Black Hills

wondered. Ever tossed him in the air, then swung him in giddy circles?
    Not that he could remember. He and his father had discussions —when there was time. And time, Cooper knew, was always in short supply.
    Country bumpkins had nothing but time, Cooper thought. They weren’t under the demands of business like a corporate lawyer of his father’s repute. They weren’t third-generation Sullivans like his father, with the responsibilities that came with the name.
    So they could toss their kids around all day.
    Because it made something hurt in his stomach to watch, he turned away from the window. With no other choice, he went out to be tortured for the rest of the day.
     
     
     
    LIL GIGGLED as her father gave her another dizzying swing. When she could breathe again, she tried to give him a stern look. “He is not going to be my boyfriend.”
    “That’s what you say now.” Josiah Chance gave his girl a quick tickle along the ribs. “But I’m going to keep my eye on that city slicker.”
    “I don’t want any boyfriend.” Lil gave a lofty wave of her hand with her expertise as an almost-ten-year-old. “They’re too much trouble.”
    Joe pulled her close, rubbed cheeks. “I’m going to remind you of that in a few years. Looks like they’re here. We’d better go say hello, and get cleaned up.”
    She didn’t have anything against boys, Lil mused. And she knew how to mind her manners with company. But still . . . “If I don’t like him, do I have to play with him?”
    “He’s a guest. And he’s a stranger in a strange land. Wouldn’t you want somebody your own age to be nice to you and show you around if you dropped down in New York City?”
    She wrinkled her narrow nose. “I don’t want to go to New York City.”
    “I bet he didn’t want to come here.”
    She couldn’t understand why. Everything was there. Horses, dogs, cats, the mountains, the trees. But her parents had taught her that people were as different as they were the same.
    “I’ll be nice to him.” At first, anyway.
    “But you won’t run off and marry him.”
    “Dad!”
    She rolled her eyes just as the boy came out on the porch. Lil studied him as she might any new specimen.
    He was taller than she’d expected, and his hair was the color of pine bark. He looked . . . mad or sad, she couldn’t decide which. But neither was promising. His clothes said city to her, dark jeans that hadn’t been worn or washed enough and a stiff white shirt. He took the glass of lemonade her mother offered and watched Lil as warily as she watched him.
    He jolted at the cry of a hawk, and Lil caught herself before she sneered. Her mother wouldn’t like it if she sneered at company.
    “Sam.” Grinning broadly, Joe stuck out a hand. “How are things?”
    “Can’t complain.”
    “And Lucy, don’t you look pretty?”
    “We do what we can with what we’ve got. This is our grandson, Cooper.”
    “Glad to meet you, Cooper. Welcome to the Black Hills. This is my Lil.”
    “Hello.” She cocked her head. He had blue eyes—ice-on-the-mountain blue. He didn’t smile, nor did his eyes.
    “Joe, you and Lil go clean up. We’re going to eat outside,” Jenna added. “We’ve got a fine day for it. Cooper, sit down here by me, and tell me what you like to do in New York. I’ve never been there.”
    In Lil’s experience, her mother could get anybody to talk, make anybody smile. But Cooper Sullivan from New York City seemed to be the exception. He spoke when spoken to, minded his manners, but little more. They sat out at the picnic table, one of Lil’s favorite things, and feasted on fried chicken and biscuits, on potato salad and snap beans her mother had put up last harvest.
    Conversation ranged from horses and cattle and crops, to weather and books and the status of other neighbors. All the things, in Lil’s world, that mattered.
    Though Cooper struck Lil as stiff as his shirt, he managed to eat two helpings of everything, though he barely opened his mouth otherwise.
    Until her father brought up baseball.
    “Boston’s going to break the curse this year.”
    Cooper snorted, then immediately hunched his shoulders.
    In his easy way, Joe picked up the basket of biscuits, offered it to the boy. “Oh, yeah, Mr. New York. Yankees or Mets?”
    “Yankees.”
    “Not a prayer.” As if in sympathy, Joe shook his head. “Not this year, kid.”
    “We’ve got a strong infield, good bats. Sir,” he added as if he’d just remembered