As Kid walked silently out of the barn, Lou blinked back the tears that had formed as she held him one last time and felt him pull away from her arms. Turning, she looked wildly around the empty stalls, at the ceiling, the floor, anywhere. She felt the walls were closing in, as if what had just happened couldn't be real, but it was. She leaned her head back against the beam behind her. The pain in her heart was so intense she felt breathless, and found herself drawing back to bang her own head against the post, as if the physical pain would somehow lessen the heartache. Trembling, and still fighting back tears, she caught herself and slid down to sit on the barn floor, her head in her hands, her fingers digging into her eyes to stop the crying. She had no right to cry. She was the one who pushed him away. She didn't have to lose him, even now, she knew she only had to call him back, promise him what he wanted, and she could keep him in her life. Part of her longed to do it . . . and the other part . . . the same part that had risen up and said no, kept her sitting there on the floor, struggling with heartbreak, guilt, shame, and loss. She couldn't call him, she couldn't take it back. That would be more wrong than even breaking his heart and her own.
Kid blindly walked, not caring where he was going, as long as it was away from her. Even after they'd agreed they had to go back to being just friends, she'd tempted him again, her soft lips trailing up the side of his neck as she held him the last time. Tempted him to keep things as they were, when she knew as well as he that it couldn't go on this way. It wasn't just because what they were doing wasn't proper. Hell, that was the least of it. It was because what they had just wasn't working, plain and simple. And in the process, their fighting, their struggle for control, was turning them both into people he no longer recognized. She was turning angry, resentful; he was now desperate and jealous. But knowing that they weren't making each other happy anymore didn't make the pain any less as he walked stiffly, unseeing and blank-faced, as fast as his feet could take him away from the barn.
Sitting on the porch whittling, Ike noticed Kid walking swiftly into the distance, the barn door swinging behind him. He sighed, and nudged Noah beside him, gesturing toward their friend.
"Ah, hell," Noah muttered, sympathetically.
"Looks like she turned him down," Jimmy remarked, glancing toward the barn. "Fella's timing is off, askin' her to get married now, after the way they been fightin' lately," he commented, shaking his head.
"You think one of us should go talk to him?" Buck asked uncertainly.
"No," Noah said. "Let him be for a bit. There's time for that later."
"Can't believe she turned him down," Cody said, watching Kid's retreating form. "She's some little - -"
"Watch it, Cody," Jimmy warned.
"I'm just sayin'," Cody protested. "She chases him for a year and a half, tellin' him he was goin' too slow, finally gets him following her around like a lovesick puppy, and then goes and breaks his heart. I think it's lousy." The boy flung the rag he was cleaning his gun with on the ground. "You ask me, he's better off without her. She never did nothin' but nag and browbeat him the last few weeks anyway. He's dodged a bullet for sure."
"What do you expect her to do, Cody? Say yes, quit her job and put up with him tellin' her what she can do, who she can talk to, the rest of her life?" Jimmy snapped. He stopped and winced, his face still bruised from Kid's senseless attack on him yesterday over the ring he'd just offered to Lou. "He was near about crazy with jealousy, for no good reason. I saw where that ends up with my pa. She's the one who's better off without him."
"You can't sit here and tell me you think Kid is anythin' like your pa," Cody protested. "He may've mixed it up with you over Lou, but he'd never lay a hand on a woman."
"I guess not, but just the same, he needs to learn to let her be her own woman. A woman like Lou can't be treated that way."
"She's still in there," Buck commented. "Wonder if we'll see either of them again tonight."
"Things could be kinda awkward around the bunkhouse now, dependin' on how they handle this," Noah said. "Hope they don't expect us to take sides."
"If they do, I'm on Kid's side on this one," Cody muttered. Jimmy's lopsided smirk showed plainly that his loyalty was with Lou, but he said nothing.
Ike got up and leaned his rifle on the porch rail.
"Where you goin,' Ike?" Buck asked, mystified.
*To talk to her. She needs a friend who can listen to her.*
Ike pushed open the barn door and saw the small, huddled figure sitting against the post. He walked over and sat beside her, waiting several minutes until she finally looked up, her face tear-stained.
"You know?"
He nodded.
*Kid asked me to help him pick out a ring for you. I happened to have just the kind you like.*
Lou smiled weakly, remembering the day she'd confessed to Ike that she hoped, some day, to marry Kid and had gone so far as to buy a ring for herself. Like some silly daydreaming schoolgirl, she thought bitterly. She'd lent Ike the ring to propose to Annie, and forgotten about it in all the excitement that had followed.
"You kept it all this time?"
*Forgot to give it back that day. It's been sitting in my Sunday suit pocket all this time. When he asked me about what kind of ring to get, I just gave it to him. Don't worry, I didn't tell him where I got it. Just told him I thought you would like it. Guess I was wrong. You changed your mind since then.*
"Oh, Ike." Her shoulders crumpled and he slid an arm around her.
Turning her chin up, he mouthed a word to her. *Why?*
"I wish I knew, Ike," Lou said helplessly. "You're right, something changed along the way. I was the one pushin' Kid at first, and then . . ." She sighed, thinking of all the times she had gotten so livid with Kid, first for not moving fast enough, then for crowding her. She didn't quite understand why she'd acted that way herself. It wasn't any wonder he'd thrown in the towel finally, she thought.
*Did you stop loving him?*
Lou stared into Ike's eyes a moment. "No. But loving each other isn't enough, I guess. I couldn't marry him with the way things have been between us."
*What are you going to do now? Work on making things better?*
She shook her head. "When I asked him what we were gonna do now, he . . . he said go back to the way we were before. Just friends. So that's it, I guess."
He handed her a handkerchief. *I'm sorry.*
"Me too," she choked, burying her head in Ike's arms.
Rachel watched Kid sitting motionless, staring at the glittering surface of the pond. Clearing her throat, she stepped from behind the brush.
"Kid, you all right?"
He shook his head.
She sat down next to him. "The boys told me you were fixin' to ask Lou to marry you, and . . . I guess she said no. I'm sorry, Kid."
"I know. She's sorry, you're sorry. I'm sorry. Everybody's sorry," he said flatly. "That's all that's left of what we had now. Sorries." He flung a rock into the pond, trying not to think of better times he'd shared with Lou on this very bank, what seemed like forever ago.
"Well, that's up to you, Kid. If that's how you want it. But I think it'd be a shame . . . you and Louise were friends first, weren't you?"
"Of course. And if she still wants my friendship, she has it. You think I'd punish her for this by being cold or angry to her? That I'm that small of a man?"
"Kid - -"
"It ain't her fault she doesn't love me," he blurted. "It's mine. I did somethin' wrong, pushed her away. I knew it would happen sooner or later, it always does."
"What are you talking about? Kid, it just didn't work out between you as lovers, that's all. It's no one's fault."
He turned and finally looked in her eyes, his face suddenly haggard like an old man's, rather than a boy of less than twenty. "I can keep tellin' myself that, Rachel, but fact is that I'm still alone, again, just like I was afraid of all along."
"You're not alone, Kid, if that's any comfort to you. We're all your family at the way station, and I'm sure that includes Louise. If you don't close yourself off, that is." She patted him on the arm. "Dinner's in an hour. I hope you'll join the rest of the family for it."
"Well, Rachel m'dear, how's your day been?" Teaspoon drawled, shutting the bunkhouse door behind him.
"Don't ask," she muttered. "Between Roger and Daisy, and now Kid and Lou, it's been a disaster."
"What's that about Kid and Lou?" Teaspoon asked curiously, tucking his napkin into his shirt and smacking his lips in anticipation of Rachel's dinner.
"They won't be courtin' anymore, it seems."
Teaspoon sighed. "That's too bad, now. Poor young'uns. They takin' it hard?"
"About as hard as you'd expect. They were each other's first love, after all."
"Ah, first love," Teaspoon reminisced. "Nothin' else quite like it, is there? As many lovely lady friends as I've had in my life, I still remember my first. I was fifteen and she was twenty-two," he bragged.
"Really? An older woman? Is she still alive?" Rachel teased the old man.
"Very funny."
Noah and Buck came in the door, followed by Jimmy, Cody and Ike. "Any of you seen Lou or Kid?" Rachel asked anxiously.
"Not for a while," Jimmy said. "Hope she's okay."
The door opened and Lou's small, pale face appeared in the doorway. She looked around nervously at them, and then silently took her place at the table next to Cody. His stern expression softened at the sight of her sad face, and he nudged her sympathetically. "Sorry about you and the Kid there, Lou."
She mumbled a thank you, praying that somebody would change the topic.
"You all right, sweetheart?" Rachel asked, putting an arm around her thin shoulders.
Lou blinked rapidly, and nodded, knowing that if one more person said anything about her and Kid, she would start crying in front of all of them. Lord knows, the last thing I want is to break down like . . . like a girl. "Where's Kid?" she asked, her voice a little hoarse from crying.
"He was out by the pond an hour ago," Rachel said softly. The table lapsed into uncomfortable silence.
The meal was just underway when the door opened again and Kid came in, hanging his hat on a peg near the door. "Not too late, am I, Rachel?"
"Just in time," Rachel responded, setting a plate down for him next to Jimmy, who pointedly ignored Kid as he sat down amid dead silence.
After several minutes passed, Kid put down his fork and cleared his throat. "Listen, everybody." He stood up and glanced over at Lou, his eyes kind. "I guess you all know by now that I asked Louise to marry me today. I'm sorry to say she . . . she couldn't do me the honor of saying yes."
He looked around the table and then back at Lou. "But there's no reason anybody has to feel strange around us. We aim to stay friends, and act like grownups about this. Right, Lou?"
She held his gaze, her eyes wet. "Yes, that's right," she whispered, gratefully.
"Well, that's settled, then," Teaspoon said lightly, as Kid sat down again. "I hear tell there was some excitement around here with Roger and that little gal of his. Why don't you tell me about it, Rachel?"
As the rest of the members of the family started chatting normally, Kid and Lou sat silently, their eyes fixed on their plates, but neither able to eat a thing.
After dinner, Lou sat on the steps with her shoes, trying to focus on polishing them. Jimmy sat beside her. "You okay?" he asked gruffly.
"Good as can be expected," she answered, trying to smile. Her eyes wandered over to where Kid was standing with Buck and Noah by the paddock, near Katy. "Leastways nothin' to fight about anymore, things'll be a sight more peaceful around here now, I suppose."
"Guess so," Jimmy acknowledged, rubbing his face. Seemed that somehow he'd gotten pulled into whatever business Lou and Kid had going on between them, and he had the bruises to show for it. Part of him was relieved that at least, he wouldn't be on the receiving end of Kid's jealous rages anymore. But he still felt a pang of sympathy for Lou, now that it was finished between her and Kid. "Sorry things had to end up like this, Lou. You know I was always rootin' for the two of you. It's too bad he had to muck things up so bad, the pig-headed fool."
"Jimmy?" Lou said hesitantly. "I'd rather not talk about the bad things, now it's over. He . . . he still was my first love," she struggled to explain. "What went wrong wasn't all his fault, not by a long shot. And I want to remember the good things, not dwell on the bad."
"Fair enough," Jimmy said. When she smiled at him through her tears, Jimmy felt his heart skip a beat as it so often did around her since she started looking and acting more like a girl. He wondered how his friend could be such a fool as to let her go, and his ire at Kid started to turn to pity.
"Feel like talkin' about it?" Buck asked, as Noah leaned up against the corral fence listening.
Kid shrugged. "Not much to talk about. We couldn't go forward, she wasn't ready. Couldn't stay the way things were, it wasn't right. Once I knew she didn't want to get engaged, well, we had to go back to being friends."
Buck peered at him intently. "If you loved each other, what difference did it make if you were engaged or not? Why couldn't you just be with her?"
"It isn't proper, Buck. It's not how I was raised." Kid turned his head to look over at the porch and saw Lou talking to Jimmy. Something twisted inside him, a sick jealous feeling in the pit of his stomach, but he bit his lip and turned back to Katy.
"So you push away someone you love because of what's proper? I don't understand that," Buck said. Noah nodded in agreement.
Kid looked irritably at his friends. "Well, you don't have to understand it. It's only important that me and Lou do."
"If you ask me, you're the ones who don't understand what's important and what ain't," Noah retorted.
Kid shook his head in annoyance and clucked to Katy, who turned to let him lead her in for the night. "It isn't like you two to interfere in other folks' business."
Noah caught at Kid's arm, and spoke seriously to his friend. "I know you don't owe us an explanation, Kid. I just hope you don't wake up a while from now and wish you had chosen love instead. Principles are cold comfort on a lonely night, and a woman like Lou doesn't come along very often. Think about that before it's too late."
Kid's annoyance faded at Buck and Noah's obvious concern, and he nodded, his eyes flickering uncertainly over to Lou again, thinking how much more complicated it was than anyone else seemed to realize.
Lou and Kid remained quiet that evening, as the others joked and played cards as usual before lights out. Kid got undressed early and lay on his bed, trying to read. He watched as Lou went into a corner and turned her back to strip off her outer layer of clothing. Her tiny, frail looking body looked even smaller and more childlike when she stood in her long johns in the lamplight, washing her face at the basin on the washstand. He knew better than anyone, from holding her in his arms and making love to her so many times, that there was nothing fragile about that small form. She was all muscle and sinew and compact strength.
She headed for the door, and after a moment's hesitation he followed her outside, stopping her on the porch. "Lou, I know you're heading for the outhouse, but . . . we haven't talked alone since . . . since . . ."
Her widened eyes met his. "What is it, Kid?" she whispered.
"Just - - just wanted to say, I'm grateful we can at least be friends," he lied. His heart cried out for her, but he fought down the urge to pull her into his arms and beg her to take him back, to promise to give her whatever time and space she needed.
"Me too," she said. Her hands tingled, aching to take his face in her hands and pull his mouth to hers.
They stood staring at each other a moment, before Lou's eyes flitted to the side. "Oh for God's sake," she muttered. "We have an audience."
"All of 'em?" Kid said, smiling.
Without turning her head, Lou counted five pairs of eyes. "Yes, I didn't know they could all fit at that window. But they're watchin' us."
He chuckled and reached for her hand. "Thanks, Lou, for everything. For being my first," he said haltingly. His eyes dropped, knowing she couldn't say the same.
To his surprise, she smiled up at him, and whispered back, "Thank you for being mine." Forgetting the watching eyes, he pulled her to him for a bittersweet goodbye embrace.