OverTime 03: Slipping (First 70 Chapters)

Chapter 29: Defying Gravity (Lillabit)

It would have been interesting just for the number of wild animals that ran away as they realized man had come to their little forest. Deer. Tiny black-horned deer, aka antelope. Even one really big deer galloped out of a copse of trees and away to another one--I think that deer was an elk. Something short and brown and waddly, which from this distance could have been anything from a porcupine to a beaver to a badger, made its escape. And there were lots of birds and, to judge from the occasional flash in the water, fish.

Benj reached our bank again, doffed his hat to me with a dramatic bow, turned around and rode away again. In the meantime, Jacob and Jorge had reached the opposite side and were doubling back--spreading out as they did.

Testing the river bottom, I realized.

The sun seemed gentler, along the Platte's edge. The sparkle of reflected sunshine, nature's twinkle-lights, delighted my eyes after so many days of dust. All that was missing was music. Why yes, I was still hung up on the absence of music around here. But at least I didn't have to fight the urge to burst into modern song--or "Sweet Betsy of Pike."

A vista like this needed nothing less than a full orchestra. Instrumental, all the way. But I was willing to take the birdsong, and the water's whisper, and the buzz of insects that Lady Billie Holliday kept flicking away with her tail.

The air felt surprisingly velvety, instead of hot.

At one point, I had to turn to Milton just to smile my pleasure at being here, watching something happen instead of hiking between endless rocks and yucca plants. He looked startled and shy, and ducked his dark face in acknowledgement, but I thought I saw his lips quirk in return pleasure.

I'd missed out on so much by staying with the calf cart and just following the chuck wagon around! Why did the guys get to explore all this, and I didn't?

Other than, you know, because this was their job. I didn't exactly have a job. And because they were experts, and I was still learning to properly rein a horse. And because apparently I was something precious to be protected.

Don't get me wrong. It's nice to have people worry about you. But I'd had more fun since last night--not just with the sex, but with the stampede that preceded it--than I had since Ogallala.

"Got some quicksand here," called Jorge, maybe twenty yards downstream.

Garrison, wet from his chest down from swimming his horse, called, "Mark it!"

Milton rode that way and notched a tree approximate to where Jorge's horse stood in the flowing water. Then the men went back to crossing and recrossing the many layers of the Platte.

"Here it is," called Jacob, well upstream. Milton headed that direction to blaze another tree.

Finally, the men agreed that everything between the nocked tree upriver, and the one downriver, had "good bottom." Then they returned to me, all three of them, in wet, clingy clothes. Don't think I didn't appreciate that, especially one broad-chested cowboy in particular. Every one of them glistened with water from the ribs down--including the horses.

"Told you so," grinned Benj. "I ain't much one to believe in miracles, but we got us a ford."

Jacob ignored him so deliberately that Benj laughed.

"Let's get them beeves across afore we lose that miracle," decided my husband. And he looked... happy. Not smiling, mind you -- I hadn't fallen into a fantasy world where woodland creatures dance about and trail-boss husbands smile! But he seemed supremely satisfied.

He held his shoulders easier than he had in awhile.

His gray eyes practically sparkled.

Unlike when he'd been stuck with the other trail bosses, he was in charge, able to bend the universe to his standards. Not surprisingly, he liked that. Even better, he had a challenge to confront and overcome.