education never hurt nobody." He smiled to take the edge off his words before asking me, "So what takes you to Nacogdoches, more or less?"
"It's the next stop on my itinerary. I'm writing a book – stories of the west." I said it as casually as I could manage, but it was a subject near to my heart, and Carson glanced at me. "With illustrations."
"A book," he repeated, nodding as he gave me an appraising look. "With illustrations. Huh. Never owned a book, myself – but I can read and write," he added. "Some, anyway."
A coyote yipped just then, and as always, the sound lifted the hairs on the back of my neck. We were silent as a second answered the first, and when a third chimed in, Carson glanced off into the darkness as if looking for them. As the lonely, mournful sounds died away, he turned back to the fire with an expression as melancholy as the fading howl of the coyotes.
"And you?" I inquired. "What are you doing out here by yourself? Searching for wayward cattle perhaps?"
Carson shook his head, causing a strand of black hair to fall across one dark eye. As he shoved it back under his hat with a big callused hand, he sighed deeply. "No... No, I'm headin' home. To get married."
The last three words were said with as much enthusiasm as a man might exhibit on the way to his own hanging, and I looked at him carefully. He was staring unfocused into the fire, elbows planted on his thighs, hands dangling loosely between his knees.
"Is the lady in question not to your liking? Cross-eyed? Hunchbacked? Bucktoothed?" I asked it with a bit of levity, hoping to lighten his mood, but received only a brief smile for my efforts.
"No, she's tolerable. Her daddy owns the farm east of ours, so it's a good match. Been planned since we were kids."
No talk of love, or even the lingering affection of a childhood friendship. Just a pragmatic reference to the securing of that dearest of commodities — more land. It was obvious that he wasn't thrilled about the prospect of marriage, but whether from lack of romantic attraction for the girl, or loss of his current footloose life, I couldn't discern.
"Well..." I began, but was saved from the necessity of a reply when the coffee pot boiled over. I snatched it off the rock with a corner of my shirt and poured two cups. Carson took the rabbit off the fire, splitting it onto two tin plates from his pack and handing me a fork. I offered him a piece of flat bread, which he took with a nod of thanks, and we ate silently.
Carson kept his attention on his plate, leaving me free to watch him. The flickering light of the fire threw dancing shadows over the bunching muscles of his jaw as he chewed. I watched his throat work as he swallowed, and then let my eyes wander up the trail of black hair on the back of his hand to where it disappeared into the rolled up sleeve of his shirt. His wrists were strong, his forearms tanned from a life spent out of doors, and my fingers itched to trace the veins on the inside of his wrist.
I didn't need to imagine where the trail of hair on his tight belly led; I'd seen every stunning bit of him as he'd crouched in the stream.
The rabbit was tender and juicy, the coffee was hot, and too soon both were gone. I rinsed the pot, plates and forks in the stream before walking slowly back to the fire. Carson had staked the stallion in a patch of grass and was sitting on his unrolled blankets gazing into the flames once again. I set the plates and forks by his saddle pack, and then stowed the pot away in my own. As I tightened up Smokey's cinch, I glanced at him, but he was lost in the flickering of the fire.
"Thanks for supper," I said. "I'll be moving along now."
Carson looked up at me then, studying my face so intently that I stopped what I was doing and turned to fully face him. After a long few moments, he spoke.
"Why don't you just bunk down here." He gestured with one hand and then held my eyes as he added the last few words. "I'd... I'd enjoy the company."
I stared at him, trying to read more into his offer than a spot on the other side of the fire, but he looked away and began to remove his boots, seemingly indifferent to my reply. Stay or go, I wondered as I watched him wiggle his long toes and inspect the bottom of one foot. Well, it was just one night, then we'd go our separate ways – him to a loveless marriage, me to...what?
Carson gave me that one-sided smile as I hauled Smokey's saddle off and tied him to a sturdy bush. After smoothing away a few stones, I shook out my bedroll and sat down to pull off my boots as Carson stretched out on his side, head propped on one hand. The firelight cast moody shadows on the planes of his face and reflected in his eyes.
I eased my sketch pad from my pack and began to rough in the shape of his head, the angle of his jaw, the tendons pulling taut against the skin of his neck. He paid me no mind as I worked, filling in the finer details of his face: the wide, full mouth, the little scar high on his right cheek, the heavy lashes shadowing his dark eyes. After a bit, he rolled onto his back, hands clasped across his belly, long legs crossed at the ankles.
His shirt had fallen open, and I flipped quickly to a clean page, my breath coming a little faster as I captured the small, dark circles of his nipples just visible in the curling black hair of his broad chest. After I had a good start on his physique, I stopped drawing to simply look at him. His eyes were closed, his features softened in sleep, and I felt a familiar clutch in my chest as I watched his lips part slightly.
It had been months since I'd been with someone — only a hurried encounter in the dark recesses of a livery stable that had left me physically sated but emotionally bereft. I could feel the stir of longing begin to work at me, warming my groin as I shifted uncomfortably on my blanket. Carson slumbered on, unaware of the effect he was having on me. I went back to my drawing, working my way down his body, and when I reached the buttons of his pants, I realized that he had an erection. The firm outline of his cock hardened me almost immediately, and I tossed the sketch book aside, any hope of concentration gone.
I tugged my boots back on, and rising quietly, moved away from the fire, off into the shadows, but still within sight of him. As I opened my pants, I listened to his voice in my head, remembering his words as he'd asked me to stay. I'd enjoy the company, he'd said. Not half as much as I would, I thought as I spit in my palm and slid my hand lightly over the head of my cock — not half as much as I would.
I took my time, running my gaze over Carson's bare chest and bulging fly. Every curve of his body came to mind with startling clarity, and soon I was spilling my seed into the Texas dust between my trembling knees, toes curled tightly in my scuffed boots, head thrown back. When I opened my eyes, the heavens were spread before me, vast and dark, and it took the shivering yips of another coyote to bring me back to earth. I crept back to my blanket, removed my boots once again, and curled on my side as the hypnotic rise and fall of Carson's chest lulled me to sleep.
"Mornin'."
Carson's voice was husky with sleep, but he was fully dressed and crouching by the fire as he poured two cups of coffee. The sky was just beginning to lighten, bleeding from black to palest gray, and from that to a translucent pink, before settling into the unrelenting blue of Texas in May. He seemed in no hurry, so I fried bacon and made fresh flat bread, and we ate a companionable, albeit quiet, breakfast together.
As I was kicking dirt over the fire, Carson stepped away and turned his back to me. I didn't immediately realize what he was doing, and when I heard the strong stream of his urine splattering into the dirt, I turned toward him without thinking. His head was lowered, his boots spread, and between them, I could see the little kick of dust from the impact of the accumulating pool. As I watched, the stream lessened, then slowed to a trickle interrupted by a couple more spurts as he grunted slightly before tucking himself back in his pants.
I turned quickly toward Smokey, all too aware of my unguarded face and the hard slant of my cock across my thigh. Breathing deeply, I forced myself to answer him normally when he spoke.
"Ridin' east?"
"Yes."
"Mind if I ride along? That's my general direction, too, so..."
"Of course."
If he thought my perfunctory replies odd, he kept it to himself, saddling the stallion with an efficiency I'd yet to master. As we rode away from the camp site, I took a lingering look back, knowing this time and this place would stay with me long after Carson was home and married.
Married.
I glanced at him, riding next to me, slouched comfortably in the saddle, one hand resting on his leg. He seemed resigned to his fate, but I wondered what life would do to him, married to a woman he didn't love and shackled to the backbreaking, unrelenting work of farming. He met my eyes just then, holding them for a long minute, his face solemn, that wide mouth unsmiling, and I wondered...
But no, it was a foolish thought, and I chided myself for giving it a moment's consideration. He'd probably shoot me if I gave him so much as a friendly pat, never mind the embrace I'd been daydreaming of since I'd seen him naked in the creek. I sighed and broke away from his gaze. The day passed as days on the trail do, slowly, with idle conversation, the swift pursuit of a rabbit for dinner, the pause to appreciate an eagle soaring on the currents off a cliff to the north.
Two months passed in this manner, two months of sharing the day with him, cooking breakfast and supper, sleeping across from him, watching the dying embers of yet another fire burn to ashes and dust. From the first, we were easy with each other, falling into a routine of making camp, gathering wood, building a fire, preparing a meal. It was a camaraderie that was seductive in its simplicity; we never discussed who would do what, the days simply unfolding one sunrise after the next in a growing string of weeks that I knew I'd never forget.
As we spent time together and Carson became accustomed to my presence, he asked my opinion on a variety of matters and gave my replies due consideration. He also took on the role of western guide, pointing out plants, rock formations, animal tracks, all manner of things I wouldn't have noticed or known the significance of, left to my own devices. His knowledge of the world he moved in was remarkable, and I wrote volumes every evening by the fire, attempting to get it all on paper.
One night as I opened my pad to sketch a brace of partridge he'd shot earlier, he noticed the two drawings I had done of him the first night. He gripped my wrist to stop my hand from turning the page and leaned over my shoulder to study the one of him asleep. His hand tightened on my arm for a moment, and then he released me and straightened up to get more wood. I looked at his back and wondered if I should say something, but nothing brilliant came to mind, so I stayed quiet.
Two days outside Nacogdoches, the skies darkened as we finished supper, and shortly after dark, the rain began, lightly at first, but soon quickening to a steady downpour. I'd lost my poncho months ago during a windy night in New Mexico, so at first I huddled near Smokey, thinking to wait it out. But when the rain began in earnest, I knew I was in for a long, wet night. I tugged my hat down more firmly and was trying to make myself as small as possible when Carson appeared by my side.
"Here, hold this," he muttered, shoving a rope into my hand. "Goddamn rain."
He hunched down next to me, swearing quietly to himself as he pulled one corner of the canvas square under his butt and the other over his head. I did the same, and shortly we were protected adequately, if somewhat awkwardly, from the worst of the storm.
As soon as the rain was no longer my primary concern, I became very aware of him. From his shoulder to his elbow, then down the full length of his thigh, he was pressed snugly against me. I sat very still, the storm completely forgotten, as I committed the feel of him to memory. The muscles of his leg were rock hard, and moved against me as he shifted his feet slightly.
The heat of his body was the next thing I noticed. I was wet clear through, and as the night was cooling off rapidly, I soon began to shiver. The second time a shudder moved through me, Carson turned his head my way. We were so close our hat brims bumped and I could feel his breath warm on my cheek as he spoke.
"You gonna catch your death." He studied my face for a second before lifting his arm over my shoulders and pulling me against him. "Come `ere. See if we can warm you up some."
I huddled gratefully next to him, chattering out my thanks through clacking teeth, my shoulder deep in the warmth of his armpit. To keep my balance, I leaned my forearm on his thigh, fisting my hand instead of gripping his leg like I wanted to, and gradually his heat seeped through me. The rain continued unrelenting, and it soon became clear that we'd have to attempt to get some sleep. Carson pulled away from me for a moment, rearranging the canvas before pulling me down next to him. I drew my knees to my chest, and let out a ragged breath when he curled up behind me, snugging his body along mine, and draping the hand holding the edge of the canvas across my chest to keep it from lifting in the wind.
The press of his chest to my back as he breathed, the hard line of his thighs along mine — these were the things I noticed as I lay there. The patter of the rain, the rock under my hip, the trickle of water working its way through my scalp — none of them registered, and I knew I could never fall asleep like this.
But, of course, I did, waking to the smell of wet wool pressed to my face and the sound of Carson's snores rumbling in my ear. His arm held me still, angling across my body to where his brown fingers curled around my wrist. It was just coming daylight, and the sky was that pearly false dawn you sometimes get after a storm moves through. I struggled to keep my breathing even, wanting to prolong this moment for as long as possible, because I knew the moment he woke up, he would shove me away, disgusted with himself, and with me.
The call of a bird roused him after a few minutes, and his grip tightened reflexively on my arm as he awoke. His breathing changed, and he released my wrist as he stretched and then rolled onto his back. I lay still, thinking to pretend to be asleep until he could move away, but after a moment, he got to his knees and gave my hip a squeeze, leaving his hand there as he spoke.
"Reuben. Wake up. Storm's over." I yawned and stretched as though I had just awoken, but he simply smiled at me, hand still on my hip, before squinting at the rising sun. "Gonna be a clear day. We best get dried out."
With that, he pushed to his feet and shucked his pants into a heap on the soggy blanket, then tugged off his shirt and added it to the pile. Stark naked, he held out a hand, offering me a pull to my feet, and after a dumbfounded moment, I took it and let him pull me up.
"Get out of them wet duds," he ordered, picking his up to spread them over a nearby bush.
I did as he said, blushing furiously at being unclothed in the full light of day in the middle of the Texas prairie, but he seemed not to notice, and before long the campsite looked like a washerwoman's yard, with shirts and pants festooning every shrub in a thirty-foot radius. We ate breakfast sitting gingerly on large rocks that he rolled close to the fire, warming our damp toes as our boots dried out. In the middle of chewing a bite of flat bread, Carson got an odd look on his face, and then bent over to peer under his testicles as he held them aside with one hand.
"Watch out for bugs," he warned as he plucked the offending insect from between his legs. "It's a sorry thing to get bit...down there."
I nodded, mesmerized by the sight of his soft pink sac gathered up in his big hand, the two globes of his balls lifting his cock toward the sky. As he let go, things fell back into place, and I sighed heavily, casting a glance at my own `down there.' My cock was partially filled and lifted slightly from my balls, and it was obvious that I was responding to the sight of him.
I closed my eyes and willed my penis to subside, but when I opened them, Carson was staring between my legs, watching me while his cock imitated mine. After an agonizing second or two, our eyes met and held. I had come to treasure Carson's friendship and was loathe to ruin it like this. But suddenly he grinned at me.
"Looks like we're both a little randy."
I managed a smile and some inane comment. If he only knew...
Eventually our belongings dried enough to pack, and then we were on our way once more, riding the dusty trail toward Nacogdoches, where we would part ways. Carson was continuing east to his home in the hills of Arkansas and the still nameless `good match' with whom he would spend the rest of his life. Late that afternoon, we met a couple men riding west and they told us that we were but a few miles from town. After they passed by, Carson gazed east for a bit, then looked at me.
"We can ride on in, if you like..." He paused, finding a sudden interest in the tooled leather of his saddle horn. "Or we can make camp now, and..."
He made a small gesture with his hand as he raised his eyes to mine. There was nothing in his face to suggest anything beyond the face value of his words, and yet...
"Let's stop now," I said, casting about for a likely spot, but he was already moving off the trail, winding his horse down the hill through a stand of trees to the bank of a small creek.
We were both quiet as we went about the now routine tasks of making camp. When we were finished eating, I rinsed the plates, made more coffee and shook out my bedroll. We were camped between the creek and the hill, so when Carson got his bedroll from behind his saddle, the only flat spot left to him was close alongside me. He sat down to tug his boots off and we bumped elbows.
"Sorry," he muttered. "It's a mite crowded."
"No bother," I replied, wondering how in the hell I was supposed to sleep with Carson stretched out next to me.
We leaned back against our saddles, sipping our coffee, as the day came to an end. I tried to envision tomorrow, waving to Carson as he rode east and out of my life forever. These past weeks had been a joy to me. The daily companionship of a man I respected, whose company I enjoyed, a man whose personality and character dovetailed so nicely with my own, had become second nature to me, and I knew that I would miss him long after he had forgotten all about me.
Some time later, a mighty pop from the fire snapped me awake. I glanced at Carson to find him staring moodily into the fire, and was about to roll over when he began to talk. His voice was low, scarcely audible above the nighttime noises of the Texas twilight, and I froze in place as I listened to him.
"I lit out from home when I was sixteen. My daddy was against it, but I had wanderin' feet and needed to see somethin' of the world before settlin' down to the life of a farmer." He paused, and I took the opportunity to turn toward him. He cut his eyes at me briefly, but went back to the fire when he took up his story again.
"Drove cattle north that first year. Drove horses south the second. Worked on the Four Sixes Ranch a few years, startin' colts. Then a letter come from my daddy, remindin' me that I had obligations." Again he stopped, his hands restless around the cold coffee cup. "So I left the ranch and started ridin'. Supposed to be headin' home, but I been at it goin' on two years now and ain't made much easterly progress."
He snorted a humorless chuckle. "Took that stallion yonder instead of my last pay packet. Thought if I could get a good mare somewhere along the way, I could maybe start up my own place." He sighed and tossed the dregs of his coffee out into the dirt. "But that ain't gonna happen. Be lucky if I don't have to sell him off to buy seed corn next spring."
"Don't sell him," I blurted out. "Can't you... Do you have to go?" I could hear the plea in my voice and knew that he could, too.
He was silent for so long that I thought he wouldn't answer me, but he finally did, in a voice so low I had to strain to hear him. "I can see it in your face. How you feel. The way you look at me." As I shrank back from him, he grabbed me by the wrist, gentling his grip as I stilled, but avoiding my eyes.
"And I been thinkin'..." He stopped again, and his hand moved slowly up my arm, then down to my wrist again. He gave me a soft squeeze before he released me. "I been thinkin' about what it would be like, you and me, goin' on like we have been, only...more so, staking out a piece of land, makin' it our own." He laughed softly, sadly, and looked down at his hands. "But I can't hardly imagine a city feller like you settlin' down in the wilds of Texas. Likely you'd miss the opera too much, I reckon."
"I wouldn't miss the opera one bit," I whispered.
He looked at me then, his dark eyes roaming over my face as his fingertips touched my cheek, moving lightly over my skin before skimming across my lips. He heaved a sigh, gave me that crooked smile, and then turned away from me to curl up on his side. I lay back on my blanket as the first heartbreak of my young life twisted through me. Hot tears burned as I took deep open-mouthed breaths, trying desperately not to cry.
Carson's breath was short and uneven, and I knew that he was still awake, but I didn't care. I rolled toward him and lay the flat of my hand between his shoulder blades, feeling his heat and the knobs of his spine and the spread of his ribs as he breathed. I pressed my face to his back, letting his shirt absorb my tears as I breathed him in. He stiffened slightly at my touch, but after a moment, his hand stole around to rest on my hip, and that's how we fell asleep.
Smokey's nicker woke me at first light, and I sat up with a start. The previous night came back to me in a rush and I turned to Carson. But, of course, he was gone. The only proof he'd ever been there was the flat place in the dirt where he'd slept, and the stallion's hoof prints in the soft bank of the creek where he'd ridden away sometime in the night.
Those, and the knot of pain so deep inside me I doubted it would ever heal.
I went into Nacogdoches late in the day when I was sure he'd be long gone. At the general store, I purchased more paper and some supplies. As I was settling up with the proprietor, he looked me over carefully. I eyed him back, sullen and defensive in my misery.
"Might you be Reuben?" he asked, as I packed my saddle bags. "The writer, Reuben Thomas?"
I stared at him, a smile of wonder widening my mouth. "Yes. Yes, I am. Why do you ask?"
"Fella left this for you. Said you'd be by for it sometime today." As he spoke, he reached under the counter and brought out Carson's black Stetson, the felt dusted off, the conchos all shined up. "Said it'd help keep you dry." He scratched his head. "Not sure what he meant by that, but he said you'd know."
I took off my battered hat, bought earlier when I'd left New York for my western adventure, and donned the Stetson. It settled onto my head like an old friend, and I grinned at the store keeper before peering at my reflection in the window. The black of the hat, set off by the glitter of the conchos, made me feel dangerous and older somehow.
I put the saddlebags back on Smokey, climbed aboard, and rode northwest out of town.
The following months were difficult. I joined up with a cattle drive headed up the Chisholm Trail, riding herd by day and listening to the cowboys jawing around the campfire by night. I wrote and wrote, drowning my loneliness in words. Now and then, when everyone was asleep, I'd take out my sketch book and torture myself with the two drawings I'd done of Carson. Just a glance was enough to tighten both my throat and my groin.
I grew up that autumn and winter. I aged in ways unremarked by the casual observer, but I felt the changes. I knew loss for the first time, and it weighed heavy. I was slow to laughter and kept to myself, to the point where the cowboys eventually stopped including me in their banter.
With the cattle safely delivered to their buyer, I set out alone, riding south in an effort to stay ahead of the worst of the winter weather. Between the infrequent towns, Smokey and I lived off the land, eating what we could find and going hungry when there was nothing. We spent a miserable four days snowbound in a small canyon before the storm let up enough for us to fight our way through the drifts.
The both of us were thin and straggly, trail-worn and tired, but we moseyed along, and the fourth of March found us once more just outside Nacogdoches, Texas. I had sworn to myself that I wouldn't come through here again. The west was plenty big enough that I didn't need to make myself sick by revisiting places Carson and I had ridden together.
But I wound up there just the same.
The night before I rode into town, I camped down the hill by the creek. The stallion's hoof prints were long gone, but the remnants of our fire were a darkened patch of earth, and I built my fire on top of it, remembering Carson's fingers on my cheek as I ate a solitary meal.
I waited till late afternoon before riding the last couple miles to Nacogdoches. The town had not changed much in the ten months since I'd seen it last. I tied Smokey to the rail in front of the general store, untied my saddlebags, and went inside. As the bell over the door announced my arrival, the proprietor glanced at me, and his face lit in recognition.
"There you are. He said you'd be through here again."
I stared at him. "Who said?"
"The feller left you that hat," he replied, tipping his chin at the black Stetson on my head.
"He was here?" I was dumbstruck. "When?"
He looked at the calendar tacked to the wall behind the cash register. "Musta been Monday last. Almost two weeks ago."
I sagged down on a keg of nails, staring at the floor in despair. Carson had been here, but I'd missed him. But why was he here? Was he married?
"Was he alone?"
"I believe so. I saw him ride up on that chestnut horse of his. Wasn't anyone with him."
So he still had the stallion. Maybe I could track him somehow; people would remember that horse. But day was fading, it would all have to wait until tomorrow. I walked slowly down the street to the saloon thinking to drown my sorrows in a beer or two. It was a rowdy place, noisy with piano music and the off-key singing of cowboys long on enthusiasm but short on talent.
I squeezed in at one end of the bar, holding up a finger to the barkeep, and a moment later leaned forward to take the beer from him. As I nodded my thanks, I glanced down the bar and froze.
Standing quietly, staring me right in the face, was Carson.
We looked at each other for a long, long moment, and then he smiled at me, that crooked half smile, and tipped his head toward the door. I set a coin next to my untouched mug and worked my way through the crowd to where he was waiting, and we stepped outside together.
"What —" I began.
"When —" he started.
We both laughed, and then he said, "Hat looks good on you. Thought it might."
"What are you doing here?"
"Well, things didn't exactly work out back home. Time I got there, she'd got tired of waitin' and married somebody else."
"But what about the farm, the land?"
"My daddy'd married a widow woman new in town. Her boy's a dyin' to follow a mule's ass all day, plowin'. I said let him have it, jumped on my horse, and hightailed it back here."
Two men passed us and Carson glanced around. "Come on. I got a room at the boardin' house. We can talk there."
Behind his closed door, I felt awkward and shy being alone with him after all this time, and he had trouble meeting my eyes, as well.
"Why are you here?" I asked, needing him to say it.
He worked the brim of his hat through his fingers one way, then back again before answering me. "Well... I missed you. Them couple months we rode together..." He paused and walked slowly to the window. "When I saw how you looked at me, realized what it meant... well, it took me by surprise. Never met anyone looked at me like that, and I suppose I wasn't expectin' it to be a man." He chuckled self-consciously, but sobered up as he turned to face me. "Took me a while to come to grips with it, but I got... feelin's for you, too."
He tossed his hat on the bed and walked slowly to stand in front of me, looking down into my face. God knows what he saw there, but after a moment he smiled and lifted a hand, hesitating for a moment before laying his palm against my cheek with his thumb on my lips.
"You still feel the same, huh? Thought maybe you'd a got over it by now."
I was unable to utter even a simple yes, so I just looked at him until finally, finally he slid his hand to the back of my neck and pulled me gently to him. As my arms went around his waist, I closed my eyes and buried my face in his shirt front, undone by the wild rampage of emotions I was experiencing. After a moment, he sighed deeply, peacefully, and pulled back a little to look at me.
"Never been in this situation before," — he gave me a wry smile — "but if it suits you, I thought we'd ride southwest a bit till we find a likely piece of land. I got two mares down to the livery, and I thought maybe we could... you know... sorta set up housekeepin' together, you and me."
I was smiling so widely by this time that my face hurt, but I managed a nod. He grinned at me. "I guess that's a yes," he laughed, and hugged me again. "Well, okay then..."
We broke apart a few moments later, suddenly conscious of our respective erections, and of the bed, not five feet from us. Neither of us was ready yet to acknowledge the physical aspects of our decision, and we stood there looking everywhere except at the bed and each other. Carson fidgeted with his shirt cuff for a moment before cupping my face in one hand and planting a quick kiss on my mouth.
As he began stuffing his clothes into his pack, he smiled at me and said, "I know a little campsite by a stream not far from here..."