We set around the table and talked and laughed awhile. Nobody said nothin' about me and Paco bein' new Flynns. We was all talkin' like we always been doin' this. After we done that for a while, Daddy said, "I reckon it's time for us to go on home, boys."
It felt good bein' in our own house. I was likin' havin' all them cousins and them friends but I reckon I was likin' better havin' a real house to live in and havin' a daddy and a brother. I thought on Daddy off and on all day and I knowed he loved me but there ain't nothin' like havin' him right there when you're thinkin' on how he loves you. I wondered some if the new would ever wear off this bein' loved. I reckoned it would and it made me some sad. I wondered did it feel as good when you got used to it.
Daddy asked if we thought we could bath ourselves. Aunt Jenny had put some water on to heat for us and she would come back and bath us did we think we needed her but Daddy said he was too tired for bathin' boys. Anyway, he never bathed no boy and he reckoned he'd be worse at it than Sam and, Lord knows, Paco couldn't afford to lose no more hide.
Paco took on a real sorrowful look. He said he was some sad. I was thinkin' some hurtful memory or somethin' come on him. He said he was some took back by Daddy. Up 'til right now he knowed that everything our daddy said was true but he sees now that our daddy is a liar. Wasn't nobody could be worse at bathin' than Sam.
That rascal. He wasn't sad. He was funnin' me. I went at him and we started rollin' around on the floor, playin' like we was fightin'. I knowed how Paco giggled when Daddy was ticklin' him and I was tryin' to do that. It made me giggle when Paco was gigglin'. We was havin' fun and Daddy was laughin' but I seen again how puny Paco was. When he was rollin' on top of me, didn't hardly feel no heavier than a bed cover. It took some of the fun out of it 'cause I got to thinkin' I was gonna hurt him. When you're playin', you can't be thinkin' nothin' like that. You just got to be playin', not thinkin'.
Daddy let us do that until he seen Paco was some wore out. He seen what I seen when we was chorin'. That boy would of played until he couldn't move no more didn't Daddy ask again did we need Aunt Jenny to bath us. We knowed from that that Daddy wanted us to stop rollin' around and get to bathin'.
I had to think on it some. I liked havin' them ladies scrubbin' my back with that soft brush. I was still thinkin' that when Paco said, "Daddy, if you make Sam promise to stay the hell away from my eyes and hide, I'll try bathin' myself."
"You ain't gonna get that comfortin' feelin' from havin' your back brushed," I told him.
He went to thinkin' real hard but this time I knowed he was funnin'. "Daddy, I reckon I'll be needin' your gun. I'm gonna let Sam brush my back but if he gets anywhere near my eyes, I'm gonna shoot him."
I didn't say nothin'. I knowed anything more I said, he'd just have somethin' better to say back. I just laughed and headed for the wash room. Daddy had to tell us to get on upstairs and get them bathrobes.
We done pretty good. Bathin' yourself ain't as easy as it looks when you got a daddy to satisfy. When he's lookin' you over to see did you do good, you got places you never knowed you had. When I was just bathin' for myself up to Goodnight, I never thought on nothin' like ears and necks and under them chins. Both me and Paco left some dirt in them places and Daddy sent us back to get it off but I reckon we got off the dirt from the rest of us and Paco didn't stink at all no more. I reckon I didn't either 'cause nobody said nothin'.
Daddy looked real good at our cuts. He was some pleased at how they was comin'. Paco's eyes still had some of that green color around them but it was goin' away real fast. When some of them school teachers I had was really set on havin' you do somethin', they sounded all mad when they was tellin' you. Up to then, our daddy never talked mad to us but he had a way of lettin' you know when he really meant somethin'. He told us that Danny and Juan and them went swimmin' almost every afternoon and they might not be thinkin' and askin' us to go. It was our job to remember there ain't no swimmin' until Daddy says swim. Could we remember that? Like I said, he wasn't mad but you got the feelin' you better.
That got me to questionin' why that bathin' water was good for them cuts but swimmin' water would set them to festerin'. I was thinkin', "That man ain't makin' no sense," but then I got to rememberin' who he was and it come to me that him bein' Seamus Flynn, just sayin' it was enough. It didn't need to make sense. I knowed he was my daddy but I ain't forgot all them Seamus Flynn stories either. I didn't say nothin'.
Daddy had a big chair in a room he called the library. It had some real pretty cloth on it. It wasn't just no wood chair. It was all soft and me and Paco come to know that's where he liked to be of an evenin'. He had one of them stickin' up in the air lamps beside that chair and I didn't know there was that many books in the whole world. Two of them walls was all covered with books and most of the other two walls had boards you could put books on, did you get some more. Our daddy told us that's why you call it a library, 'cause it had all them books in there.
Our daddy told us he loved to read. Readin', he said, was the best way to learn things and he just loved learnin' things. I got a soft feelin'. That was another way him and me was alike. Daddy said now that he had me and Paco and he was some more growed up, he reckoned his biggest regret was that he never went to college. He said his daddy was real hurt that none of his boys went to college. Our Grandpa Flynn was a man who loved learnin' too but when he was young, he was too poor to think on college. By the time our daddy and our uncles was growed, he was rich and them boys could have gone to college, but none of them did. Daddy even got a little water in his eyes and looked off like his thinkin' was somewhere else. "Liam Flynn would be a very proud man if he could see his grandchildren in college."
Our daddy said that me and Paco wasn't gonna make the same mistake he did. We was goin'.
Me and Paco didn't even hardly know what no college was and we didn't know how you done it. We got the sense that if you done it, you was someplace else, not on the Bent-Y. Somehow, I got the sense that we wasn't gonna have to do it right then but Paco didn't. All he could think was, Daddy said we was goin' away. He went to cryin'. It come to Daddy right off what was the cause of Paco's cryin' and he went to pick him up so he could comfort him and tell him different. But Paco was tryin' to run away from Daddy. When Daddy got to him and picked him up, Paco went to hittin' on Daddy with his fists. In his head he was thinkin', "This man made me love him and now he's sendin' me away." He never cared nothin' about Vox or them other folks who had him so what they done didn't really mean nothin' to him. But he had got to love Daddy and Daddy had said that he loved Paco. Now, to his thinkin', Daddy was sendin' him away. Paco wasn't just scared. If you was lookin' you seen that he hated Daddy right then.
I seen the hurt in Daddy's face. I knowed that hurt was not for what Paco was doin' to Daddy but for what Daddy done to Paco. That boy had hardly knowed nothin' but hurts in his life and now, from not thinkin', Daddy had hurt him again.
Daddy was real gentle with Paco but he didn't let him run off. At first he tried to talk soft like he done when we was comin' to the Bent-Y but Paco wasn't hearin' him. Daddy put his hands under Paco's arms and held him up close to his face. "Paco! Paco! You have to listen to me, boy. It's not what you're thinking. You're not going away. You're staying right here, with Sam and me on the Bent-Y."
Paco stopped fightin' with Daddy. He just looked at him for a spell. Paco had them dead eyes. The ones that looked like you was lookin' in a dark room. Real slow, it come to Paco what Daddy was sayin'. His thinkin' took in what he was hearin'. He buried his face in Daddy's shoulder and wrapped his arms around Daddy's neck and held on real tight. Nobody said nothin'. Paco wasn't even cryin' no more. He was just holdin' on to Daddy.
When Daddy felt Paco lettin' loose he pushed him back so he could see his face. "You all right now, Son? I'm sorry, Paco. I have to think what I'm saying. You had no way of knowing that folks don't go to college until they are all grown up. I told you once, you're stuck with us. I'm not letting you get away. It will be a long time before you go to college and by then you'll be glad to get away from your daddy for a little while."
Daddy set in that big chair of his. He had Paco on his lap and he motioned for me to come sit there too. Paco was sittin' on one knee and I was on the other. We was both kind of layin' on his chest, kind of lookin' at each other. Paco's eyes was takin' on a better look and he was doin' his meltin' in thing. Daddy had one arm around each of us. Daddy said, "We've all got some learning to do but we've got each other so we can do our learning together." He kissed both of us on the forehead.
After while he asked what we done today. From how he was feelin' before, I was some took back by how ready Paco was to talk. I was thinkin' I was gonna have to do the tellin' but Paco was talkin' just as fast and just as loud as me. Daddy laughed and said, "Whoa, there, boys. I know I have two ears but they can only listen to one thing at a time."
I think my daddy seen that Paco needed to talk right then. He didn't need to have no time to go to thinkin' on nothin'. I seen that too and I didn't care when Daddy said, "Tonight, Paco you tell me first and if you leave anything out, Sam can tell it. Tomorrow night Sam can tell first."
If you been payin' attention to what I been tellin' you, you know Paco don't leave nothin' out. I didn't have nothin' to tell 'cept how I come to name my buckskin, Hunter. Daddy got water in his eyes from hearin' me tell that.
"Happy and Hunter," Daddy said. "Those are good names for those horses."
We set there for a long time, just bein' by him and lettin' him hug us. I got to thinkin' about all them years I had to play in my head about that huggin' I done on my daddy when I didn't even know he was my daddy. I knowed now he wasn't just carryin' me then. He was huggin' me too. It come to me for the first time to wonder why he never told me who he was. I wanted to know but that was a question for a time when it was just me and him. I reckon it didn't really matter. I had him now and if I wanted huggin', I didn't have to play in my head. I just had to wait until Daddy come home.
I was thinkin' Daddy was gonna soon be tellin' me and Paco to go on to bed. I reckoned I would if he told me to but I wasn't that sleepful yet and I knowed I wouldn't get to sleep. I hated when I couldn't get to sleepin' in that cabin but somehow, the idea of layin' awake in that soft bed in this fine house, hearin' my brother breathin' and knowin' my daddy was down the hall didn't seem all that bad.
I didn't have to find out though. Daddy asked did we want him to read to us some. He said he had a new book that was just wrote by that same man that wrote down that poem. He was a Englishman and his name was Robert Lewis Stevenson.
Daddy wasn't near done with that story 'cause that's a big book. It's got a boy, just some older than Paco and me, named Jim Hawkins. Daddy said its got boats and sailors and pirates and buried treasure. He didn't get no farther than Jim Hawkins and his mama livin' in the Admiral Benbow Inn. I wanted to ask my daddy what the hell was a Inn but by then I was mostly sleepin' and Daddy was havin' to almost carry me and Paco to our bed.
Felt good, that bed. Felt good, Paco's ass touchin' mine. We had us some day. We got to know all them cousins and all them friends and me and Paco didn't even always be together but if he hadn't scooted over to me, I would have scooted over to him. Just that little touchin' was a comfort.
It's a good feelin', feelin' that sleep come over you and knowin' your daddy's downstairs and your brother's needin' you so much he has to be touchin' you just enough to know you're still there. It's a good feelin', feelin' that sleep comin' over you knowin' you got folks you love and who love you.
Seemed like we didn't hardly sleep none at all when Daddy was shakin' us, tellin' us to get up. There was sunshine comin' in through the windows but I sure wasn't done sleepin'. Made me some mad. I was used to sleepin' until I woke up without nobody shakin' me. I reckon I woke up some faster than Paco. He looked like he was still sleepin' when he was puttin' on his britches. He got both his legs in the same side of them britches and when he tried to stand up he near about fell down. Seein' that woke me up good. I went to laughin' at him and that made him some mad but I knowed he was mostly playin' when he said, "Dumb white folks. Wake you up when you're sleepin' good and then laugh at you when you're tryin' out a new way to wear britches."
When we come downstairs, Daddy was drinkin' a cup of coffee. I could smell that he was cookin' eggs and I was hopin' he had some for me. I reckon he seen me lookin' kind of hopeful like at the cookin' stove and he said. "Ho Boy has breakfast ready for you at Kevin's. It won't be long until we have our own cook. I can't remember if I told you or not. Ho Boy wired his brother, Ho Chow, in San Francisco to come be our cook. He told me this morning that he'll be coming but I don't know how long it will take him to get here.
"Ho Chow's wife will take care of our house and if they are anything like Ho Boy and Ki Tuan, we'll eat well and live clean. Until they get here, we'll eat at Kevin's and Brian's in the evening and you'll eat with Danny or Spike for breakfast and noonin'."
Daddy told us to sit down, he had something he wanted us to hear good. He said that him and Kevin and Señor Pablo done some talkin'. Señor Pablo said that he could use some help in the workin' horse barn and with Uncle Brian buyin' all them fancy new horses, the house horse barn was gettin' too much for Danny. Besides, it was comin' on summer and with us boys helpin' in these home barns, it would free one man up to go to the west herd. They were short a man there. If we promised that we would do our chorin' when it was chorin' time and our playin' when it was playin' time, me and Paco could chore with them horses.
He said Uncle Kevin and Señor Pablo was talkin' to their boys the same way and them daddies was only tryin' us out. If we done more playin' than we done chorin', they was gonna have to think up somethin' else.
Me and Paco was real glad for what he was tellin' us. I reckon we'd of promised anything but we was sure promisin' to do what he said. Turned out my chorin' was gonna be with Juan in the workin' horse barn and Paco's was with Danny in the house horse barn. We wasn't to try to do nothin' we wasn't told with them horses and we wasn't to go near no horse we wasn't told to work with. Daddy's big gray was a stallion and too rank for boys our big. Uncle Kevin rode a big gelding but he was too high spirited and some of Uncle Brian's horses was what Daddy called "blooded stock" and was real nervous. We was to stay away from them. Anyway, Uncle Brian loved horses and he liked to do his own groomin'.
In the workin' horse barn, we was to do only what Señor Pablo told us. No more!! Some of them horses was still near wild and some of them was nervous from bein' hurt or sick or in a strange place. Daddy knowed we liked horses and he wanted us to learn some about them but he just got us and he loved us and he didn't want us gettin' hurt. Did we understand that? He told us that he wasn't gonna let us do no horse chorin' but Uncle Kevin told him he was bein' a mother hen and he didn't want to do that to us but he was some worried. I think we ended up promisin' him ten times we'd be real careful before he let us go to do our chorin'.
We went on over to get Danny before goin' to them barns. We started in that dust room and we got yelled at. Aunt Lydia and Katy was just gettin' ready to do the milkin' and they was in there changin' from house clothes to barn clothes. The way Katy yelled at us I was glad I wasn't her brother was she gonna do me like that all the time. Aunt Lydia told Katy to hush and told me and Paco to go on in the kitchen door and get Danny movin'. He was probably sittin' at the kitchen table sleepin'.
Danny was sittin' at the table lookin' like he was asleep. He didn't even say nothin' when we come in. He just sit there kind of lookin' nowhere. Pretty soon he said, "All the places in this world there is, I gotta be born in Texas where they think you're a damn outlaw if you're still sleepin' when the sun comes up."
Aunt Lydia called from the dust room, "Daniel Patrick Flynn, I still have a big bar of lye soap and if I hear any more of that talk out of you, that's what you'll be having for breakfast."
Danny looked at us and grinned. "See what I told you?"
Juan was waitin' for me at the barn door. His daddy was there and two of them growed hands that helped Señor Pablo. They all howdyed me and then one of them said, "We can't have no cowboy lookin' that shiny and new in this barn. Look at them boots. Ain't got a mark on 'em. Look at them brand new britches. You reckon we got us a dude on our hands?"
I seen Juan grinnin' and Señor Pablo was tryin' real hard not to. I knowed something was gonna happen but I also got the sense it was funnin' so it didn't worry me none.
There was too much work in them barns for just boys to do so Señor Pablo had several growed cowboys helpin' him in both barns. They mostly worked with the rank stock and some of them done shoein' and tack fixin'. Us boys done mostly grainin', hayin' in the winter, curryin' and brushin' on gentler horses and sometimes even puttin' on salve and wrappin' ankles if Señor Pablo knowed the horse to be one who'd let a boy do that.
I reckon most of our time was spent scrapin' shit. When I first started, I thought it was gonna give me my mad but horse shit's got a different smell. Got so I didn't even think on it.
Well, gettin' back to that first day I went walkin' in that barn. I knowed them two cowboys was up to somethin'. After the first one asked was I a dude, the other one said, "Wouldn't do to have no dude on the Bent-Y. Everybody here's a dust eatin' cowboy. It come to me that could be that boy ain't no dude. You reckon he just ain't learned to eat dust yet?"
The first cowboy looked real serious. He put his chin on the thumb and finger of his right hand and went to scratchin' his head with the other hand. "You know, that could be it. Reckon we better teach him."
This is real dry country. Right at the place where them horses went in and out that barn, there was about a inch of real fine dust, ground that way from all them horses shod hoofs goin' over it. Them cowboys grabbed me and started rollin' me around in that dust. They was throwin' it on me and puttin' it in my boots and down my britches. By the time they was done, I'd eat some dust all right. Juan was laughin' real hard and Señor Pablo was lookin' at me to see how I took it. When he seen me laughin', he went to laughin'.
Them two cowboys stood back and kind of studied on me. "What you think? You reckon he could pass for a Bent-Y hand now?"
"I reckon so but you know how Brian is. He's one for fancy and I reckon he'd be some upset did he see a Bent-Y hand that dirty. I reckon we better bath him."
I knowed what was gonna happen. One of them had my shoulders and the other one had my feet. We was headin' for the horse tank. I come up with a mouth full of water and I shot it out my mouth at them cowboys. They laughed and I heard other folks laughin'. When I got the water out my eyes, I seen my daddy and them uncles. Daddy was right there lookin' at my cut. He had a cloth and was dabbin' at it. He looked at them cowboys and said, "That scab's hard enough I knew that dust wouldn't hurt him none and I reckon that little dippin' didn't hurt him. Thanks again boys for not giving him the usual Bent-Y welcome." I seen that my daddy knowed what was gonna happen. He had a dry pair of britches for me and he told me to wear my boots dry. He said they'd take the shape of my foot and do me better.
After we started our chorin' I asked Juan what was the usual welcome. He said the first day he started they told him you ain't no wrangler until you get horse shit in your ears. They rolled him around in the shit pile before they throwed him in the horse tank. From knowin' what that damn preacher man done to me, I reckon my daddy didn't know how I'd take to that kind of welcome so he seen to it I wasn't rolled in no shit.
Mornin' chorin' took us about a hour and since Aunt Jenny liked to do her own cookin' and she had Buck to take care of, all of us, even Spike, went to Danny's house for breakfast. Juan went with his daddy to his house and us Flynns are only gonna do this until we got our cook. Since mornin's is the most work with babies, we're gonna eat breakfast at Danny's and noonin' at Spikes.
Like I told you, Spike's chorin' was takin' care of his mama's chickens. It fretted him somethin' awful 'cause mostly the mamas or the some growed girls on the Bent-Y done chickens. Maureen done Aunt Lydia's chickens and before Buck was born and Rosie had to help her mama in the house, she done Aunt Jenny's chickens but until Buck was some growed, Spike was gonna have to keep doin' them chickens. His daddy said he could start chorin' with horses when he was ten like Danny, and Spike just turned nine so he had almost a year to live with the shame of doin' girl's work and Katy never let him forget it.
After all us boys had washed up we went on in the kitchen. Paco was some excited and was tellin' me about the chorin' he done. He was already some proud but when Danny went to tellin' how good he done, he got a smile I thought was gonna break his face. He didn't say nothin' about bein' welcomed so I figured my daddy told them not to 'cause of Paco's malnutrition. He'd of took the funnin' all right but I reckon Daddy thought he might get hurt from his puny. I didn't say nothin' 'cause I figured that after he was over his puny, he'd get his welcome and I didn't want him to know it was comin'.
Aunt Lydia and Katy come in from their milkin'. When they was set, Aunt Lydia went to talkin'. We didn't ask her nothin' but she went to tellin' us that she just loved milkin' cows. It reminded her of when she was a girl in Ohio. Her daddy was a farmer and she'd been milkin' cows since she can remember.
I never heard of no farmer and I asked her what it was. Danny said, "Sod buster. It's the same thing but when they're doin' it in Ohio you call them farmers and ain't nobody mad at them. But, if they go to doin' it in Texas, you call them sod busters and it's all right to be mad at them."
Aunt Lydia went on tellin'. She said as much as she loved milkin', there was just gettin' to be too much for her and Katy. She said our daddy was gettin' some Jerseys shipped in from Illinois 'cause he figured Paco needed some richer milk. She said she didn't know how Jerseys would do in Texas 'cause they was green grass cows and there ain't too much of that in this part of Texas, but the way Shay was all fussed over us boys, there wasn't no tellin' him nothin'. Aunt Lydia said she'd be glad to see a Jersey again' even if they didn't do good in Texas. Anyway, her and Katy was gonna need some help milkin'. How would us boys like to learn milkin'?
Danny said, "I ain't learnin'. Milkin's woman's work."
Katy said, "You couldn't learn anyway 'cause milking's not baby's work."
Danny said, "I come down here for eggs and taders and steak for breakfast. If I want bull shit, I can get all I need out on the range. I don't need none from you!"
Katy went to talkin' in a real uppity way, "Mama, do I have to sit here and listen to this obstreperous child?"
Aunt Lydia said, "Well thank the Lord He gave us you so we'd all know what perfect is. I see always having your nose in a book has improved your vocabulary. I suggest you spend a little more time with your nose in the Bible. There are some words in there like love and kindness and understanding it wouldn't hurt you to learn."
Aunt Lydia looked at Danny. "I wish your daddy would see to it those hands watch their talk around you. I don't care what you hear. You're the one who's saying it and you're the one who's going to be burping bubbles. This is the last time I'm going to tell you about that talk."
About that time Ho Boy come in with them eggs and steak and taders. He had hot biscuits but we had to drink regular milk. Aunt Lydia said there was too many of us now. We was runnin' out of butter milk between churnin's.
Paco eat good. Aunt Lydia kept givin' him more milk. I reckon my daddy thought it was meat and greens that was gonna cure the malnutrition and Aunt Lydia thought it was milk. Somethin' was helpin' though. He still had them ribs stickin' out and that belly but you seen somethin' was doin' him good. He just looked different. I reckon it was his skin.
I never give no thought to how I was eatin' but I must have been doin' good too. Ho Boy pointed to me and said, "That boy a Flynn okee dokee. He eat like his daddy." If you eat Ho Boy's cookin' good, he took right to you.
I don't know why she done it, but as we was walkin' out, Aunt Lydia was standin' by the door. She didn't do it to Danny or Spike but she give me and Paco each a big hug and kissed us both on the cheek. She didn't say nothin' but I knowed what she was meanin'. She was glad we had our daddy and glad we had our home and you got the feelin' that she was even glad for her that she come to know us. It does somethin' to your thinkin' when you know folks take joy from you.
It come to me that I didn't feel took back by the fussin' goin' on in Danny's house. You got the feelin' that nobody was mad. That's just how they done each other. It seemed to work for them but I wasn't sure if I liked it or not.
Seemed like all the younguns on the Bent-Y was like horses goin' to their own stall. After chorin' and breakfast, everybody headed for the windmill like that's where they belonged. There was a lot of talkin' and decidin' and sometimes everybody done somethin' together, like play baseball, and sometimes little groups would go off and play something. That first day me and Paco was at the windmill, they decided on baseball.
I reckon there was a lot of folks playin' baseball back east. There's even some that say folks get money for playin' it. Them soldiers brought it to Texas and even though they're growed, them Flynn daddies still love games and mostly they love to play baseball. 'Course, my daddy's the best but all them Flynn daddies play real good. A whole lot of times on Sunday afternoon folks come from town, the other herd camps and even the army camp at Claude and them men play baseball. I seen some boys in Goodnight hittin' that ball but there was never enough for a game like they have on the Bent-Y.
When we went to playin' that first day, it took some learnin'. When you're standin' back, it don't look like that ball's goin' that fast but when you're tryin' to hit it with that bat, seems like it's past you before you can get your bat moved. Made me some mad, not bein' able to hit that ball but Rosie said, "Don't fret, Sam. It just takes some practice. You'll get the hang of it."
Rosie sure as hell - ah - I got to quit sayin' that --. Rosie sure had the hang of it. She could hit farther than any of us and when she ran she put me in mind of water flowin'. Danny was some good, Juan was next best to Rosie and Virgil looked like he was comin' apart when he run. Isabela was some good, so was Spike. Both me and Paco got so we could hit the ball some before we was done playin' and we both got to know what a out and a strike and a base and all them other baseball things was. Nate got mad at Rosie when she hit a ball over his head and he had to chase it and he called her a mangy bitch. Rosie got a look on her face that said, "Only one thing to do about that. You got to beat up that boy." She done it too. Nate went cryin' home to his mama. His mama went to talk to Aunt Jenny. Rosie had to go in.
Aunt Jenny knows that Nate needs what he gets but she keeps tryin' to tell Rosie that beatin' up folks ain't ladylike. Rosie don't say this to her mama but she told us younguns, "I know beatin' up folks ain't ladylike but I ain't a lady yet. I'm a youngun. When I get to be a lady, I won't beat him up no more."
Katy never played with us but she'd often come out and say kind of mean things while we was playin'. That girl could get Danny crazy. I don't know why he paid her mind. Them Bent-Y cousins was teachin' me and Paco a lot of things but if they'd listen to us, we could teach them some things about payin' no mind to namin'. After while it come to me that it was a kind of game they played.
I didn't understand it. I was gettin' to like Katy some but I had to ask my daddy why she was always nasty to Danny and all of us. Daddy said that's just the way it is with them pop-n-jay younguns. He said it don't make no difference if it's a boy or a girl, when they get to about thirteen or fourteen or fifteen, around in there, they come to think they're the only one in the whole world that knows something. I told my daddy, "Do I ever get like that, I want you to kick my ass."
My daddy said, "You'll probably get that way and I'll probably have to."
When I'm tellin' you what my daddy said, I'm tellin' you in how I talk. The longer I live with my daddy, the better I'm gettin' to like how he talks. I can't really tell you how it sounds but it's almost like you're havin' a book read to you. I like that kind of proper talk. So does Paco. We're both gonna try to learn to talk that way, even if them cowboys keep tellin' us that way of talkin' keeps your ass soft and you won't never make no cowboy 'cause you won't never get saddle tough. Danny believes them and he's had a lot of schoolin' and been livin' around folks who talk proper all his life and he can do that proper talk real good. But he wants to be a cowboy real bad so he ain't takin' no chances. He mostly talks range talk and cusses, even sometime when his mama can hear him. I think them cowboys is full of sh...., ah....I think they're lyin' to us.
I'm gettin' a whole new feelin' for Paco. I still love him and I need to have him by me when I'm sleepin' and I'm still some worried on his malnutrition. But we don't just got to be with each other all the time no more. When I ain't seen him for a while, I go lookin' to see is he all right. He does the same with me. But I can be playin' with Juan or Virgil or Danny and he can be off with someone else. I like the feelin'. I know I got him. I know he's my brother but I don't need him right by me like I done when I first got him.
I reckon, besides Paco, Juan's my best friend. Probably that come from us chorin' together but it come too from what I told you when I first seen him. I ain't sure why, but some folks is just right for you. Paco was. So is Juan and it ain't as much as Juan, but so is Virgil. I reckon they got proper words for what I gotta say now but I ain't learned them yet so I'll say it the only way I know how. Nate is just a pure D pain in the ass.
Sometimes I wish Rosie wasn't a girl. I think if she wasn't, she'd be my best friend. Now that I have the chance, I'm findin' that I got some of my daddy's coordination and I'm gettin' some good at ridin' and baseball and Rosie's my best teacher. It ain't that nobody said we can't be best friends. It's just that it's always in your mind that you're some different and when you're ten or 'leven it's just easier to be yourself with folks who are the same as you. Rosie ain't no girly girl when she's with Isabela but she's some different and I like how she is then. When she's with us boys, seems like she's tryin' to be more of a boy than we are. I don't know. I love her for a cousin and I like her real good for a friend but there's just somethin' that makes us both go to our own for our best friends.
When I see Paco playin' baseball, I almost go to cryin'. You can see he's gettin' over his puny. He can hit the ball almost every time if they can throw it close to him and seems like every day, he hits it farther than the day before. When me and him go to wrestlin', he's got a lot more breath in him and we can play longer before I can tell we better quit. I can tell by how he holds down my arms, his strong is gettin' better too. He still ain't got hardly no ass but his belly ain't stickin' out near like it was and I ain't looked that good, but I don't think you can see his ribs that good no more.
Some of them afternoons got to be some lonesome. Me and Paco could be together and I could practice my ridin' and Paco was even learnin' me some of them Indian things. His strong was gettin' better. I was seein' that soon he was gonna be the best rider on the Bent-Y. I don't mean on the whole Bent-Y. I know some of them men is real good riders. I mean best in the younguns.
But even do me and Paco have fun together, when you get used to havin' all them people around, when them boys was off swimmin' and you can't, you feel some put out. We asked Daddy could we just go with them and watch but he said, "There's somethin' about a boy and water, as long as it's not bath water. It could be just a puddle but if it's there and there's a boy within' a mile of it, they're going to find each other. You'd just better stay away from that swimmin' hole or you'll be in it. I'll tell you when. The way your cuts look, it won't be long."
Paco acted some hurt. "You tryin' to say that I don't like bathin' water. I been lovin' that bathin' since I was a baby. I remember when I first seen Sam, I had to hitch a mule to him to get him in that creek so I could get the stink off him. I can't think why any boy would hate bathin'."
He was funnin' on hisself and he got both me and Daddy laughin'. I went to try to tickle him but he was even gettin' to where he was movin' faster and I had to run after him to catch him. He acts like he don't, but he loves that ticklin' and I love his gigglin'. Unless I'm sittin' on my daddy's lap, I don't think I'm happier than when me and Paco is funnin' on each other. I love that boy.
I don't reckon Daddy would have let us go quite yet, but it come a real hot day and we went to fussin' at him. He's still Seamus Flynn but we don't think on that no more. He's just our daddy and we do him like Danny and Spike do their daddies. When they say no, if you fuss at them enough, sometimes they give in to you. You got to know when it's a good time to fuss and when it's time to quit fussin' though. You go at your daddy at the wrong time, you can get sent to your room.
You don't never fuss at your daddy when he first comes home in the afternoon. That's a time for huggin' and lettin' him rest some. If there's still some coffee hot, you can get him some and then you ask him what he done all day and you tell him what you done. Then you wait until Paco gets him laughin'. That's a good time to start fussin' at him. I reckon what us Flynns call fussin', some folks call beggin'. It's the same thing.
You got to learn there's two kind of nos. There's the kind they just say when they ain't really payin' attention. Them's the nos that you can get changed sometimes. The other kind is when they know damn well what they're sayin' and they're meanin' it. You don't never fuss at them kind of nos. You got to learn the difference. It's some like ridin' a horse. You got to learn to do it right or you could end up with a sore ass even when you got a daddy that don't hold much with whippin'. You push too much, them daddies can change their thinkin' on that real fast.
When we first asked our daddy about swimmin' that real hot mornin', he said, "No." I think when you're a daddy somethin' happens inside you. It's like when you smell somethin' you know is gonna taste real good, you get water in your mouth. You don't put it there. It just comes there by itself. When you're a daddy and you see your boy open his mouth to ask something, a "no" just comes in your mouth. I don't think they can help it no more than they can help that mouth waterin'. I reckon I ain't got the most right to talk on this 'cause I ain't been studyin' daddies that long, but there's a lot of them on the Bent-Y and they all do like that.
Me and Paco seen right off that was a not-payin'-attention "no". Didn't take much fussin' and we was on them horses, ridin' toward that swimmin' hole with Juan and Virgil and Danny and Nate, and even Spike got to go. I also seen what that fuss between Rosie and her mama was. When we was waitin' for Spike, I heard Rosie tellin' her mama that there wasn't no sense in her not gettin' to go with us. She knowed that us boys swim naked but she sees Spike naked all the time so it wasn't like there was somethin' hangin' on somebody she ain't seen before and if her mama didn't want them boys seein' her, she'd wear a bathin' suit like she done at them Sunday picnics. Aunt Jenny said that was the most foolish talk she'd ever heard. Everybody knows boys and girls don't go around naked together and she didn't want to hear nothin' more about it.
Rosie said that if everybody knows that, why was it that she and Spike bathed together until just last spring and she didn't see that much difference between bathin' water and swimmin' water. That was when Rosie got her mouth slapped and us boys rode off to the swimmin' hole.
It wasn't a real long ride to the swimmin' hole but, even with all them boys, there was still some times we rode quiet. When we was talkin' and funnin', Nate was never part of it. I questioned on that. We'd all talked about it and we all thought he was bothersome but we never thought of leavin' him out of what we done together. It was like, in your head, you made a difference between the boy and what he done. He was a boy, a Bent-Y boy, so that made him one of us. It made him somebody. I think he knowed better than to do any of us boys too bad so none of us never done no beatin' on him. Anyway, beatin' on him would have been somethin' like my daddy was sayin' about Clayhurst. We knowed we could whip him. It wouldn't have proved nothin' and by makin' us do it, Nate would have been decidin' what we done. We was too proud for that. Us, not no whinin' baby, was gonna decide what we done.
When we come in sight of the swimmin' hole, we went to racin'. Virgil and Juan and Danny had the fastest horses so they was some ahead. I ain't sure which one got there first. Paco come in just some ahead of me and Spike and when Nate seen he wasn't gonna win, he just walked his horse. We was all in the swimmin' hole by the time he got there.
'Course there was a race to see who could get their clothes off first. Paco and me learned right off that you don't want to be last. We wasn't but Spike was and all them boys was splashin' water on him, duckin' him under the water and pushin' him to the bottom. Seemed kind of mean, Spike being the littlest and all, but you seen he was havin' fun and it seemed like he was talkin' the whole time, under water or not. Them boys had a rope hangin' from a tree limb and they'd run and grab that rope and swing out over the water and let go and go splashin' in the middle of that swimmin' hole. Once you got the hang of it, that was fun. We was swimmin'and splashin'and pull them under, stuff like that. Paco had swum with them Indians and he knowed a lot of Indians tricks to play on folks, but what swimmin' I done, I done mostly by myself. This havin' folks to play with when you was swimmin', well, what you say about that?
We got some tired from that hard playin' so we went and sit in the sun for a spell so we didn't get cold. It's funny how you feel warm in the water that's cold but when you get out in the air that's warm, you feel cold don't you sit in the sun.
We was talkin' and laughin' and funnin' on each other. Me and Paco only been on the Bent-Y for about three weeks but all us boys was part of each other. It's hard to tell the difference between lovin' and likin' real good but I was doin' one of them to them boys for lettin' me and Paco be who we was. We wasn't no whore's bastard or goddam greaser. We was Sam and Paco and we was part of that bunch.
Pretty soon, Spike, rememberin' what happened to him before, said, "Last one in's a Bottom Baby."
Juan said, "That ain't no fair. Paco's got a butterfly on his ass. It's gonna fly him in that swimmin' hole first."
I don't think Paco was first but I found out that Bottom Baby is what they call the one they keep pushin' to the bottom 'cause he was the last one in. I found that out good. I was the Bottom Baby.
After while we sit in the sun some more to get dry. We pulled on our britches and started for home. I was ridin' with Juan. I can't remember what we was talkin' about but I reckon you know how boys are. There's things that's real important to them that need real hard talkin' on one day but then don't mean nothin' to them the next.
Paco was ridin' with Spike. The way that looked, Spike wasn't gonna be the champion talker on the Bent-Y for long. I don't know what they was sayin' either but Paco was doin' all the talkin' and Spike was doin' a lot of laughin'.
Since me and Paco come to the Bent-Y, seemed like all them days was good ones but I can't remember one as good as this one. After eatin' and we was sittin' on Daddy's lap like we done every night, we had some things to tell him.