Flutter-Field Ranch

Chapter 3

I turn to the woman Mr. Matthews had been threatening and hold my hand out to her.

"I guess you're Ms. Clemons, my parents best friend." I say with an apologetic smile on my face.

"You know you look like you mother when you're angry... she'd always get that look upon her face whenever she thought someone was gunning for any of her friends." She informs me gently, "You have your mother's blonde and your father's red in your hair... and if I'm seeing correctly, Blue and Green both within your eyes."

"With silver in them too... at least that's what the doctor's say." I laugh nervously because I don't like talking about my parents much... I don't even remember what they look like so I avoid the topic.

"Well your mother's eyes were Green with gold in them, so you must have gotten that from her then." Ms. Clemons informs me, "I'm sorry about Mr. Matthews though... we all know how he can be, but that must have been shocking for you."

"Actually... I think I've met worse." I comment, falling into the more familiar topic, "but I wasn't lying to him. I'm not selling the land to anyone, but I don't want to take over everything either."

I see the young man, who had helped me earlier, saw his eyebrows shoot upward at my words and I raise a questioning one in his direction before continuing with my conversation with Ms. Clemons.

"I've already spoken with all of the officials, your name is still on everything and you're still in charge as far as I'm concerned how things have been running... but I want to integrate myself into the work, because I get the feeling that you don't like the paperwork side of things." I inform her and she laughs gently.

"How could you tell?" She says with bright eyes watching me with so much kindness.

"The records of all of the paperwork... you only did what you needed to in order to keep the government officials off your back, and Mr. Lawrence was the one who helped you keep up with the necessary forms." I reply in a technical manner, "I happen to be very good with paperwork of all kinds, and have almost no skills that would help you with the hands on part of our Family's business... so I hope you'll become my mentor as well as my partner."

"I'd be honored." She smiles at me, "And now that we've got that part of the business taken care of, may we start your welcome party?"

"We may indeed" I laugh along with her and pulled into a mass of hugs, introductions and I feel an odd bit of comfort forming within me as I realize that this really is apart of my family that I've missed out on for years.

The evening is spent with everyone laughing, everyone talking to me, asking me what the general plans for the business were, and many people trying to explain to me that we had Farming land on one half of the property and Horse-Ranch on the other half of the property... Ms. Clemons tried to help me with any questions that I had and soon it was well after midnight by the time I went over to my truck and pulled my suitcase, my duffle-bag and then my backpack out of the bed of my truck and let Ms. Clemons lead me to my room.

"We didn't feel right taking your parent's room... so we just redecorated it in a way we thought you might like." Mrs. Clemons informs me softly as I walked through the doorway of the bigger of the two master bedrooms and took it all in.

I found myself in a room with pale blue walls, soft lighting, a king sized bed at the one end of the room with a real-wood frame and light green sheets (a matching dresser sat at the end of the bed), the corner closest to the door looked like a small office space where I could do all my work... but what I really liked about the room, were the birds, fairies and flowers that were painted upon the rooms walls and especially around the window seat that had a bookcase built around it. I took a quick glance at the small amount of books that sat upon only one section of the shelves and realized that I was going to need to increase my reading options as well.

"Here's the spare key to the company truck... I made sure that it'd be available for you tomorrow, Mr. Lawrence warned me about your Kota. We'll get you another vehicle soon, but until we do, you can use this one." Ms. Clemons tells me as she sets a clip with a small set of keys onto the desk top, "The other keys are labelled for what they open, it's the spare set that your father would carry around with him... if you need anything, I'm in the room closest to the stairs and my son's room is this one here between the two of ours."

"Your son?" I repeat in a confused manner as I set my bags on the floor by the bed gently and walk back over to the desk in order to lean against the edge as I pick up the keys silently.

"Her one and only... I didn't get to introduce myself earlier, I'm Drew Clemons... technically Andrew Clemons, but I prefer Drew." The young man who had helped me with Kota comes to stand behind Ms. Clemons, looks me directly in the eye and holds out his hand in greeting.

"Diane Roark... I prefer Diane though." I take his hand gently as I smile at him kindly and then all to soon, I'm left alone for the night.

I unpack my things into their new places in my room, clothes into the dresser or closet, laptop on the desk, I'd have to get a safe or lockable filing cabinet from town, so until then the I had the papers Mr. Lawrence had given to me with me at all times. I put what few books I had brought with me into the shelves around the window seat and once I was finished putting everything away, I sat on the edge of my bed just looking around my room.

"This is my home." I whisper to myself as I curl up on top of the bedding and quickly fall into the calmest sleep I've had in a very long time.