After lunch, Adam left with Evan, Ford and Guthrie in the truck to chop firewood and Brian tacked up Crane's horse, Duke, for me and Olivia. He told us where he was going to be for the rest of the afternoon; it wasn't far and then warned us again that we were restricted to me leading Olivia around on Duke in the paddock. He directed it to us both, but when his eyes met mine, I knew it was really meant for me.

I led Olivia around the paddock a few times, holding on to Duke's reins and then I told her how she could use her legs and reins to control Duke herself. I let go of the reins and she managed to lead him around the corral on her own without my help.

"This is so much fun!" she exclaimed, halting Duke from her second round trip on her own, "I think I've got the hang of it now, so we can go on our ride."

I looked up at her, confused, "What do you mean?"

"I know how to control the horse now, so we can go for a ride," she said again.

I shook my head emphatically. "No way, Liv; Adam and Brian said no- didn't you hear them?"

"But that's because they thought I don't know how to horse ride, and I do now," she said, and I could tell that she genuinely meant it.

"Riding Duke around a paddock isn't the same as taking him on a proper ride," I pointed out.

"But you'll be on the front controlling him, and I'll be holding onto you."

I shook my head again, slightly incredulous at her reasoning "It doesn't matter; I can't disobey Adam and Brian like that. They'll be really mad if they find out."

"They won't find out!" Olivia said. In her voice, I heard the same wheedling tone that she had used with my brothers over lunchtime. "We'll just take him out for a short ride. Please, Heidi! I really want to."

I'll admit, I did consider it for a couple of moments. It was unlikely that my brothers would find out: Adam was gone for the afternoon and Brian was busy. But I came to my senses quickly. Direct disobedience is one of the things my brothers hate the most, still to this day, and I literally shivered a little thinking of how much trouble I'd be in if we were to be found out.

"No, we can't, I'll get into too much trouble," I said.

Olivia looked down at me curiously. "You mean like get grounded or something?"

"Yea…" I said. I had no desire to share with her what other forms of correction my brothers opted for sometimes. She wouldn't find out until we were 9 and shoplifted together from the general store, along with a couple of other kids from our class.

"I've never been grounded," Olivia said, not boastfully or anything, more matter of fact like.

"I know… you told me."

Olivia didn't really get punished. Ever.

"What's it like?"

"What? Being grounded?"

"Yea."

It was kind of a weird question in my opinion, but Olivia looked genuinely interested.

"Uh… well it's boring because I can't go anywhere off the ranch, and I have extra chores and I'm not allowed to watch TV or use the phone and I have to go to bed early."

Olivia's eyes widened. "All of those things?"

I nodded.

"But that's like 4 punishments all rolled into one!"

I shrugged. I hadn't really thought about it that way- that's the way it had always been as long as I could remember. For all of us, although the early bedtime thing fell away when we got older- I couldn't remember Evan or Daniel having to go to bed early when they were grounded.

"I don't get it," she said, musingly, "Adam and Brian seem so nice."

"They are nice!" I protested, reading the inference between her words and feeling defensive. "They just really don't like to be disobeyed."

Olivia climbed off Duke then and picked up his reins handing them to me.

"I don't want you to get grounded, Heidi, so we shouldn't go. Let's go watch Daniel practice with his band instead!"

I readily agreed, relieved that Olivia had backed down and I wouldn't need to fight her on it more. We turned Duke out to the pasture with the other horses, but left him tacked up as we couldn't untack him alone. I knew that Brian or another one of my brothers would come along later and take care of him.

/

We did go over to the barn and watch Daniel and his band practice for a while, but it turned out to be not so interesting or fun because while they tolerated us, they also didn't pay us much attention. We went back and hung around with the goats for a while, and then towards the late afternoon, Olivia suggested that we do some baking.

"I don't know how to bake," I said. I'd helped Brian before, but I'd never done it myself.

Olivia waved her hand dismissively, "It's easy, I help my mom all the time. Do you have baking stuff?"

"I think so…" I said slowly. "We could check the cupboards."

The two of us headed inside to check the contents of the refrigerator and the cupboards for ingredients. I led the way and was chattering to Olivia as I went into the kitchen and pulled open the refrigerator, but when I asked her how many eggs she thought we'd need, there was no answer. When I turned around, she wasn't there.

"Liv?" I called.

She came wandering into the kitchen holding a photo frame. I recognised it as one that normally sat on top of the piano that held a photo of my parents with their arms around each other. Adam had told me it had been taken a couple of years before Guthrie and me were born.

"What's up?" I asked.

She pointed at the picture.

"Is this your mom and dad?"

I walked over to look at the picture, just to check it was the one I thought it was.

"Yea, that's them."

Olivia looked down at the picture and then up at me again.

"Brian looks just like your dad," she said.

"I know. People say I look like him too."

"Yea," Olivia said, looking down at the photo again.

"Do you remember anything about them?" she asked curiously.

"Not really. Guthrie and I were so little when they died."

"How old?"

"Just after we turned two."

Olivia looked up from the photo once more and looked at me directly. I thought she looked sad.

"Do you ever think about them?"

"Sometimes," I said, "And we talk about them a lot. Or my brothers do because they have memories of them."

"I can't imagine not knowing one of my parents," Olivia said. Her voice seemed to wobble and her eyes were shiny.

I shrugged, feeling a bit uncomfortable.

"I guess I'm used to it," I said, and then because I wanted out of the conversation, I asked Olivia exactly what we would need to do baking.

We decided to make chocolate chip cookies because we had the ingredients for it, according to Olivia. I let her take charge- she seemed to know what she was doing. The sticking point came when it was time to turn the oven on.

"Do you know how your oven works?" Olivia asked me.

I went over to look at the dials and icons.

"Don't you just turn these?" I said, pointing to them.

"My mom says there's different settings though."

"Oh. What one d'you use for cookies?"

"I don't know," Olivia admitted, "My mom usually does that part."

We looked at the dials and icons for a couple of minutes before deciding to turn the first dial to the first setting on the left and the temperature dial to 400F which Olivia said confidently was the best baking temperature.

Once we'd put the cookies in the oven to bake, I looked disdainfully at the mess we'd made. I don't know how we'd managed it, but we'd used about 7 different bowls, along with the scales, a measuring jug and countless spoons. There were streaks of cookie dough and flour and sugar and melted chocolate all over the table and floor.

"I guess we'd better start cleaning up," Olivia said.

I looked at the clock on the kitchen wall. It was still only around 4pm; we had, I decided, time before the others came home. I made the decision that we could do some coloring first.

"We can clean up after the cookies are ready," I said.

We went upstairs to my bedroom and got out my coloring pens and the paper. We settled on the floor on our stomachs, drawing and talking, neither of us paying attention to the time.

We were giggling over a story Olivia was telling me about her older sister, when I heard my name being called from downstairs. I sat up on my knees.

"I think someone's calling you," Olivia said.

My name was called again, this time more insistently, commandingly even.

"It sounds like Brian," I said.

Olivia sat up on her knees as well and sniffed the air.

"Can you smell smoke?"

My eyes widened as I remembered.

"The cookies!"

We raced downstairs and into the kitchen. The air was hazy with thick smoke and, for some reason, the kitchen looked even more of a disaster than it had when we'd left it earlier. To top it all off, Brian was standing next to the oven, wearing the floral oven mitt holding the tray of black, charred cookies.

"Uh, hi Bri," I managed.

He didn't answer but shot me a 'are you kidding,' kind of look as he placed the tray of cookies on top of the oven and then moved to open all the windows in the kitchen along with the back door to let out the smoke.

"Is he mad? He seems mad," Olivia whispered to me.

"Yea… he's mad," I whispered back, shifting nervously. My only hope was that Olivia was here with me which would maybe tamper Brian's temper.

Once he'd opened the windows, Brian turned back to us, hands on his hips. He still had the floral oven mitt on, which in other circumstances would have looked comical. I gave him a nervous smile.

"You've been baking," he said, gesturing to the mess around him. His brow was furrowed like it gets when he's mad, but at least he wasn't yelling.

"We tried to make cookies," I said, "but we lost track of time…"

"Evidently," Brian said. He tried to cross his arms, but the mitt made it difficult. He pulled it off and put it on the counter and crossed his arms again.

When he spoke again, it was directly to me.

"Are you allowed to use the oven on your own, without supervision, Heidi Mae?"

"Um…" I said thinking. I'd never been expressly told I couldn't, yet the way that Brian had phrased the question suggested I wasn't.

"I'm not sure," I stammered. "You've never said not to."

Brian looked slightly taken aback.

"It goes without sayin', Heidi."

"Oh…"

"It was my fault," Olivia said quickly, "I told Heidi I knew how to bake on my own because I help my mom a lot."

"Your mom lets you use the oven unattended?" Brian asked, one eyebrow raised.

"Not exactly… she's around, and she usually turns on the oven," Olivia admitted.

"Right," Brian said. "You know why? Because using the oven is dangerous unless you know to use it properly. You girls turned on the grill and then shut the door, which added to the smoke. This is an old oven, Heidi, you've got to be careful."

"I'm sorry… I didn't know," I said.

I looked up at Brian, pitifully. I felt bad. And scared; I hadn't intentionally tried to disobey, and I didn't want him to think I did.

Brian gave me a long, hard look for a moment and then he looked upwards, towards the heavens and shook his head, in an exasperated way.

"Sometimes, Heidi, I don't know whether to hug you or kill you."

"I'd prefer to be hugged," I said. Brian shot me a look as if to say his previous statement had been rhetorical.

He gestured to the catastrophe around him. "Clean up this mess," he said.

He took the tray of burnt cookies and put them in the bin. And then, unexpectantly he helped us in the clean up.

We were almost done; I was wiping down the table with a cloth and Olivia was drying the last bowl when Brian said gruffly, "You still want to go on that ride?"

Olivia's face lit up.

"On the horses?" she asked.

"Mmhmm."

"Yes please!"

"Finish up here and then come on down the corral."

As he passed by me towards the back door, he said my name and when I stopped what I was doing to look at him, he took my chin in his hand so I had to look at him.

"No more usin' the oven without permission. Consider yourself warned; if it happens again, I won't be so lenient. D'you hear me?"

"Yes, Bri."