Page 3 of Cattle Stop

“Tyvek? Is he finally building Sadie the dog palace she needs and deserves?”

“You haven’t talked to him? Come up and look.”

Cooper follows Penny up the attic stairs, which squeak like they always have. He and Drew used to take turns locking each other in the attic during weekend sleepovers, when Cooper’s grandpa needed a break from watching him and he’d been thrilled to terrify himself with the cobwebs and dust and hair-raising creaks of the centuries-old house. Even now, some of that good old terror sparks up his spine, though this time it’s at the sight of the roof.

Fucking yikes. “What the hell?”

“I guess a family of squirrels spent all winter digging into the siding and window trim, and we got a hell of a lot of snow this year. It all melted, and yeah, Drew’s not too thrilled.”

Cooper follows the stained and pockmarked rot of wood across the attic’s ceiling until he’s standing right over the room he normally stays in. The damage travels down the wall to the floor, and he takes a careful step backward. “Wow.”

“You think this is a mess, you should see Drew. He’s not exactly—how should we put it?—in the best of moods.”

“He didn’t say anything. We talked the other day and he—”

“Is low-key panicking and probably was in the middle of one of many nervous breakdowns? Welcome to my and Whit’s life these days. Please start visiting more often than every six months, we can’t actually handle him.” Her head tips. Cooper hears the rumble of a car outside, and then Sadie barking. “Ah, the grump himself.”

Cooper jogs down the stairs and nudges Sadie aside with his foot to throw open the door. Sure enough, there’s Drew, his arms spreading wide as he sees Cooper.

“I knew that was your goddamn truck!” Drew nearly lifts Cooper off his feet with his hug.

“Miss me?”

Drew smacks him on the back with one meaty hand. “Of course, I fucking missed you.”

“I can’t breathe.”

“I love you, man. Where the hell have you been all winter?”

“Working.” Cooper tries to heave in a breath, but Drew just squeezes him tighter. “Go do something useful, milk a cow.”

“They only like Whit,” Drew says, “and you and I both know it. Hi, you fucker. Thanks for the warning you were stopping by.”

“Hi, yourself. Did you shower in the last six months? ’Cause all I can smell is cow shit.” Cooper looks him over, Drew’s mop of red hair, the length of his winter beard, and the freckles over his nose and cheeks, stark against his pale skin. “You look good, though.”

“You look scruffy as shit.” Drew smacks him on the shoulder again. “Come in, you asshole. Pen, go slash his tires so he can’t leave.”

“I can’t stay. I told the mom squad I’d stop by and then”—Cooper shapes his fingers into guns and points both at Drew—“grand adventures await. Can I get a hell yeah?”

“You can get your butt in a chair and tell me how your winter was. You fucking promised you’d come down to visit and here you show up and it’s already spring.”

“What can I say? I lead a life of mystery.”

“You lead a life of refusing to plan more than five minutes in advance.”

“Enigmatic intrigue.”

Drew snorts a laugh. “Is that what you tell all the boys?”

Cooper winks at him. “We don’t do much talking.”

Drew sets out Brie, Camembert, and cheddar, and pulls a dish towel off of a lump that reveals itself to be freshly baked bread. Cooper settles into one of the mismatched chairs around the worn kitchen table and leans back into the heat of the woodstove, idly scratching at Sadie’s ears when she totters over. The kitchen always seems like something out of an old-time museum, wood beams in the ceiling, quaint curtains over the window above the soapstone sink, and a refrigerator nearly buried in magnets. It’s like Drew’s aunt and uncle should walk back in at any moment, given how it’s frozen in time since they retired and left Drew the house and the farm. But only Penny appears, pulling a sweatshirt over her head.

“Well,” Cooper says, “I’d ask how your winter was, but I saw the attic.”

Drew points a jar of jam at the ceiling. “The attic? That old thing? There’s nothing wrong at all, except if you thought you were going to stay in your usual room and wanted, you know, walls between you and the great outdoors.”

“Good thing I’m only swinging through town to put a smile on your face and a twinkle in your eye,” Cooper says.