The Journal

The dimly lit room was cut into bursts of sunlit streaks from the window at the east side of the old office to the side of the stables. Recent personal setbacks had set Lou Fleming Morris on a cleaning frenzy and her mother's old office was the only space she had not gotten around to the execution of a top to bottom makeover. Conquering each room had been like a jab back at a life that seemed lately to be giving her more punches than seemed fair.

Along the way she discovered that each room revealed certain memories that would have been otherwise lost forever, but now sprung back to life in the most unexpected places, in pictures found on a dusty shelf, boxes long hidden away in the back of a closet, or the old cedar chest stored in the attic. The chore had taken much longer than she had planned, but she felt it was worth the extra time, given the emotional journey it had sent her on, freeing her thoughts to focus on something besides her struggling marriage and the pressure she was under to find a solution to save her relationship with her husband, Peter.

It had been nearly eight years since Lou had lost her mother, Marion Fleming, to an automobile accident that also involved her then fifteen year old sister, Amy. Losing her mother so suddenly altered the course of her life, completely upsetting all of her plans to be a relevant player in the daily bustle of Wall Street, the ambition to which she had devoted all of her energy since the day she left Heartland Ranch to begin her university studies in business.

After the accident, Lou had come back to Alberta to oversee the ranch's transition into a future without Marion Fleming, a celebrated horse trainer known all across Canada and the northwestern US, and the driving force behind the business' success. The ranch was located in the beautiful foothills of Western Alberta, within sight of the breathtaking eastern slope of the Canadian Rockies. Marion had dedicated her life at the ranch to helping horses in danger of being destroyed for various reasons, including behavior issues or owners who abused their animals that had been taken away by county authorities, and then re-training them to be re-homed to a new, useful life with their more appreciative new owners.

Although its purpose was honorable, the ranch's profit margins were slim before, and suddenly nonexistent, leaving the family in a desperate fight for survival. Although she at first resented having to leave her dreams in the city behind, coming home to what was left of her family had affected her so much that she surprised even herself by deciding to stay and fight to keep the ranch afloat. It was partly because her aging grandfather, Jack Bartlett, and her young sister were left with a situation they were ill prepared to handle, but also because coming home had rekindled a forgotten love of the place, the place of her roots, six generations deep with her grandfather, and maybe seven, if she managed to keep the bank from following through with their threats of foreclosure. Something in her wanted to take up the challenge, and so she did.

Those eight years back at the ranch were swirling around in her thoughts as she placed mementos of her families past in boxes to strip the room bare and permit her to give every square inch of it a much needed cleaning. She brushed each ribbon she and Amy had won at jumping competitions that had hung on the wall for so many years that it seemed like another lifetime ago. There were some of Marion's old buckles from her roping days at rodeos from all over the province and trophies from her colt starting victories.

A rolling growl come from Lou's stomach and when she looked at the clock she realized that she had been out in the barn for four hours and it was already past lunch time. Since her 13 year old daughter, Georgie, was in school, her four year old daughter, Katie, was with Amy who was running errands in town, and Grandpa Jack was away on travels with his wife, Lisa, she was alone today and on her own schedule. She picked up the last box and carried it into the aisle between the stables and placed it with the other sorted things she had taken out of the office. When she went back inside for one last look around before going to the house for a quick lunch, she was struck by the prominence of the bare desk sitting in the middle of the room. She could see herself crawling around the floor at her mother's feet and eventually distracting the horse whisperer from her work long enough to be picked up and sat on her lap. A flood of emotions overtook Lou as visions of Marion's love for her and Amy washed over her, releasing years of her earliest stored up memories of growing up here with the security of having a mom that thought the sun rose and set in her daughters, and having a world full of horses and farm animals to occupy her childhood days. The visions blurred as tears gushed out of her, like a dam had burst and the forces being held back were suddenly released to go wherever they wanted. The urge to sit at the desk drew her to the chair behind it and after doing so, her fingers began to trace circles in the dust she had aimed to clean, but now felt some kind of strange connection back to the days when Marion sat here. She thought of how jealous she was of her little sister when she would get home from school and find Amy on their mother's lap. There were ten years between them, so there was a greater separation than most of the other siblings she knew, and Amy had inherited Marion's love of the horses and had an uncanny way of communicating with them. Marion hoped that someday Amy would be the one to carry on the tradition of healing horses and giving the ranch its purpose. Only in the last few years had they come together as sisters, with all of the respect and love that would be expected from family.

Lou sat back in the chair and drew in a deep breath. "Damn it, Lou, get yourself together!" she scolded herself. "Oh, what's this?" A small hook dangled from the underside of the bottom drawer of the desk and when she bent down to see what it was, she discovered it was attached to a smaller drawer hidden underneath. She pulled on the hook and inside the drawer rested a beautiful leather journal and a pen. After removing the journal from its hidden place she laid it on the desk to examine it closer. The front cover was embossed with a galloping stallion racing ahead of a cowboy and cowgirl chasing him through a place in the mountains. She was taken with how beautifully it was done, apparently custom made by a talented craftsman. A string tied loosely across the front held it shut, and a cautious tug allowed her to open the cover to see what was inside.

12-25-1984

I received this beautiful journal is a Christmas gift today from my husband, Tim. The stallion embossed on the cover, he told me, is Pegasus, the horse we saved from a cull up in Pike River. He was rendered by one of our First Nations friends, John Goodstoney, from up by Gap Lake in the mountains. Pegasus has been the best horse I have ever known, still full of his wild spirit but proving to be the most loyal friend to both of us, and we are proud of his work in the rodeo arena with Tim.

This journal, Tim told me, was meant to remind me of what we can do when we work as a team, instead of individuals trying to make our way through life separately. I admit it has been rough lately, with Tim on the road 38 weeks last year and me trying to keep things going here at the ranch with a little girl to raise, mostly by myself.

Lou was completely engrossed in the private thoughts of her mother and was beside herself with joy at the treasure she had discovered. The growl persisted and reminded her that another hour had passed since the discovery, and she picked the journal up and took it with her to the kitchen while she prepared a sandwich for her delayed lunch.

As she finished the dishes left in haste earlier that morning Lou saw Amy making her way down the long drive from the gate at the top of the hill. She hastily wiped her hands and grabbed the journal to tie the strings at the front, then rushed to her bedroom to hide the valuable prize for her own perusal until she was sure about whether or not she would share the treasure with anyone else. The writings were meant to be private, after all.

Katie hopped through the front door carrying two small bags from the grocery store and a pink bunny that no doubt came as a result of her puppy dog eyes to her Aunt Amy who could not say 'no' to her when she used them.

"Whatcha got there, kiddo?" Lou asked.

"This is 'Bugs', my new bunny!" she said, holding the fuzzy cuddle creature up to her mother for inspection.

"Wasn't 'Bugs' a blue bunny?"

"Well, they didn't have a blue one, and I like pink better anyway!"

"Oh, I see!" she chuckled at her adorable little sweetheart.

"Hey Amy! I see you caved again," Lou needled her sister.

Amy tried to justify her weakness, "Yeah, I did, but, Lou, you know what it's like when she looks at you like that!"

"OK, suckah!, You are gonna have to toughen up before you have kids of your own, or else you won't be able to walk through the house with all of the things they will have you dragging home," she laughed.

That stung Amy just a little, still unsettled since her recent 'break' from her engagement with her longtime boyfriend, and best friend, Ty Borden.

"Like that is going to happen any time soon," she answered with a frown.

Lou grimaced when she realized how tender the subject was to her sister. "Sorry! But, look, Amy, it isn't over until one of you says so, and I know very well how much Ty loves you."

Amy and her fiancé had run into a rough patch after a misunderstanding involving her former employer, Prince Ahmed Al Saeed, the owner of high end horses who had hired the promising young horse trainer to lead the other trainers of his international jumping team. It was a huge opportunity for her to advance her reputation on the world equestrian stage, and she had moved to Europe for four months in order to take the job.

Although Amy's professional performance was a resounding success, her relationship with Ty had been badly bruised as a result of the Princes advancements toward Amy after confessing to her that he had fallen in love with her. Amy had chosen to keep the potentially volatile situation a secret from her fiancé, fearing that he would not believe her when she told him she did not have any feelings for the Prince, and that he might end their engagement, and their friendship, because Ty was more than a just a fiancé, he had been her best friend in the world for years.

Ty had come to live with her family at the ranch less than a month after she lost her mother in that crash. The family could have sent him away, but decided to honor Marion's commitment to take him in while he finished his probation with the local juvy system. He was a troubled young man, but Marion must have seen something in him, and they all voted together to give him a chance to prove himself.

Her grandpa would laugh at the thought of how the two teenagers fought like cats and dogs in the beginning. Before long, however, the two of them grew almost inseparable as the weeks turned into months and although they had endured at least two fights that were serious enough to make them date other people for a short time, the feelings they had for one another always brought them back together as if fate intended it that way, in spite of themselves.

"I don't know, Lou…, I…, I can't even get him to talk to me about it. I hurt him…, not telling him the truth, and to be honest, I wouldn't blame him if he never forgives me for not trusting him to understand everything that happened with Ahmed."

"Do you think he still doesn't believe your side of the story?" Lou asked.

"I DON'T KNOW!" Amy shouted in frustration.

Lou spun around to look at her sister, obviously hurting from the uncertainty she was facing and near the end of her wits trying to find a way to repair what she now knew to be the life she wanted.

"When was the last time you tried to talk to him about it?" the older sister asked.

"I rode over to see him a couple of days ago, and…, he wasn't rude, or hateful…, but I could tell he would just as soon that I leave him alone. I made the effort to try and fix things, but he wouldn't have anything to do with me!" the panicked cowgirl shrieked as she began to sob into her hands.

Lou ran to her hurting sister and grabbed her around the shoulders to bring her into a reassuring hug.

"Just hang in there, Sis. He was really hurt by…, the situation. I'm not saying it was your fault, how it happened, after all, I told you not to tell him myself, but you have to understand how it looked to him, the way it happened, and how embarrassed he was to hear the details in front of all of us. That is a private matter, and you know how he feels about the people he loves. It isn't the kind of thing he is going to get over quickly. Just give him some more time, please, Amy." Lou advised.

"It's time for dinner," Amy said, trying to change the subject. "We had better start getting it ready for the girls."

After she had tucked the kids in for the night and Amy had retired to her room early like she usually did at this time of the evening, Lou made herself a cup of hot tea and sat it down on the coffee table by the sofa in front of the fireplace. She pursed her lips and fought the temptation to go back into her mother's journal. Even though she felt as if she was betraying some unspoken trust, her curiosity was a force of its own and soon she sat down to curl up with the most private thoughts of her deceased mother bound in leather on her lap.

7-4-1995

My world came crashing down today. Tim was leading the bulldogging competition at the Stampede and on his last run the calf made a weird turn and caused him to miss when he jumped. The calf caught him with his rear hoofs and caused Pegasus to fall and roll over him. He is busted up pretty bad and will probably be laid up for quite a while, and Pegasus may not even make it. Lou and Amy were terrified, I was too, and now I don't know how we are going to manage with everything in such a mess. I guess a little praying might be in order.

The memory caused Lou to break out in a cold sweat. She still hadn't gotten over the trauma they all experienced that day. Tim had been a four time National Title holder of All-Around Cowboy. Everyone who knew about horses and rodeos knew about Tim Fleming. He was one of the best rodeo cowboys, ever. Between the attention she got from his success and the reputation her mother had as a horse trainer, Lou was extremely proud of her family's tradition with horses. She had begun to win some of her own ribbons in jumping competitions and her love for horses was one of the most important things in her life.

After that day it was eighteen years before she would even get in a saddle again. Seeing it all unfold again through her mother's eyes was surreal to her. She knew other members of her family had to deal with what happened as much as she did, but that day was the turning point for her. It was the kind of emotional experience that made her change the way she wanted to live her life. It was all about going to business school after that, and horses were the farthest thing from her mind.

11-18-1995

Today is a day I wish would never have happened. I knew Tim was having a hard time with the pills he takes for his pain, but after today, our family will never be the same. He was hysterical and yelling at the girls and it scared them to death. When I went after him to stop it, he swung and hit me in the face with the back of his hand and nearly knocked me unconscious. Dad heard the commotion and when he got to Tim, I honestly thought he might kill him. I had to use every ounce of strength I possessed to make Dad stop hitting my husband, and as soon as he stopped he drug him out of the house and threw him out into the yard, telling him to never set foot on Heartland soil again.

How am I going to explain this to my little girls? Amy will be OK, eventually. She is only five and she is my girl, but Lou is daddy's girl and having him scream at her like that will be devastating to a fifteen year old teenager who thought he was the one who hung the moon. Who knows when we will ever see him again, or if we even want to. I wish with everything I have in me that I could have gotten him back to us after we lost him to those damn pain killers. I guess he could not deal with the fact that the very thing that made him a hero to so many people had been taken away from him, thinking it made him less of a person than he was. If he could only see what I see when I think of that silly, handsome cowboy who wouldn't give up, even after Dad threatened to remove any part of him that came within ten feet of his daughter.

Lou read her mother's words until well after midnight. She snapped awake when her head bounced off the cushion on the sofa and she had to struggle to drag herself to her bedroom to try and get a few hours' sleep before breakfast.

The next two days Lou spent cleaning out the office in the barn and replacing the things she decided to keep back onto the shelves, into the drawers, and hung on the nails driven into the walls for their ribbons and pictures. She somehow felt closer to her mother after reading so much about the things defining their lives while she grew up here at the ranch. She and Marion were never very close after Tim left, and even though she knew that her mother was not the cause of all of her problems, if she couldn't have her daddy, the fifteen year old teenager was going to hold somebody accountable, and in her eyes, her mother should have tried harder to help him get better.

Only now could she see how Marion dealt with raising two daughters and keeping Heartland up and running, and with watching after her father who was still mourning the death of his wife, Lindy. The wind had left his sails after she died and Marion was not about to let him slip away when there was so much living left to do.

The last picture was hung on the wall behind the desk in the center of the office and she sat in the chair behind it to take a few minutes to look around at the cleaned and rearranged heirlooms. She had been here among most of these belongings for years, but now everything within these walls was precious and irreplaceable, something to be respected by anyone who came inside.

"Wow! It looks nice, Lou!" Jack told his first granddaughter. He was just returning from the trip he and Lisa had enjoyed and had stopped by to check on things to see how the girls had coped while he was gone. "I gotta admit that I didn't think it would make any difference, but seeing the office all cleaned up reminds me of how Marion used to keep it."

"Thanks, Grandpa. It was worth it."

'If he only knew how worth it the effort had been!' she thought.

By the weekend, Lou had finished the journal and had cried, laughed, and cried some more as the layers of her childhood were peeled away by the entries her mother had made. She was standing in front of the kitchen window watching Amy work with a client's horse in the round pen when she was shocked to see her sister stop in the middle of the ring and cover her face as she began to cry.

"What the…,?" Lou asked to herself as she sat the knife she was using to peel potatoes down on the counter beside the sink.

She cautiously walked up to the wooden rails surrounding Amy and the horse and as she pulled the handle to open the gate she asked, "Amy, what's wrong, did he hurt you?"

Amy was startled when she heard Lou's voice. "Uhh, no, I'm fine Lou," she said while trying to hide the tears rolling down her cheeks.

"Bullshit! What has happened? Tell me!"

"Let me put Hot Shot here back in the barn and we will talk about it, OK?" she offered.

"OK, c'mon, let's go," Lou said while walking to the gelding and hooking up his lead before turning around to motion for Amy to open the gate.

Once they had deposited the horse into the stall, Amy grabbed a flake of hay and threw it over the top of the half door holding the animal inside. "There ya go, boy. We will take this up tomorrow, what do ya say?" as she patted him on the nose.

"Amy, come in here, please!" Lou hollered from the office.

The younger girl leaned against the door casing and said, "OK, here I am…, What?" she asked sharply when she noticed the expression on her sisters' concerned face.

"Amy, this has gone on long enough. Your moping around here is affecting everybody and you are going to make yourself sick if you don't get a handle on things," she pushed.

"I don't know what you want me to do, Lou! I have screwed up and it has cost me, and believe me, I know it already!"

"You need to talk to Ty and you need to do it, NOW!" she scolded.

"He doesn't want to see me, Lou! How can I do anything if he won't even listen to me?" she responded with frustration.

"What if I told you that I may have found a solution to your problem, something to get you and Ty back on track?"

"What the hell could you possibly be talking about? I humiliated him in front of the people he loves when he found out about Ahmed telling me that he loved me and about the kiss that never should have happened, and it doesn't look like he is ever going to forgive me for that! He doesn't believe in us anymore, and I don't blame him!"

"Well, I don't buy that, Amy! He loves you, and I don't need any more proof than what I have already seen! If you give up now, after all you two have been through together, you will regret it for the rest of your life! Come here!" she demanded as she rose from the chair.

"What? Are you going spank me like Mom did when I sassed her?" Amy scoffed.

"Sit!" Lou pointed toward the seat behind the desk.

Reluctantly, the younger sister obeyed the request and plopped down in the swivel chair and shrugged her shoulders, "Happy?"

"Look down, below the bottom drawer," Lou instructed.

Amy looked where she pointed and didn't follow what she was supposed to be doing. "Lou, have you lost your mind?"

"Look…, under the bottom of that drawer!"

"Wha…, What is that?" she asked when she saw the hook.

"Pull on that hook you will see!"

Amy drew the hook tight in her grasp and pulled the drawer open to reveal the secret that Lou was trying to explain to her. "What is this? Do you remember Mom ever saying anything about this?"

"No, she never said anything to me about it. I thought she may have said something to you, though, since you were her baby," Lou smiled as she took a dig at her sister for being her mom's favorite, even though she would never have admitted it to anyone.

Amy frowned at the implication, but she knew it was probably true. She shared a love of horses with her mother that Lou never did, and because of that, there was a bond between them that the older daughter never had, especially after her father's self-destruction as a result of his accident.

"What is this?" she asked as she laid the leather bundle on the desk.

"That is something that is going to change your life, Amy. It's Mom's journal. I found it there the other day when I cleaned everything out of here. It pretty much has the story of our lives in it, everything she felt was important, she put it in this journal with dates and details…, you are not going to believe some of the things she was thinking. It starts on the Christmas when I was five and goes right up to the time when she died.

Tears were filling Amy's eyes as she opened it up and started to thumb through the pages. This was amazing, almost like having a close conversation with her mother from the other side.

"I can't believe this! I…"

"Amy, I know you are thinking you want to start reading at the front, in the beginning, but I want you to turn to the back, that is what you need to see first."

Shuffling through to the last few pages, Lou pointed to an entry and said, "Start here."

Amy pressed her hand against the page to hold the journal flat so she could read the last entry her mother had written in it. She recognized within the first few words that the pages were delivered in her mother's own handwriting, matching the insightful journals that the renowned horse trainer used to keep a record of her thoughts of prescribing herbs and using natural methods of handling problem horses, the very ones Amy now cherished and used as her own standard in practice. The words immediately transformed her into another place and time when she realized where these previously unknown thoughts would take her. Tears were thumping the top of the desk as she continued to be drawn deeper into the story she had always wondered about, and now that all doubt was removed, straight from the source, everything she knew as reality was suddenly made much clearer to her.

Amy folded the journal closed when she finished it and stared at the embossed leather design on the front, running her fingers across its texture and admiring how beautiful it was. Tears continued to fall and she was clearly stunned at what she had just experienced, the chance to be a fly on the wall and share the instant that her mother had found Ty.

"He needs to see this! Would you mind if I showed it to him?" Amy asked Lou.

"If you don't show it to him, I will have to kick your boney little butt!" Lou said with conviction.

Amy reached into the pocket in her jacket and pulled her phone free, took a deep breath, and dialed his number. "Ty, are you home? ….Well, I have something I need for you to see, and I have some things to say, if you will only give me the chance to talk to you… OK…, Yeah…, I will be right there! Bye!"

Lou noticed a spark in her sister's eyes that hadn't been there for a while. She smiled her knowing smile at her sister, and Amy jumped out of the chair and wrapped her arms around the woman who she was glad to have as a sister, and said, "Thank you, Lou. This is…, amazing. I still can't believe it!"

Spartan was glad to see his owner come into the barn. Not only did she have a treat for him, but when he finished it she told him, "C'mon boy. Let's go for a ride!"

As she neared the yard in front of Ty's little trailer, Amy's heart was pounding in her ears. This was it! This was the last chance she would probably ever have to get him to listen to her. This had to work!

Ty was waiting by the door when she arrived. "Hey," Amy greeted him with a rare enthusiasm, as of late.

"What's up? Are you OK?" he asked, cautiously.

"I have something I need to show you! Come…, sit!" she commanded as she went past him and stood beside the dining table.

Ty looked at her, trying to figure out what was different, because something had changed in her attitude and it was good to see some of the 'old' Amy he had been missing so much.

"Sit!" she commanded again as she laid the journal on the table in front of where she was pointing.

He obeyed the order and looked at the leather bundle and asked, "What is this? That is some beautiful leather work, is it yours?"

"Well, technically, it belongs to both Lou and me, but there is something inside that I want you to see. It was Mom's journal. She wrote down all of the things she thought were important in it, from the time when Lou was little to just before she died!"

"Uh, do you think I should be looking in here? I mean, it's kind of personal, and I…"

Amy cut him off again, "Just open it up and turn to the last entry…, here!" she helped him find the spot. "Read it out loud, please, I want to hear your voice when you read it."

Ty settled in his seat and began to read aloud….

"4-8-2007"

Ty turned his head to look at her one last time and asked, 'You sure?" to which she impatiently flicked her finger in the direction of the page and said, "Go on!" As Ty focused on the script Amy reached around his neck from behind, put her cheek against his, and impatiently looked over his shoulder to read silently along with him.

"I had a meeting today with Clint Riley at the Juvenile Detention Center in Calgary. He wanted me to look at a file of a boy who is in trouble and in danger of being lost to the system. Clint remembered me from the time I took in Scott Cardinal to live with us, and after the success we had with Scott he decided to call me to see if I would consider this boy, Tyler Borden, to take him in and see if we could help him finish his probation period when he turned 18, given that we could keep him out of trouble that long. When I read through the file, my heart broke to think of a young child having to deal with the things his parents had put him through. When I finished reading, I said I wanted to see him. Although he wouldn't let me talk to him directly, Clint walked me to a window overlooking a courtyard where some kids were playing ball. Ty, as he is called, was sitting alone at the near end of the yard where I could see him pretty well. While we watched he noticed us standing in the window and when he saw me he just smiled briefly and then looked away, back toward the younger kids playing in front of him. He was such a handsome young man, and I saw a kind spirt in those beautiful green eyes of his. I am sure he figured we were there to look at one of the younger children, since sixteen year olds had a slim chance of having someone wanting to take on a kid that was beyond help, in their view.

I watched a couple of the younger kids come up to him, like a big brother, and saw him ruffle their hair as he made them laugh before they returned to the game they were playing. I knew right then that this boy deserved a chance to make something of himself and I agreed to sign the papers necessary to make it happen. I hope Dad isn't too upset with me, or Amy, since she will have to deal with him on a daily basis. Maybe he will be just as much help to me as I will be to him, if I am lucky. Amy could use someone in her life to challenge her and make her see there are other things in life besides horses and working at the ranch, to see her potential, and I am betting that this boy is up to the task… if I can keep him from doing something stupid like running away again. It worked with Scott and Lou, maybe we can do it again…We will see!"

Ty was dumfounded when he closed the book and he noticed the wetness forming on his collar. He realized where the moisture was coming from and stood to take Amy in his arms as he began to cry along with her.

"I remember! I remember seeing her looking at me and I remember thinking she was there looking at one of the younger kids and how lucky one of them was going to be to have a nice lady like her as a foster parent! That was Marion Fleming! That was…, your MOM! I actually met her! Almost!"

Watching the astonished young man's eyes click as an important gap in his past was suddenly bridged, linking him even closer to the family that now regarded him as one of their own, had Amy's heart pounding with exhilaration. Then, just as suddenly for her, the same bridge took her closer to the boy who had been brought to live in the loft of her barn as a last act of enormous compassion that her mother had felt for the stranger and had in fact changed her own life in such a remarkable way.

Amy continued her grasp of the emotionally reeling love of her life, her arms tightening around him and her cheek pressed against his as she spoke softly into his ear, "You know, I used to think of Spartan as the last connection I had with Mom, how she gave her life trying to help me to help him, and that is the reason I couldn't give up on him…, couldn't let his story end without a fight," Amy reminisced. "And look how he has turned out! But reading this journal has been like a wakeup call for me because I now realize that you are just as much of a last connection I have to Mom as anyone, or anything! You came into my life, Ty, because she saw something in your heart that most couldn't see back then, and she was right! And I see something in you that I am not willing to give up on, not without a fight, because I know what Mom saw in you, too! You are a good and decent man, and you have the biggest heart…, you are smart, loving, loyal, hard working…, everything any girl could ever want in her guy! I love you more than you could ever know, and I am not going to let you go without your knowing how I feel about you, about us! Please, Ty, don't let the things that have happened because of my screwing up and not appreciating what we had together make you think that I don't know what having you in my life means to me! I could never be happy without you in my life because you have become as much of a part of who I am and who I want to be as I am to myself!"

A renewed commitment burned in Amy's blue gaze as she gently grasped his jawline with her fingers to direct his eyes into her own, "There is nobody in this world that I want to spend the rest of my life with, to make a home and a living with, to share the joy of having my children with, than you! You are mine, and I am yours, that is just the way it is, and the way it will always be! Please, Ty, don't you give up on us! Give me a chance to prove to you that what I am telling you is the truth!

"I'm sorry, Amy, that I shut you out like that. I just couldn't find a way to deal with everything we were going through. I thought I had lost you, and I didn't really think I would be able to get over that…, ever. I don't want to be the one to keep you from doing the things in life that you want to do!"

"Then…, just hold on, tighter…, and don't you ever let go!"

"Are you sure that you will be happy living as a veterinarian's wife, in a small town, without servants floating around to fill your every request?" he said, partly in jest, to lighten the moment, but still stinging from the situation the Prince had put him in.

"I will be happy, as long as I can share my life with you! Just think about it…, those words in the journal were sent to us from heaven, and you don't want to make anyone up there mad at you, do you? Especially my mom!"

Ty reached around and spun Amy into a seat on his lap and they drew themselves into a kiss worthy of sealing the commitment of a lifetime together.

"I mean everything I just said to you," the cowgirl reassured him, still flush from the kiss, "and I will spend the rest of my days showing you that I do!"

"I know, Amy," he said through a grin, "and I will spend the rest of my days holding you to it!"

The End