CHAPTER 2

The accident happened two weeks after the border closed. It was a Saturday night and Gramma Abby and Grandpa Al had gone into Lloydminster for dinner and a movie.

“We can’t stay out too late,” Al said to Donna, who was out in the yard in a lawn chair, enjoying some of the late afternoon sun. “Someone’s got to get up early. I’ll have this girl back in time,” he said, putting his arm around his wife.

“Have fun on your date,” Donna said. She thought it was great her in-laws went on dates and still looked at each other with love. They were in their sixties, and completely smitten with each other. Gord said sometimes he’d go looking for Al in the yard and catch his parents sharing a kiss, Al the red-haired, red-bearded mountain bending over to kiss Abby, who was barely five feet tall. Abby and Al were prone to driving around the back country, taking back roads and staying away from the farm for hours.

“I think they park like teenagers,” Linda said once when she and Donna were having coffee.

“Better them than the actual teenagers around here,” Donna said, and she and her sister-in-law laughed.

Donna watched as Al and Abby drove Al’s old truck out of the farmyard. Al’s window was open and he hung his elbow out. Abby always teased him for driving like that, said you could see how much he had driven by how red his arm was. She said it made him look even more like a hillbilly, even more than his red hair, or his weathered face and the crow’s feet around his eyes. Abby had grown up on a farm just outside the city, but hadn’t worked cattle until she married Al. Donna had never met anyone tougher than her mother-in-law. The woman was barely one hundred pounds soaking wet, but she would get up in the night to pull calves, drive the truck to bring bales into the pasture and wrestle sick calves into the bathtub if needed. Abby was the matriarch of the ranch, the one everyone deferred to. But she was so sweet about everything nobody minded taking direction from her.

The truck rolled down the long driveway, through the gate and down the road. The horses Temple, Crow and Cassidy stood in their pen looking out at the yard, swishing their tails to keep the flies off. The sun shone and there were no clouds. They hadn’t had a lot of rain yet this spring, and everything was dusty. Allyson’s allergies were acting up and she kept sneezing and rubbed her eyes all the time.

“I wasn’t meant to live on a farm,” she said earlier that morning after sneezing three times in a row.

“Well, this is where you live until you’re old enough to move out,” Donna snapped. “I’m sick and tired of your whining. Just think, it could be worse. It could still be winter.”

Donna moved to a deck chair on the porch behind the house. She lit a citronella ring and allowed the smoke to waft over the deck. Rascal and Maggie had come in from the yard and lay near her feet. It was still light out, but the sun was fading, even though it was warm for the beginning of June. She shivered a little and pulled up the blanket that rested over her legs. It was one of Abby’s quilts. She was always knitting or quilting or doing something crafty when she wasn’t farming. She and Al had an inability to rest.

“Idle hands are the devil’s workshop,” Abby liked to say. She wasn’t an overly religious woman, but she believed in God, went to confession and attended church every week. Gord, Donna and their kids had never gone because Donna never wanted to, but Gord’s brother Craig and his wife Linda kept the faith. Abby and Al never said anything about it, but Donna knew they wished her kids had been confirmed. She’d baptized them because she knew Abby wanted it, but they’d never gone further than that.

She heard footsteps running across the yard, the slam of the front door. Craig inside the house, his voice loud. She couldn’t make out what he was saying, but she heard Gord’s voice answer him. The screen door to the deck opened and Allyson ran out. The next thing Donna knew, her girl was in her arms, sobbing.

“What?” Donna asked, putting her arms around her daughter. Allyson was fourteen, too old to ask for hugs on a regular basis. She’d seen her daughter cry recently—she was a teenager, after all—but she hadn’t seen waterworks like this for a while. Her daughter sobbed, nose running, her face blotchy and red.

“What’s wrong?” Donna asked. “Honey, what happened?”

This was no ordinary teenage problem. Her daughter had been unhappy a while ago, something about issues with Chloe, but Allyson was crying too hard for this to be something as simple as a fight with her cousin.

Donna heard footsteps and looked over her daughter’s shoulder to her husband’s face. Something terrible had happened because he couldn’t look her in the eye. He stared out at the space over her head, out into the yard. When Gord spoke, his voice was calm and terrible.

“There’s been an accident,” he said. His words were without emotion, as if he was telling her he was planning to become the treasurer of the Elks’ club.

“What?” Donna asked, letting go of her daughter. Allyson moved away, leaving Donna alone in the chair. Donna sat up straight. “Is it Linda? Where’s Chloe? Is Colton okay?”

When you lived on a farm and someone said there had been an accident, you never knew what you were dealing with. The last time there had been an accident, Gord cut himself badly with a bandsaw and was rushed into town to get stitches. The sight of Gord with blood streaming from his hand down the front of his t-shirt and onto his jeans haunted Donna for weeks.

“Mom and Dad. Someone hit their truck out on the highway.”

“Oh my God,” Donna said. “Jesus. No.”

“It’s bad,” he said. “We don’t know if they’re alive. Craig and Linda are going to the hospital in the city. I’m going there too.”

“What happened?”

“We don’t know. Rita called Craig. The ambulance just brought them in. She said it’s bad.”

“I can go too,” Donna said, standing up.

“You better stay here,” Gord said. He looked at Allyson who stood in between them, taking in their words. “The kids.”

Donna nodded. Her eyes itched and she could feel tears starting, but she willed herself not to cry. Abby’s voice popped into her head, telling her crying would do no good and she should focus on getting things done.

“Are you okay to drive?” Donna asked.

“I know where the hospital is,” he said. “I’ll be fine.”

Even though Gord did most of the driving on the highways and in town, he hated driving in cities. Said all the stopping, starting, twisting and turning was enough to make a man throw himself under a truck.

Gord walked down the deck stairs and around the side of the house. Donna followed him. She heard a truck start up and sprinted across the yard. She ran to Linda’s side of the vehicle and leaned in. Linda always bragged about how she wasn’t a crier, but she was dabbing at her eyes with a Kleenex. She shifted towards the window, grabbed Donna’s arm and held it tight. “I’m already praying,” she said.

Donna wished she were a believer—that she could ask God to save two of the people who mattered most to her.

“Call me when you know something,” she said.

Linda nodded. “Give my girl a big squeeze if she gets home first,” she said.

Then Gord’s hand was in Donna’s, and she walked away from the truck towards their vehicle. Craig and Linda drove off. Donna’s legs were heavy and wobbly. How could this be happening? Were Al and Abby dead? Everything was far away and distant, as if she was looking at the world through the wrong end of a telescope. She couldn’t finish a thought. Gord’s arms circled her and she inhaled the familiar smell of Old Spice and his warm body.

“Breathe,” he said, and she realized she had been taking shallow sips of air, heading towards an anxiety attack.

She closed her eyes and tried to suck in as much air as she could. She couldn’t have a panic attack now. Gord gave her a kiss on the top of her head, got into the truck, started it up and rolled down the window.

“Drive careful,” she said. “Call me when you have news.”

He drove out of the yard. Donna watched the back of her husband’s head, a silhouette she’d seen thousands of times. The worn-down red truck kicked up gravel and dust and turned down the driveway. The horses stood in their pen, calm, staring off into space, oblivious to what had just transpired. Worries began to trickle into Donna’s thoughts. What if someone hit Gord’s truck while he was driving? What if Linda and Craig hit a deer on the road? Where were Colton and Chloe?

She was shaking, and wrapped her arms around herself. Her teeth chattered and her chest was tight and sore like she’d been punched in the sternum. She walked around to a tree and braced herself against it, feeling the bark against her hands, inhaling the scent of emerging leaves. She looked across the yard towards Al and Abby’s big white house and Craig and Linda’s smaller brown house, leaned into the tree, and let its sturdiness prop her up.

“Mom,” she heard, and Allyson was there, hugging her, pinning Donna’s arms to her sides.

“Breathe,” Allyson said, and Donna closed her eyes, concentrating on the sound of her daughter’s own jagged breathing, the quick beating of her daughter’s heart against her own chest. Rascal had joined them and his cold, wet nose brushed the back of her hand. She reached out and buried her hand in his warm fur. She felt a tickle on her forearm and turned her head to see a wasp land on her arm. She moved her arms, and her daughter let go of her. The wasp flew off. Rascal licked her hand. Donna tried to concentrate on these things, rather than the cloud of worries in her head. A therapist had told her years ago to concentrate on the things around her, the physical details she could see, feel and smell, and use them to ground her.

“Let’s go inside,” Allyson said and Donna leaned on her daughter. As they walked toward the house, Donna had a flash of what she would be like as an old woman, scared and confused, relying on her daughter for guidance. That wasn’t the way it should be right now. She was the parent, the one who should be strong. She heard Abby’s voice telling her to pull herself together.

“I don’t know what we should do,” Donna said, once they were inside. “We should probably sit in the front room to watch for Chloe. And go get the phone.”

Allyson walked out of the living room and returned with the white phone in her hand. Donna took it from her and checked to make sure the ringer volume was turned up high. The phone was covered with fingerprints.

“Stay by the window,” she said to her daughter, before walking to the kitchen to grab a dishcloth to wipe down the phone. She brought the cloth back to the front room. Might as well do some dusting while they were waiting. Allyson kneeled on the couch, staring over the back of it, out into the yard.

“Chloe is probably with Jamie,” she said. “Should I try to find the number?”

“I don’t think we should call,” Donna said. “It’s probably best not to tie up the phone.”

Donna wondered where Colton was. Probably driving around town or sitting in a bar somewhere. Maybe he was out in the bush, making a fire and drinking beer. Should she try to find him? It probably made more sense just to wait and see when he turned up. He had been talking about getting a cell phone, and now she wished he had one.

The phone rang while she was holding it in her hand, and she jumped.

“Hello, any news?”

“What?” The voice on the other end of the phone was low and groggy. “Is Colton there?” The caller exhaled, as if he was letting smoke out of his lungs.

“No,” Donna said. “He’s not. Do you know where he is?” The minute after she asked, she realized how stupid the question was.

“If I knew, I wouldn’t be calling,” the caller said, emitting a low laugh.

“Is this Booger?” she asked.

“Yeah.”

“If he turns up, tell him to come right home. There’s been an accident.” Donna hung up without saying goodbye.

Allyson was still sitting on the couch, looking out the window.

“I wish we had a TV in here or something,” she said. “I need something to distract me. I don’t want to think what I’m thinking.”

She had stopped crying. Donna studied her daughter’s face. Allyson’s eyes were blotchy. She had only started puberty last year, and it still surprised Donna to see adult features on her baby girl’s face. When she looked at Allyson’s face, she could see a glimpse of what Allyson would look like when she was in her thirties. But she could still see the remnant of the child toddling around the yard as well. Right now, her daughter looked young and vulnerable, and Donna remembered Allyson when she was small, the feeling of holding her entire body, the way her hair smelled like Johnson’s baby shampoo. Her daughter’s eyes were too big for her face.

“Put on some music. It’ll be okay if we play something quiet,” Donna said. “I’ll keep watch while you go get some CDs.” She stood and looked out the window. The sky was starting to darken. Even though it was after nine, she could still see the yard as clear as day.

Allyson returned with a stack of CDs and put one in the player. Piano music and mournful vocals filled the room. Allyson turned the volume down low and moved back to the couch. She’d brought her sketchbook and started doodling, stopping once in a while to look out at the yard. Donna dusted the top of the mantel and the china cabinet. There was no dust on anything, but the physical movement of cleaning was calming. If she concentrated, she could pretend it was an ordinary day. She was doing something, accomplishing something. She wished she could run the vacuum cleaner, but she didn’t want to make noise. What if they didn’t hear the phone? She was still holding it, scared to put it down.

She didn’t want to start thinking about what had happened, if Abby and Al were still alive. Years ago, her therapist had told her she should always try to imagine the best scenario, rather than the worst. She closed her eyes and pictured Abby and Al. In her mind, Al was out in the yard, looking at the cattle, surveying everything in the place he called “his little piece of heaven.” Abby was in the kitchen, quilting or outside working in her big vegetable garden, her small hands clad in her favourite purple gardening gloves. They were going to be okay, she thought. But even as she said those words to herself, she didn’t believe it. There had been so many horrific accidents on that highway. And Rita had said it was bad. She opened her eyes, and tried to make herself focus on her surroundings. She walked over to the old rocking chair and fluffed the pillows on it, and tried to make herself concentrate on the music. Someone with a sad voice was singing about “Yellow”.

“What is this music?” Donna asked her daughter. “This is way too sad. Put something else on.”

Without complaining, Allyson got up from the couch and changed the CD. Soon Jim Morrison’s voice filled the room.

“When did you start liking The Doors?” Donna asked.

“I saw that movie on TV late one night,” Allyson said. “The one with Val Kilmer.”

Donna put the phone next to her daughter’s head, checking again to make sure the ringer volume was high. She walked over to the mantel to dust pictures. She picked them all up: baby photos of Clay, who had been a huge Doors fan when he lived in the house. Photos of her and Gord and Clay, all smiling. How young they had been. Just babies themselves. There were baby photos of Colton, who hadn’t bothered to crawl, but ran as soon as he was able to pull himself upright. School photos of all three of her kids with gap-toothed grins, and then Clay’s smile, full of shiny silver braces that cost a fortune. Photos of her girl, of Chloe, of Craig and Linda, and Pam, her own sister. She stopped dusting before she got to the photos of Abby and Al’s fortieth wedding anniversary. She didn’t want to pick up those photos right now. Instead, she moved back to the couch and sat down beside her daughter.

“Want me to make tea?” Allyson asked.

Donna nodded. “I’ll sit here and watch.”

She hummed along to the CD, glad to be listening to something so familiar. Sang along with Jim as he sang about being untrue and a liar. Her singing was off key, but it made her feel better, helped take her mind off things. Donna looked at the clock on the mantel. Why hadn’t anyone called? It took about an hour to drive to the city. She hadn’t kept track of what time everyone had left. It was a little after ten now, finally starting to get dark.

The kettle bubbled in the kitchen, and she could hear the sound of her daughter opening drawers and cupboards. Allyson returned with two steaming mugs. Donna took the Co-op mug, inhaled the calming smell of peppermint, and blew on it before taking a sip. Allyson sat down next to the window and looked out.

“I wish they would call,” she said.

Donna saw the dust before she saw the orange Celica barrel up the driveway and park beside Craig and Linda’s house.

“That kid is driving too fast again,” Donna muttered. She turned to her daughter. “You need to go out and talk to her. Tell her what happened.”

Allyson didn’t move. “Maybe you should go.” She took a sip of tea and grimaced.

“Don’t be silly,” Donna said. “Go get your cousin. One of us needs to wait inside.”

Allyson put her mug down on the coffee table. Donna thought about asking her daughter to use a coaster, but now was not the time for lectures on proper furniture maintenance.

Chloe stepped outside the car and walked toward her house. Rascal and Maggie ran over to greet her, and she leaned over to pet them. Their wagging tails made Donna feel a bit better. At least two of the kids were home safe.

Allyson sighed and pulled herself off the couch. Her movements were slow and reluctant, as if her limbs were weighed down. Donna wondered if the two of them had had another fight. When they were little, they had been like sisters, but they were spending less time together lately.

“Hurry up,” Donna said. “I’ll feel better when Chloe is in here too.”

Allyson shuffled towards the door. Donna watched out the window as her daughter walked across the yard. God, that girl was getting tall.

Her daughter caught up to Chloe. Chloe turned and looked at her, and Donna shivered. She’d seen that look before, but not on Chloe’s face. A look of disdain and annoyance, a look she remembered on the face of a girl who bullied her in high school. Donna watched as the girls talked. Chloe stood a few steps away from her cousin, but then she took several steps forward, crumpled towards her cousin and embraced her. Donna couldn’t see either girl’s face. As she watched, they broke their embrace and ran toward the house. At the same moment, the phone rang. She fumbled around for it, before finding it on the back of the couch, near Allyson’s sketch pad.

“Gord, is that you? Any news?”

“Dad’s dead,” he said.

“Oh God,” she said. “Abby?”

“Still alive. But she’s not doing well.”

She wanted to cry, but tears wouldn’t come. She was a crier, but here she was, unable to cry. There was a rush of heat, as if she was developing a fever. Then she was freezing, and she went to the couch and wrapped a blanket around her, teeth chattering. Al couldn’t be dead. This wasn’t supposed to happen. He was too young. He was supposed to grow to be an old man, a man in his eighties or nineties, hobbling around his land with a cane, practically deaf, keeping watch over all he had created.

She heard Gord’s sobs and it was the worst sound she’d ever heard, long low moans like an animal in pain. She didn’t know what to say, so she just let him cry. They had been married for over twenty-five years and she had never once heard or seen him cry. He’d slipped and fallen, cut himself and needed stitches on one of his knees. He’d been kicked by cows and had more black eyes and skinned knuckles than she could count. She’d watched him bury his favourite farm dog and warm his toes in the tub after he’d given himself frostbite staying out in the yard to help a cow calve in minus forty-degree weather. They’d survived so many emergencies together, some of them caused by farming and some of them caused by life and the stress people encounter when they have three children and live out in the middle of nowhere. But Gord never cried in front of her.

She wasn’t sure what to say, so she just listened, waiting for him to speak. His sobs were so horrible that she forced herself to stare at the window, out at the yard, which was now almost dark. The girls were nowhere to be seen. As she listened to Gord cry on the phone, she heard Jim Morrison sing about riders on the storm. The juxtaposition of the two sounds was surreal and she knew she would never be able to listen to this album again. Still holding the phone to her ear, she ran to the bathroom, the acid in her stomach rising and burning.

“Just wait a second,” she said and she held the phone away from her head with one hand, and pulled her hair back with the other as she heaved, retched and threw up in the toilet. When she finished, she flushed and sank down next to the toilet, holding her head up with one hand, inhaling deep, shuddering breaths.

“I’m okay,” she said into the phone. “I’m okay. Don’t worry about me. Just talk when you’re ready.”

“Donna,” she heard on the line. “It’s Craig.” His voice was calm.

“Tell me everything,” she said. Her teeth chattered against each other.

“Aunty Donna?” Chloe’s voice came from the other room. “Are you okay?”

“In the bathroom,” Donna called. The door to the bathroom was still open.

“The girls are here,” she said to Craig.

Allyson and Chloe entered the bathroom, their bodies filling the tiny room as the three women squeezed into the space. Chloe hugged her aunt. Donna smelled vanilla, the scent Chloe always wore.

“Chloe’s here,” she said to Craig.

“Let me talk to her,” Craig said.

Donna handed the phone to her niece, who took it and moved down the hallway. Allyson backed out of the room and stood just outside the doorway, watching Donna turn on the faucet. The cool water felt good on her hands and she splashed her face, letting the freshness wash away the sickness. She turned off the tap, dried her hands on the fluffy purple towel and looked at her daughter.

“They’re dead,” Allyson said. “That’s the only thing that could make you throw up like that.”

“Your grandpa’s dead,” Donna said, before wiping her face on the towel. Allyson started to cry. Donna put her arms around her, hugged her close, felt the fast beat of her daughter’s heart against her chest.

“Gramma?” Allyson asked, pushing her hair back from her face.

“She’s alive. That’s all I know.”

Chloe came back up the hallway and handed the phone to Donna. “Dad wants to talk to you,” she said.

Donna walked away from the girls and down the hallway. Chloe was still wearing her jean jacket. The sleeves of the jacket were dirty and grass stained. She leaned against the wall. The cool sturdiness of the wall was solid against her back.

“Tell me everything,” she said.

Craig’s voice was strained and he spoke faster than he normally did. Craig usually talked in a slow drawl that made him sound like he was from Texas rather than Alberta.

“They were coming back from the city and were turning onto the highway. A car drove through the turnoff on Highway 21, blew the stop sign and t-boned the truck on Dad’s side. Truck rolled into the ditch. Some people behind them saw the whole thing and called it in on their cell phones. They were both alive when they arrived at the hospital, but Dad’s injuries were really bad, and he didn’t make it.”

Craig took a long shuddering breath. “Mom’s in rough shape. She broke one of her arms and she’s still out of it. Doctors say she’s going to make it, but she’ll have extensive injuries.”

There was a long silence on the other end of the line as Donna waited for him to go on.

“His body was banged up. The crash did a number on him. Must have gone flying through the window. He was all cut up and bruised, bones broken everywhere. Those yahoos must have been gunning it.”

Donna felt like throwing up again.

“Linda is taking care of the arrangements,” Craig said. He lowered his voice. “Gord’s a mess. He started wailing as soon as he saw Dad. Just sat near his bed, held Dad’s hands in his and bawled. It was so terrible, like something out of those tearjerker movies. Might be best for Gord to go home, but I don’t want to leave, and I don’t want him to drive himself back. He wouldn’t be able to concentrate on the road right now.”

Donna knew Gord would never forgive himself if he wasn’t there to help out. If he missed out on making some critical decisions, he would never let himself forget it. Gord prided himself on being tough, and things would be better if she did whatever was needed to help him get through this. Gord’s favourite sayings were “Cowboy up” or “Git ’er done.” She’d never hear the end of it if he ran away from this one.

“He’ll pull himself together,” Donna said. “Do you want us to come down?”

She waited for Craig to answer.

“I don’t think we need you right now. I think you should stay with the kids. I know they’re all old enough, but I don’t want Chloe to be alone.”

“What if we all drove down?” Donna asked. “We could all be there.”

“The three of us can handle it,” Craig said. “Linda and I can do most of it even if Gord needs to take a time out. I don’t want you guys on the road. It’s dark, everyone’s emotional and there are lots of deer out tonight. We saw a whole whack of them on our way up here. I was a little distracted, worried that I might hit one. I don’t think Chloe and Allyson need to be here. I don’t want them to see Dad’s body. I’d just feel better if everyone stayed put. If we need to, we’ll grab a motel room in the city and sleep. You can come out in the morning, when everyone has rested. Maybe we’ll know more about Mom by then.”

“Okay,” Donna said. She wasn’t going to argue with him. This wasn’t the time to rush in and try to be a hero. Craig and Linda were there and they would deal with things. She was good at taking orders. She’d been doing that since she moved to the farm. “Is Gord around?”

“I just saw him walk down the hallway. I think he was going to get a coffee or a water or something. You know how he is.”

“Well, tell him to call me if he needs to,” she said. Her mind raced. What were the next steps to take? She started to talk through things out loud.

“I’ll try to get hold of Clay. Wait up for Colton. Call me back and tell me if there’s more news. Let me know if there’s anything I can do. Just say the word. I’ll get in the car the second you ask.”

“You don’t need to start calling people right now,” Craig said. “It can wait until morning. We don’t have any news about Mom and Dad’s gone.”

“Where’s Linda?”

“I think she was talking to the nurses, signing some forms. We’ll call Sutter’s funeral home in the morning. Make all the arrangements.”

She heard the catch in his throat. “I can’t even think about this stuff right now. Linda’s handling it all. She’s such a trooper. Don’t know where Gord and me would be without her.”

Donna didn’t know the right thing to say and so she stayed silent, trying to digest everything Craig was telling her.

“Just tell me whatever you need me to do,” she said. “Call me if you need anything. Ask Gord or Linda to call. I’ll do whatever needs to be done.”

“We know that,” he said. “We’ll keep you posted. We might come home. Just take care of the kids. I need to go.”

“Okay,” she said, trying to think of the right thing to say, the perfect thing that would make this terribleness just a little bit better. “I love you. Tell Gord and Linda I send my love.”

“We’ll keep praying,” he said. “I gotta go.”

Donna let him hang up first, then clicked the button to hang up the phone. She checked the phone’s battery levels and carried it into the kitchen, where Chloe and Allyson sat at the round wooden table, a large box of Kleenex between them.

“Chloe told me everything,” Allyson said. “I know Grandpa’s dead.”

Her daughter’s face was even paler than normal. Donna looked at Chloe. Her niece’s mascara had run off, and blackish-grey marks streaked down her face.

“It’s the most terrible thing that could happen,” Donna said, sitting down at the table with them.

“Gramma is going to make it,” Chloe said. “We need to concentrate on that. Mom and Dad told me they were praying for her. That’s what Gramma would want.”

Allyson and Donna said nothing. Donna hadn’t been brought up in the church, and had never taught her children to pray. Gord wasn’t a believer and he was more than happy to stop going to church when they’d married. Every Sunday, when Chloe, Linda, Craig, Al and Abby made the drive into town to go to the Blessed Sacrament Church, Donna, Gord and the kids stayed home and watched old movies, cartoons or westerns on TV. Sometimes they made pancakes and stayed in their pyjamas until noon.

Donna stood up and hugged Allyson. As soon as she felt the warm sturdiness of her daughter, she knew she didn’t have the luxury of crying any more that night. Allyson started crying as soon as her mother hugged her. Donna squeezed her, made shh sounds and stroked her daughter’s long, brown hair. Her daughter may be turning into a woman, but Donna could still feel the bony points of the shoulder blades on her daughter’s back. She was the adult here; she would need to take charge. She had two kids to take care of, and she couldn’t just go to bed, pull the covers over her head and start bawling, even though that’s what she wanted to do. She looked at the clock, wondering if it was too late to call her sister. Pam’s voice would be a comfort. But she couldn’t lean on Pam right now. Abby’s voice came into Donna’s head, reminding her that she needed to take care of things. She let her daughter go and hugged Chloe for a few minutes, before grabbing a Kleenex from the box on the table. The box was ­covered in a crocheted cozy that was a gift from Linda. Donna hated it, and had taken it only to appease her sister-in-law. She bit her tongue every time Linda went to Country Treasures in town and came home with a new ornament shaped like a farm animal, or a sign embossed with a pat saying like “Live, love, laugh” or “Home is where your heart lives.”

Donna stood up and went to the cupboard for a glass, leaving the phone on the table. She glanced at it, daring it to ring. “Do either of you want some water?” she asked.

Chloe nodded and Allyson shook her head. Donna filled three glasses of water anyway, and brought them to the table one at a time. Chloe picked up a tall glass with a Coke label on it and took a long drink. Donna watched the movement of her throat. When Chloe put the glass back on the table, Donna spoke.

“I think you should stay here tonight,” she said. “Unless you really want to be in your own bed. You can stay in Allyson’s room if you want.”

Chloe looked at her fingers, which were still gripping the water glass.

“I think I’d sleep better in a bed than on an air mattress,” she said. “Can I stay in Clay’s room?”

Donna nodded. “The bed is made up.”

Chloe stood up. “I’ll go get my stuff and come right back.”

She walked out of the room. The screen door slammed a few minutes later. Allyson sat at the table, staring at the Kleenex box.

“Honey, are you okay?” Donna asked.

Allyson turned to her and gave her a baleful look. Donna was familiar with that face. She remembered the first time she had seen it, shortly after Allyson turned thirteen.

“My Grandpa just died and my Gramma might die,” she said and stood up. “How am I supposed to feel?” Her chair scraped against the kitchen floor. Donna winced at the sound, and watched as her daughter left the room.

Donna wasn’t sure what to do with herself. She went to the sink, grabbed a dish cloth and began wiping down the counters. She wished she could call Gord and find out how Abby was doing. Maybe after this, Gord would want to invest in a cell phone. Everything would be so much easier if everyone just had phones. What was happening at the hospital? Someone would have to go into Abby and Al’s place to look for all their necessary documents. What could she be doing to get things ready? She walked down to the front room and looked out at the dark yard. The trees in the yard moved a little in the breeze. Allyson had hated the trees when she was young, and begged to trade rooms with Colton. She said the branches looked like fingers reaching for the house.

Donna went back to the kitchen, opened the fridge and started taking things out. When was the last time she had cleaned the fridge? She returned to the sink, wet the dish cloth and began wiping down the condiments, starting with the peanut butter, the jams and the syrup. She wiped down Linda’s preserves, the ones she dropped off but no one ever ate, and ended with the plastic squeeze tubes of Co-op mustard and ketchup. The jar of hot peppers at the back of the fridge was cloudy, the vegetables inside swollen with liquid. Clay was the only one who liked hot peppers and he hadn’t visited for a while. Unscrewing the lid, she put her nose over it and sniffed, inhaling the spicy brine. The peppers had probably gone off. She screwed the lid back on and dumped the whole jar into the metal trashcan in the corner.

The door opened again. Donna heard shoes getting kicked off, the shuffle of Chloe’s feet. That girl had never learned how to pick up her feet properly. Chloe poked her head into the kitchen.

“I’m going to bed now,” she said.

Donna looked at her niece. She had washed her face and scrubbed off the mascara streaks. Her face was clean, almost shiny, but the area around her eyes was puffy and swollen. She had changed into a long floral nightgown that brushed the tops of her ankles. The neckline of the nightgown had a light blue ribbon around it. The ends of the ribbon were frayed, as though Chloe had chewed on it a few times. Donna always wondered why her sister-in-law and niece insisted on such nun-like sleepwear. Donna wanted to cry, just slump into the chair and start weeping, but that wouldn’t do any good. Before she could help herself, Donna ­pictured tiny Abby with her cleft chin and bright eyes, lying in a hospital bed, bloody and bruised. How would they tell her that Al was dead? Did she even know what had happened?

“It’s okay,” Donna heard and Chloe’s arms were around her. Her niece smelled like Neutrogena soap.

Donna heard the sound of the tap. Allyson was in the kitchen, filling a glass with water. Donna opened her mouth to tell her daughter to come for a hug, but the only thing that came out of her mouth was a sob. Allyson looked at the two of them and walked out of the kitchen. Donna let go of her niece.

“We should probably all go to bed.”

Chloe ran her sleeve under her nose, a childish gesture Donna hadn’t seen her do in years.

“Night, Aunty Donna,” she said.

She shuffled up the stairs to Clay’s room. Donna followed her. Her niece entered the room, flopped down on the bed and rolled over to lie on her back.

“Do you need anything, Chlo? You going to be okay?”

Her niece stared at the ceiling and nodded.

“We’ll just be down the hallway if you need anything. Do you want me to turn off the light?”

Chloe nodded again and Donna flicked the switch.

“Thanks for letting me stay here,” she said.

“Of course, sweetie,” Donna said.

She had no doubt her niece would be dead to the world in a few minutes. Linda and Craig marvelled at what an easy baby she’d been, how she was a perfect child designed to entice every new parent to have more babies. Linda had tried and tried, lost a few and hadn’t been able to have any more.

There was no way Allyson would be sleeping yet. Down the hall, her daughter’s door was closed. Donna knocked and then opened it once she heard her daughter’s muffled voice tell her to come in. Allyson was under the covers. Her bedside lamp was on, and she lay on her stomach, a book open on the pillow in front of her.

“You okay, sweetie?” Donna asked, moving into the room. She sat down on her daughter’s bed, taking care not to sit on her outstretched legs. Allyson’s hair was cool against her hand as she smoothed it down.

“I can’t talk about it,” Allyson said. “I just need to think about something else.”

“I know,” Donna said. She looked down at her daughter’s book; a dog-eared copy of Harry Potter. She wasn’t sure how many times Allyson had read the story of the boy wizard. Comfort reading. Donna understood.

“If you can’t sleep, you’re welcome to crawl in,” she said. “It’s okay tonight.”

Allyson flipped a page. “Thanks,” she said, without looking up. “Can I be alone now?”

Donna ruffled her daughter’s hair with the back of her hand and stood up. “I love you,” she said.

“You too.”

She left her daughter’s room and walked down the hall. What could she do to calm herself down? Should she run the tub, fill it with the lavender-scented bath balls she’d bought during her last trip to Saskatoon and have a soak? What if someone called and needed her? What if she had to go to the hospital? She couldn’t do that. She walked to the kitchen and inspected everything, checking to see if there was anything she could clean. But the kitchen was spotless, as was the front room. Maybe she should have a drink. A screwdriver would hit the spot right now, or maybe a rye and coke. But what if someone needed her in the city? What if she needed to find something in Abby or Al’s house and she was too buzzed to do it? The smartest thing she could do was try and sleep. She didn’t think she would be able to sleep, but maybe if she lay down, it would just happen. There was a bottle of sleeping pills in the medicine cabinet that could help her, but she couldn’t be out of it if someone called. Best to lie in bed, watch TV and try to make herself sleep so she could help everyone tomorrow.

Donna left the lights on for Colton and went to her bedroom. She hoped he’d be home soon. She wanted him to come home so she could see he was alive and all in one piece. Things would be better once everyone in the family knew what had happened.

She put on her old Saskatchewan Roughriders T-shirt and a pair of pyjama pants, washed her face and brushed her teeth. When she looked in the mirror, she saw her eyes were puffy and red, the skin around them dark. It would be good to have another glass of water before she went to bed, but she didn’t want to walk to the kitchen again. Instead, she climbed into bed and turned on the TV. Her fingers pressed the buttons, surfing through channels, trying to find something worthwhile to watch. She flipped across Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet romancing each other on the deck of the Titanic. She had seen the movie when it came out. She, Abby, Linda, Chloe and Allyson drove into the city for a girl’s night. They cried so hard they ran out of Kleenex. Donna tried not to think about that day, to concentrate on Kate and Leo falling in love. She watched until the boat hit the iceberg and then changed channels. There was no way she could watch a sinking ship and a final deathly declaration of love tonight.

Eventually she settled on a cooking show. She just wanted to listen to something she wouldn’t have to concentrate on. Closing her eyes, she willed herself to relax, trying to remember the things her therapist had taught her when she had gone for counselling for her postpartum depression. The therapist worked with her on her breathing when she had panic attacks, made her concentrate on taking deep breaths, and calming her mind. She still used these skills fourteen years later. Her depression had been an abyss that had sucked everyone in the house into it. Even Abby, who thought a person should be able to pull themselves out of anything by sheer will and determination, told her to go to the hospital and see somebody, talk to somebody so she could care about her baby again, and pay attention to the two children she already had. When Donna thought back to that time, she felt embarrassed. How she let Linda and Abby take care of the kids, while she lay in bed sleeping or staring at the ceiling. Her fear of the terrible blues she had experienced after Allyson’s birth was one of the reasons why she had never had another baby, even though she would have loved to have another child. Gord had been great, rubbing her back, trying to help with the kids, pulling his weight. He stepped into her world, even though she had never been able to step into his. God knows, she had tried to force herself into this life. She never regretted that she’d ended up with Gord, or had his children. It was her own damn fault. She had been looking for a handsome cowboy, hanging out in country bars. The night she met Gord, he taught her how to two-step. He was still living on the ranch, saving up to go to school in the fall. She’d ended up pregnant, dropped out of university and moved out to the farm. Her parents and Pam thought she had lost her mind. But she loved Gord and the matter-of-fact way he talked, his calmness around cattle, his strong hands and back. Most of all, she liked the way he looked at her. Whenever she entered a room, he turned his entire body towards her.

She and Gord built their house close to Al and Abby’s and Craig and Linda’s, because Al wanted it that way. He wanted all the Klassen family members to be able to look out and see each other’s places.

“We’re family,” he said. ‘We’re real neighbours, not like those people in the city.”

The second Donna saw the plus sign on her pregnancy test, she knew was ready to move to the ranch. She’d fallen in love with beautiful Paul Newman and Robert Redford in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. Now she had her own good-looking, real-life cowboy, just like in the movies.

“I know you wanted to leave Saskatoon after you were done your degree. I know you dreamed of backpacking around Europe,” he said in the minutes after she slipped the ring over her swollen finger. “But I’m going to give you and our baby the best life. You’ll love the ranch as much as I do.”

She smiled. “It’s not the order we planned. But I love you.”

Those first few years she had been so occupied with Clay, falling in love with being his mom and learning how to be a good wife to Gord. Clay was an easy baby and she loved being a mom so much that they had Colton a few years later. She remembered the smell of her boys’ heads, their milky grins and the joy she’d felt at each milestone. Over the years, she mastered cooking by reading the Best of Bridge cookbooks, Company’s Coming, Chatelaine magazine and Abby’s handwritten recipe cards. Her house was immaculate. But she failed at farming. She tried to love farming, the farming life and helping with the animals, but she had been a colossal failure. If she’d been a homesteader or a pioneer, she would have died. Been eaten by wolves. Or she would have gone crazy, been one of those women who just walked off into the bald prairie, marching off like one of those penguins that walked off into the Antarctic alone, determined to die. She took care of the house and the kids, while everyone else ran the farm. How many times did they have family meetings to discuss the farm business while she sat there, listening, wanting to ask what they were talking about because she didn’t understand the markets. She was a city girl and always would be, even though she’d been out on the ranch for twenty-five years.

Donna wondered what would happen now. Al had been the head of the farm. There was going to be a huge shift. This thought exhausted her and made her head hurt. It was better to think about the past and things that had already happened. Things that she didn’t have to worry about because she couldn’t do anything to fix them.

She heard the front door open and bang shut. The glowing arms on the clock beside Gord’s side of the bed told her it was almost one. There was a loud thump of a boot, the sound of Colton dropping one of the heavy, scuffed-up Doc Marten boots that he always wore. He was finally home. Thank God.

Donna got out of bed and walked down the stairs to the front door. Colton leaned against the wall. The scent of cigarettes and pot wafted off of him. He must have been at J. D.’s saloon in town. She caught a whiff of campfire. Maybe he’d been at a bush party. It didn’t matter. What mattered what that he was here, standing in front of her, alive.

“Colton,” she said, rushing forward to hug him.

“Mom?” He was drunk. He looked at her, and she could tell that even through the haze of alcohol coursing through his veins, he knew something was wrong.

“There was a car accident,” she said. She hugged him tight, feeling the solidness of his shoulders under his bunny hug. “Your Grandpa is dead. Your Gramma was injured pretty badly.”

“What?” Colton cried. “Jesus, fuck. No.”

He staggered a bit, pulled away from her, and leaned against the wall again, bracing himself. He sobbed a loud, angry cry. She hadn’t heard him cry like that in years.

“I know,” Donna said. “I know.”

“What happened?” he asked, pulling his head away from the wall. She grabbed his arm and steadied him.

“Let’s go to the kitchen,” she said. “You need a glass of water. Do you want to hear the details now? Or do you need to sober up?”

“Are you the only one here?” he asked.

“Allyson is in bed and Chloe is sleeping in Clay’s room,” she said. “Everyone else is in the hospital at the city.”

“Is Gramma going to make it?” Colton’s nose was running. His eyes were half closed. He looked much younger than his nineteen years right now.

Donna sighed. “Hope so.”

She took her son’s hand and led him to the kitchen. “Sit there,” she said, pointing to the table. She got a glass from the cupboard. Maybe she should make him some coffee. But the best thing he could do was go to bed and sleep it off. Colton flopped down into the chair, and crumpled forward, laying his head down on the table. He mumbled something against the table’s surface.

“I don’t know what you’re saying,” she said as she stood at the kitchen sink. He mumbled again and then lifted his head.

“Was Grandpa in pain when he died?” he asked.

Donna held her hand underneath the water faucet. The cool water flowed over her fingers.

“We don’t know,” she said. She pictured Al lying in the ditch, his face down, his broad back facing the sky. She took a deep breath, and pictured herself shaking the image out of her head, the way her therapist had taught her. Her son sat at the table, waiting for her answer. I need you, his face said. I need my mommy.

She placed the glass of water in front of Colton. He looked at it, and with a jerky movement of his arm, he hit the water glass. It flew across the table, spraying water everywhere. He sobbed, stood up and ran out of the room. Donna watched the glass roll across the table. She took the dishtowel and wiped up the water, which had soaked into a copy of The Western Producer.

When the table was dry, she walked up the stairs to Colton’s room. She knocked on the closed door.

“Go away,” he said.

Colton wailed again from the other side of the door, screaming like someone had stabbed him. Donna opened the door. Her son sat on the floor in the middle of his bedroom. There were piles of clothes everywhere. He was rifling through a drawer. She heard the crinkle of plastic in his hand. As she watched, he pulled his hand out of the drawer, slammed it shut and turned around, looking guilty. He probably had dope in there. Or some sort of drugs. She wasn’t going to get into that now. Her son could be a druggie, but now wasn’t the time to discuss it. She heard footsteps and turned to see Allyson standing behind her.

“He probably drove home drunk,” she said. “Just like those people who hit Gramma and Grandpa.”

“Allyson,” Donna said, her voice tired. “Don’t talk like that right now.”

“Colton’s still drunk,” Allyson said. “And he was probably driving.”

“We’re all upset,” Donna said.

“You’re not even going to ask him how he got home?” Allyson asked. “He could have killed someone.”

Colton stood in front of his dresser, swaying back and forth. His face was red, streaked with tears and his hair was lank and greasy around his face. Donna resisted the urge to tell her daughter to shut up. Of course, her son had gotten behind the wheel after too many beers. But she hated talking about that stuff with him, hated having these discussions. Now was not the time.

“We need to get through this,” she said to Allyson.

Colton stopped looking at the ground, raised his head and spoke. “Does Clay know yet?” he asked.

Donna was glad her son was thinking about what was actually happening. “We’ll let him know tomorrow. I haven’t had a chance to call Aunty Pam yet either,” she said. She looked from Allyson to Colton. “I’ll need you both to get up early and do the chores. Now why don’t we all go to bed?”

Colton nodded, swaying a little.

Donna smelled the rank perfume of alcohol on him.

“Colton, why don’t you go take a shower first?”

He nodded and left the room, heading towards the bathroom.

“I need to sleep with you,” Allyson said. “I don’t want to be alone.”

“Okay,” Donna said. “Let’s go to bed.”

She put her hand on her daughter’s shoulder and followed Allyson as she left the room.