Raven Publishing, Inc. 
Absaroka received Honorable Mention in the IPPY Awards: Best Fiction for the Mountain West category. (Independent Publisher Book Awards, 2006)
Chapter 1
Matt Reed shifted in his seat and looked out the window. He was grateful that the plane was almost empty. It had been a long time since he had this much space to himself. The transport from Vietnam had been packed, the airport in New York a nightmare of impatient bodies, and then he had shared his space on the 727 to Denver with two drunken college students with a penchant for dirty limericks. He liked the smallness of this little commuter plane even though it seemed almost antique, slow and quiet, unlike the Hueys he had flown in the jungle. Everything is relative, he thought. Matt Reed was going home.
“Hi. Would you like a drink? Coffee?” The flight attendant was young and friendly. She reminded him of one of the nurses he had met in Nam when she first arrived, before she had seen the awful reality of war.
“No. Thanks, anyway.”
“You’re sure? It’s on the house.” She had a nice smile.
He shook his head.
“Are you going to Sheridan to visit? No—let me guess. I’ll bet you’re a geologist.”
Matt was startled. Why would a geologist be going to Sheridan? That was cattle country. Of course, it wasn’t all that far from the coal fields in Gillette.
“No. That’s where I live.”
“Oh. Have you been gone a long time?”
An eternity, Matt thought.
“Vietnam?” she asked gently.
“Yeah.”
Did Matt imagine a flash of contempt? He didn’t know why, but he had encountered such reactions ever since he arrived in the States and even one or two cases of open hostility. He shook his head. She would never understand where he had been or what he had seen—not in a million years.
The passenger behind Matt spoke up. “Hey honey, what’s it take to get a drink around here?”
The girl grimaced, winked at Matt, and turned to the demanding man. Matt had noticed him when he boarded, probably because of his shaggy red beard and his haughty manner. Matt looked out the window again, impatient to land.
The plane touched down and bounced twice before settling onto the short runway. The pilot reversed his engines and braked immediately. Sheridan’s field hadn’t been designed for jets, even small ones. Matt smiled at the flight attendant as he left the plane and stepped into the familiar Wyoming landscape. He inhaled deeply savoring the cold, crisp, dry air. It was wonderful. He scanned the small group waiting for the plane and felt a pang of disappointment. He had expected Dad to be here to meet him. Perhaps he was still angry at Matt for volunteering for something that “wasn’t any of our business, anyway.” Well, he had turned out to be right about that, hadn’t he? If only Mom were alive. He shoved the pain away. He hadn’t even been here for the funeral, but surely Dad understood why he couldn’t be.
Matt’s only luggage was the duffle bag he carried containing another pair of Levis, a shirt, some underwear, socks, and his dress uniform. The uniform was there only because he hadn’t known what else to do with it. He certainly didn’t intend to wear it ever again. He passed through the small terminal building and surveyed the parking lot. Sheridan had one taxi, a dilapidated Chevy owned by Hank Ketchum. Matt didn’t expect it to be around. Hank kind of worked when he felt like it. He spotted the old red and white pickup in a corner of the lot. Matt could still remember how good it smelled when Dad had brought it home all shiny and new. It wasn’t new anymore. The red was faded, and Matt could see the dent in the side of the door where his colt had kicked it the first time they tried to shoe him. But it was clean, not its usual condition, and Matt knew Dad had taken the trouble to wash it.
He loped toward the pickup and thought how typical it was for his father to wait in the truck. Jake Reed had always been expert at making people come to him. Matt stopped as his father opened the door and stepped out. He looked so short. Matt had always thought of Jake as giant-sized, yet he found himself looking down on the tanned, weather-beaten face, with its inscrutable green eyes.
“Hello, Dad.” He extended his right hand.
“Matt.” His father’s grip was strong, his hands rough and calloused. Matt wanted to hug him. I risked my life landing helicopters in the jungle to pick up the wounded, he thought, and yet I’m afraid to hug my father.
“How are you, Dad?”
“I’m fit. You look a little thin, though.”
“I’m fine, Dad. You want me to drive?” Matt stowed his bag in the back of the truck.
“I’ll drive,” Jake said curtly.
Matt shrugged and opened the passenger door. They drove in silence.
God, Matt thought. I’ve been gone for two years and there wasn’t a day I didn’t think about home, about Dad and Mom, about the ranch, the mountains, the peace; it was the only way I could survive all the horror and death I saw. Now, I’m finally back, and we don’t seem to have anything to say to each other. He pushed down the pain and turned his attention to the snow-covered Bighorns. He had carried their image in his mind for so long that their reality did not seem remarkable. He gave them a moment to work their magic and ease the tension that held his belly muscles taut.
“I can’t wait to get on a horse and ride up to Hunt Mountain. How’s the game this year?”
“Don’t know,” Jake replied. “Haven’t been to the hills since last spring.”
Matt was startled. Dad had always spent every spare moment riding the mountains, hunting, fishing, or looking for arrowheads.
“You want to stop for a cold beer?” Jake asked as he turned on to Sheridan’s main street.
“No thanks, Dad. I’m kinda anxious to get home.”
Jake turned into the parking lot of the VFW and said, “No hurry about that. I’ve got a mighty thirst.”
Matt felt uneasy. Dad had always considered coming to town an unpleasant piece of business to get done with as soon as possible. He remembered how Mom always tried to come in alone, just so she wouldn’t have to hurry through her shopping. The VFW was pretty quiet. It was only three o’clock in the afternoon.
“Howdy, Jake. Who’s that you got with you?” As Matt’s eyes became accustomed to the dim light, he recognized Tom Snow, the bartender. Tom had run the VFW ever since Matt was a hell-raising youth attending the Saturday night dances here. Matt grinned and extended his hand.
“Welcome home, boy. I’ll bet you gave those gooks hell.” Tom’s round, bald head bobbed as he talked.
“Hello, Tom.”
“Bring us a couple of beers, Tom.” It was just like Jake not to ask Matt what he wanted.
Tom brought the beers and sat, uninvited.
“You get home in one piece, boy?” Tom’s words were rude, but Matt knew Tom didn’t have enough sensitivity to know that.
“Yeah. All in one piece.” Matt didn’t tell him about the steel plate in his leg or the nightmares that haunted his nights. It wasn’t anybody’s business. Tom was the town gossip, who seemed to believe it was his God-given duty to know what was going on in everyone’s life and to serve that knowledge to his patrons along with their drinks. It didn’t really matter to Tom whether he had the whole story or not—he was a master of embellishment.
“I don’t understand this war, Matt,” Tom said. “All those draft dodgers and deserters, and such. It wasn’t that way in the Big War. Why, when I was …”
“Tom,” Jake interjected. “You have a customer.”
A man stood at the bar tapping his fingers impatiently. Matt recognized him as the red-bearded man who had sat behind him on the plane.
As Tom scurried away to wait on the stranger, Jake cleared his throat and looked away. “You want to talk about the war, Matt?”
The war! Another world away, another life, almost another person. He shook his head.
“I didn’t think so.” Jake cleared his throat and looked away. “I am proud of you though, son.”
Matt felt a familiar hurt deep in his gut. How many times he had ached to hear those words, but for a feat that deserved them, not for the craziness that was Vietnam.
“Excuse me, Dad. I need to take a leak.” Matt fled to the men’s room, hoping he hadn’t missed his only opportunity to communicate with his father. Why couldn’t they ever talk?
When Matt returned, two other men had joined Jake. Matt recognized Hank Ketchum and Joe Smith. Joe was the town’s only mechanic. Ever since Matt could remember Joe had smelled of grease and gasoline, just like his garage. Matt shook hands with both men and acknowledged their greetings with a smile of genuine pleasure. As the men chatted, Matt watched the three old friends. They had grown up together. Matt knew that Jake and Hank had once been rivals for his mother’s hand, and that Joe had once stopped them from nearly killing each other. Hank had never married, but he had remained a good friend of the family, always there when they needed him. Matt remembered the time Hank rode out into a blizzard looking for Jake, who was overdue from a hunting trip.
Joe had always been a part of their lives as well, but Matt usually thought of him as “Amy’s pa.” Amy Smith—with her upturned nose and brown eyes flecked with gold. He had fallen for her the first day of high school, when he noticed she had magically transformed from the pesky kid he had known all his life into a vision in a short little cheerleading skirt, her honey-colored hair hanging almost to her waist. He had never seen such pretty hair or so much of a girl’s legs.
“Matt,” Hank interrupted his reverie. “Joe asked you a question.”
“I’m sorry, Joe. Guess I was daydreaming.”
Joe laughed. “I guess that beats listening to us old geezers reminisce. I just asked if you planned to stay in Sheridan.”
“Of course,” Matt said incredulously, “where else would I go?”
“Well, I just figured with the ranch …”
“Joe! Forget it.” Jake’s voice was a command, the voice that always alerted Matt or his mother that Jake would stand for no further word on the subject.
Matt looked at his father sharply. What the hell was going on here?
“Well, son, let’s get on home.” Jake strode to the door without a word to either of his old friends. Matt shook hands all around, searching Joe’s face for a clue. Joe avoided Matt’s eyes.
To read more, click here: Chapter 2
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Price $10.00 |
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