Chapter 12 - The Home Jasper Had Left Behind
Montana looked different to Jasper as a free man.
He and Ellie traveled with Rose in early summer.
The Cain ranch stood beneath enormous blue skies.
The house had deteriorated.
Fences sagged.
The barn roof had partially collapsed.
Jasper dismounted slowly.
Ellie saw fourteen years settle across his shoulders.
“This is where you grew up?”
“Yes.”
Rose remained near the wagon.
She looked frightened.
Not of the building.
Of memory.
Inside, dust covered everything.
Jasper entered his father’s study.
A dark stain remained near the fireplace.
He stopped.
Ellie didn’t ask what it was.
She simply took his hand.
“I hated him,” Jasper whispered.
“You had reason.”
“I loved him too.”
Ellie squeezed his fingers.
“That’s allowed.”
He looked surprised.
“Is it?”
“Yes.”
People often wanted grief to be simple.
Victim and villain.
Love and hatred.
But families could wound and still be mourned.
Jasper walked through the house until sunset.
The following morning, they discussed selling.
Rose wanted nothing from the property.
Jasper wasn’t sure.
Ellie refused to decide for him.
Then they discovered something in the barn loft.
A wooden box belonging to their mother.
Inside were letters.
Dozens.
One was addressed to Jasper.
Written shortly before her death.
He read silently.
Then sat down.
“What does it say?” Rose asked.
Jasper handed her the letter.
Their mother had known Silas was becoming violent.
She had saved money secretly.
She intended to take the children away.
But illness killed her first.
Near the end she had written:
Jasper, you are not responsible for carrying everyone. Protect your sister when you can, but remember that your life belongs to you too.
Jasper covered his face.
Ellie sat beside him.
For years he had believed he failed his mother.
Failed Rose.
Failed his father.
Now a dead woman’s words gave him permission to stop carrying ghosts.
They sold most of the ranch.
But Jasper kept forty acres around the house.
“Why?”
He looked toward the mountains.
“Maybe someday we turn it into something good.”
Ellie smiled.
“Such as?”
“A place for people who need somewhere to start over.”
The idea grew.
Part of the ranch money funded Ellie’s nursing school.
Another part restored the Montana property.
They called it Rose Haven, though Rose complained bitterly about the name before secretly painting the sign herself.
Former prisoners found work there.
Widows passing west stayed temporarily.
Young men without families learned ranching.
Women training under Ellie sometimes spent summers practicing frontier medicine there.
Something painful became useful.
Years passed.
Ellie’s school grew.
Jasper divided his time between tracking work, the ranch, and helping her.
People sometimes asked who ran the household.
Ellie answered, “Whoever is less tired.”
Jasper answered, “Ellie.”
Both were correct depending on the day.
Then one autumn morning Ellie stood in their bedroom holding a letter from a doctor in Cheyenne.
Jasper entered.
“You’re pale.”
She handed him the letter.
He read it.
Then read it again.
His eyes lifted.
“Ellie.”
She nodded.
Neither spoke.
After years of believing it might never happen, Ellie was pregnant.
Jasper sank into a chair.
“Are you all right?”
He started laughing.
Then crying.
Then doing both.
Ellie laughed too.
“You look ridiculous.”
“I’m going to be a father.”
“Yes.”
“I don’t know how.”
“Nobody does.”
“My father—”
She crossed the room.
“You are not Silas Cain.”
“What if—”
“You are not him.”
Jasper looked at her.
She placed his hand against her stomach.
“This child already has something neither of us had enough of.”
“What?”
“Parents who know what loneliness costs.”
Jasper kissed her forehead.
But pregnancy on the frontier carried risks Ellie understood better than anyone.
May you like
And as winter approached, those risks began becoming frighteningly real.
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