January 24th 2022

Chapter 24
We Jump For Aid & Comfort

Marianne would lament the protective gear they had her put on whenever she'd ride her horse. In her mind, she was plenty grown and secure in her position that she shouldn't need them. She'd still put them on in the end, but it would usually take some talking into. They'd gone so far as to play to her likes, getting her all these things in the most beautiful shades of green they could find. Maya had even painted designs on her helmet, so she would be thrilled to wear it, and she was, more or less. It was the rest she took issue with the most.

She would learn the value of this extra protection on that day when she and her horse took a fall.

Lucas was looking on the whole time, grinning as he watched his pumpkin go around, having the best time and thinking not at all about this 'annoying' gear. She just smiled, and laughed, and hooted for Truffle to go on and on. The horse seemed to hear her and agree with her in every way.

And then, very suddenly, something went wrong. The horse grew frantic, and twisted around, and even as Lucas was reacting and starting to move, the horse tumbled down, sending her young rider rolling away. Even as she hit the ground, Lucas was running toward her, same as her trainer, who was much nearer. For all that, Marianne was still the first to reach her mark, as she rolled over and crawled over to her still panicking horse.

"Truffle! What's wrong?" she asked as first her trainer and then Lucas got to her.

"Hey, hey..." he pulled her back toward him, looking her over.

He supposed that he should have immediately seen it as a good sign that she looked completely unbothered or scared for anyone but her horse, but this was his baby girl, and even though she was very capable in very many things, he had just watched her take a fall that could leave no one indifferent, least of all one of her parents. Already, beyond their short circle, people were hurrying over to see what had just happened and whether help was needed.

"I'm okay, Daddy!" Marianne insisted, trying to pull away and get to the horse. Having left her care to Lucas, the trainer had turned to Truffle, and it was easily the biggest test to his attention, needing deep down to make absolutely certain that his daughter was okay even though what he saw said that she would be alright, and the horse needed him more.

One of their medics was nearby, which resolved the matter as he got to checking Marianne over, leaving Lucas sufficiently secure to turn his attention on Truffle along with others who'd come to assist. She was in pain and distress, which made it difficult to tend to her at first, but then she knew them and trusted them on the day to day. All they needed to do was remind her of that.

It was the surest guarantee for activity at the ranch to come to a grinding halt when one of the animals were injured. It also made it so that help never lacked; if anything, they had it in excess. At the top of the line, there would be Bishop, hurrying from the retreat to back up his friend and former classmate. When the busy and stressful part would be behind them, the two men would reminisce on how, back in their college days, they had imagined themselves, somewhere down the line, cooperating much in this way. And now here they were, making it happen.

Even as they had that conversation, they were standing where they could watch Marianne sit with the recovering horse. Truffle was calm now, and the tall little blonde had her best encouraging smile on as she brushed at her friend, but it was plain to see that she still worried very much. In her heart, they knew, none of that would matter to her so much as that she could make sure that Truffle felt alright. She sang in a voice that quavered just a bit, calling up every song she'd been swearing up and down that her horse loved. To look at Truffle in that moment, she definitely looked pleased to hear that voice.

By the time Bishop went back to see to the dogs, the singing had stopped, and Marianne was as good as hugging the horse, letting her know that she was there. Lucas sent a picture of this to Maya. He'd already called her to tell her what had happened, hating to have to settle any kind of worry in her even if he could in that same breath promise her that their daughter was safe. That he'd convinced her that she didn't need to rush over was already something. As he told her, everyone was in agreement that Marianne hadn't broken anything, hadn't hit her head… She'd fallen in about the best way she could have fallen, if there was such a thing. Oh, she would be sore for a bit, Lucas had seen it just in the way she'd walked and carried herself since they'd moved back to the stables, but it would all become a thing of the past before very long. Just now, the biggest thing was that she'd been shaken up by the fall and Truffle's injury.

"Hey, pumpkin…"

"I don't want to leave her yet," Marianne quietly told him.

"I understand," Lucas told her. He approached, crouched, and sat by her. "But they're going to take great care of her even while we're gone, you know that." She nodded, but she wouldn't move away. Lucas let out a breath, considered his options. He still had his phone in one hand. He turned it over, and over, and over, before he had a thought. Unlocking it and pulling his photo albums open, he went searching for what might be helpful in this scenario. It wasn't 'picture story time' yet, but…

He tried not to smirk when he found this scheme already brought results before he'd even said a word. Marianne had clearly seen him scrolling at his screen and, curious as to what he was doing, she'd moved back just enough so she might see what he was looking for. Pictures… The more he went, the closer she drew, until her head was resting against his arm, and she got to playing with the ends of her long braid, which was generally a signal that she was not likely to move away. When she made a noise that sounded to him like curiosity, he paused, turned his head down to her.

"That's me, right?" she asked, and he pulled up the picture to its full size. It showed Maya, well and roundly pregnant, standing out somewhere on the ranch property, cast in shadows by the sun, the better to highlight that great belly full of pumpkin.

"That's you alright," Lucas confirmed with a grin. "You were born just a few weeks after this was taken. Your mom would try and come out here whenever she could, she said, so the horses could get to know you even when they hadn't met you yet." This made Marianne smile even as her eyes traveled up to Truffle for a beat. "They all knew you were in there," Lucas went on. "They knew you were on your way. Our very first baby girl," he whispered, and she looked back up to him with a smile. "And they all loved you from the moment they knew you. We've got that in common."

"Me, too," Marianne told him, and he nodded. Yes, of course she loved them all, humans, and horses alike.

"And when they did meet you in person for the first time, just a tiny, little baby," he held up his hands to mime her approximate size at the time, "We could barely take you away again, they just wanted to have you near them all the time. We could have had a whole horse revolt over it." This made her laugh, imagining all those horses trying to follow her out of the ranch, all of them behind her parents' minivan. "You know why I still have this one on here?" Lucas asked, indicating the picture. If he kept every last picture that he, Maya, or anyone in their family took on his phone, following each pregnancy, birth, and growing child, he'd have space for nothing else. The bulk of them had been saved elsewhere, but he still had a sizable collection there, following him wherever he went.

"Because it's very pretty?" Marianne guessed.

"Well, it is that, yes," Lucas agreed with a laugh. "I can look at this picture of your mother here and still feel all the things I felt for her in that exact moment." This made her smile. "But, also," he went on, "There's you, right in there, and I remember how you made me feel in that moment, too."

"How?" Marianne wanted to know. Careful not to disturb her so much, he pulled his arm from between them and wrapped it lightly around her, minding that she might have been aching from her fall.

"Scared… proud… hopeful," he recounted and, as she was presented with this string of words, Marianne looked perplexed.

"You were scared? About what?"

"Being a dad," he confessed easily, and, at her ongoing confusion, he chuckled. "I get it, looking at me now, I probably seem very on top of things, dad-wise, huh?" he asked, and Marianne expressed her full support on this statement, to which he tipped his head in thanks. "I didn't start that way, no one does. Well… If you ask me, your mom had it locked from the start. She won't say so, so we'll just keep that between us. You'll understand what that feels like, someday, if you end up becoming a mom yourself," he promised, trying not to let himself veer down that lane of 'future panic.'

"Proud, hopeful," she repeated his other words, not resting nearly so much consideration on the idea that she could herself have children someday as he did. Lucas gladly followed along down this new train of thought, especially as Marianne finally agreed to rise and leave the stables to head on home.

"First one's easy. I'd been thinking about this moment for so long, about when your mom and I would finally be parents together. And you made that happen," he smiled down at her. Yes, she knew this already, and she understood how unique that had made her. "The second one, well, you weren't here yet, but your mom and I had been off around the world with Ree's tour, and we were finally home again, at the ranch again, and you were almost here. It made me think about being at the ranch with you, like we are now, about getting to share all of this with you, the way my grandparents and my parents shared it with me. And I couldn't wait to do that."

Today hadn't exactly gone the way either of them would have liked, with the fall and Truffle's injury, but it would be little more than memory in time, part of their journey together, Friars both but Sullivans in their blood, too. They were bonded to this whole place as they were to one another, and as much as he had known it eight years prior, Lucas knew that they would grow in this feeling for years and years to come.

"Dad?" Marianne asked as they got buckled in their seats. Lucas turned to look at her.

"Yeah, pumpkin?"

"Think Mommy could paint my other riding things like she did my helmet?" she asked. Lucas bit back a laugh at this new and unconditional endorsement of 'the gear.'

"Pretty sure all you have to do is hand it over and she'll have her brushes and colors out in the blink of an eye."

TO BE CONTINUED


See you tomorrow! - mooners