#Coyote wants to smoke Rabbit out of it's hole but when it lights the fires Rabbit kicks the embers back into his face | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

reallifedean · 7 years

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Reckon (pt 1) (zero edit)

The sky bled red as the smoke from blazing fires cloaked the land. The shadows on the hills reflected purple where ash and dust were all that was left behind of the landscape. The stench of rotting meat flared nostrils, turning smoke rancid and stomachs sour. The sickness had taken so many; all that was left was to burn the infected zones to soot. The Carmine brothers watched from the back of sturdy horses.

“That would be up at Ma and Pa's place by now. Reckon they burned them too?” Hank asked the back of his older brother.

Bo spat a wad of tobacco on the earth, the yellowing grass rustling beneath his horse's hooves. “I reckon they are burning 'em all.” Bo nudged his mount, turning the animal away from the hills, steering him into the deepest part of Grave Valley. “Let's go moving, sun's going down. Don't want to be in the open come nightfall.”

Hank followed Bo, watching over his shoulder a moment longer. He turned ahead and urged his horse to catch up. “Figure we'll find some rabbit for dinner?”

Bo nodded out a slight grunt of acknowledgment as he watched the ground ahead of him for anything to trip up his horse. The last thing they needed was to lose a mount to a rabbit hole tucked under the shadow of a sage bush. Hank tended to talk a lot, especially when he was nervous. Lately Hank talked all the time. Bo had had a lifetime of telling him to shut up, since their folks had been lost to the sickness, he'd stopped telling Hank to be quiet. He listened to his younger brother, who though he was nineteen now seemed more like a kid to Bo than ever, rattle on about this and that inane thing. He figured it kept his mind off what was really going on; everything was different now.

“Hey, Bo!”

Bo was jerked out of his thoughts reflexively pulling his horse to a halt. He looked back, bracing himself to see the worst. Hank hadn't gotten sick, neither had he. They had strong constitutions their mother had said, but so had their father. Bo remembered hearing something on the news before the television stopped working that some of the population would be immune. He told himself that was the reason they hadn't gotten sick, they had their mother's hearty stock in them. She had died anyway.

“I think I see some cattle! Up on that ridge!” Hank stood in his stirrups, leaning forward and pointing towards a darkening horizon. “Yeah! It's some cows! Holy shit.”

“Don't cuss.” Bo said, it was a reflex. His father had said it to them growing up, and it had come to him second nature when he'd taken over as the man of the house. Bo shielded his eyes, hoping to block the low hanging light and better look at what had Hank's attention.

After a moment he dropped his hand. He needed a closer look. “Wait here.” He ordered, urging his horse forward.

His horse, Old Trooper, traveled forward at a steady trot. A few yards closer Bo could make out the distinct outline of open range cattle, grazing on drying grass beds. Throwing caution aside Bo pushed his horse to a faster speed, steering him around a hazardous looking set of diminutive boulders. He slowed when the first of the haphazardly gathered cattle shied away from where they were feasting.

It was less than a dozen cows, scattered over a half acre. They had spread across a flat plain that crested as a small butte away from the rest of the landscape.

“Reckon they're ours?” Hank asked from behind him.

Bo sighed. “Thought I told you to wait?”

“I got lonely. They could be ours. This ain't that far from the ranch.” Hank's horse mirrored her rider's excitement, legs dancing along the ground before settling next to Bo and Old Trooper.

“I can't rightly tell unless I get a good look at 'em. And I can't do that with you chattering away like a damn squirrel.” Bo immediately regretted snapping at Hank. It wasn't Hank's fault that Bo was jumpy. He felt like a new colt on the trail; everything was a monster until proven otherwise. Everything was a threat. Everyone who wasn't them could not be trusted.

That was the moment Bo knew it was really over, that their way of life was gone for real; when their neighbor held a shot gun on them and took their father's pickup. Old Man Brooks had lived at the neighboring homestead to the Carmine Ranch since before the boys had been born. He had helped with branding in the fall, and sorting cattle for market. He'd come to gatherings and grilled steaks on a long bed smoker for volunteers during gathering season. But the power had gone, and with it much of the communication with the outside world. Nestled in the fertile valleys that crawled along the edges of the Snake River their rural community had been long forgotten by any body that would care what was happening. They had avoided the worst of the sickness for the better part of a year, but they too had people fall ill. Mr Brooks had decided he needed to leave. When his own busted down old Ford wasn't up to the job he'd come to the door and taken the three year old truck Jon Carmine had been so proud of. He'd put a gun in Bo's face and made his demands. Until that moment Bo had always thought Mr. Brooks was their friend.

It was in then, staring Mr Brooks in the eye, and later watching him drive away with the most reliable vehicle on the ranch, that Bo knew being civilized was done for. Half the world's population dead, and the other half divided between the dying and those not sick yet, or immune, there was no authority left to take control of the situation. And the rules of good men, the rules their father had drilled into their heads as growing boys, did not matter any more. Being a good Christian man was worth only as much as what was right in your hand. If God gave a damn about people any more he was taking his time with showing it.

Bo moved Old Trooper forward, steering the horse to round up the backside of the cattle, trying to get a closer look at their hides. He'd spent his entire life on the ranch, until the Firebugs had come through to burn the infected zones to the ground, Bo had thought he'd never have a reason to leave his family's land. Now the house he'd grown up in, that his father had grown up in, and his grandfather before that was gone. Nothing but cinder and smoke any more. The cow nearest him grunt, it was a steer not more than a couple of years old, too young to be of much use to the market – when there had been a market.

“Can't tell if that one's got our brand on it...” Hank muttered.

Bo felt a repeat of the same exasperation he'd known growing up with Hank on his heels. He pushed past the young steer to the nearest heifer, on her flank was a distinct C with a line through the middle of it and a small cross tucked at the mouth. It was the Carmine Ranch logo, the same brand that had been seared into cow hide for generations.

“Hey this one is ours!” Hank called out from where his horse shifted beneath him. He had moved to another heifer this one trotted a few paces to put some distance between them when he'd gotten too close.

“Yeah, looks like some of them are. Must have fled when they started burning and mixed with some other stock. Probably from the Travers place and a few others up the river.” Bo took a moment to survey the few cattle in front of them. “Well... Let's get them gathered up. No sense leaving 'em out here to get picked off by the damn coyotes.”

“Sure thing, Bo!” Hank was more excited at the prospect of rounding up the cattle than the practicalities of doing such.

Bo wasn't sure what he wanted to do with them, except that it seemed a waste to just leave them where they were. Who knew how long before the Firebugs managed to catch the whole region on fire and smoked them all out. He didn't know what he was going to do with them once he had them all gathered in a smaller area. He had legal claim to anything with the Carmine brand on it's hip, but it wasn't like there was a line looking to claim anything out here. But it felt good, it felt normal, for him to nudge his horse closer to the cows, and watch them move away from the pressure. It felt like how he would have spent any other day in his life. And for a few moments he embraced what little normalcy the world had left, cattle still had no business out in the wide open in so few numbers with no one to watch over them.

#reckon #novella #writing #author #novelist #novel #dean ocean #reallifedean #real life dean #the other guy #FEED BACK IS ALWAYS APPRECIATED #no really #like interact with me

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