“Nothing turned out the way I wanted it to,” she said.
“In my experience it almost never does. But do you regret what happened?”
“No,” Beth said. She didn’t even have to think about it.
He took a deep breath. “Many times everything comes out better.”
“Even when we don’t get what we want?” she said, suddenly needing to know he agreed with her view.
“Especially when we don’t get what we want. Not always, but I mean, what do we know about what we really need?”
Beth laughed. He was looking at her with a serious expression, and her laughter seemed inappropriate. She cleared her throat.
“Well, who knew I had guts, huh?”
“Oh, I’ve always known it.”
“You have, have you?”
“Yes, ever since the night when you turned that calf around inside its mother, because the vet couldn’t get here through the snow.”
The memory came back to Beth like a rush of pleasure. “I forgot about that. A little something I thought I could do just because I’d read James Herriot’s books. When was that?”
“The coldest February night in a decade.”
“I was like, what?”
“Fourteen,” he said, and she was startled by the swiftness of his memory. He finally turned away from the saddle rack and faced her. He held up his big hands and turned them over. “You were the only one with hands small enough to fit through that cow’s narrowness. You didn’t even wrinkle up your nose.”
“You coached me, if I remember right. Mr. College Grad, Expert on the Herd.”
“You didn’t need much coaching.”
He was regarding her with a look of admiration that made her uncomfortable. Her heart was thumping harder than it needed to for a person just standing around.
“I thought you were angry with me then,” she said.
His admiration turned to surprise. “Why would I have been angry? You were a crazy success.”
“I don’t know. I was so happy—that calf, staggering around alive because I’d pulled it out. But you didn’t have much to say about it. You kind of wandered off. I just thought I’d done something wrong but you didn’t want to say so, me being your boss’s daughter and all that.”
Jacob smiled then. “Oh. That.”
“Oh that what?”
Now his face reddened, she could see it clearly even under this wicked incandescent glare, and his embarrassment so embarrassed her that she didn’t dare press him to explain. She tried to rescue him from the awkwardness she’d caused.
“Mom said she’s asked you to take on some of Dad’s old duties. Congratulations. You are so right for that job.”
“I guess Levi didn’t want it.”
“That would be an understatement.” She pushed her fingers into her pockets.
“What do you think he’s going to do?” Jacob asked.
“Look for a way around those wolves.” Beth sighed. “I feel sad for him.”
“One day at a time, Beth. You never can tell how God can turn a thing around. Or a person.”
“This is true.” She was reminded of God’s promise to heal her family. Did the promise include Levi? There were so many questions unanswered still.
“I’m sorry you won’t get to attend vet school as soon as you’d planned,” he said.
“Me too.”
“But I’m also glad you’re staying here.”
She liked the sound of his voice, the meaning of his words.
“I’m glad you’re glad.”
That awkwardness between them was back again. It could only be that tension rooted in the wrong that she’d done. She hated that it was there, preventing them from being the friends they were. And because it seemed that the only way around it was to go directly through it, Beth said the only thing to pop into her head, which was probably not the best thing she could have picked:
“I learned a thing or two about your saddle while I was up in Burnt Rock.”
Jacob cleared his throat and glanced back at the vacancy where it should have been. This simple motion filled her with a great need to leave the room, to step away from Jacob’s closeness and from the discomfort of the choice that she couldn’t undo, even though her sin had been redeemed. Mostly redeemed. She turned away and started to walk out. She might as well get this whole thing over with.
“You said you were going to tell me what I owe you for it,” she said over her shoulder.
She heard him following her out of the tack room and out of the barn and into the fresh air, where she could breathe a little more easily. She went to the metal corral gates and propped her foot on the bottom rail. He came