Little Red’s Riding by Nicole Casey

1

Ruby

None of it was real.

Not the flight from New York to Cheyenne. Not the bus ride to Magnolia. Not the walk down the town’s streets with my suitcase in tow. It couldn’t have been real. It didn’t feel real.

It felt like some bizarre projection, like I was still back in New York dreaming or suffering a delirium brought on by heatstroke. I wasn’t walking down the wide country lanes with the mountains sprawled out in the distance, the clear wide sky, the fresh air.

‘Maybe New York was a dream,’ I thought, ‘a premonition warning me not to go.’

I looked down at the suitcase I was dragging behind me. If New York was a dream, then why am I towing a suitcase?

It didn’t take long for me to understand the odd sensations I was experiencing. It felt so unreal because I was in the same environment I had spent nearly my whole life in, but I had changed so much in those eighteen months in New York that everything around me looked and felt off.

“Good afternoon.” A man passed me, smiled, and touched the brim of his hat.

I had seen that man before, probably. I had seen him when I was a little girl leaving the general store with an ice cream cone in hand; I had smiled and said ‘good afternoon’ back. I had seen him when I was a high school senior in my cheerleading outfit, walking past the shops in the town’s main square with my squad hoping the schoolboys would notice me.

But seeing him then almost made me laugh. How out of place he would be in New York! Saying good afternoon to a stranger! What a weirdo.

Yet hadn’t I had the same thought walking down the sidewalks of New York? Passing a businessman in a suit and tie speed-walking while barking orders into his cellphone? Passing a hipster in Brooklyn pretending he was above what others thought of him but going out of his way to stand out, to be seen.

As I turned the corner and saw my childhood home come into view, I thought to myself, what is this place? And who are these actors walking around it? Who am I? Do they know I’m an actor, too? Or maybe they think I really did grow up here, that I do belong. But maybe that’s just the part they’re supposed to be playing.’

I went up to the front door and contemplated ringing the doorbell. It occurred to me that I had never rung the doorbell to my home in all my life. If I ring it now, they will know that I am not the girl who grew up here. They will know I am a fraud.

The door was unlocked—nobody locks their doors in Magnolia. So instead of ringing the bell, I simply opened the door and walked in, suddenly aware that I had not phoned home to tell them I was coming.

I stood in the entryway. The stairs to the right leading to the bedrooms, the living room to the left, the kitchen down the hallway ahead, nothing had changed. I felt oddly betrayed. I had changed so much in the eighteen months I had spent in New York. Weren’t they supposed to change with me?

My mom popped out from the kitchen.

“Ruby, is that you?

Good question, Mom. I was just asking myself the same thing.

She had a worried look on her face. She came down the hallway to me. “Is everything all right?”

I smiled. “Everything’s fine.”

She examined me with a creased forehead.

I let go of my suitcase and held out my arms. “Do I get a hug or a kiss?”

“Of course, dear.” Mom gave me a big hug and a kiss on the cheek. “What are you doing here?”

I opened my mouth to speak, but I had no answer.

“I thought you were in New York.”

“I was,” I said, like I was finally remembering the lines of a script I hadn’t properly prepared. “I wanted to come home for a visit.”

She still wore a look of concern on her face, and she passed the dish towel she was holding from one hand to the other nervously. “Oh.”

“Is that okay?”

She beamed. “Of course that’s okay. I’m happy to see you.”

“You don’t look happy.”

She gave me another hug, less squeeze this time. “Of course I’m happy to see you. Just surprised. Why didn’t you call?”

I didn’t have an answer for her. I thought to say, ‘because this is all a dream’ or ‘because none of this is real and I’m actually passed out on the subway on the way to Coney Island’. But I figured that wouldn’t make much sense, so I fumbled for an explanation. “Umm, I wanted to surprise you.”

She laughed. “Well you sure did, honey. You sure did. You’re just in time to help me with the cookies.” She took me by the arm and led me into the kitchen.

We baked cookies—well, Mom baked cookies and I did what I considered ‘help’, which consisted mostly of standing against the counter and saying, “looks good” and “smells good.”

“Now, when you get to be a mother,” she said, “you will notice that you have certain motherly powers.”

“Like baking cookies?”

She rocked her head from side to side. “Like baking cookies, but also like being able to tell when your daughter isn’t telling the truth or is holding something back.” She looked at me with a knowing grin. “Mothers are psychic, in a way.”

“Oh, yeah? Then what am I thinking?”

She feigned an exaggerated pensive frown, rubbed her chin, and said, “You’re thinking that there’s something you want to tell me, something about why you’ve come home. But also, you’re kind of nervous to say it because you think your old mother wouldn’t understand.”

“Hmm.”

She glanced at me with a smile and nodded. “Psychic, didn’t I tell you?”

My mother’s smile was infectious, always had been. I smiled back. She laughed, and I laughed along with her. I laughed so hard and without knowing why that after a moment I had to concentrate on stopping so I could catch my breath.

Mom pulled out a chair from the kitchen table and had me sit. She took the seat next to me. “I’m psychic, and I’m also a good listener.”

I put my hand on hers and gave it a gentle tap. “I know you are, Mom.”

“So.”

“So, I don’t know,” I said. “And that’s the truth. I don’t know about New York. I don’t know about the job. New York is great, don’t get me wrong. It’s exciting, and despite what people are always saying, New Yorkers are really nice people, overall.”

She nodded.

I continued. “And the job is great, too. But a modeling agency in New York City, those come and go. Seems like there’s one that goes under every year and a new one pops up hoping to make it. I don’t know if Handsome’s is going to be one of the few that actually lasts.” I let out a breath and leaned back in my chair.

“And?”

“And I don’t know.”

“And the guy?”

I cocked my head to the side and furrowed my brow. I hadn’t told her about Aiden.

She tapped a finger to her temple. “Psychic, remember?”

I looked back over my shoulder at the oven. Maybe the cookies were burning, and we’d have to attend to them. Maybe I wouldn’t have to open up and pour out all the contents of my confused mind. But no smoke came from the oven, only the sweet aroma of home.

I looked back at my mom, smiled, and let out a long breath through my nose. Here goes.

“His name is Aiden. He’s a native New Yorker.”

Mom nodded.

“Those are rare, native New Yorkers, you know? Usually, everyone you meet is from somewhere else.”

“Like Wyoming.”

I chuckled. “I didn’t meet anyone from Wyoming. Those are even rarer.”

“Sounds like you and Aiden made quite a match, then.”

“We did, at first. Everything was new and different. It was exciting.” I paused trying to recall those first few weeks together, wondering how much I should divulge: definitely not the intimate parts, the sex in public places—that was Aiden’s thing. And it was quite a rush—in the stairwell of a building on 10th Avenue we’d snuck into; the back of a movie theatre; the bathroom at the MOMA; afraid someone would catch us; perhaps wishing someone would.

“Where did you meet?”

I snapped myself from the reverie, straightened in the chair, and crossed my legs. “Um, we met through the agency. Greta—she runs the agency with her brother…”

“I know who Greta is,” Mom reminded me.

“Right, well anyway, she had spotted him. I don’t know from where.” I looked at my mom wide-eyed. “He’s really good-looking.” I bit down on my lower lip and shook out my shoulders to emphasize the point. “Tall, sharp cheekbones, dark skin but freckled, dark eyes, big crazy hair.”

“Crazy hair?”

I laughed. What a terrible description. “He’s half and half, you know, so he had an afro, but not a tight one; the kind with locks that jet out in all directions and hang a little like bangs. He looked like a rock star. Definitely Handsome’s material.”

“So he’s a model?”

I shook my head. “No. Sometimes the look doesn’t translate well in 2D. Or maybe, like Greta said, his eyes are too kind, which clashes with the hipster rock star look he was going for. But he came in for a shoot, so I got to hold the camera and order him around.” I chuckled.

“Order him around?”

I blushed. “You know: turn your shoulder this way; look at me like I’ve hurt you; sneer;

lean back with your hands behind your head; flex; stretch out your leg. That sort of thing.”

Mom raised her eyebrows. “Sounds fun.”

I nodded. “Yeah, ordering hot men around is fun.” I cleared my throat and shifted in my seat. Though Mom and I got along so well that I considered her almost more of a sister and a friend, I had to remember she was my mother. Go easy on the details, Ruby.

“So what does he do, this hot, kind-eyed, rock-star-haired young man?”

“Oh, he’s a vet. And he runs an animal shelter.”

Mom put her hands out, open palms up. “Well, that’s something the two of you have in common. You love animals.”

I nodded. “Right. We have a lot in common, but…”

“But?”

I sighed. “I don’t know, Mom. It’s hard to explain.”

“It’s okay, dear.” She patted my hand.

I seized her hand by the wrist, and she jumped back, startled.

“For one thing,” I said, excited and pointing at her hand, “it’s the hands.” I let go of her wrist, and she looked at her hand then at me bewildered.

“Men in New York have such icky hands,” I said with a sour look on my face.

“Huh?”

“Not icky, but,” I waved my hands in the air hoping I could conjure the words I needed. “It’s hard to explain. The guys in New York, they have such clean hands, not like the guys in Wyoming.”

She looked at me like I was crazy. And I was sounding crazy; I wasn’t making any sense.

“They don’t get dirty, work the land, work the wood or, you know, mold things with their hands. Even a vet, like Aiden. He gets manicures.” I looked at my mom, but she wasn’t getting the point I was trying to make. “Manicures, Mom!” I shook my head then looked down at the table, thinking if I avoided eye contact maybe that would help me get my words out. “I’m not saying I like dirty guys. But I want to see traces. I want to see… like the calloused palm of a rider who is used to gripping and controlling a leather rein. Or the nicks and scars on a rancher’s hands that you know is no stranger to tools. The traces of rope burn. The…” I looked up at my mom. “You get what I’m trying to say.”

She cocked her head to the side then nodded. “I think so. Like a real man, a Wyoming cowboy.”

I pointed at her. “In fact, I’ve come home to take some photos of Wyoming cowboys for Greta.”

“Really?”

I immediately regretted having said that. Already in five minutes, I had told my mom more about what I thought of men, what I wanted in men than I had in my entire life up till then. I thought I had given her just about as much as she could handle. If I started talking about the sexy cowboy calendar I was planning to shoot, she might faint from shock. I looked back at the oven. “Are the cookies ready yet? I sure would love to try one.”

The cookies were ready. And I could try one—but only one. Mom explained that she had baked them for my grandma, Blanchette.

Blanchette, or Gran, was my hero—the mayor of Magnolia; the first woman elected to public office in Magnolia, a town known for its hyper-macho patriarchal ways.

Sadly, Gran hadn’t been feeling well, my mother told me. So, she’d prepared a basket of goodies for her: jams; pickled beets, pickled peppers, and cookies.

“I’ll take them over to her,” I volunteered with enthusiasm.

“Well…” Mom hesitated and furrowed her brow as if she were trying to think of a reason to say no. Any time I said I was going somewhere, her first reaction was to try to find a reason I shouldn’t go.

“I’d love to see Gran,” I said. “Plus, I could use the exercise. I’ve been sitting all day, either on a plane or a bus or the subway.”

She frowned and rubbed her chin.

“Okay, Mom? I’ll leave right now and be back before supper.”

“Okay, Ruby. But stay on the main road. No shortcut past the ranches.”

“But I want to see the horses.”

“Horses! You want to see the cowboys.”

“Cowboys?” I said innocently. “That never crossed my mind.”

She tilted her head and gave me a knowing grin. “I’m serious, Ruby. We’re approaching rodeo season, and I bet they’re setting up right about now. Cowboys are one thing. But those rodeo types, I’ve heard the stories.”

“What stories?” I, too, had heard stories, but they weren’t the kind that would keep me away from ‘those rodeo types’.

“You know how it is,” she said, waving a dismissive hand in the air. “People come from all parts, women especially. And they have wild parties, lots of sex and orgies and the like.”

I gasped, hoping it came across as more from offense than from excitement.

“You’re young,” she said, wagging a finger at me, “You think that’s all fun and games. But every year, we get more than our fair share of foolish girls and wayward women thinking they might like to go for a ride with some handsome cowboy. Then who do you think’s left holding the baby?”

“Mother!” I said with exaggerated offense. “You know me. I’m not like that. I would never go to wild sex parties with cowboys and get myself pregnant!”

She nodded. “I know you. I know how young girls are, too. That’s why I’m telling you this. Stay away from the ranch. Keep to the roads.”