Chapter 5

Ron was back about an hour and a half later.

He wore work clothes and had steel cap boots on. While more miner’s attire, they looked well-worn suggesting he has done manual labour at some time. The hat had a broad brim, and he even had dark shaded safety glasses in his pocket.

I had to smile. I wondered if the bloke actually owned jeans. Bobby heard him turn up and walked him up to the house. They dumped his stuff in the lounge and then Bobby had him out the door.

I had dinner on the table by five thirty, as we would need to be in the paddock by about six thirty to get started. The boys trooped in as I finished putting it on the table.

They were soon wolfing down the meatloaf and baked potatoes. I had steamed a heap of other veggies as Ron had indicated he liked his veggies. He was true to his word and had plenty piled on his plate.

“Thank you,” he said, as he placed his knife and fork on the table. “Your meatloaf was as good as my mums. She likes lots of veggies, in hers as well.”

Bobby agreed, telling him that mine was better than Martha’s, but don’t ever tell her he had said that. Ron laughed, and we chatted amicably. Ron helped me clean up again. We all sat on the veranda with a drink and waited for the dew.

When Bobby said it was time to go, I grabbed the water bottles, and we trooped off down the paddock. He got the tractor with the baler going and headed off. Mark drove the second tractor happy to let, ‘The young stud, strut his stuff,’ he told us.

We slowly followed Bobby around the paddock. Ron got on the trailer, and I’d toss the bale on while he stacked. I had the easy job because I only needed to lift them a couple of feet. Ron had to shift it and stack them, while the vehicle moved.

We chatted while we worked and the job went smooth. We got a short rest when Bobby ran out of baling twine and had to load a new spool. Ron happily helped him. He even broke the half-strung bale and tossing it back in to be processed again without being asked.

The bloke really surprised me. He seemed to be having fun and often had a grin on his face. We had the bales about six high and Ron was building the seventh tier. He had just dropped the bale when Mark jerked the trailer to a stop.

Ron tumbled backwards. He rolled down the six tiers of bales and off the trailer. He landed on his back. I heard the breath ‘oof’ out of him as he lay there stunned.

I quickly ran up to him, knelt beside him and asked worriedly, “Are you okay?”

He groaned, “Crap, that hurt.”

Can you move, sweetie?” I asked really worried as I leant over him. He looked at my face. His arms came up and around me. Then he pulled me down and kissed me. I kissed him back relieved.

Mark interrupted us and gruffly said, “He can’t be hurt too bad if he has the capacity to do that.”

We helped him to his feet and dusted him off. He stretched and moved everything. Mark said, “Sorry about that, but Bobby had stopped.”

Bobby came running down to us. He had seen Ron take the dive. “You okay son?” he asked worriedly. “No tingles, does everything move?”

Ron looked at us. Obviously, he had no idea why we were so worried. “I’ll have some bruises tomorrow, but everything is working okay. I didn’t hit that hard, the bales broke my fall,” he told us.

Bobby looked at me concerned. I hugged Ron and said to him, “I’ll explain later. I’m just relieved you’re okay.”

“The bloody twine had a knot in it and snapped,” Bobby offered by way of explanation of why he had stopped.

“Want me to help?” Ron offered.

“No son you take a break, have a drink. Mark can help me,” he told Ron.

I grabbed a water bottle and offered it to Ron. He took a big swig and gave it back. I felt my legs wobble and sat on the bale that was still on the ground. I took a deep breath and tried to get my racing heart back under control. I was more upset than I realised.

Ron sat on the other end and lay back, so his head was on my lap. He folded his arms across his chest, and I felt him relax. I absently played with his hair. It was sweat-plastered to his forehead, and I smoothed it back.

“You scared the shit out of me,” I told him.

“Scared the crap out of myself too,” he told me with a grin.

I felt the tears roll down my cheek. I wasn’t even sure why I was crying. He pulled off a glove and wiped away my tears. “Hey what’s all this, I’m fine, honest.”

I sniffed and asked him, “Did Bobby tell you, I’m a widow?”

He looked up at me and then sat up. He moved so he was sitting on the other side of the bale so he could face me. He hugged me to him. He ran a hand soothingly up and down my back. “No,” he said simply.

“My husband fell down the front steps. We had only been married six weeks. He broke his neck but took nearly two months to die,” I told him.

I didn’t tell him I was glad the son of a bitch was dead and that he saved me going through a messy divorce. The way he died wasn’t nice, and I still couldn’t use the front stairs.

“Shit, that must have been rough. I’m sorry I scared you, I’ll try to be more careful, okay?” he told me, still hugging me to him and rubbing my back until I felt better.

I didn’t think I’d be as happy to lose him. He had shown me more love and attention in two days than Brad had in all the time he was trying to convince me to marry him. And definitely, not in the weeks after I had.

“I love being out here at night,” Ron suddenly said. “You can see the stars in all their glory. I hadn’t even realised that I had missed the smell of Lucerne.”