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window, I said, “Just adjusting, I guess.”
    “What exactly are you adjusting to?” she asked. “I mean, what on earth are you doing wherever you are?”
    “I’m, well, just doing odd jobs on a farm right now. Something to keep my hands busy and a roof over my head while I get my head together.”
    “You have a roof here, sweetheart, and—” She paused. “Wait, you’re a farmhand ?”
    Heat flooded my cheeks. “You could say that.”
    She laughed. “Amy, what in the world are—”
    “I just need a break, all right?” It came out sharper than I’d intended, and I sighed. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry. Listen, I just need a little time to regroup, and when I saw the ad for this job, I jumped on it.”
    “You’re picking up shit and feeding someone else’s horses to regroup?”
    “It means I’m around the horses all the time.” I lay back on the bed and stared up at the ceiling. “But there’s no pressure to work with them.”
    Mariah was quiet for a moment. “Huh. I guess…I guess that makes sense. I think?”
    “It probably doesn’t.” I rubbed my eyes with my thumb and forefinger. “I’m not even sure it makes sense to me. But I’ll see what happens.”
    “How is it going so far?”
    I thought about Dustin’s weird demeanor. “Probably too early to decide one way or the other.”
    “That bad, huh?”
    I laughed halfheartedly. “No, it’s not that bad. Just an adjustment.”
    “I guess it would be. Going from Ms. Trainer to horseshit-removal specialist.”
    “Something like that.” I swallowed hard. Absently, I pulled my ring out from under my shirt and turned it on its string between my fingers. “So, um how was the funeral?”
    Silence hung over the line for almost a full minute before Mariah said, “Honey, do you really want to wallow in that? It’s only been forty-eight hours since you couldn’t make yourself show up.”
    I sat up and idly picked phantom burrs off my jeans. “I should have gone.”
    “So why didn’t you?”
    “I don’t know.” I sighed. “I just…couldn’t. I couldn’t deal with hours of listening to all the reasons Sam was the most amazing human being ever to walk the earth.”
    “I guess I can’t blame you for that.” She paused. “How’s your face?”
    My reflection flickered through my mind, and I groaned. “Oh, it looks great .”
    “Is it healing?”
    “I think so.” I absently touched my discolored cheekbone with my fingertips, flinching from my own light touch. “It’s a little darker today than it was yesterday, though.”
    “Darker? Oh, lovely.”
    “Tell me about it.”
    “Well, it’ll probably fade soon,” she said. “You know how bruises are. They get worse before they get better.” She paused. “There’s no swelling, is there?”
    “No. It wasn’t that hard, don’t worry.” I laughed humorlessly. “You know me. I bruise if the wind changes.”
    Mariah didn’t laugh. “Just keep an eye on it. Make sure it really is just a bruise.”
    “It is. Don’t worry.”
    “Don’t worry. Yeah right.” She exhaled hard. “Honey, that’s about all I’ve done since you left. I’m working twice as many horses right now, remember?”
    I winced. “Sorry…”
    “Don’t be. I’ll manage it, and I have Tim, Curt and Dena to help when I need them. I just want you to be okay, that’s all. And where are you, anyway?”
    I continued turning my ring back and forth between my fingers. “It doesn’t matter. Just…don’t worry about it.”
    “Baby, we’re all worried about you,” Mariah said. “Your husband died, and you just disappeared. We all just want to know you’re okay.”
    “I am.”
    “Are you?”
    Watching my gold ring catch the late afternoon sunlight, I sighed. “I really don’t know, honestly.”
    “And is it helping, being wherever it is you are?”
    I gritted my teeth, glaring out at the barn as if it was the reason for my frustration. “Not really.”
    “Then why not come home?”
    “I don’t