Lilac's Chance

Chapter Two

"Are you okay, Miss?"

The world is upside down. The sky is coated with dirt, the ground a great blue abyss opened at my feet. Nothing makes sense. Especially not the sky-blue eyes that stare worriedly at me through my window that should be next to my shoulder, not above my head. I can't focus on anything else, just those eyes and a cowboy hat floating above them.

"I think she's in shock, Braydon. Help her out of the truck before we all freeze."

Hands enter the equation. They're yanking at the door handle, and then disappear only to go through the dash and unlock Mother Teresa from the inside. And then somewhere a seat belt unbuckles, and I'm being pulled back into the cold air.

My brain has stopped at this point. I can't think, can't breathe. Mother Teresa is pressed into a ditch, the front of the entire truck matching the shape of a tree that looks like it just fought its last fight. Probably, it has.

Probably, also, Mother Teresa will never drive again. She looks utterly totaled.

"Are there any broken bones? Are you hurt?"

I blink, slowly, and the feel of strange, calloused hands gripping my arm and an exchange of voices somewhere above my head comes into my mind. From somewhere far away, I hear myself say, "Nothing is broken. Except maybe Mother Teresa. But I'm.... I'm cold."

"She's going into shock," someone says. The voice is young, friendly. "Let's get her back to Bonawinds." I can only nod an agreement before the calloused hands are replaced by the sensation of lifting, and motion. I think I am being carried, but I cannot be sure because it is then that blackness folds on on me, swallowing me in blissful nothing.

*****

I wake in a small room, burrowed under a thick woolen blanket. Somewhere a fire crackles. The thing beneath me- a couch, or a bed, maybe- is deep and pulls me in, trying to convince me back to sleep.

I don't know where I am. 

At the thought, I bolt upwards and throw the blanket off, taking in dark wooden walls and portraits of horses and a black window in a single glance. There's a fire, all right, embalmed in a brick chimney-thing. We never had or needed such a thing in my modern Kentucky house. And there's another couch- that is what I'm sitting on- felt and mismatching red plaid that slouches against the opposite wall beneath a wide photograph of some unkempt ponies. The room is small, with what I think may be a kitchen- if you count a mini fridge and microwave- in the corner but there's a few doors that hint at a little bit of size.

All of this I take in, and then one of the doors flings open to let in a chilling gust of wind and a man.

He stomps his boots as he steps through the door, shaking mud over a towel that shields the wooden floor from the worst of the elements. There's a hat on his head and a jacket on his body, and that's all I can see before he realizes I'm awake.

He's the older of the two that presumably rescued me, if my fractured memories serve me right. His weather-beaten face speaks of long, long hours outside, deeply tanned to the point of looking leathery. And he looks at me for a long, long time, long enough for me to realize that he's not the owner of those blue, blue eyes, before finally saying, "Mother Teresa?"

"My truck!" I realize. Outside of my blanket is still far too cold, despite the fire, so I burrow back into it before asking hopefully, "Is she- it,  okay?"

He stares at me for a long time, again, before shaking his head. "You're lucky to be alive."

I deflate.

Fantastic. Now I'm in the middle of nowhere with a demolished truck and two strange guys. If it weren't for the fact that I haven't been killed yet, I would think that this sounded like the beginning of an excellent horror novel. "Who are you?" I risk asking. "And the other guy?"

"So you remember everything that happened after the crash? Before you fainted?"

"I did not-" I stopped. "Okay. Yes. I think."

He nods, once, before hanging up his hat and kicking off his boots to reveal holey socks and a graying head. "The name's Hank. The boy is Braydon. He's still in the barn."

The barn! So I am on a horse farm. Instantly I feel a little more at ease- if anything, I am in the proximity of a horse (no surprise in Texas). Anywhere near a horse is home. Hank must see some of this written on my face, because he inclines his face and steps across the tiny living room towards the mini fridge. "You a horse person?"

"I'm- a jockey." Truth, but not all of it. "I was looking for work when I, um, crashed."

"I reckon you were driving from Silvercreek?"

"Yep." Hank takes something from the fridge and tosses it to me. A half of a sub sandwich, full of meat and cheese and all things unholy for a jockey with a weight limit. Well, I am in absolutely no position to be picky. Carefully unwrapping the paper wrappings, I bite into it, suddenly realizing how famished I am. "Thanks."

Shrug. "No one else was gonna eat it. But Silvercreek turned you down? They're not the nicest of racing barns round here. How many races have you ridden in?"

The sub suddenly isn't as appetizing as before with a side of his implication- if I wasn't good enough for Silvercreek, I wasn't good enough for anywhere. My fingers dig a pickle from the depths of the bread while I sullenly answer, "a few."

I've run and placed in every jewel in the Triple Crown. So Far So Good and I had been undefeated on the road to the Derby until the Santa Anita. I'd raced a few other horses for Dad since then,  just to keep in shape, and had five wins from them. But it isn't enough. It never will be.

"Well," Hank grunts "You're young. You'll get there." And with that, he grabs something from fridge and disappears into what I figure is his room.

He hasn't even asked for my name.

With the onset of nighttime- how long have I slept?- pressing in on me through the windows, and the dwindling fire as my only company, I finish my sub. And then I wait. I wonder when Braydon will come inside. I wonder where my phone is, and if Mother Teresa has been towed yet. I wonder if Dad has tried to call me, and if he has, if he's worried about me. But mostly I can't think about the same thing for too long, so I stare at the ponies on the wall and wish for a TV.

An indeterminate amount of time has passed before the door to the outside opens again, and a young man I assume is Braydon lets himself in. He, too, removes his hat and jacket and sticks them on the wall, and kicks off his boots. I study his backside, since it's the only thing I can see, and note the faded shirt and old jeans that cling to him just right and the way his hands carefully adjust his hat so it won't fall from the hook.

So I'm staring at him with an intensity that could fry an egg when he turns around and catches sight of me.

It's definitely the guy from my rescue. His eyes are a piercing blue that seem to gleam in the shadowed doorway he stands in. His hair is dark dark dark brown, almost black, slicked back into a pontail, and his face is angled in a way that makes me think instantly of Jack, though he's about two feet taller than the jockey and much more filled out.

"You must be Braydon," I say, because he doesn't seem to be the first to break the silence as we both appraise each other.

He looks away first, and his eyes find my sandwich wrappings. "Hank fed you, then," he says, and that's it. He crosses the room and opens the door next to Hank's.  So the left must be, hopefully is, a bathroom.

I'm left in utter silence. Well, almost. There's whining and scratching coming from outside, so I get up and throw away my sandwich wrappings before letting the dog in. She's a small mutt, speckled and yellow, with floppy ears, and she jumps onto my side of the couch before shooting me a suspicious look. I curl up on the opposite armrest, wishing for sleep to take me from this awkwardness, until the dog finally creeps over to me, tail wagging apologetically, and cuddles into my arms. She smells of dog, and dirt,  and also hay and horses. It's very comfortable, and draws me back into sleep. I'm on the verge of it when a final thought flickers through my mind.

Neither of them know my name.