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“You ”

“You’re a good woman”

He , too Elsa didn’t kno to respond, and in the silence of her confusion, he rose slowly, tiredly to his feet

She stood in front of him, tilted her face up She knehat he saw: a tall, unattractive wo, and eyes that seemed to have drunk all the color God allotted her

“I need to get to work,” he said “It’s already so goddamn hot I can’t breathe”

Elsa stared after hi, Look back, s and headed in to start the laundry

THE FIRST PIONEER DAYS celebration had taken place in 1905, back in the days when Lonesorass and the XIT Ranch employed a thousand cowboys Homesteaders had been drawn to this land by brochures that proes, and wheat All without irrigation Dry far, it was called, and it was promised to them here

Indeed

Loreda was pretty sure the party was really aboutthemselves

“You look beautiful,” Mo Loreda felt a rush of irritation at the intrusion She bit back an angry remark about privacy

Mom caether in the mirror above Loreda’s washstand Beside Loreda’s tanned skin and blunt-cut black hair, Mom’s pallor was remarkable Hoas it that Mom’s skin never tanned, just burned and peeled? She hadn’t even bothered to do anything with her hair beyond braiding it in a coronet Stella’s mom alore cosmetics and had her hair pinned and curled, even in these hard times

Moood The dress she wore—a floral flour-sack housedress with a button-up bodice—was at least a size too big and just exaggerated how tall and thin she was

“I’m sorry I couldn’t make you a new dress or at least buy you some socks Next year When it rains”

Loreda couldn’t iine how her mother could even say those words any the waves she’d coaxed into her chin-length hair and ruffling her bangs “Where’s Daddy?”

“He’s hitching up the wagon”