From a backbend, I went into a downward-facing dog pose. e sun felt good on my skin, and it made the coldness running through me a little warmer. I was out front on a yoga mat, trying to relax and not think about how much had gone wrong. is wasn’t how it was supposed to go. I hadn’t seen Albert since we were introduced earlier, but I knew he was around here because his station wagon sat alongside the driveway. I glanced around the pond area, the porch, beside the house, toward the barn, trying to pinpoint where he was. He was somewhere watching me. I could feel it. After several deep breaths, I lifted myself into a handstand position. My breathing slowed as I held myself up and closed my eyes, trying to picture nothing, only listening to the sounds of nature.
When I opened my eyes, I came tumbling down. Sitting about twenty yards from me was Albert. He drank from a small bottle of Jack Daniel’s, watching me. Rather early in the day for Jack. e corner of his mouth perked up. Creepy old man. I closed my eyes and went back into a handstand, attempting to forget about Albert and his lingering eyes.
“You’re really bendy,” he said.
My eyes shot open, and I tumbled over again. Albert stood a few feet away from me. How had I not heard him? He wasn’t graceful, and he was rather large—but perhaps like that mountain lion, he could be quiet when he needed to be.
“I think the word you’re looking for is exible.” I stood up from my yoga
mat and pinned my shoulders back.
He took a swig, and his eyes scanned over me.
“Can I help you with something?” I jutted out my hip and threw a hand on
it.
“Nope, just taking in the view.” His thin, crusty lips turned into a grin.
I rolled up my yoga mat and tucked it under my arm. “Enjoy your view,” I
said sarcastically as I stormed into the house.
What started out as an enjoyable and relaxing vacation seven days ago had turned into a nightmare I couldn’t wake up from. In the living room, I walked to the bookshelf Calvin had pointed out on the day I arrived. He said he loved to read, but I realized I hadn’t seen him pick up a book once in the past week. My ngers ran along the spines. ey were all classics, the ones you were forced to read in a literature class, not at all what I thought Calvin would be into. I slid one out and fanned through the pages. A piece of paper fell to the
oor. I bent down and picked it up. It was a receipt from a bookstore dated two days before I arrived. e total at the bottom was over ve hundred dollars. And every book on the shelf was listed on it.
An engine outside sputtered. I shoved the book back into its place and peered out the window. Albert’s station wagon crept slowly down the driveway. I let out a sigh, and my eyes icked back to the bookshelf. It was all a lie, like Calvin had designed a set for my arrival.
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I could see nearly the whole ranch plus the road I had driven in on from the porch. It felt like the safest place on the ranch, so I took a seat with a beer and
one of Calvin’s “favorite” books. I tried to concentrate on reading but the
words jumbled together on the page, swirling around. I couldn’t focus. My eyes kept going back to the road and then my broken-down car parked o in the grass. How was I going to get out of here?
Tires crunched over gravel. It was either Calvin or Albert, but I didn’t look up and continued to pretend to read instead. I wasn’t in the mood to talk.
I ipped the page. e car shut o . A car door slammed. Footsteps padded up the porch stairs. ey weren’t Calvin’s though or Albert’s. ey were lighter. “Calvin here?” Charlotte asked. She sounded drunk, and I knew she was
looking for trouble. “I didn’t see his truck.”
“No,” I said.
“Good, I wanted to talk to you.” She stumbled toward me, plopping down in a rocking chair.
It creaked every time she rocked back.
“Calvin didn’t tell you about us, did he?” She raised one of her thick dark eyebrows.
I didn’t say anything. I just looked at her, waiting for her to spill whatever it was she wanted to spill. Charlotte’s eyes were bloodshot and her lipstick was partially smeared.
“He and I slept together about a month ago. I thought you’d want to
know,” she said, and then she stared at me, waiting for a reaction.
I grabbed the beer from the table and took a long swig. It wasn’t a surprise to me. I gured something happened between them. It was obvious and explained why she’d been so cold and territorial. I didn’t care that they had slept together. I just wanted her gone.
“Calvin told me he didn’t want you coming around anymore,” I said.
She clenched her jaw, moving it side to side.
“When did he say that?” Charlotte raised her chin. She tried to relax her face, but there was so much tension in it. It was like she was going to explode depending on what came out of my mouth.
I took another swig and glanced at her, choosing my words carefully—or
carelessly, for that matter. “Last night,” I pointed the top of the beer bottle
toward the eld of grass beyond the barn, “when he fucked me over in that pasture.”
Her face turned red like she was going to cry and scream at the same time.
Before she could react, Calvin’s truck pulled into the driveway. She stood unsteadily and marched across the porch and down the steps.
He closed the door of his truck behind him and spun the keys in his hand. “What are you doing here, Charlotte?” Calvin slid his hands into his
pockets and leaned against his vehicle while she closed the space between them.
I walked toward the steps, standing at the top of them, deciding whether to intervene or to just go inside.
“I told Grace about us,” Charlotte spat.
He shook his head and ran his hands down his face. Calvin’s eyes swung to me.
“I’m sorry, Grace,” he said. “It was nothing, just a one-time mistake.”
I o ered no expression because he didn’t deserve one. His lip trembled when I turned on my foot.
“Grace, wait!” he called out.
Without looking back or saying anything, I went into the ranch house and let the door close behind me. It was the last place I wanted to be but I didn’t have a choice. Calvin was a liar. at much was clear. But I wondered now . . . was he something worse than that?
