think—”
“I know what you think.”
He walked away and didn’t look back.
* * *
LEAVE. JUST GIVE UP on this land and walk away with nothing.
Actually walk away. She was still thinking about it hours later, well after night had fallen.
She couldn’t imagine joining the horde of jobless, homeless hobos and migrants who were headed west. She’d heard it was dangerous to jump onto those trains, that legs and feet could be cut off, bodies severed in half by the giant metal wheels. And there was crime out there, bad men who’d left their consciences along with their families. Elsa was not a brave woman.
Still.
She loved her husband. She’d vowed to love, honor, and obey him. Surely “follow him” was understood.
Should she have told him they’d go to California? At least talked about it? Maybe in the spring, if they’d had rain and a crop, there would be money for gas.
And God knew he was unhappy here. So was Loreda.
Perhaps they could leave—all of them—and come back when the drought ended.
Why not?
This land would wait for them.
She could at least discuss it with him properly, make him see that she was his wife and they were a team and if he wanted this enough, she would do it. She would leave this land she had come to love, the only home she’d ever had.
For him.
She threw a shawl over her worn lawn nightgown, then stepped into the rubber boots by the front door and went outside.
Where was he? Out on the windmill, alone, chewing on his disappointment? Or had he hitched up the wagon and gone to the Silo so he could sit at the bar and drink whiskey?
It was nearly nine o’clock and the farm was quiet.
The only light on in the house shone in Loreda’s upstairs window. Her daughter was in bed reading, just as Elsa had done at her age. She walked out into the yard. The chickens roused themselves lethargically as she passed by and quieted quickly. She heard music coming from her in-laws’ bedroom. Tony was playing music on his fiddle. Elsa knew that music was how he spoke to Rose in these hard times, how he reminded them of their past and their future, how he said, I love you.
She saw Rafe in the darkness by the corral, an upright slash of black against the black slats of the corral, all of it sheened silver by the light of a waxing moon. The bright orange tip of his cigarette.
He heard her footsteps, she could tell.
Rafe pulled away from the corral, stubbed out his cigarette, and dropped the unsmoked portion into his shirt pocket. Tony’s love song wafted toward them.
Elsa stopped in front of Rafe. All it would take was the smallest movement and she could rest her hand on his shoulder. She knew the faded blue chambray of his work shirt would feel warm after this long, hot day. She’d hemmed and washed and stitched and folded every garment he owned and knew each one by touch.
How was it possible that Elsa was close enough to her husband that she could feel the heat coming off him and smell the whiskey and cigarettes on his breath and still feel as if an ocean sloshed between them?
He surprised her by taking her hand and pulling her into his arms.
“You remember that first night of ours, out in the truck in front of Steward’s barn?”
Elsa nodded uncertainly. These were things they didn’t speak of.
“You said you wanted to be brave. I just wanted … to be somewhere else.”
Elsa stared up at him, saw his pain, and it hurt her, too. “Oh, Rafe—”
He kissed her on the lips, long and slow and deep, letting his tongue taste hers. “You were my first kiss,” he whispered, drawing back just enough to look at her. “Remember me then?”
It was the most romantic thing he’d ever said to her, and it filled her with hope. “Always,” she whispered.
Tony’s music stopped, leaving a heavy silence behind. Insects sang their staccato songs. The geldings moved listlessly in the corral, bumping the fencing with their noses, reminding them that they were hungry.
The night around them was black, the huge sky bright with stars. Maybe those were other universes she saw up there.
It felt beautiful and romantic, and just now, the two of them could be alone on the planet, attended to only by the sounds of the night.
“You’re thinking about California,” she began, trying to find the right words to begin a new conversation.
“Yeah. Ant