The evening we had eaten Frieda for dinner
I had sat there in my red shorts
with the blue and yellow
crisscrossing lines and my bare feet.
Lyman had come out and stood for a time looking into the clear distance. Then he said, "You want to ride with me?" and nodded his head toward the barn.
I leaped up, nodding like a broken toy before I could manage, "Yes!"
He smiled a little, just a little, that fleeting little twitch of his thin lips.
All the kindness was in Lyman's dark, dark eyes. Dark and bright they were.

We went down the one lane road into the evening with the dropping sun on our backs, Lyman, black Banner, and me behind with my arms around Lyman's waist. I could feel his jeans, his belt, and his hip bones. I could feel Banner's muscles, motion, smell the good horse smell, hear the sound of hooves on the Earth.

Several years later I took my bike after school one day and went to see Lyman's house. I had heard others talking and knew where it was. It was a long way. When I reached it I stood straddling my bike and looking up at it on an improvised rise behind a broken cement wall whose segments had shifted. The house was huge, rambling, gray, peeling, partially hidden by great straggling jagged trees. It looked like a witch's house. It was fascinating.
So many windows and nothing moved.
After a time I rode back.

more