Chapter 8: Autumn

I should’ve headed straight back for that trailer, but as I was traveling along the highway, I saw those same trailers being pulled behind trucks to be stored for the next rodeo. Obviously, Dallas had woken up yet again to an empty bed, and the more I thought about it, the sicker I felt. Yet again, I’d left the only man who ever made me feel worth something, right after he’d bared his soul to me, no less.

What kind of woman was I?

I thought about traveling around town to find him. I thought about going to his parents’ home and asking if they knew where he was. I wondered if they were still alive, rickety in their old age still rocking on their porch, or if they had passed and if so, whether they were buried somewhere I could visit. Somewhere I could shed tears over not being at their funeral to pay my respects.

Dallas was close to his family, and I adored them myself. He was an only child, but his mother had adopted many boys and girls around the neighborhood. Not legally, of course, but they always seemed to be in and out of their house. She would feed them, give them a place to sleep when they needed it, and even gave out keys to her own home in case they wanted to come over instead of going home. Dallas and I, we were fortunate to have loving families, but a lot of the kids around our hometown weren’t as lucky. Some had abusive homes and some had poor homes. Some had homes with too many children, and some had homes with absent parents. Dallas’s mother was never able to have the house full of kids she wanted, so she took in everyone else’s when they didn’t have a place to go.

I decided to drive by their old home, just to see if anyone was there.

The house was kept up really well. The porch looked to have been repainted, and the roof was obviously new. The old rocking chairs swayed with the wind, but no one seemed to be home. There were no cars or lights on, and no children frolicking around the property.

Not before long, my eyes landed on a ‘For Sale’ sign in the front yard.

I parked my car and got out to pull a slip of paper from the open box, and when I slipped back into my car, I looked over the information; Four bedrooms, two-and-a-half baths, ranch-style home with a basement sitting on nine acres of land. Wrap-around porch, forced heating, central air conditioning, hardwood floors…

The works. “Someone really put a lot of work into this home,” I muttered to myself.

The home and property was being sold for $200,000.00, but I could tell it had been on the market for a while. My eyes watered at the idea of Dallas experiencing the passing of his parents by himself. It made me nauseous with guilt because I should have been there to help him. To support him during a time of need.

I sighed, thinking about how I really needed to tell him what happened. I needed him to know it wasn’t his fault just in case he’d been incorrectly assuming that he had somehow chased me away.

I opened my phone and called the only restaurant in town that I knew took reservations and made one for two at 7 o’clock in the evening. I still wasn’t sure how I would get in touch with Dallas before then, but I was sure if I asked around town enough, someone would lead me to him; in small towns, you never really could stay hidden for long.

Unless, of course, you up and left without telling anyone except your parents via a note.

I tossed the piece of paper to the floor after I hung up my phone and sped down the road towards the stables. I used to go there whenever I felt overwhelmed or needed to think. The owner’s son knew Dallas from high school. If they still owned the barn and he was still working there, I figured they might know where Dallas was and I might be able to get in a relaxing ride before cleaning up and meeting him later that night.

That is, if he was willing to meet with me after my rude and abrupt departure.

I weaved my way to the stable as if I had been there yesterday. It looked exactly as I remembered it, apple trees lined the half mile gravel driveway so the horses could have snacks while they were out to pasture. The grass was a lush green that could be seen for miles. My parents owned the second-largest piece of property to this stable. It sat on close to forty acres of rolling hills and land, and no matter how much the city tried to buy out some of their land, they simply paid the higher taxes and kept on going with their services. They provided everything anyone could possibly want when it came to horses and their care, from boarding services, to breeding services, grooming services, shoe services, and even training services. They gave lessons and had a partnership with my parents in the summer to help with the summer camps, and they even held horse shows and competitions so the local kids learning to ride horses could compete.

It was where I found my solace whenever I felt stressed during my high school and college days. I had volunteered my time whenever I could in the summer to help out when I was a kid, shoveling stalls, brushing horses, and even helping birth a few foals too.

My smile hurt my face as I pulled up to the stables and the shaggy-haired boy I’d known throughout high school turned around with the face of a man plastered onto his neck.

“Well, I’ll be damned! Autumn is that you?” he said.

I threw the car into park and barreled up the parking lot, jumping into his arms. He swung me around, holding me for a while before setting me back on my feet.

“You ain’t been ‘round here in a while! How ya been?” he asked. Bradley had always been such a good kid, even after losing his mom so young. His dad stepped up the best he could, and the two of them decided to open this place when he was in middle school, dedicating it to her and everything. They always said this place had her soul. She loved apples in the fall and there was nothing she loved more than a horse in white. Every horse they ever purchased on their own volition either had white coats or white manes and tails, and it made me teary-eyed every time I thought about it.

“Thinkin’ ‘bout Mom, aren’t ya?” Bradley asked.

“Sorry,” I sniffled.

“Don’t be. So, what brings you here? Wanting to take a ride?”

“Well, yes, and there’s something else,” I said.

“You wanna know where to find Dallas,” he smirked. My face flush before he held out his phone. “Give it here,” he said, gesturing to mine.

I watched him open it up and type something in, and when he turned it around, I realized he had added Dallas’s number into my contacts list. I looked up at him with tears in my eyes before taking the phone from him and slipping it back into my pocket before throwing my arms around his neck.

“I don’t know what happened with y’all, but call him. He’ll be happy to see you,” Bradley said.

“Any chance I can cash in that ride?” I asked.

He led me out to the barn and showed me this beautiful horse. His coat was white, while his mane and tail were black. As I admired him, I could have sworn there was a mischievous smirk on the horse’s face.

“This here’s Oreo. Let’s get you saddled up, and you can take him out. He hasn’t been out yet today, so he’ll love you just for gettin’ him out of his stall.”

“You think I don’t remember how to put one of these on?” I asked. Bradley laughed while he saddled up Oreo, and when I swung my leg over, he whistled before walking away.

“Dallas sure is a lucky guy!” he called back over his shoulder.

I wish I could’ve believed him, but the truth was that Dallas deserved far better than me. I’d fallen in love with him and I knew that he loved me; yet, when I was offered my dream job, I left his side without so much as consulting him in the matter before booking a flight for Paris. On the one hand, that’s my career. They handed me my dream on a platter and I sure as hell wasn’t gonna turn it down. But on the other hand, Dallas was my soulmate, the man I clung to all throughout college. I supported his bull-riding endeavors even when his parents were too worried about his safety to see how happy it made him. And he had supported me in my fashion passion even though he repeatedly admitted not understanding a lick of it. We feasted on each other’s presence during the day and dined on each other’s bodies at night, and we had dated so long that our parents had already begun planning our wedding before Dallas had even proposed; it was just one of those things everyone knew would eventually happen. We knew it, our families knew it, and the entire town knew it.

The least I could do was give Dallas an explanation as to what happened. Even if my assumptions were incorrect and he would’ve followed me to Paris or, at the very least, supported me as I went, I needed to let him know that it was all in my head.

I needed him to know that I still cared for him and that there had been no one after him.

God, there was so much I wanted to say over dinner that just thinking about it made my hands tremble as I held Oreo’s reigns.

“Steady now,” I whispered to myself.

I ducked us out of the barn and got us going in the field. I untied my ponytail, letting the wind comb through my hair. I then held my arms out while my hips synced to the rhythm of Oreo’s thunderous hooves. My god, I had forgotten how powerful I felt on the back of a horse. I always used to tell Dallas that being on the back of a horse was more liberating than being on the back of a bull, but he would just smirk and tell me I hadn’t been on a bucking bull before.

And then I’d prove to him wrong every single night whenever I straddled his hips.

Everything was going so well. I had Dallas’s number, I had reservations, I finally had the guts to tell him what happened all those years ago, and I had actually gotten to sink my hands into the thick of his muscles again.

And now I was on top of the most beautiful horse in town, galloping through the greenest fields this state had to offer.

In short, I felt absolutely unstoppable.

Until Oreo unexpectedly reared back onto his haunches and started shrieking up a storm.

“Whoa, Oreo! Calm down, boy. Whoooooooa!”

I held tight onto the reigns and flexed my thighs, but my foot slid from the stirrup to my right. My body slowly sliding off to the side, I figured that if I tucked and rolled, I could at least run back to the barn while Oreo shook off whatever it was that had spooked him.

But when I looked down, there was a massive snake.

“Shit,” I swore, my heart skipping a frightened beat.

I tried desperately to rein Oreo in, but when he brought his feet back down, he bucked back with his hind legs, whinnying in pain. Having never dealt with this situation before, I was in unfamiliar territory.

I suddenly heard Bradley screaming behind me as the hooves of another horse quickly approached. And then I felt my body being thrown from Oreo as Bradley continued roaring my name in the background. When my back hit the ground, the last thing I remembered was Oreo’s hooves above my face and a sharp pain ricocheting down my neck right before everything went blank.