The Stars in the Sky

Chapter 5: Check Yes or No

Will put two fingers up to his handsome, full lips and whistled, a loud, piercing whistle, and yelled, "C'mon girl!"

For a second, I thought he was talking to me, and I went to put my hands to my hips and say "excuse me?" (or a whole lot worse), but then a beautiful, fluffy, white and mottled gray Australian Shepherd dog came bounding up to him, circled around him in excitement wagging its tail, and then clambered into the back of Will's truck. So he was calling the dog, not me. Serves me right for making assumptions.

"This is Trixie," he said, introducing me to his dog. Then he paused a second, eyebrows closing in on each other, looking at me. "You okay with dogs?"

Was I okay with dogs? I loved dogs! "Hel-lo, gorgeous," I cooed, rubbing behind her ears and putting my face in her ruff. She was soft to the touch, and licked my cheek thoroughly, while I giggled.

Will let out a breath and looked at me, somewhat satisfied, like I had passed a test.

After lunch, we had bussed our dirty dishes to the kitchen window and then I followed Will out to his truck to get my tour of the top secret quantity of acreage of Headlands Ranch.

This cowboy drove the biggest truck I'd ever seen, a brand new, white Ford F-350. It was silly big. I hated to think of its freeway gas mileage, let alone "in town," and I had practically needed a stepladder to get up into it. His truck would totally eat my car for dinner and still have room to spare. Although his truck was so new that it did not have license plates, most of the sides were covered in mud and the inside was dirty with dried clumps of mud that were clearly from his boots. I wondered why there was so much mud, because it was the dry season, and then I remembered that he was probably going around fields as they irrigated, which would explain it. As he saw me gingerly put on my seatbelt, he gave me a half grin. "You okay with things being a little dirty?"

"Of course," I chirped, more heartily than I felt. Ignoring the double-entendre, I wasn't about to complain and make him think that I was more of an elitist than he already seemed to think. It was strange: part of me could care less what he thought of me because he was an asshole with whom I didn't agree about anything, and who therefore deserved a tongue lashing, and part of me told me to be quiet and polite because he was my boss. These sides were at war with each other and it was anyone's guess as to whether the mouthy me or the agreeable me would come out. Throw in the fact that he was gloriously handsome, and I knew what was under his big belt buckle, and it was extremely difficult to know what to do from moment to moment. I figured that I would continue to wing it, because this was my summer adventure, after all. I liked not knowing what would happen next.

He shifted the truck into reverse, turned on country radio — ugh! — and started down the rough, dirt road.

I had already figured out that Will was not much of a talker. Fortunately, or unfortunately, I was, so I decided to drill him with questions as we drove.

"So. You grew up here, huh?"

"Yep."

"Do you have any brothers or sisters?"

"Nope."

After a few more one word answers, I realized that this wasn't working well. Still, I kept on.

"What are we listening to?"

"George Strait."

"It's, uh, not bad." This was a white lie. It was definitely country music, and twangy, so it was not my style (since I listened to "anything but country"), but the song was cute, about a girl passing a guy a note in school to "check yes or no" if he liked her.