“They're allowed to age.”
“That sounds philosophical.”
“I dislike needles.”
She stared.
The feared Black Ridge Wolf.
“That's the truth?”
“Yes.”
She laughed for several minutes.
At sixty-two, the mountain cowboy finally admitted his shoulder hurt in cold weather.
At sixty-four, his knee.
At sixty-seven, everything if asked honestly.
His wife developed arthritis too.
They complained competitively.
Their children refused to judge.
The ranch passed gradually to the next generation.
The couple kept the original cabin.
They preferred it.
One autumn evening, nearly forty years after the woman first arrived in Black Pine, they lay in the same bed beneath a newer quilt.
The cowboy was still broad.
Less muscular.
Hair mostly gray.
Beard silver.
His wife’s chestnut hair had become streaked with white.
She remained very large.
Softer.
Older.
Still beautiful to him with an intensity she found ridiculous.
She rested her cheek against his chest.
The tattoos were faded.
Her fingers traced the woman’s portrait.
“You know what I thought that night?”
“When?”
“The first time I realized this was Mother.”
He smiled.
“That you were going to murder me?”
“Briefly.”
“Reasonable.”
“I thought you had loved her.”
He turned toward her.
“I did.”
She lifted her head.
He continued quickly:
“Not like that.”
She laughed.
“I know.”
“Good.”
“Now.”
He frowned.
She smiled.
“I was extremely concerned for several hours.”
“You accused me of being secretly in love with your mother.”
“You tattooed her on your chest.”
“Evidence looked unfortunate.”
“Very.”
He laughed.
She touched the rider.
“And Father.”
“Yes.”
“What would they think of us?”
The cowboy considered.
“Your father would probably complain that I married his daughter.”
“My mother?”
“Would say she predicted it.”
The woman smiled.
“She would too.”
They became quiet.
Outside, wind moved through pines.
Same sound as decades earlier.
The woman whispered:
“Do you still fear morning?”
He looked down.
“What?”
“The first night we lay here.”
“You said you were afraid morning would come and I'd leave.”
He remembered.
“Yes.”
“Do you still?”
His hand entered her gray hair.
“Every morning.”
She looked at him.
“That is not romantic.”
“No?”
“It sounds anxious.”
“It is.”
She smiled.
“Forty years and still frightened of one woman.”
“Terrified.”
“Good.”
He kissed her forehead.
She slept.
The mountain cowboy remained awake longer.
Listening to the breathing of the woman who had transformed his house into something he once thought existed only for other people.
Home.
He died first.
Not in violence.
Not on horseback.
Not with a gun in his hand.
In winter.
In bed.
His wife beside him.
He woke before sunrise one February morning and told her his chest felt wrong.
She called their son.
The doctor came.
Nothing could be done.
The old cowboy understood before anyone said it.
His wife sat beside him.
One hand over the tattoo of her mother.
Another holding his.
He looked at her.
“Don't look like that.”