Cowboy Summer
Chapter 2

Copyright© 2013 by Sasha Distan

Rhydian sat on the deep wooden steps outside the kitchen with his boots sitting next to him on the sun bleached planks. One foot on his knee, he rubbed the sole with his hand, feeling the places where the skin was hard and rough from pressing against the hard leather. Back home he rode in a pair of old work boots, but his sister had insisted that if he was going to have a real cowboy experience, he was going to need real cowboy boots. And he hadn't spent long enough wearing them in. He stretched the joints as he massaged his foot, wishing that he had thicker socks and tougher soles.

"Trouble with your shit-kickers?" Sam's deep southern drawl made Rhydian shiver before he looked up at the blond Texan, grinning down at him.

"Sorry?"

"You English apologise too much." Sam scooped up the boots and sat heavily next to him, "Shit-kickers are these things." Sam handled the boots lie he handled the horse, strong firm hands, quick in inspecting the joints and seams, "These are good boots. Nice leather." Sam's short square fingernails ran over the stitching and the noise made my skin crawl in such a good way, "You're sister bought them for you right?"

"Yeah. How did you know?" I frowned at him.

"I'll bet she got them just after she found out that she wasn't coming with you, huh?" Sam took my foot and pulled it into his lap. I yelped but then his strong warm hands were massaging my foot and I felt the ease of relaxation all the way up my spine. "Better now?"

"Ohh yeah..." Sam had grabbed Rhydian's other foot, causing the teenager to lean back against the steps lest he slump into a puddle under Sam's dextrous hands.

"You'll toughen up in no time bud. Riding every day will make leather of your feet in no time at all." Sam grabbed the cuffs of his jeans and placed his feet back on the steps gently. "So tell me how you got here Rhydian."

Rhydian exhaled into the late afternoon sky and clicked his nails together. The soft noise made his nerves shake a little bit less.

"My sister loves horses. All Claudine ever wanted was a horse, so when she was fourteen mum and dad bought her one. He's called Cloud. Once she was done with riding lessons and when she wanted to hack out, she got the girl who stabled her pony at the yard to lend me little Hopper to ride with her. All I've ever done is follow her around before." Rhydian sighed again, and looked sideways at the big handsome cowboy. Sam had his Stetson in his hands, turning the rim around with his fingers. His eyes were see through blue to the sky, and Rhydian watched him peering at the fields dotted with horses, little tan creases around his eyes, "Mum and dad didn't want to lose out on the deposits and the flights when Claudine went to uni early, so now it's just me." Rhydian gulped and Sam shot him a questioning look, "I don't know how I'm going to ride Shura by myself tomorrow."

The big cowboy shot out a hand and rubbed Rhydian's dirty blond buzz cut.

"Oh you ain't going out by yourself yet little boy," Sam smiled wide, "It's not a bad thing bud. You just need a bit more training. You wanna shadow me tomorrow?"

"Yes please?" Rhydian tried not to show just how much he wanted to purr under Sam's hand, "That would be awesome. But, won't you be busy?"

"Don't worry about it kiddo." Sam slapped the side of his thigh and stood, "Get your boots on and come feed the horses with me."

Rhydian pulled on his boots, wincing and gritting his teeth at the aches of his protesting muscles as he got up to follow Sam back towards the horse yard.

"Do we have to feed all the horses?" Rhydian knew it must have sounded like a silly question.

"No actually." Sam started to assemble a host of thick rubber buckets in front of a range of big steel drums, "The horses who aren't being ridden by guests live out in the big pastures. Horses in the little paddocks get individual dinners."

"Simple."

"That's the way bud." Sam handed Rhydian a big plastic scoop which would have been about three big handfuls, "Everyone needs an alfalfa chaff, which is this stuff, the green chopped mixture. I'll put in the molasses and nuts and then you do another big scoop of the combined hay-chaff OK?"

"OK Sam." Rhydian scooped out a big chunk of the green chaff and sniffed, "Smells sweet."

"You should try this," Sam dug both hands into the nuts and oats mixture and held his scooped palms towards Rhydian, "Smell that."

Rhydian leaned in and sniffed, a heady sweet mix which was hard to describe, like nature dipped in honey, and his brain reeled at him as he glanced up to see Sam smiling at him, big eyes happy and calm and kind, his rough lips so kissable with the scent of the molasses in the air. Rhydian swallowed nervously and leant back, hoping that his blush wasn't too noticeable to the big farm hand.

They made up the rest of the dinners in what seemed to Sam like an easy silence. Shura's boy Rhydian was a quick learner, than was for sure, and after Sam had explained to him the dinner needed to be soaked with water 'because otherwise it's like eating a whole bowl of dry cereal with no milk bud' and shown him where the hose was he was perfectly content that Rhydian would get on with it while he scaled the ladder to get the hay down for the horses.

Rhydian's shadowing of him had been Caleb's idea, as it was obvious from the get go that the kid wasn't going to be able to just up and do things like he would have if his sister had been along as well. Caleb hated to be shadowed, and needed the time and space to do his own thing, after all, he had far more horses to look after than the average twenty two year old. So they had decided that Rhydian was going to stick with Sam and learn the ropes of riding that way. Sam took a moment to look at the boy. Rhydian was pretty tall, for all he gave off the feeling of being small and a little bit helpless, and his dirty blond hair and pink complexion couple with his nicely structured face to make him good to look at. And that wasn't a danger, except that Sam had seen what Caleb hadn't, and knew that the boy was already smitten with him.

 
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