The next morning, I woke up to the sound of my alarm clock and the sound of heavy rain hitting my bedroom window. I turned off my alarm and got up to look out the window. The sky was a dark grey, and the rain came heavily on the earth. I smiled to myself, knowing that this downpour was going to be great for the corn field. I walked down stairs, once again to find Billie-Mae at her computer working with all the numbers. This time her music consisted of much more classic country music. As I walked into the kitchen, "I Cross My Heart" by George Strait was playing through the small speakers of the laptop, and Billie-Mae hardly even noticed me when I greeted her.
"Billie-Mae?" I tried getting her attention again. This time she lifted her head up, a confused and blank look on her face.
"Oh, good morning, Hayden." she said plainly. She immediately dropped her head back down to the papers that laid scattered in front of her.
"Is everything alright?" I ask her as pour myself a glass of orange juice. Billie-Mae answered me right away this time, but didn't take her eyes off her work for a single second.
"Who? Me?" she asked confusingly. "Oh, I'm alright, just a little tired is all." she says.
"Why's that? Didn't you get any sleep last night?" I asked, a little concerned about her mood.
"Yeah, I slept fine. It's just. . .all these college assignments are draining all the energy out of me." she tells me. Billie-Mae had been accepted to some fancy university up in Virginia three years ago. She received a scholarship in honor of taking advanced math and science classes since she was in junior high, and was planning on leaving late that summer. But about a month before she was supposed to leave, her mama got really sick. Billie-Mae couldn't bring herself to leave her mother alone for so long, considering her father left their family when she was only a little girl and there wasn't anyone else who'd be able to watch her and take care of her, so she contacted the university and was able to keep her scholarship while earning her degree online. Eventually, Billie-Mae's mama, my Aunt Jeanie, got better and Billie-Mae would've been able to go to the university, accept she had gotten comfortable with online classes and decided to continue college via internet.
"Why's that?" I ask as I take a seat next to her at the table. Unlike my sister and cousin, I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life. I never really had the desire to go to college. I was always perfectly content where I was. So, I decided to stay home and take over the farm as my career, which of course I didn't mind. Mama used to tell me she wished I would've gone to college, earn my degree and make a living for myself, doing what I wanted to do without having to be stuck in Jameson my whole life. I won't lie, there were times when I wished I had applied somewhere, maybe start my degree in agriculture or something, but it was too late now at this point. I had an entire farm to run, and Lord knows I don't have the money to pay for college anyways.
"Just a lot of complicated, time consuming problems and equations and stuff. I don't get summers off since a vocational school, so I'm stuck doing homework all year round." she informs me. I made a face at the idea of having to go to school in the summer. I barely liked going to school fall, winter, and spring. "Sometimes I just wish I could push all this stress away, or maybe even have the ability to get the answers right every time, no matter how hard I'd try to get them wrong." she admits.
I notice the song had changed to my favorite one of all time. I smiled, remembering my phone call with Chase a couple days ago. I felt a little bad for Billie-Mae having so much to stress about so much. I rubbed the back of her shoulders a little while she let her head hang low, her arms around her neck.
"You don't know how jealous I am of you right now." she also admits. I furrow my eyebrows at and giggle a little.
"What on earth do I have for you to be jealous of?" I asked, confused. She picked her head back up and looked at me with her tired eyes.
"You're just so happy right now. You got the family farm, you got a hot guy crushing on you like you two are in high school, you barrel racing for the first time in two years, and you don't have to worry about a mama that's on the verge of getting really sick again." she said, flailing her hands around in slight frustration. I use my fingers to move a few stray hairs from her bun out of her face.
"Oh, Billie-Mae. If only you knew how jealous I am of you." I tell her. She gave me the same confused look that I gave her. "At least you still got your mama and daddy. Granted, they ain't together anymore, but at least they're still breathing and alive. And you're taking college classes, earning your degree to become your own damn person. You don't a crybaby for an older sister, you don't have to run an entire farm by yourself, and you don't have to shovel animal crap every damn day." I say jokingly as I take a sip of my orange juice.
"Yeah, I guess you're right about that." she smirks a little, letting her eyes droop at the papers.
"It's just like Dolly Parton says: 'Everybody wants happiness, and no one wants pain. But you can't have a rainbow, without a little rain." I advise her. She smiled at me after giving her my coincidental advice.
"That's something your mama would say." Billie-Mae says as she lightly nudges my arm with her elbow. I give her wink before standing up to put my cup in the sink. As I stand in front of the sink, I look outside at the rain falling against the kitchen window and out onto the ground. The horses were probably staying in the barn at the moment, the cows finding refuge under some tree, the chickens in the coop or wandering around, and the pigs sleeping in their pens. I guess today was a lazy day for the farmers. Just then, I got an idea. I ran back over to Billie-Mae excitedly.
"Billie-Mae!" I shout. I jump on her, slamming the paper in hand down onto the table.
"Hey!" she says, a little annoyed.
"We're going dancing tonight." I tell her with a smile on my face. She looks at me like I'm crazy.
"Dancing?" she asks.
"Yeah! Me and you. What do you say?" I ask. I could feel the excitement running through my veins at the mere thought of dancing.
"I don't know, Hayden. I got all this work and--" I cut her off immediately.
"Oh come on, cuz! When was the last we went out? Especially when it was just me and you? Think about it. The two of us, in our good boots and jeans, wearing out tight shirts and our hats. We haven't been dancing at Wagon Wheel in years." I try to convince. She sat there in silence for a moment, thinking.
"Well. . ." she starts.
"Come on, Billie-Mae. Please!" I beg.
"Oh, hell. Why not?" she agrees. I throw my arms around he and squeal with joy.
"We're going to have so much fun!" I shout. I got up and and started making pancakes for the two of us. When we were finished and the dishes were cleaned up, I got dressed in my normal clothes and went outside to do what few chores I could while it was down pouring. I fed all the animals, checked for more eggs in the chicken coop, and then checked the utters of a few of the cows to see if they'll milking soon. I figured another day or two should be perfect.
When I went back inside the house, I was soaked with rain water. Billie-Mae gave me a stack of towels to dry off with and to clean up what made and water I had tracked into the house. After I had dried off as best as I could and changed into dry clothes, I got a phone call from this year's director of the Jameson's Fourth of July Fair. Ever year they ask local farmers to pitch in in anyway they can to help make the fair a success. Sometimes they make specific requests from the farmers depending on what that year's director wants to do.
"Hello?" I answer my cell phone. The voice that came out of the receiver was not one I was fond of hearing.
"Hello, Hayden Jane! It's Rosanne Pickett! " she says a little too cheerfully. I rolled my eyes at Rosanne Pickett's greeting. She was the kind of women that always used people's first and middle name when she greeted them, and how she knew everyone's middle name was a mystery to everyone.
"Hello, Rosanne." I say plainly. I flop onto my bed, hoping this was going to be a short phone call. Rosanne's voice was like one you'd hear out of a cliche southern belle movie, where they talk proper with a southern drawl, mixed with nasally sound of Jenifer Coolidge's voice when she was in "A Cinderella Story".
"I was just calling to let you know that I'm in charge of this year's Fourth of July Fair, and to also ask you what ya'll would be providing for this year?" she asked. Great. So I'll have to answer to Rosanne for the next week and a half about where to put things and how much she appreciates the Lord's love.
"Well, that's nice to hear, Rosanne. I'm sure we'll just be supplying to hay bales again this year." I inform her as cheerfully as possible.
"Uh huh, okay. Thank you so much, honey. I'll give you a call in a few days for when we're going to need those bales of yours, if you need any help you just me know, alright? Okay, I'll see ya'll at soon. Bye-bye." she says before hanging up. Thank the Lord that that didn't take as long as I thought it would. Ever since I was little my family always supplied the hay bales for the fair, considering we had the most horses than the other farmers did. I wrote down a note about calling Ed, my supplier, and telling him we'll need this year's fair delivery.
I go down stairs to check up on Billie-Mae, only to find her cleaning up her work from this morning.
"Who was that you were talking to?" Billie-Mae asked. She must have heard me from my room.
"That was Rosanne Pickett." I inform her. Billie-Mae makes a disgusted face, scrunching up her nose at the very sound of her name.
"Rosanne Pickett? What on earth does she want?" she asks again.
"She's running the fair this year and called to put my down for hay bales again." I say as I grab a glass of sweet tea. "I swear, every year she gets more and more artificial looking." I joke. Rosanne Gracie Pickett was Jameson's golden girl. In high school, Rosanne was the girl all the guys wanted to date and all the girls hated. She was on the cheer leading team, student council, homecoming and prom queen, and has been Daisy's competition since kindergarten. Believe it or not she stole one of Daisy's boyfriends, and my only one with in the same year.
"Doesn't surprise me. Last time I checked, natural blondes' hair doesn't change from yellow to platinum in four years." Billie-Mae teased. We both snickered at Rosanne's famous claim about being a natural blonde.
"I wonder if anyone else noticed that her bra size when from a C to a DD in just a few months." I joke as well. We laugh again at our jokes towards Rosanne Pickett, the queen of artificial and the goddess of being two-faced. People could coddle Rosanne all they wanted, but so some people, she was still putting on the sweet and innocent act she in high school. "Alright, I'm gonna go shower. You might wanna start getting ready, too." I suggest to her. Billie-Mae nods her head as I walk back upstairs to get ready.
"Billie-Mae!" I shout from my closed bedroom door. I hear my cousin's door open, immediately followed by mine.
"What is it?" she asks. I turn to her with two different shirts in my hands.
"Which one?" I ask. She makes a disappointed face as she approached my chosen options.
"Honestly, neither." she said, taking my shirts and throwing them on the bed. She walked up to my closet and shuffled through my shirts. "Hayden, do you anything remotely girly?" she asked.
"What do you mean?" I asked. I walked to her side as she pulled out a shirt that I hadn't work in years. It was a Dierks Bentley t-shirt that I had bought at his concert in Raleigh last year. It was white and it had the cover of his album "BLACK" on it. I remember Daisy had taken me to the concert for my birthday, and made me wear the shirt right after I bought. Except, she though it could use a touch up, so she took a pair of manicure nails and cut a line up the front, right before it would hit the bottom of the picture. Because she was using such tiny scissors and was determined to complete her work, she ended sitting through the entire Cole Swindell opening performance. She wouldn't let me leave to change into the shirt when she was finished, so she tried to cover me as best she could while I quickly changed, and then took the two ends of her cut and tied them together, exposing my stomach, but leaving the shirt loose enough for the knot to hang over my bellybutton and be comfortable. I smiled at the memory of one of my favorite nights of life.
"I think this would be do-able in replace of something shiny or even pink." Billie-Mae joked as she tossed me the shirt. I hadn't worn the shirt since the day I bought it. Maybe it was time to wear again. I pulled the shirt on over my head and looked in the mirror. It was just a smidgen tighter then it was last year, all thanks to the muscle my body had produced from farm work. The sleeves fit a little tighter, and the knot still hung over my belly button, but the shoulders seemed to be fitted as well. I shrugged and thought it looked fine. I sat on the bed and grabbed my good boots.
Every southern girl owned two pairs of boots: one pair for working and riding, and the other pair for showing off. I had a pair of authentic, brown leather boots that were a graduation present from Mama. The toe of the boot came up to a short, rounded off point, just the way I liked them. The leg of the boot stopped mid shin and was decorated in all kinds of stamped patterns. They were are the most prized thing I own, because not only were they one of the most expensive things I owned, they were also the last present that Mama and Daddy ever got me. I pulled my boots on and pulled the legs of my jeans over them. I wore my jeans that fit and flattered my body perfectly, and cut off at the right spot at the boots so they weren't high and weren't so low that the pants legs dragged under the boot. I ran a brush through my eye and checked my make up one last time before grabbing my black hat with a white outline of the Panthers logo on it and my denim jacket before heading downstairs.
"Alright, Billie-Mae, you almost ready?" I should from downstairs, still hearing the music playing in her room.
"I'll be ready in a second!" she shouts back. I walk into the kitchen, the heels of my barely worn boots echoing through the halls. I grab down two shot glasses and a bottle Jack Daniel's Whiskey, setting them on the island. I go to fill both glasses with the dark liquid when there was a knock on the door. I set the bottle down and walk over to answer it, kicking my jacket and hat to the side so they were out of the way.
I pull the door open, and there before me is none other than Chase Taylor himself. As soon as the door opened, Chase stared at me with his jaw dropped in awe. I could feel my ears turning more and more red by the second. "Chase!" I say. "W-what are you doing here?" I ask, a little confused.
"I invited him to come with us." Billie-Mae said as she made her down the stairs. I motion for Chase to come in.
"Oh, did you now." I say sarcastically to my cousin, who was putting her good boots on while she sat on the bottom step.
"I called him while you were in the shower. Chase hasn't been in Jameson for that long, and Lord knows how bored he probably is at his grandparents. So, I invited him to come with." she explains. She stands up, patting me on the shoulder and she clicked her boots down the hall and into the kitchen.
"You don't mind, do you?" Chase asks.
"Oh, no, no, of course not. You're more than welcomed to come with. You just got me by surprise is all." I say with a nervous laugh. He smiles at me, making me ears even hotter.
"If it makes you feel any better, you caught me by surprise when you opened that door." he flirts. I gave him a smile and shyly looked down at my boots, but I felt a hand grab my chin and push it back up. "You gotta stop doing that." he tells me.
"Why?" I ask, giving him a look.
"How else am I gonna be able to see that smile of yours?" he flirtatiously asks. My heart just about did a back flip when he said that to me. We were frozen for a moment, his hand still holding my chin.
"Are were doing shots, or what?" I hear Billie-Mae shout. I move away from Chase's hand guide him to the kitchen.
"Aren't you both only, like, twenty?" Chase asks suspiciously. Billie-Mae and I laugh at his remark.
"Oh, sweetheart. In Jameson, North Carolina, as long as you're eighteen, ain't nobody gonna care if you're drinking or not." Billie-Mae explains. Chase shrugs his shoulders as we all hold our shot glasses in the middle of the island.
"Cheers. To the harvest." I say. Billie-Mae lets out a small cheer before downing her whiskey, then making a disgusted face afterwards.
"Ugh, you know I hate whiskey." Billie-Mae complains.
"And you know I hate vodka." I laugh. Chase offered to be the DD tonight since he didn't think his grandma would appreciate him coming home drunk. We all hoped in to Mr. Taylor's pick up truck and rode on over to the best place in all of Jameson, North Carolina: Beau Jr.'s