Middle-aged rancher alone for 8 years until an Apache woman came and begged for warmth in his bed. The snow started coming sideways around 4 in the afternoon, which meant I had maybe an hour to get the horses in before the temperature dropped far enough to matter. I remember the exact sound the barn door made, that iron scrape, the wood swollen with cold. I'd been hearing it for 8 years and still hadn't fixed the hinge. Never seemed like enough of a reason to bother.
The bay mare was already pacing her stall. I threw feed, checked water, pulled the lantern high, and counted heads the way a man does when he's out of habit of counting anything else. Five horses, one dog somewhere. Me. That was my whole inventory.
I was 44 years old and I had a working ranch, 160 acres, decent water, the house my father built, and I'd added a room onto when I thought I'd need the space. I had a smokehouse with meat in it and a root cellar with enough to last the winter. On paper, I was fine. I knew men in worse shape. I told myself that a lot.
What I didn't have was anyone to tell about the hinge. You get used to it. That's the honest answer. You stop noticing the quiet the same way you stop noticing the smell of your own coat. It just becomes the texture of days.
Wake up, work, eat something, sleep. The ranch ran because it had to run. I wasn't unhappy exactly. I wasn't much of anything. Her name had been Clara and she'd been dead 9 years come March.
Not eight. No. I've been saying 8 for so long I forgot to update it. Some men drink after a thing like that. Some men sell and move on and find themselves a new life.
I stayed because the ranch was real and I understood it and I didn't know what else I was supposed to do with myself. Clara had wanted to be here so I stayed. It made a kind of sense at the time. Less sense by year 4. No sense at all by year 7.
But by then staying was just what I did. I was nailing the barn door closed from the inside storm nail. Just a board across the bracket when I heard something hit the side of the building. Not the wind, the wind. I knew this was something with weight.
I stood still and listened. The horses shifted. The lantern swung a little on its hook. Then it came again, a flat open palm sound against the planking. Not a knock, more like something using the last of what it had.