CHAPTER 3

It was light out when Allyson got up, and her room was cold. When she sat up in bed, her mother stirred. Donna always smelled warm and moist after she had been sleeping. Allyson could never describe the smell to anyone else, but she noticed it every time she woke up next to her mother.

“You slept,” her mother said. “On and off, but you still slept.”

“Did you?” she asked.

“Barely,” her mother said. “But I have to get up now. I think they’ll want me at the hospital. I’ve got a lot to do.”

Donna got up and walked in the direction of the bathroom. Allyson got out of bed, went to her own room and put on a pair of jeans with a hole in the knee. She slipped on socks and an old hoodie that used to be Clay’s. After pulling her hair back into a ponytail, she walked down the hall to Clay’s room. She stood outside her cousin’s door, trying to decide if she wanted to knock. After a minute, she walked down to Colton’s room and rapped on the door.

There was the sound of rustling and Colton mumbling.

“Chores,” she said.

“Be right out,” Colton said. His voice sounded raspy. That’s what happened when he smoked a lot. She heard a large thump from the other side of the door, and quiet again.

In the kitchen, her mother brewed coffee. Allyson grabbed a mug from the cupboard and waited for the brown liquid to spill down, pulling out the carafe so she could stick her mug underneath.

“When did you start drinking coffee?” her mother asked.

“When I turned fourteen. Jeff is always drinking it. Clay got me hooked on it the last time he was here.”

Her mother shook her head as if trying to clear it. “I wonder if I should just go to the hospital,” she said. “I can’t stand this waiting around.”

Allyson looked at the clock. It was seven.

Her mother took a mug and poured herself some coffee. “I wish I could call Clay,” she said. “I might just call him and wake him up. I’ll feel better once he knows.”

Allyson didn’t answer. Her mother often talked through things out loud.

“Thanks for doing the chores, honey.”

Allyson drank her coffee as her mother opened the cupboard and started looking through the mugs.

“Some of these we don’t even use,” she muttered, taking a few of them out and putting them on the counter.

“What are you doing?” Allyson asked.

“Why do we have so many mugs?” her mother asked, grouping four mugs together in a pile. “I’m going to take these to Goodwill.”

Allyson saw Clay’s favourite blue pottery mug, the one he always used when he was home, in the group to be discarded. She walked over and put it back in the cupboard.

“That’s Clay’s,” she said, finishing up her cup of coffee. Her mother always made weak coffee. Her parents should stop buying Maxwell House and get the good stuff. Maybe she’d make her mom stop at Tim Hortons the next time they were in Saskatoon or Edmonton and pick up a bag of good coffee. They might live out in the country, but they didn’t have to act like backwoods hicks.

“Is Chloe going to help?” Donna asked.

“I thought I’d let her sleep. Colton should be down soon.”

Allyson finished her coffee, left the mug next to the sink, and went down the stairs to put on her barn boots. The screen door slammed behind her as she went out to the yard into the crisp air. Morning dew coated the blades of grass and she could smell spring. The quads sat right near the barn, where her dad and grandpa had left them. It was hard for her to believe she wasn’t going to see Grandpa Al again, that he would never be out near the barn he had built before she was born.

She heard footsteps and turned to see Colton. He shuffled along, a ball cap pulled low over his face, unbrushed puffs of hair spilling out from below it. As he approached and stood by her, she smelled the staleness of day-old booze and unwashed sleep. There was a patch of dried toothpaste by the corner of his mouth.

“Hey,” she said, heading into the barn.

Colton grunted in her direction. Maybe he was still drunk. He squinted as he looked at the sky. He grabbed a bale and took it over to the bull pen. Allyson broke a bale into pieces and threw it over the fence. Her dad’s favourite bull, Fully Loaded, leaned against the other side of the fence and scratched his face. His name suited him because he made fine calves. His father, Git’R’Dun, had been a champion, worth a lot of money. There was something about the routine, about just doing simple things like taking care of cattle, that made Allyson feel better. She had done all of these things so many times. Her grandfather was dead and her Gramma was in the hospital, but the world kept on going. The animals still needed to be fed.

“Let’s go out to the pasture,” Colton said. She nodded, wondering if Chloe would be out to join them. The sky was a bluish grey and it was starting to warm up. Maybe it would be warm today, hot for the beginning of June.

“I’ll take Grandpa’s quad,” Colton said.

Allyson finished feeding the bulls before walking to the quads. Colton got on Grandpa Al’s quad and started it, leaving Allyson with Gord’s quad. They drove through the yard, up to the gate. Donna hated it when the kids drove the quads; said she’d heard too many stories of kids flipping them, running into rocks and dying. Gord scoffed, saying most of those stories about people getting hurt were about city people who drank too much while quadding at the lake. Donna always countered him. “It’s not city people who are dying,” she said. “I read about it in a newspaper article about farm safety.”

Allyson tried not to think about that as she and Colton drove the quads out to the summer pasture. It was easy to die. She’d seen so many things die on their farm. Now the sceptre of death was even closer. You planned a date to go into the city to see a movie, and next thing you knew, someone hit your car and you bought the farm. The past week before the accident had been so strange. All the adults were talking about the border, and why it had closed, and how they might not be able to sell their cows. Things seemed normal, but in some ways, they didn’t. She could tell something was up.

When they arrived in the pasture, Colton stopped his quad and Allyson turned hers off as well. Allyson was glad Colton had helped the day before and knew where the cattle were. Allyson watched the cows, and wondered how everything would change, now that Grandpa Al was dead. She shook her head as if trying to shake the thought out, mimicking the movements of the cows as they shook their heads, trying to get rid of the flies buzzing around their ears. Everyone looked good, chewing their cuds, looking at her with big, curious eyes. The calm of the animals soothed her. They were just chewing, walking, pissing and shitting. Regular cow stuff. Some of the cows moved away from the quad as she got off and walked over to a small group of them. As she approached, one cow raced down the field, kicking out her back legs, frolicking a little as she ran. Her dad would have said the cow was having her own private rodeo. The cow reached the bluff and turned to look at Colton and Allyson before putting her head down to take a bite of grass.

Colton broke off a piece of tall grass, stuck it in his mouth to chew and kicked a bit of dirt. He put his arms over his head, stretched and yawned.

“Colton,” Allyson said. She wanted to ask him how he felt and what he was thinking about Gramma and Grandpa. Had it even hit him that Grandpa was dead? It still didn’t feel real. She half expected to turn around and see Grandpa Al there, ­smiling.

“Huh?” Colton said. He coughed, horked and spit into the dirt.

“Gross,” she said. Colton pulled a pack of cigarettes out of the pocket of his Mack jacket and lit up.

“Let me have this smoke before we head back,” he said, exhaling.

“Gross,” she said again. She no longer wanted to ask him anything. He might pretend everything was okay. He’d never been good in a crisis. When her dad cut his hand with a band saw, Colton took off as soon as he’d seen the blood. When he came back hours later, they found out he’d been at Cal’s in town, shooting pool and playing video games.

“Gramma is going to be okay,” he said. “She’s tough. She’s not going to die on us. She’d make sure we’re okay before she checked out.”

Allyson didn’t answer. She kept staring at the cattle, then turned to watch as Colton finished his cigarette and stubbed it out on the ground, taking care to grind the butt down under his heel.

“Let’s go back,” Colton said. She nodded and they got back on their quads and rode towards the house. The wind felt good on her face. Even though everything was different, some things were the same. She and Colton parked the quads by the barn. When she stopped to listen, Allyson heard rustling. Chloe was inside the barn, scooping kibble out of a big bin to feed the barn cats and the dogs. Maggie and Rascal stood beside her, tails wagging. Chloe brushed her hair back from her face.

“Clay knows,” she said. “And Dad called. Uncle Gord’s on his way home.”

Chloe finished filling the dishes and set them down. The dogs crowded around to eat.

“Got any smokes?” she asked Colton.

He patted his pocket. “If your parents catch me, I’ll be in shit,” he said. “Just don’t let them know that you got them from me.” He held the red, banged-up cigarette pack out to Chloe and she pulled out a cigarette.

“Got a light?” she asked. Colton pulled out his lighter and gave it to her.

“Just be careful you don’t light anything on fire,” Allyson said. “That’s the last thing we need right now.”

She couldn’t believe they were both smoking together. How gross. And in a time like this. Just acting normal, when Grandpa Al was dead, and Gramma Abby was in the hospital. She left her brother and cousin inside the barn and started towards the horse pen. When she got near their pen, she saw Chloe had already fed them. Of course. The horses were her cousin’s domain. Chloe had been the one who had been in pony club, the one who spent hours in the barn or near the corrals, talking to the horses, brushing their manes, reading books like Summer Goes Riding or Black Beauty. She would never neglect the horses. She was probably getting ready to go for a ride later on. Crow and Temple were the working horses, and Cassidy was hers, the one Chloe used most for ­riding.

Inside the house, it was too quiet. “Mom,” she called. “Where are you?”

“Upstairs,” her mother called back. Allyson walked up the stairs to the bathroom and stood outside her parents’ bedroom before going in. Her mother sat slumped on the bed. The television blared and the sounds of a cooking show filled the room. Donna was dressed and had make-up on, but her eyes were red, her face blotchy and puffy.

“I’m going to the hospital right away,” she said. “Your dad is on his way home. Clay has to juggle a few shifts and pack and then he’ll be on his way out.”

“Can I go to the hospital with you?”

Donna shook her head. “Gramma woke up in the middle of the night. Your dad doesn’t want you to see her yet. She’s banged up and confused. He wants everyone to wait until she’s stronger. She’s probably going to be paralyzed. And they think she has a concussion.”

“Paralyzed?” Allyson said. She thought of a television show she’d seen years ago, about a guy who could only move things with his mouth. He had a wheelchair he operated with a stick he moved with his lips and teeth. Would Gramma be like that? It would kill her.

“They don’t know how bad it is yet,” Donna said. “It looks like she’s lost the use of her legs and her left hand. We don’t know what will happen. But she won’t be able to manage all the stairs in her house.”

The bed creaked as Donna rose. “I should have waited until Colton and Chloe were here before I told you all that,” she said, starting for the door. “Where are they?”

“Out in the yard,” said Allyson. She thought about telling her mom they were in the barn smoking.

“Can I do something to help?” she asked.

“Take a shower,” Donna said. “Get dressed. Make coffee for your dad. I’ll let you know if I think of anything else you can do. There are people we need to phone.”

*

Linda must have phoned people from the hospital, because food started to arrive that afternoon. Mabel Jacobson, a Métis woman who lived in town, brought over a tub of butter tarts and Anita, Donna’s boss, drove up the long driveway with a tin of date squares. Some of the wives of the Elks club members dropped off casseroles and stews and expressed their condolences. Mary Anne, Donna’s good friend, came over and hugged the kids. She brought a card, a couple of her newly published romance books, a big bouquet of gerbera daisies, a box of chocolate and a casserole in a blue Pyrex dish. Donna was still at the hospital.

“Tell your mother she can call me any time,” Mary Anne said, sticking her head out of the window of her PT cruiser as she started her car and drove away. As Allyson watched her, she wished she could drive away too. Just drive away from her family, and all of the sadness on the farm. Allyson’s friend Amber called to say she was sorry, but Allyson felt bad about tying up the line, and let her go after a couple of minutes. Besides, she had nothing to say. The whole thing didn’t seem real yet. It felt as though she was running through the motions, performing some sort of elaborate dance. If she did the rituals correctly, perhaps this would turn out to be some mistake, and Grandpa Al and Abby would appear back at the farm. She almost wished that she was back at the coffee shop, listening to the men talk about cattle. Anything but this.

Allyson and Colton greeted visitors and accepted food. None of them spoke about the accident. Allyson was in the kitchen alone when her father came in. When she looked at him, she was struck by his face, the visible mask of pain he wore. His wrinkles stood out even more, as if they’d been etched into his face with a knife. In the kitchen, Gord put his arms around Allyson and hugged her tight. She didn’t say anything, just willed herself not to cry, breathing in her dad’s familiar smell of dirt and Old Spice, a musty smell she associated with the hospital, and the faint scent of B.O.

“I need to take a shower and have a lie down,” he said. “I’m going to wait until Clay is here to tell everyone what’s happening. Your mom isn’t going to be gone for long.”

“Can I do anything to help?” Allyson asked.

“Go read or draw or watch TV,” he said. “Try to pretend everything is normal.”

Allyson went to her bedroom and tried to read Harry Potter, but she couldn’t concentrate. She went to the family room and turned on the TV, flipping through channels. After a while, Colton joined her. Chloe had gone home, back across the yard to her own house. But after a few hours, she came back and the three of them sat in the room in the dark. Normally Donna or Linda would have made them go out and work in the yard. They generally weren’t allowed to sit inside in the dark, watching the boob tube. When Donna came home, she walked into the family room.

“Linda’s home,” she said. “Is your dad upstairs?”

Colton looked up from his Gameboy.

“He’s sleeping,” said Allyson. “How’s Gramma?”

“Rough,” Donna said. “She was sleeping when I got there. She knows Grandpa’s gone. Rita says Gramma is going to be okay. Rita has been really great. Even Linda said so. She was there when they brought Grandpa and Gramma in last night and then she was there again this morning.”

Rita’s name was notorious among the Klassens. Rita Dennis had been Craig’s high school sweetheart. But Rita wanted to move to Calgary, and Craig had wanted to go to school in Vermilion before returning to the farm, so they broke up. Rita got her nursing degree and lived in Calgary for a few years before moving to Lloydminster with her four kids after the divorce. Her parents were still in town, so she showed up at the odd town function with her rag tag kids in tow. Chloe called Rita the prairie prune because her face was wrinkled and she wore bright coloured lipstick that ran outside her lips. She had big hair, as if she believed that the bigger her hair was, the closer she was to God. A silver cross sat nestled within her ample, suntanned cleavage. Even though she was the same age as Craig, she looked much older, with lines from years of cigarette smoking around her mouth.

“Dad made the right choice,” Chloe muttered as she watched Rita walk away on teetering high heels, her toes flashing bright orange nail polish. Rita always came up to talk to them whenever she saw them, and Abby always hugged her. Linda bristled every time Rita came around. Craig was polite, but never said much around her.

“Clay should be here soon,” Donna said. “I’m going over to Linda’s to see who she’s phoned, and then to Gramma and Grandpa’s house to pick up a few things to take to the ­hospital.”

Allyson sprawled out on the couch and watched her brother flip the channels. At one point, Colton left the room, leaving her alone. She could have turned off the television, but didn’t. The nattering voices were comforting. Chloe came back and sat down on the couch. Allyson handed her the remote. Uncle Craig didn’t believe in satellite television, so Chloe lived with peasant vision—only four channels. Whenever she could, she came over to watch MuchMusic, YTV and everything else she couldn’t get at home. Craig came over to watch the news when something important happened. Donna asked him why he just didn’t get satellite, but Gord said Craig was too cheap.

“I don’t want to be at home right now,” Chloe said. “Mom just phoned the paper to place an obit.”

She flopped down on the couch and lay on her side, her arm dangling down. “I think they’re going to send a reporter out here to talk to everyone. Everybody in town will want to talk about Grandpa’s death.”

“You can watch whatever you want,” Allyson said.

Chloe flipped channels until she landed on a Justin Timberlake video.

“He’s so hot,” Chloe said. “And such a good dancer. Just look at him.”

Allyson zoned out and didn’t even hear Donna’s footsteps.

“Do you girls want anything to eat?” she asked. “I made sandwiches.”

The sandwiches were cut in diagonals, just the way Allyson liked them. She took a ham, lettuce and mustard sandwich off the plate and took a huge bite. The bread was dry, but it still tasted good.

“I got hold of Aunty Pam,” Donna said. “Finally.”

“Is she going to come out?”

“She is,” Donna said. All of them heard the sound of the front door open and bang shut.

“Hello?” It was Linda’s voice.

“You must be exhausted,” Donna said, as she left the family room and walked towards the door.

“I’m running on adrenaline,” Linda said from the other room. Allyson could hear her mother and aunt talking but she couldn’t make out what they were saying. She went back to her room. About an hour later, she heard the sound of a vehicle out in the yard and saw Clay’s blue Ford Ranger. She ran down the stairs, happy her brother was home. Everything would be better because he was here. Clay’s presence always calmed her parents. He had rarely broken his curfew and only stumbled home drunk a few times when he lived at home. He was the sturdy one, the responsible one, while Colton was the wild child.

Outside, Clay hopped out of his truck and grabbed a big blue duffel bag from the back.

“Hey, kid,” he said, ruffling her hair. He was ten years old when she was born. Clay was the one she thought of as her big brother, not Colton.

“I’m so glad you’re home,” she said, giving him a hug. He smelled like Calvin Klein Eternity. He referred to it as his signature scent, until Colton told him that sounded gay. Clay wore the Roughriders T-shirt Donna had bought him for Christmas. He’d cheered for the Riders his whole life. As a joke for Christmas one year, Al had bought him Edmonton Eskimos gear and souvenirs: a mug, a hat, a key chain and a pennant. Clay left all of these gifts piled in the top of his closet, until Craig liberated everything and took it all over to his place.

“How is everyone holding up?” Clay asked.

“Mom’s upset. Aunty Linda’s been a rock.”

“Of course,” Clay said. “She gets things done.”

Over the next few days, Allyson, Chloe and Colton spent hours watching television, sitting in the dark, saying hello to whoever showed up at the house. Sometimes Allyson went to her room and cried, thinking about how she would never see Grandpa Al again. The phone kept ringing and people kept coming, Tupperware in their hands. They piled tins of food on the table and filled the fridge.

When Chloe wasn’t sitting with them or out with Jamie, she was sleeping or out on the trails riding Cassidy. Colton stayed out with friends, returning late at night. Clay helped out with the chores and seemed to be doing a lot to help the adults. Whenever Allyson asked if there was anything she could do, she was told to go sit in the family room and watch TV. She stayed in her room and doodled on her sketch pad. She drew pictures of characters from Harry Potter.

One day, she watched out the window as Chloe drove off into town. She should have asked Chloe for a ride. Things would be different once she could drive legally. She knew how to drive, of course. Her dad had taught her how to drive the truck when she was eleven so she could help out around the farm. He wanted all his kids to know how to drive in case of an emergency. The RCMP had caught a couple of kids driving without licenses before, so no one would let her drive into town. Even though everyone had been getting ready for the funeral and visiting Abby in the hospital, Gord and Craig were still obsessed with the news. The border was still closed and cattle weren’t moving. When the border closed, Craig had been down south, about to take a liner of cattle to the States. The border guards had stopped him. Said he couldn’t cross, that they weren’t letting anyone in. He’d had to drive the whole liner back, which meant he wouldn’t get paid. Since the cows couldn’t cross, no one was going to get paid.

No one knew when the United States would start buying cattle again. Gord and Craig worried and talked about it, their voices low and murmuring.

“Dad would have hated this,” Allyson heard Craig say late one night. “This uncertainty and not knowing would have driven him nuts. He would be in here every night, yelling at the TV, telling people to get some answers and get things done.”

“I think the government boys and Shirley are trying. They’re not going to let us choke here,” Gord said.

“We’re going to have to look at Dad’s finances,” Craig said. “Figure out what’s what and get everything settled.”

Allyson tuned them out and went back to reading Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets.

She just didn’t want to hear more talk about markets or any of that other crap everyone was always talking about. She bet people who lived in cities didn’t talk like this. One day, she would be one of them. She couldn’t wait to get out of here, to have another life, to escape the claustrophobic walls of the farm. In school, they’d had to read As for Me and My House, a book about a preacher and his wife and a small town. The preacher and his wife were suffocating in their town, closed in by the townspeople, their religion and all the things they couldn’t do in the town. Allyson knew exactly how they felt.

The next day, Craig had to do some carpentry work in town. Colton had gone in to work at the shop. Her dad came into her room that morning, and woke her up.

“I need you,” he said, his voice still rusty with sleep. “We’re going to try and take some cattle to the auction mart.”

Normally, Allyson would have moaned and groaned, or asked him to get someone else to do it, but there was no complaining these days. No one had told her that she had to suck it up and help out, that was just what she knew she needed to do. That was the only way they were going to get through this, whatever this was.

“Clay’s coming with us,” her dad said.

“I’ll be there in a second,” she said. “Just give me a few ­minutes.”

Her dad stood in the doorway and nodded. When she was younger, he had been the one who put her to bed, who read her the Sandra Boynton books about mooing, and baaing and going to bed. She liked it better when he brushed her hair than when her mom did. But all of that ended as soon as she turned twelve.

She sat up, and swung her legs down off the bed and nestled her toes into the blue carpet. If they were just going to the auction mart, it wasn’t worth taking a shower. She put on Clay’s old sweatshirt and some jeans, and pulled on a pair of socks that were mismatched, but clean. They were hauling cattle. It wasn’t a beauty pageant.

She went into the kitchen. Her dad had already left, but there was a pot of hot coffee sitting on the burner. She drank a cup, and made herself some buttered toast, and walked down to the front door. After shoving her feet into her barn boots and putting on a green Roughriders cap, she pushed open the front door, picked up the toast again, and headed across the yard, chewing on the bread as she walked.

Her dad and Clay were already at the pen. Unlike Allyson, Clay looked like he’d been up for a long time, and had had a shower. His shirt even looked like he’d managed to pass an iron over it.

“Do you even know if the auction is buying cows?” Clay said, turning to his dad. “Did you check?”

Gord studied a heifer. “This girl is so pretty,” he said. “Nice looking cow. Shame she’s open. We can’t afford to keep her.”

He turned to his son. “Border’s still not open, but we’ll head down and check,” he said. “There are just a few cows to load up. Even if we have to come back, it won’t be a lot of trouble.”

“Did you try calling?” Clay asked.

“Called yesterday, but that was no answer,” Gord said. “But that doesn’t mean nothing. Could be busy if it’s a sale day.”

Right after the border closed, the auction mart shut its doors and no one could sell anything. When Donna drove past the building on the way into town, the parking lot was empty and deserted, except for Marty Valleau’s black pickup. Gord and Craig talked at the table one morning about how Marty had shut the doors of the auction mart and turned away all the people who had driven in with their cattle that day, sending them back to their homes.

“Allyson, you stand in the pen,” her dad said. “Clay, you go get the truck.”

Clay nodded and tipped his cowboy hat. Allyson sometimes wondered if he’d been born wearing one. Out on the farm, he always wore his white Stetson, brim a bit discoloured from dirt and the sun.

Clay backed the truck and the liner up near the gate. The cattle balked a little when they saw the vehicle approach, but Gord made calming noises. They trusted him, and would follow where he wanted them to go. He opened the door to the liner, and the pen. Allyson stood with her boots in the manure. She wouldn’t push the cattle from the rear, but from the side. They’d all clump up, and head towards the liner. Cattle didn’t like to go into a dark area from a light area, but her dad, with her help, was able to load them up.

“Nice work,” he said, when the last little red heifer was inside the liner. He swung the door shut and bolted it.

“Okay, let’s go,” he said.

Allyson thought about asking if she really had to go to the auction mart, but one look at her Dad’s face told her not to bother asking. Why should she leave him and her brother alone at this time? He needed her. He needed some semblance of normal.

The three of them hopped in the truck, and drove to the auction mart. The truck cabin was filled with the scent of manure from their boots, hay, and cattle. She wondered if her own unshowered scent was in there somewhere, blending with all the other smells. And over all of this earthy farm scent, she could smell Clay’s CK One Eternity. She concentrated on breathing that in. A little bit of city life permeating the wildness of their truck.

There were trucks in the auction mart parking lot when they pulled into town.

“This is a good sign,” Gord said, mainly to himself, as if he had forgotten that his children were with him.

“I’ll go check things out,” Clay said, once they had stopped. He jumped out of the truck, and strode over to the back door of the auction mart. Gord and Allyson watched as he yanked on the door handle. Perhaps the auction mart was closed, even though there were trucks in the lot. But finally, Clay pulled open the door and went inside.

Gord jumped out of the truck and started pacing around. “I don’t recognize any of these trucks,” he said. “Just Marty’s. I don’t think any of the regulars are here.”

Allyson opened the truck door to get some air, and dangled her legs down off the side of the seat. The air was chilly and tasted like dust. They were going to have a bad grasshopper problem this year, Gord said. She hated grasshoppers, and always had. The things jumped out of nowhere, zig zagging, and erratic, gnashing their teeth. Chloe always laughed at Allyson’s fear. “They’re teeny tiny insects,” she said. “They can’t hurt you.”

Her dad walked down the rows of trucks, as if he was looking for something. The door to the front of the auction mart opened, and Clay came out.

“I don’t know if you’re going to want to sell today,” he said. “The border’s still closed and the prices are way too low. It’s not even worth it.”

“Like how low?” Gord said.

Clay glanced at Allyson. And in that moment, she saw that things had changed somehow between Gord and Clay. They weren’t talking to each other like father and son any more. At some point, their interactions had become a conversation between two men.

“She can hear,” Gord said. “It’s okay.”

“It’s not worth it,” Clay said. “It’s probably cheaper to feed them. Wait until things get better. We’ll have some green grass soon. Better just take them home and keep them for a while, and then sell them at a later date.”

Gord sighed. “Damn, I hope this thing doesn’t go on too long,” he said. “Nobody in this industry can afford a wreck.”

Gord stood in front of his son, looking up at his face, shielded by his cowboy hat. Gord’s shoulders were hunched, and Clay looked so much stronger and younger.

Clay touched his dad on the shoulder.

“Yeah, it’s really better if we don’t sell now,” he said. “I talked to Marty. Most of the guys who are selling today are guys who hauled from up north. They just don’t want to haul back and pay freight. They’re going to take the low prices.”

“Okay,” Gord said. “Let’s go.”

They got back into the truck, and drove back to the farm without speaking. Gord didn’t even turn on the radio. Allyson helped her brother and father unload the cattle back into the same pen, and then went back to the house, abandoning them once they’d gotten into a heated discussion about body scoring cattle.

*

That night, Allyson woke up to get a drink in the middle of the night and went downstairs for a glass of water. Even though the hallway was dark, it was familiar, and she didn’t need to turn the lights on, feeling her way with the soles of her feet. She stayed close to the wall, dragging her fingers along its coolness. But as she descended the stairs she realized that someone was in the kitchen, even though the lights weren’t on. She walked a few steps closer, then stopped to listen. As she got closer, she realized that the horrible, guttural sounds she was hearing belong to her dad. Her dad, the one who calmed and soothed her. Her dad, who fully believed in cowboying up, getting back on the horse. He was in the kitchen crying like a little girl.

She didn’t know what to do. Should she go in and comfort him? Or would he be embarrassed to know that she was there, that she’d heard him crying? He didn’t like to look weak in front of her. Until the accident, she’d never seen him cry. She didn’t really need that glass of water. She turned, crept back into bed and put on her headphones to listen to Eminem until she felt relaxed enough to sleep. Something about the anger and swearing in the music soothed her and brought her back from all the sadness and the image of her dad, sitting alone, crying at the kitchen table. She could lose herself in his angry voice.

*

About ten days after Al’s death, Allyson lay in bed, reading Alice, I Think when she heard the front door open. It was late, and her parents had gone to bed. Clay had gone back into the city. He’d been home for a while to help out, but he was worried about taking too much time off work. Footsteps creaked on the stairs, but she didn’t pay any attention to them. Why should she, when her book was so good? She kept reading, entranced in the novel, when her bedroom door swung open and Chloe, Colton and Jamie stumbled in.

“What are you doing?” Allyson said, embarrassed as everyone piled into her room. She had her retainer in, and wore her pyjamas with teddy bears on them. Jamie was the only one of them who seemed sober. Colton dumped Chloe onto Allyson’s bed, almost squishing Allyson in the process. Chloe moved close so she lay beside her cousin. Colton and Jamie sat down on the bed, trapping Allyson with their warm bodies.

“She needed to come home,” Colton said. “Let her sleep here. Uncle Craig and Auntie Linda will flip if they see or smell her right now. She can go home in the morning.”

“I love you, cousin,” Chloe said, running her hand through Allyson’s hair, her voice a singsong. She stunk like rotten grapes, like the inside of the wine bottle at Colton’s graduation. Allyson tried to move away so Chloe could have more room on the bed. Her cousin veered towards her again, her movements floppy and loose. If she stood up, she’d be as wobbly as a newborn calf toddling after its mother.

“You’re such a nerd,” Chloe said, still stroking her cousin’s hair. “Who stays in to read on a Saturday night where there are good parties going on? Everything you do is so nerdy. All that drawing and reading. Cartoons.”

Allyson considered pushing her cousin off the bed. It wouldn’t take much to shove Chloe onto the floor. But if she fell, she’d make a loud noise. And if she screamed, there was a possibility that she could wake up Donna and Gord.

Jamie laughed, a loud laugh that came from the pit of her stomach.

“Pipe down,” Colton said, elbowing Jamie in the ribs. “You’ll wake everyone else up.”

He looked at Allyson. “Chloe’s just drunk,” he said. “Just let her sleep here. Tell everyone you decided to have a sleepover.”

Chloe sprawled across the bed like a starfish, pushing Allyson closer to the edge of her single bed. She’d shared beds with her cousin before, but they hadn’t slept in a single bed together for years.

“So tired,” Chloe said, closing her eyes. Colton got up and started towards the door.

“We gotta get out of here,” he said to Jamie. “Thanks for driving us home.”

Colton and Jamie left, abandoning Allyson with her snoring, sweaty, smelly cousin. Chloe was so hot that Allyson had to get up and go sleep in Clay’s room. In the morning, her cousin went to the bathroom to retch. When Donna asked her if she was sick, she said she’d eaten something that didn’t agree with her, then trudged across the yard to her home.

That afternoon, Allyson heard Linda tell Donna Chloe had come down with the flu.

That evening, Chloe was in the barn doing chores. Allyson walked up to her as she was scooping kibble out of the bin to feed the dogs.

“Why did you do that to me last night?” Allyson asked.

Chloe stood up and pushed her strawberry blonde hair out of her face.

“Do what?” she asked.

“You were drunk,” Allyson said. “I couldn’t even sleep in my bed because of you. Why did you have to bring Jamie into my room?”

Chloe turned away from her, and leaned down to put some kibble into Maggie’s and Rascal’s dishes.

“Here, babies,” she said, smiling and patting the dogs’ wriggling bodies. “I’ve got your din din.”

Allyson stood in front of Chloe and stared at her cousin until Chloe looked at her.

“You were rude to me,” Allyson said. “And I don’t even recognize you any more. Why have you become this person?”

“I don’t want to talk about it,” Chloe said, her face flushing red. “Don’t make a big deal out of this. If you bring it up even once, I’ll never talk to you again.”

She turned, and headed over to the horse corral.