Rain Shadow (11 page)

Blah, blah, blah.

She signed her name. Few things in life were not “inherently dangerous” and when compared to, say, falling in love, horseback riding was a cakewalk.

“How many hands would you like to buy today?” A chubby, sixty-something woman wearing a plaid vest took Taylor’s waiver form and gestured toward a bag of poker chips.  

“Uh, just one.” Taylor dug in her pockets for a five. “I’m really here for the ride.”

“And we hope it’s a dry one.” The woman smiled and looked toward the heavens. “
Ridin’ on faith today.”

Taylor stuck her poker hand in her back pocket and made her way to the trailer. She breathed in the moist, fall air. It felt good to be outside being active and getting dirty. All that time in California had made her soft, citified. She remembered suddenly that as a child she’d loved the outdoors: collecting bugs, building forts, playing with animals, and being in the action. She’d pulled back over the last two years, stayed inside and avoided engaging too deeply with anyone or anything, her skin turning pale and sensitive as she cocooned in her own thoughts.

Protect, that’s what Taylor had tried to do for her body. It seemed the least she could do. But instead of getting stronger, she’d felt more and more vulnerable. Like the callous that builds up on the soles of tender feet exposed to sun and different textures, a person needed to risk to become strong and healthy. Since Rain had come into her life she had felt the pull to engage in life again.

Rain…. Why was a strange man touching her
?
Taylor’s steps quickened as she approached the trailer. A man stood by Rain’s side, stroking her shoulder. He seemed to be talking to the horse but Taylor couldn’t hear any words. She cleared her throat.

“What do you call her?” The man glanced up briefly but kept his attention on the horse.

“Rain.”

“Rain?”

The man made an effort to enunciate the word clearly, considering the choice. He furrowed his brow and ran long fingers through a thick mop of wavy brown hair. Taylor looked him up and down. With his longish hair he could be a hippy, but the high tech riding gear suggested something different. An athlete. She noted his riding tights, half- chaps over hikers meant for the stirrup, and Patagonia vest
.
Note to self: Buy a vest of some sort
.
A multi-tool snuggled at his hip, clipped to the belt. This guy knew horses and liked to be active. He watched her with probing hazel eyes.

“
I
lik
e
Rain.” Taylor crossed her arms. “Why else would I live in this part of the country.”

“Good point,” the man chuckled and stuck out his hand. “Jacob Wilson.”

“Taylor.”

She ignored his hand and pretended to adjust Rain’s headstall, pulling the mare close. Jacob looked disappointed. He ran his hand once more down the crest of Rain’s neck and over her shoulder.

“Well, Taylor,” Jacob seemed to be committing her name to memory, “I’ll always have my own name for this horse—Belissima.” He smiled, “Enjoy your ride.”

Taylor did not answer
.
Move away from the horse, you weird cute guy.

~  ~~

“My ass is killing me.” Taylor maneuvered Rain next to Toby, Liz’s rangy bay gelding. The horses made their way, unguided, to the horse trailer.

“What do you want, a medal for completing the ride or something?”

“How about at least a winning poker hand? I needed to win that Carhartt vest. Would help me fit in with the natives.” Taylor glanced back at a large circle of riders eating an after-ride lunch of chili and hot dogs. At least half wore a vest of some kind.

“That was barely ten miles. Get yourself in shape and I’ll take you on a real ride.” Liz pulled Toby up by the trailer and dismounted. She swayed for a moment and grasped the horn to steady herself.

“You knew most of the riders today.”

It was a statement more than a question. Though Liz kept to herself and avoided company on the trail, it seemed every person at the poker rider acknowledged her in some way. Though she hated herself for thinking it, Taylor wondered if it was because of Liz’s handicap, like the way one felt compelled to say hello to the guy in the wheelchair at Wal-Mart who greeted incoming shoppers.

“I like horses because they do not feel sorry for me.”

Taylor suddenly understood why Liz was always alone, why she shunned company or needless conversation.

“I know some of them.” Liz pulled the latigo free. She lined her weak side up to  Toby’s shoulder and shimmied the saddle off his back, guiding it to the ground to avoid having to heft the full weight herself.

“Do you know Jacob Wilson?”

Liz looked sharply at Taylor. “Everyone know
s
Docto
r
Wilson.”

“Doctor?”

“Doctor of Veterinary Medicine. Wasn’t for Wilson, your horse there would have been put down. He patched her up free of charge, took care of her for a month, and then asked us to find her a good home.”

Taylor dropped Rain’s sweaty saddle pad to the ground as her brain
clicked into rewind, sifting through images like a slide show—the photo
of the hand holding the bullet; the intimacy of his exchange with Rain; the mare’s obvious affection for him.
“
I’ll always have my own name for her
.
”

“You didn’t hit on him did you? Or insult him?” Liz’s odd features twitched repeatedly as she studied Taylor’s reaction.

“Not exactly. But I wasn’t nice, either. Why didn’t you tell me he was here?”

“You didn’t ask.”

Taylor watched Liz push her saddle into a carrying bag, then drag the bag to the tack room. It was a resourceful way to take care of her equipment without having to ask for help.

“Do you know what
Bellissima means?”

“You gonna load up or what? I don’t have all day.” Liz jerked her head to Taylor’s saddle lying where she had let it drop. Dirt scuffed the cantle. Liz frowned.

“I’m going, I’m going … ”

After loading the rest of the tack, Taylor put Rain into the trailer where Toby already waited. Liz immediately turned the key and the F250 rumbled to life. Taylor hurried to the passenger side. How was it possible she consistently couldn’t keep up with a handicapped woman?

“Why would he patch up a stray horse for free? Especially one like Rain?”

“Obviously handicapped for the rest of her life, you mean?” Liz glanced in her rear view mirror. “Why waste resources on that sort of individual?”

“Yeah.”

In the silence that followed Taylor forced her mind from Jacob Wilson
and considered her verbal blunder. With Liz it was hard to know when to keep talking and when to shut up.

“I didn’t mean it like that.”

“Like what, exactly?” Liz looked quickly at Taylor. She ignored her own question. “Guess he saw something worth saving
.
Bellissim
a
, by the way, means ‘beautiful’.”

Taylor did not reply. In the space of a few hours she’d insulted both people responsible for saving her mare’s life. Best to keep one’s mouth shut. She focused instead on the sun bleached stubble on the fields outside and the poetry of one word:
Bellissima.



Chapter 15

T

aylor watched her windshield wipers smear the first drops of rain into undulating channels across the glass in front of her. The long Indian summer had ended suddenly in early October, the day dawning with a brisk wetness that contrasted sharply with the sunburned shoulders Taylor had received on a trail ride the previous day. As much as the rain was refreshing, she fought the melancholy bubbling inside. The regular weekly trail rides with Liz would soon cease and she’d be forced back inside to fight memories of the past and contemplate her bleak future in real estate.

The wet weather and impending soggy winter were foremost on her mind when Taylor finally pulled up to her mother’s stylish condo in Edmonds for dinner. It wasn’
t
jus
t
dinner, Taylor reminded herself, shaking smoke from her jacket. It was an inquiry, a test, and marching orders. She’d earned her Washington State real estate license and a broker’s license was next on her mother’s agenda. Taylor had no interest
in becoming a broker, no interest in being made into a mini Ann Archer.
The two things she currently enjoyed most were a one-eyed horse and making mochas. Taylor punched the bell outside the building and scrambled for a way to explai
n
tha
t
to her mother.

While waiting, Taylor fought the anxiety of an evening with her mother by returning to a recent victory: Rain’s moment of trust. It was a small, inconspicuous moment, yet carried the deepest of messages.

She’d almost missed it, lost in thought about Melissa and the real estate deal she hoped to pull through. Then it dawned on her: she was standing at Rain’s blind side and the horse had not moved. Taylor looked down at the white head, muzzle lipping up stalks of hay, the sightless socket bobbing as Rain chewed quietly.

“Thanks for trusting me,” Taylor stroked the mare’s neck in their usual ritual, feeling the euphoria of passing a difficult test with flying colors. Rain lifted her head a few inches above the hay and paused as if she were listening. Without turning, a whiskery nicker answered, so faint it was hardly more than a fluttering of the nostrils.

The moment was real and true in a way few things were. Not that her mother would understand.

At first she’d been ecstatic to hide Rain’s existence and her secret riding life. Now she felt compelled to get the information off her chest, confess and get on with it. Secrets were like that.

“You keep the secret, then the secret keeps you.”

Taylor only needed to think of that particular
motherism to relive a wave of seven-year-old shame: the night her mother discovered the package of Bubblicious she’d stolen from the grocery store.

She hadn’t meant to. Really. She’d only wanted to hold the sparkly purple package of grape gum that her mother would never buy for her. When it was time to take the
cartfull of groceries out of the store she’d stuck it into her coat pocket without thinking. Shame washed over her in waves as she sat in the back seat of the car, fingering the secret package hidden in her pocket. She wanted to take it back, but there was no way now. And there was no doubt in her small mind that telling her mother was out of the question. No, she would throw the gum in the trash when they got home and forget she had done something so dishonest.

By the time they pulled into the drive, Taylor was certain the horror of what she’d done was written all over her face. Inside, she removed her shoes, eager to get to the bathroom, and hide that pack of
Bubblicious at the bottom of the white wicker wastebasket.

“Wait. Your jacket is soaking wet.” Her mother had grabbed her arm. “Let’s take that off so you don’t drip water everywhere … I swear this rain makes me feel like a slug.”

Her mother grinned and began to slide the jacket off Taylor’s shoulders. It slipped to the floor. As if in slow motion Taylor watched her mother pick up the jacket, feel the unbalanced weight in one pocket and stick her hand inside to investigate. She withdrew the gum.

“What? I didn’t pay for this.”

And so began a nightmare that lasted several months. The disappointment was the worst.  Taylor had cried and cried; had said she was sorry. She hadn’t meant to; truly, it was a mistake.

“But, you did it anyway, Taylor Ann. You broke a bond of trust between us and it doesn’t come back just like that.” She’d snapped her fingers, dark eyes serious.

Even after returning the gum and going to confession her mother insisted on checking her hands and pockets after each shopping excursion. She seemed to enjoy having the attention of fellow shoppers and the checkout clerk. The shame of a public audience would surely serve as insurance that Taylor’s dishonesty would never be repeated.

“You may be forgiven, Taylor Ann, but nobody really forgets. They think of stealing every time they see you.”

The incident was the first of many that produced the opposite of the honesty her mother had been trying to teach. The truth Taylor
learned is that living with the shame of revelation is worse than the secret
itself. Cover up your sins as best you can because God may forgive, but He remembers forever.

If her mother had ever been ashamed of anything only the priest at the Catholic Church knew about it. Ann Archer’s mistakes were not fodder for discussion; they were attended to in stoic solitude.

As tempting as it was, revealing Rain might open Pandora’s Box. Things about herself her mother didn’t know and didn’t want to know would spill out unbidden. Like the fact that they had nothing in common and probably never would.