Nova (11 page)

I was so excited
and I just had such a great feeling about the whole thing. I knew that my life was headed in the right direction.

A woman came into the office just
before
eleven with a big smile on her face. I knew
right
away it was
Mrs. Gaines
,
Marlo
,
because she looked like an older version of Sam. When she entered
she
asked, “Well? How’s she doing?” Then she notice
d
me and said, “Oh! You must be Nova, right? I’m
Marlo
, Austin’s mom.”

“It’s
very
nice to meet you,” I said, shaking her hand.

“It’s nice to finally meet you too. So will we be seeing you
every day
?”

She seemed really eager for an affirmative answer, and that made me feel really good. I felt wanted, and there was no better feeling than that.
“Uh, probably when I’m done with
this semester of
school. For now it will just be Friday to Sunday.”

“Oh, that will be a good start.” She looked at Jack and said, “Does Clara
know
?”

“Nope, haven’t gotten that far,” he replied.

“Well let me take care of it, okay?”

Jack nodded, and then the two of them began discussing Goldie. After about five minutes
Marlo
asked, “Are you done with Nova?”

He looked at me and said, “Yeah, I believe so. But we were going to take a walk around the grounds so she can meet some of her new patients.”

“Hmm, could you do that later?” she asked him. “I can make sure she gets a tour, and when you’re done with Goldie you can go over the vet stuff with Nova.”

“Sounds fine to me,” he shrugged.

Marlo
looked at me for agreement, so I nodded my head.

I followed her outside and made a comment about how much I loved her ranch.

“We love it here,” she replied as we walked. “We started the business when we lived in Texas years back, but then my sister’s brother-in-law had this land for sale, and we just couldn’t pass up the deal. Eventually the business just kind of…
grew
.
”

“I like the name. Why’d you name it Harmony Acres?”

“Harmony was the nam
e of my very first horse
,” she smiled. “I was fifteen and fell in love with horses the first time I saw her. She was kind of the start to all of this,” she motioned to her surroundings, “so I only felt it suiting to name my business after her.”

I noticed we were walking toward the main house, and I could only assume
Marlo
wanted to start there with the tour. As we got closer to it, I saw the tail end of a car parked on the side of the house next to the garage, and I got a funny tickle in my stomach as I realized whom it
must belong
to.

It was the Camaro. 

Chapter Six

“
Well,”
Marlo
said as we entered the house. “Welcome. Let me go find Aust
in for you; I’ll be right back,”
she smiled.

My stomach did a nosedive into my gut
. My feelings for Austin had temporarily been put on hold until that moment. Well, actually the moment I recognized his car by the garage. Why did things have to be so complicated? Why couldn’t
he
be some ugly guy
that wasn’t smart and didn’t have a nice smile with great teeth? I would have much rather he be someone that didn’t make my heart pound in my chest
whenever I thought about him—l
ike right now, when I pictured him looking at me from across a table, or holding the door open for me—

“Hey, Nova.”

—Or every time he spoke to me.

I turned around slowly, mainly trying to take time to compose myself, and said, “Hey,” as casually as I could.

Oh gosh, he looked better than I remembered. How was that possible? I just saw him the day before. Then I recognized the difference. It looked like he’d just showered, but I could tell he hadn’t shaved. That twelve o’clock shadow dusted his face very nicely, and I concluded that it must be his out-of-the-office, weekend appearance.
It worked very well for him, and the fact that he was incredible to look at really annoyed me.

“How’d it go with Jack?”
he asked as he came nearer
.

“Uh, it went great,” I replied, still trying to recover by taking silent, steady breaths.

“You decide
on what you’re gonna do? Will you be working here?”

H
e took a pair
of shoes into the living room and
sat dow
n on an ottoman to put them on, so I gave him a brief rundown of the plan I decided upon with Jack.

“That’s great,”
Austin
nodded.

“Did you just wake up?” I had to ask.

He chuckled as he stood. “Is it that obvious?” He rubbed his face and said, “Yeah, I was the lucky sucker my mom sent out looking for the dog last night. We were pretty sure she was in labor and she
just
disappeared.”

“Where was she?”

“Behind the guesthouse in the woodshed.”

“Ooh, and you moved her?”

“No, she followe
d me
so I just walked her into Jack’s office. I heard she started having ‘em, though. Is she still in labor?”

“Yeah, she had four already.”

“And she’s not done?”

“There’s probably
at least
one or two more,
”
I replied, wishing that I could be there when they arrived. But unfortunately someone else was a little more interesting to me, and that made me feel guilty.

“Hmm,” he nodded. “Oh, did you want to check on her progress?” he asked, seeming to read me pretty well.

I smiled and
said
, “Yeah kind of, if you don’t mind.”

“Nah,” he shrugged.
“Oh, just a sec.” I waited for a few moments until he returned with a paper plate
that had three
apple fritters and offered me one.

I followed him out of the house and we walked in silence
as we ate
. There was another trailer parked ahead at the arena and two horses were being unloaded. Austin said hi to the owners as we passed and one of the horses let out a long, loud whinny. It seemed to provoke a response from other horses nearby, and they hollered their response back.

“A lot of horse talk goes on around here,” Austin smiled.

I chuckled as he held the door to the arena for me, and then the door to Jack’s office. Jack popped his head out from the back room
and paused for a moment.

“Just lost one,” he informed us. He motioned us back
as I stuffed the
last of the fritter in my mouth
and I saw the tiny little pup lifeless in a
towel
on the counter. “So, Nova? What do you think?”
 

I stepped up to the counter, and after looking over the litter and then the deceased pup on the table, I asked, “Do you mind?”

Jack shook his head with a slight smile, so I slipped on a pair of sterile gloves
before I
uncovered the rest of the puppy.

“What time did she
have the first one
?” I asked.

“About four this morning.”

I barely nodded and took my pinky finger to open the pup’s mouth. “Well, seeing that Goldie had number five,” I nodded with my head to the litter, “and this little guy is
number
six
?”

Jack nodded
.

“Well,
I’m going to say he’s been in the birth canal for too long, or he’s breathed in birthing fluids. His tongue is blue…” I continued to look him over but didn’t see anything that suggested any other cause. “He died from lack of oxygen, but I’d do a necropsy just to be sure.”

Jack slowly nodded and then smiled. “Nice job. And would you like to stay for said necropsy?”

“
Yes
,” I said immediately.

He chuckled
as he took
the last
fritter from t
he plate that Austin had set down
for him
. “Ok
ay, give me about an hour
and we can get started on that.”
After taking a bite of the fritter, h
e glanced at the clock and
mumbled, “How ‘bout n
oon?”

I agreed right away
,
and when we left the office Austin said, “You seem a little too happy to dissect a puppy.”

I rolled my eyes but looked at him for a moment. “I’m not insensitive about death.”

“I wasn’t implying that at all,” he said, seeming to be truly sorry about the comment.

We walked for a few seconds before I said, “If you think about how many animals are in the world, it’s kind of an incredible amount. There are so many cats and dogs, pets that people don’t even take care of, a
nd they just seem to come and go. Everything is in balance, and I realize that even if I become the best I can be, I’m still not going to save them all. I believe there’s a purpose for every living thing, and when something dies, I have to tell myself that it was meant to be that way no matter what.”

We walked in silence again until he said, “
I agree with you. And i
t wasn’t meant to mean anything. Sorry, I guess I’m used to teasing Jack about all that stuff. I even tell him he likes sticking his hands up a horse when she’s giving birth.”

I chuckled at that and nodded. “Okay. And I can take a joke, but I just wanted to clarify that I guess.”

“Understandable. It’s part of your vet oath, isn’t it?” he smiled.

I returned the smile and nodded. “Yeah, something like that.” We walked for a few more seconds and I added, “I’ve never even had a pet of my own.”

“Really?”

I shook my head. “Nope. My grandma was allergic to cats and my grandpa didn’t like dogs. My mom worked a lot so she couldn’t even take care of a
fish
. And when we moved into an apartment, pets weren’t allowed. So I guess I’ve never really been attached to any sort of animal,” I shrugged. “I guess I’ve always wanted to be a vet because I never got to be around
them
.”

We came up to a fence behind the stables and stopped. There were
eight
horses in the
closest
field, grazing on the grass.

“This is Field On
e, FYI,
”
Austin told me.

“Okay.”

He pointed to the next field
s
over and said, “Field Two, Field Three, and back there behind the guesthouse is Field Four.”

I nodded.

“Across the road is Fields Five and Six, and behind the main house is
Seven
and Eight.”

“All right.”

“These
three
fields are mainly the horses that compete. The horses aren’t divided up by ownership or anything, but how they mingle with the other horses. We don’t put horses together that don’t get along because they could really hurt each other. The stable crew pastures the horses in shifts. It’s on a chart in the barn if you ever need to know it
, or need to find a particular horse.”

“Okay.”

I looked over the four fields to get a good look at the horses. It really was a beautiful site to see so many of them in one place.

“Do any of these horses belong to you guys?” I asked.

“Oh yeah,” he nodded. “Right there is one of Sami’s horses.”

He pointed to a very dark mare that seemed to stand pretty tall.

“Over there
is my mom’s baby,” he smiled. “He’s a s
poiled
brat
.”

“Do you even know their names?” I joked.

He gave me a funny scowl and said, “Pssh, of course I do. Sami’s mare is Queen Sadie Elizabeth—‘Sadie Liz’ for short. My mom’s
brat is
Aces Diamond Rio—‘Ace.’ Over there is Cash the Check—‘Cash.’ Uh…right there is N
ellie…there’s Ridley.
Zorro’s
Last Choice and
Conan
belong to our stable manager. Uh, that old guy right there is
Zazu
Zebedee. I
n Field Two
is
Bench Rider
,” he pointed, “and
Spitfire
is
another one of Sam’s
… U
h
, a
nd that
black
one there is Wizard.”