Life is like a game of dodgeball. Sometimes it chunks things that you can catch and throw right back at it. Sometimes it throws things you can narrowly miss, feeling the wind from it whoosh against your skin. And sometimes, it throws things at you t...
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MY ARMS BURN as I toss another square bale onto the stack. I'm not even halfway done yet and I feel lightheaded. But I won't stop. I never will give in to it. I grab another bale and toss it perfectly on to the stack. What can I say? Years of practice pays off, honey.
"What are you doing?"
"Ahhh!" My arms flail, and a bale goes flying up in the air, right into the arms of none other than Braxton. A frown drops onto my face and I ignore him, turning back to grab another bale. If he thinks I am speaking to him, he is sadly mistaken. There is no way I am going to even mutter a word to that sorry butthog. He doesn't deserve my words, let alone any of my attention.
"You do realize that I am the ranch hand, and this is my job, right?"
I turn to look at him with a glare. "My dad specifically asked me to unload these. And for the the record, I don't need a ranch hand around here. I keep up with the place perfectly fine."
Okay, maybe just a few words. Good intentions, though. Good intentions. Or bad intentions, since the intent is to be sour with him. I'm not sure, I don't really do people. Well, I do do people, but not like that. I would love to do Braxton though. Boy, would that be a blast. Anyways.
"Your dad reached out for me to come work for him. I wasn't even looking for a job when he called so you must have been slacking off," he gloats. My stomach twists with a twinge of hurt, but it's not his fault. He doesn't even know. I ignore him, afraid that my voice will give away my thoughts. Instead, I chunk the hay bales a little harder, ignoring how my head pounds, and how I feel more and more faint by the second.
I won't let this stupid thing affect me.
Bale after bale, the stack gets higher and higher until I finish, gazing over the now empty flatbed trailer. My entire body aches and burns and I can barely see straight but my head stays held high, as always. I feel eyes on me and I turn around to spot Braxton leaned up against the barn, staring at me.
"I thought you'd give up," he admits, "Impressive."
Jumping off the trailer, I forbid myself from stumbling when I walk. My head begins to pound even harder but I push through. There's other work that needs to be done and I'll be darned if I'm going to give him even more reason to grow that, already-too-large, head of his. This chick is not one to be reckoned with, and he's soon to find that out first hand if he doesn't fix his tude.
"You don't know me," I spit, shooting him a nasty glare. I didn't stick around to see if he said anything back. I didn't exactly care to, because quite frankly I could barely see straight.
"You need to stay out of the heat, and avoid extreme manual labor."
Once again, something that Doc had tried to tell me. Something that I would ignore, just like the rest of the orders. The stupid doctors don't know what's best for me. I know what's best for me, and I'll be darned if I'm going to let them push me around like the rest of the world thinks I'll do. I have a disease, so what? I'm still Ainsley Vermont. The baddest b-word of them all.
