Page 6 of Take Me Home

I stride over and make a show of searching for his chest hair. Before he sees what’s coming, I yank one of the blond hairs out of his chest. “Ahh, there was one…but I got it.”

Tripp cackles with laughter, Poppy shakes her head, and Wayne lunges for me. “You bastard, that hurt!”

I shove him off easily, and with a sigh he gives up and ambles toward the coffeepot to fill a mug.

Wayne takes a sip of his coffee and makes a face, wrinkling his nose in disgust. “This is awful.”

I shake my head at Wayne before taking my seat at the head of the table where my father should be.

Wayne sits down beside me. He’s nothing but trouble with his smirks and pranks. At twenty, I worry he’ll never grow up, but he brings some much needed humor into our old farmhouse.

We dig into our breakfast, which is delicious because Poppy is an excellent cook just like Mom was.

“Finishing the fence today at Whispering Pines?” Poppy asks, reaching for her coffee mug and taking a sip. Her freckled face scrunches slightly at the bitter flavor. She really did make it strong today, apparently.

Looking at her from across the oval shaped, oak table, I notice how tired she looks and my heart sinks. My sister is twenty-five and full of life, the most positive person I know. But she’s weighed down by responsibilities.

“Yeah, you guys will have to eat dinner without me. I’m sorry.” I set my fork down on the table.

She smiles, her brown eyes are bright. “We’ll manage.” Poppy looks down at her plate. “Drive safe, okay? There’s a chance of snow.”

Wayne goes unnaturally still at her comment. Two years after my parents’ accident, we’re all still wound tight when it snows. Maybe we should move to the desert…or someplace where we wouldn’t have to worry about inclement weather. But that would require getting on a plane, and just the thought of that sends a shiver down my spine. Plus, our farm is here; our lives are here.

Tripp hums to himself, finishing his food, then pushing his plate back and grabbing two toy horses from his jeans pocket and playing while the rest of us finish eating. He’s a horse lover through and through.

Standing, I move in front of my nephew and crouch down to get on eye level with him. “Hey, Bud. Be good for your mama, okay?”

He sticks one of his horses in my face with a loud neigh. “I’m always good.”

“That’s not what Mrs. Barb says,” I say, reminding him of just last week when Poppy was called into school for a meeting with Tripp’s teacher. He wouldn’t stop correcting her over their letter of the week…H for horse. Tripp insisted that the pictured horse was a mare, and it should be the letter M.

When I stand up to leave, Tripp hops out of his chair and hugs me around my legs. “Love you, Bud.”

“Love you, too,” he mumbles, with his face against my jeans.

I run my hand over his hair, turning toward my sister. “I’ll be careful,” I say.

Her body relaxes into her chair before she stands and gathers everyone’s plates.

Tripp takes off up the stairs to his room—probably to get ready for school—and Wayne finishes eating and says a quick goodbye before heading outside to tend the cattle. Our farm is small compared to many around the area, but between our cattle, the brome fields, and me working for Hank, it pays the bills—and keeps my brother out of trouble.

We all work together to keep things running. Even if we’re hanging in there by one measly little thread…a thread that could fray so easily.

Poppy stands at the kitchen sink, washing the dishes from breakfast. I study the room that needs a good renovation. The old, painted cabinets are peeling along the edges from wear, the dishwasher hasn’t worked in a year, and the wood floors are scratched and faded.

The outside of the two-story house needs fixing up, too. Fresh paint, new windows, and some repairs to the steps on the front porch would not go amiss. The longer I think about everything that needs to be done, the higher my shoulders rise.

“We’ll be fine,” Poppy says, looking over her shoulder knowingly. “Get out of here so you don’t get back too late.” She smiles.

I huff a laugh. How does she do that? “Okay. I’ll text you when I’m on my way home tonight.”

“Thanks, Linc.”

On my way out the front door, I stop in front of the stairs and yell up, “have a good day at school, Tripp.”

Tripp neighs in response, and I smile.

It’s a short, ten-minute drive down worn dirt roads before I reach the long, winding driveway of Whispering Pines Ranch. A rustic wooden fence surrounds the entire property, with a gate rising above the entrance to Whispering Pines holding a sign displaying the ranch’s logo.