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Ranger

“IT’S THE MOST BEAUTIFUL name.” I smile as I hold out the kitchen chair for her to sit. “Maria Garcia McGowan.” I repeat it, enjoying every sound as her name moves over my lips.

And that name is attached to what I know to be the most beautiful woman.

“You are soooo smooth, aren’t you?” She crosses her arms and ankles, and I note for the first time there’s a hint of a dimple on her plump right cheek.

Just then, the loud ring of the old house phone breaks the silence. They’re only three people that still use that number. Pastor Reynolds from First Baptist, who still calls now and again to check in on me. My neighbor a few miles down, Mrs. Wilson, who was my mom’s best friend. And Paul.

“Excuse me.” As much as I hate it, I step back from her chair and make my way into the living room where the black phone still sits where it has since I was a boy next to the window on a little phone table my dad built for my mom.

My fingers twitch as I raise the receiver to my ear.

“Hello?”

Before a word is spoken, I hear the breath and know who it is, and I do my best to find that brotherly love I know deep down we have for each other.

“Hey.” Paul’s voice comes through with forced cheerfulness. “How you doing, brother?”

“I’m all right. Sort of in the middle of something here...weather comin’ in.”

“Oh, sorry.” I hear the disappointment. We’ve had our issues, but Paul’s a dreamer. Always has been and it’s gotten him in a few tight spots, but I know his heart is good. It’s just his head that isn’t twisted on quite straight most of the time.

“Naw, it’s fine.” I think of the letter I’ve yet to open that arrived today. I’m sure this call has something to do with it, but at the moment, all I can think about is getting back in the kitchen.

“Well, I’ll call back another time. Just wanted to check in. See how things are around there.”

I fight the urge to ask if he’s all right, but in my heart, I know something is going on, and now is just not the time to get into a long discussion about another pickle my older brother may have found himself in.

He’s more like my mom. And she did favor him because of his free spirit. I’ve always been the steady Eddie, but Paul’s been colorful and sure kept us entertained through the years with his wild ideas and sense of wonder. My chest tightens, missing some of the enthusiasm he always carries with him. Missing some of the tight spots he managed to get us into as we grew up. The laughs when he also managed to get us out of most of them.

“Hey, I’m sorry. There’s just a big storm, and I’ve got a couple people here keeping safe at the house. I’ll call you tomorrow, okay? Your cell number the same?”

A moment of silence then a cough.

“Paul? You okay?” I turn to see Maria’s cute as fuck feet tapping on the wooden floor in the kitchen. I swear I hear her hum for a second, and my cock lights up and my selfish needs override my brotherly concern.

“Yeah. Yeah, I’m good. Just...” He pauses. “I’ll call you back. I lost my cell is all. I’m going to get another one, just been busy.”

I read his voice like a billboard. He’s lying, probably got his cell shut off again and no money to get it right. Read this book before, and my gut twists, fighting the urge to lecture him again. But the scent of Maria is still swirling in my head, and everything else in the world is going to have to wait.

“Okay. Take care. We’ll talk soon.”

With that, he clicks off. I hang up the heavy receiver and make my way back to the kitchen with my hard-on growing like a motherfucker.

I walk in, stop, and admire her for a step.

She’s wearing these dangly little earrings with three daisies on each, and at her neck, there’s a delicate gold chain, a tiny upturned horseshoe flexing at the base of her throat as she speaks.

“Sorry about that. My brother.”

“It’s okay. Ranger Stoddard, smooth cowboy,” she mocks with a playful squint. Her flawless skin calls for my fingers. My lips.

“I’m just me. Call me what you will. You want a drink?” I spin toward the icebox, shoving a hand down into my front pocket to adjust my raging hard-on, then jerk the door open and peer inside. “Don’t have much. Beer, water, or sweet tea?”

“Tea is great.”

The chirpy lilt in her voice only makes it harder to resist the urges welling up inside me. It’s a sound that reminds me of a canary’s song, like the canary we used to have in a cage in the corner of this very room when I was a kid. As I take out the pitcher of sweet tea and turn to the Hoosier, I can’t help the smile as I think back, remembering when we painted this kitchen for my mother’s birthday one year.

Dad marched my brother and me into Piedmont Hardware and proceeded to take an hour trying to find the perfect shade of canary yellow. I remember old man Piedmont almost kicked us all out of the store after Dad rejected his third attempt at mixing the shade on the paint chip my dad picked out.

It was my mom’s favorite color, and the kitchen is a time capsule even now. The same Formica and chrome table positioned smack in the center of the large room, same cast-iron stove sitting off on one wall, same faded red Hoosier cabinet, and next to it, its twin in seafoam green covering the opposite wall.

There’s running water in the house now. But the old hand pump to bring the water from the well to the sink still juts up through the kitchen counter, and my mind floods with memories of a childhood of laughter and love.

Looking at Maria sitting there, I realize this place hasn’t felt more like home in a long time. And right now, I’d freeze this instant in time just to relive it over and over because I know it’s going to be the first of thousands of moments I see her sitting here. Glowing. Lighting up my heart.

I grab a glass from the chaotic selection of mismatched options gathered over the years and fill it with sweet tea, then shut the refrigerator, open the freezer, and plunk a few ice cubes into the amber liquid.

When I hand it to her, our fingers touch around the cool glass, sending lightning through my fingertips and blurring my vision. I stare long and hard at that face as she sips the liquid, shooting me a quizzical smile from over the rim of the glass.

“What?” she finally chokes out after a long, obvious moment of my silent gawking.

“Do you have any idea how sexy you are?” I rub my hands up and down my thighs, wishing I could rub them up and down my cock and ease this need.

“Whatever.” She dismisses my comment, clearing her throat and crossing her ankles.

“Baby, you are the sexiest thing God ever strung a gut through.” I cross my arms over my chest, bow my head for a moment, and try to gain my bearings. I’m about to throw her across this table and feast on what I’m sure is the world’s sweetest cunt.

She almost splutters her drink. “What did you say?” Her giggle raises my gaze, and I see the sparkle in her eye. A sparkle I want to put there every day for the rest of my life.

“Just cowboy wisdom, darlin’.” I grin, reaching over to press my fingertip just under her eye and wipe away a loose eyelash. “Make a wish. The angels are listening.”

I raise my finger in front of her lips. When she closes her eyes and blows, I make my own wish, and in that second, make all the plans I need to make it come true.