One Came Home by Amy Timberlake

the creek.
    We sat silent awhile, each of us engaged in our own tasks. I finally joined him by the fire in order to clean my rifle. TheSpringfield was covered with pigeon muck, and I needed to know that it would fire without a problem. I promised myself I would be ready next time, shooting dead any cougar contemplating a meal of girl and mule. As I worked, honey light soaked into a deepening blue sky. Moonlight spattered the water, and clouds of tiny white insects floated up from the banks.
    To test my cleaning job, I loaded a cartridge into the Springfield and aimed at a twig approximately one hundred yards away. I fired. The twig shattered.
    “Nice shot,” said Billy.
    “I never miss,” I said.
    “I have heard that when you’re
holding
the rifle, you’re quite good.”
    He’d caught me off guard and I laughed. “I do need to work on my draw.”
    Billy grinned. “Let’s not fight. I like you when we’re not fighting.”
    It was a simple enough statement, but somehow that statement stopped my tongue in its tracks. “Yes” was all I managed to say in reply, though I suddenly wanted to tell him that he hadn’t been as bad a companion as I’d imagined he would be.
    Then Billy yawned. “That’s it. I’m going to bed.”
    At that, my neck hairs lifted straight off my skin. I saw cougars stalking me, dragging me off, my screams muffled by the sound of river water passing.
    I set the Springfield across my lap. “I’m going to sit up,” I said.
    Billy waved away fire smoke to look at me. “We’ve got a long day tomorrow.”
    “If you’re tired, go to bed.”
    Billy laid his eyes on me. “Fry, that cougar isn’t coming back. It went straight over the hill, remember? You scared the bejeebers out of it.” He smiled. “Like I expect you would.”
    I shook my head. “No, Billy, listen to me. Today I learned I need to pay attention. Long Ears was the one that heard the cougar—not me. I’m keeping my eyes open,” I said. I began to shake.
    “It was probably only curious. You and Frederick are a pretty big target.”
    “Go to bed.”
    “I shouldn’t have let you get so far behind.”
    “Even if I wanted to sleep, I couldn’t. Go.”
    Billy frowned. After a moment, his eyes lit up. I watched as he pulled a canvas tent from his saddlebag and set it up. He opened my bedroll inside it and set a saddle at the top for a pillow. “How does this look?” he said.
    He was right. I liked the idea of canvas walls all around me. He said he’d sleep in front of the tent with the repeater by his side.
    Then Billy reached for my hand. As his hand wrapped around mine, a sort of wooziness came over me. I stood, but I swear my feet were not on solid ground.
    This confused me, but I
had
confronted a cougar. Ever since that cougar, my senses seemed off, misfiring every which way.
    Billy walked me to the tent, lifted the flap, and let go of my hand. “It’ll be fine. I won’t let anything get you,” he said.
    As I went to sleep, I may have thought of Billy, but I dreamt of Agatha. I dreamt of that night—years and years ago—that I woke up and found Agatha gone from our bed. I crept through the house and finally found her in the vegetable garden out back, the wind twisting her nightgown around her ankles. Barefoot, I ran into the garden to meet her. The two of us, in white nightgowns, stood hand in hand between rows of carrots and lettuce as we watched comet after comet scuff the sky. I felt garden dirt between my toes, and liked the way her hand fit around mine.
    But in the dream, her hand slipped from my own. It was like she wasn’t even trying to hold on.

After more lessons in mule saddling, Billy and I rode all the next morning. We arrived in Dog Hollow as the sun beat down overhead.
    I’d heard Dog Hollow described as down-and-out, distressed, and in straitened circumstances, but nothing could be further from the truth. Not one thing sagged, leaned, or needed oiling, and there were plenty of inhabitants.