“Oh, you just don’t know her; she’s got a lot more to her than that,” Albert said with a trace of defensiveness.
“Look, I could be dead wrong, and it’s only a first impression, but my sense was that she’s kinda sour and self-absorbed.”
“No, not at all. Trust me, I’ve—”
“Yes, I know, you’ve known her a lot longer than I have, but keep in mind you’re not exactly the most objective analyst here. And also—big news—I’m a woman. Women can read other women a hell of a lot better than men can. Like I said, I could be way off base, but it’s a pretty strong vibe. And for a guy like you, with so much going for him, I would think—”
“Well, let’s not get hysterical. I’m not sure exactly what you think I have going for me.”
“See, there you go, cutting yourself down again. You act like this girl was performing a charitable act by dating you. It’s really frustrating. Albert, you’re sweet, you’re funny, you’re smart. And you’ve made something of yourself. You know, a lot of people out here can’t say that. You’re a good sheep farmer.”
“Oh, please, that’s a bunch of bullshit. I suck at sheep. Look around you. Louise is right, I can’t keep track of them at all. There was a sheep in the whorehouse last week.”
“Really?”
“Yeah, it wandered in there, and when I went to pick it up, somehow it had made twenty dollars.”
Anna laughed loudly. It was a sweet, satisfying sound. In fact, Albert was struck by just how quenching it was to hear. Why is that? he wondered. Had he ever felt that way when Louise laughed at one of his jokes? And then it occurred to him: Louise had never laughed at his jokes. She had smiled, yes. But she’d never actually laughed. Albert mulled this realization. But doesn’t that make those smiles that much more meaningful? Sure, we didn’t necessarily share the same sense of humor, but she never failed with that smile after every joke. She made the effort. Still, Anna’s laughter was welcome.
“Thanks,” Albert said to her. “For saying those things about me. I guess I’m not used to much positivity in my life.”
She put a hand on his arm. “Look, the West sucks,” she said, “but your problem isn’t just the frontier. It’s you. You need a little confidence boost.” She tightened her grip and raised his arm, helping him aim the pistol back toward the cans. “Now try again, sheepboy,” she said.
He gave her a cringing smile. “Yeah, that sheepboy thing isn’t helping the ol’ confidence.”
“I like sheepboy.”
“You’re basically calling me a pussy.”
“Point your gun that way, pussy.”
The first five bullets missed the cans by as wide a margin as before. But on the sixth shot, one of the cans went down.
“Yes!” she shouted gleefully, jumping like a schoolgirl. “There ya go, pussy!”
Albert stared, legitimately astonished despite himself. “Holy shit,” he exclaimed, wide-eyed. “So, all I gotta do is get Foy to let me shoot seventy-one times before he shoots, and I win!”
Anna laughed again. “You’ll get there, I promise.”
During the following days she drilled him. Hard and often. Everything from tin cans on fences to hand-drawn paper targets to airborne ceramic plates. And soon, armed with the ominous knowledge that what hung in the balance was not only the love of his life but his very life itself, Albert began to improve.
The lessons were not without their bruises, of course. He grazed his big toe on the first day. On the third day he cut his wrist on a tin can. And on the fifth day he got smashed in the face by one of the ceramic plates that Anna hurled into the air for him to shoot. Although Albert’s face was bleeding profusely from the gash, a trip to Doctor Harper proved less than helpful. When the doctor tried to place a blue jay near the wound so it could peck out the blood and prevent infection, Albert and Anna politely declined treatment, opting instead for a homemade dressing.
Each day he hit more and more of the targets, until at last he was hitting more than he missed. This was a milestone, and Anna felt it was time for a little reward. She waited until the approach of sunset, then took him up to the ridge overlooking Old Stump—the “swearing place” they had visited that very first night. They leaned against a rock face and stared out at the spectacular vista of the southern Arizona landscape.
“You did great today.” She smiled. “You’re so much better than you were before.”
“I guess,” he said softly. The impending reality of the gunfight was now truly beginning to sink in. I could be dead in a couple of days, he thought.
Anna sensed his anxiety. “Hey, I have a surprise for you,” she said, reaching into the pocket of her dress. “You’ve earned one of Anna Barnes’s very special super secret cookies.” She pulled the cookie from her pocket, took a bite, and offered it to Albert.
He stared at it as if it were a live tarantula. “Wait, is this… is this a weed cookie?”
“Yes, it’s a weed cookie.” She laughed.
“Oh, no, I… I don’t do well with that stuff.”
“That’s ’cause you’re too uptight. This’ll help. Just have a little.” She moved it toward his mouth, and he backed away.
“No. No way.” He squirmed. “It’s like my worst fear to OD on a recreational drug.”
“Albert, it’s just pot. Have a small bite. C’mon, do it for me.”
She had him beat. Anna had been such a pal to him since she arrived in Old Stump that he would’ve felt like a loser had he declined a request from her that was phrased in such a way. But his past experiences with pot—eaten or smoked—had been less than mellow. Once, after sharing a few too many puffs with a group of peer-pressuring schoolmates, he had been certain that Jim Wegman, the blacksmith, was somehow controlling the rhythm of Albert’s breathing with the clang of his hammer. Another time Albert had flown into a panic when the room began to spin, so he’d lain down on the ground, only to become terrified that remaining motionless for over ten seconds was how people became paralyzed. After a good twenty minutes of lying on his back while waving his arms and legs like an upended beetle in the hopes of staving off paralysis, he had finally started to regain his senses.
Albert took a crumb-sized nibble of the cookie.
“Oh, come on, more than that!” Anna snorted, grinning at him.
He took a deep breath and bit the cookie in earnest, noisily masticating with a sustained wince.
Anna gave his hand a squeeze. “And now we get to wait for the sunset.”
An indeterminate amount of time later, Albert was leaning stiffly against the rock face, doing everything in his power to keep Anna from discovering that he was in a state of unfocused mortal terror.
“Wow, this—this is so weird. Is it supposed to be like this?” he said, trying to sound nonchalant but feeling like something had gone horribly wrong with his swallowing reflex. Can throat muscles just shut down? Is that a thing? Like, some sort of instant throat atrophy? I won’t ever be able to eat solid foods again. I’ll have to pour liquefied food and water down my throat. But wait—how do I make sure it goes into my esophagus and not into my trachea? I could drown. Oh, my God, I’m gonna die by drowning! Wait, no, I could build a special funnel. Like a throat funnel. To guide the liquid food down the right tube. Edward would help me with that. I’ll ask Edward. We’ll make a funnel, Edward and I. With a funnel, I can live.
Anna was too perceptive to be fooled by his casual tone. She knew he was having a private freak-out and couldn’t help but laugh. “Oh, my God, Albert, will you relax and enjoy the buzz?”