Awesome photo by Isaac Bridges that just reminded me of Av and Outlaw when I saw it. Isaac is just starting out so check out his fb page. Thanks Jessica for the photo
I must say sorry for the long wait, I've had some pretty full on stuff happening and yeah... again sorry and thank you for all your support.
Irene's fingers in my hair don't possess the strength of the ones who spent their time twisting and twirling my locks last night, causing me to audibly sigh and goose bumps to cascade down my neck but they do have a strange hypnotic calming effect. Really calming, because I don't know how in hell her brushing is causing my eyes to constantly drift shut considering what is going on in front of them... but they are.
And I know why I'm not fighting it, it's because when they close I get to picture this morning. Waking up early and finding myself wedged between Amber's back and Noah's side, my leg thrown over his and my arm wrapped around his waist. It felt good, it felt right. I liked it. And Noah for the first time ever, swollen eye and bruised and battered shoulder clad in an old shirt of Harry's, looked as peaceful as I could ever imagine him being. The way his face was free of all coldness and worry, the way his arm was curled around me without fear of his father's words. All that but mostly it was the way his hand was tangled in Amber's mane. My heart felt funny.
We didn't start off like that though. I suppose I may have to thank Outlaw - in a weird way - for causing Noah to want to be extremely close to me. Bloody horses with sketchy backgrounds.
We had spent a good deal of time the night before just brushing Amber, Cherokee and Peanut, Outlaw at that stage was nowhere to be seen. Since he had started to get a bit stronger and steady on his legs he'd taken to exploring, which was fine because every step worked his muscles on his own accord and I couldn't wait until he was well enough to get back into work.
Cherokee couldn't make up his mind who he wanted to brush him. He kept moving after a few seconds and tried to push in between the other horses and the groomer. Amber got jack of it pretty quickly and had tried to boot him. Noah was chosen then, although Cherokee clearly wasn't overly impressed as Noah didn't brush him at his preferred intensity or area. He'd kept turning and either pushing his butt at Noah or shoving his head under the brush and lifting it up for the brush to be moved over his head. I was impressed at Noah's calmness with him, the way he berated him as he brushed him and Noah's laughter made me smile when he giggled like a little kid when Cherokee would curl his lips back when Nosh brushed his face.
While we brushed we played this word association game that Noah said people had tried to get to him to do after... his family ordeal. Slowly it changed into songs, Noah, by the way does not know many songs. I will have to change that. Most of Noah's answers were about fighting, cars or surfing and most of mine were to do with horses or farming. Big surprise. We got into giving crazy answers though that cracked us up. I wondered why people would want to know his answers after that happened on his life?
As I watched Noah brush the geldings from under Amber's neck, a plan started to formulate in my mind. It seemed touching - if it was rhythmic and I was talking or singing - got past some of his defenses. Okay, that and maybe the fact that he was quite tipsy. He kept chuckling or staring at me through his one good green eye, sometimes though a shadow past over his face and he frowned and put a lot of effort into brushing.
I kept thinking how words can change peoples' lives. That the person who come up with the saying stick and stones will break my bones but words will never hurt me had to have been deaf. He had to of been without a doubt, words have have hidden contraptions like ninja weapons that claw into your stomach and feast on the flesh they keep reopening. Dad's words were doing that to me again and again even though I had put them in perspective. They kept popping up at random moments and I kept trying to shove them down but they were just to sticky to move. I can't imagine what words accompanied by the brutal scene Noah had faced would have done to his insides.
