Rescue Me

JH.”
    “I’m a Hollowell.” He coughed and it sounded a bit rattly as he grabbed his side, and she wondered if she should hit his call button. “But I hate goddamn cattle.”
    She forgot about the sound of his cough and calling a nurse. Everything in her stilled like he’d just told her that the Earth was flat and you fell off into nothingness somewhere around China. Like he hated Texas. Like he’d lost his mind. She gasped and clutched her chest. “What?”
    “Stupid smelly animals. Not like horses. Cattle are only good for T-bones.” He cleared his throat and sighed. “I do love a T-bone.”
    “And shoes,” she managed. He looked like her daddy. Same gray hair, long nose, and blue eyes. But he was talking crazy. “And really nice handbags.”
    “And boots.”
    She held up the socks. “I got you something,” she said through her fog.
    “I don’t need anything.”
    “I know.” She handed him the socks.
    He frowned and touched the nonskid bottoms. “I guess I can use these.”
    “Daddy?” She looked at him and it was as if the world was indeed suddenly flat and she was falling off. “If you hate cattle, why are you a rancher?”
    “I’m a Hollowell. Like my daddy and granddaddy and great-granddaddy. Hollowell men have always been cattlemen since John Hays Hollowell bought his first Hereford.”
    She knew all that, and she supposed she knew the answer to her next question. She asked it anyway, “Have you ever thought of doing anything else?”
    His frown turned to a deep scowl and she wouldn’t have been surprised if he didn’t answer or changed the subject as he always did when she tried to talk to him about anything that might make him uncomfortable. Instead he asked, “Like what, girl?”
    She shrugged and pushed her hair behind her ears. “I don’t know. If you hadn’t been born a Hollowell, what would you have done?”
    His gruff, scratchy voice turned kind of wistful. “I always dreamed of driving truck.”
    Her hands fell to her lap. She hadn’t known what she’d expected him to answer but not that. “A truck driver?”
    “King of the road,” he corrected as if living out the dream in his head. “I would have traveled the country. Seen a lot of different things. Lived different lives.” He turned his head and looked at her. For the first time in her life, she felt like she was making a connection with the man who’d given her life and raised her. It was just the briefest glance and then it was gone.
    “I would have wandered back here though.” His voice turned to his usual gruff. “I’m a Texan. This is where my roots are. And if I’d traveled the country, I wouldn’t have bred so many fine paints.”
    And the good Lord knew he loved his horses.
    “You’ll understand someday.”
    She thought she knew what he meant, but he’d just been full of surprises today. “What?”
    “That it’s easy to roam if you have an anchor.”
    Sometimes that anchor was a heavy burden, weighing a person down.
    He hit a button on his bed and raised the head a bit more. “It’s the breeding season for horses and cattle and I’m stuck in here.”
    “Have the doctors said when you might be able to come home?” When that happened, she’d hire a home health care worker to look after him.
    “They don’t say. My old bones aren’t healing like they would if I was younger.”
    Yes. She knew that. “What has your doctor said about your higher temperature? Other than you’re obviously tired.”
    He shrugged. “I’m old, Sadie Jo.”
    “But you’re tough as old boot leather.”
    One corner of his mouth turned up a little. “Yeah, but I’m not what I used to be. Even before the accident, my bones hurt.”
    “Then take it easier. Once you’re out of here, we should go on vacation.” She couldn’t recall a time they’d ever vacationed together. As a kid he’d always sent her off with her mama’s relatives or to camp. She didn’t think he’d ever left the JH unless it was business-related. “You said you wanted to travel the country. We could go to Hawaii.” Although she could never imagine her father in a floral shirt sipping umbrella drinks on the beach with his boots on. “Or you could come stay with me in Phoenix. There are whole retirement cities in Arizona.” Old people loved Arizona. “The JH will survive without you for a few weeks.”
    “The ranch will survive long after I’m gone.” He looked at her, the whites of his eyes a dull beige. “It’s set