Henry’s entire body began to quiver and tears fell from his tightly closed eyes. He began shaking uncontrollably, and he found himself opening first one eye, then the other. “Time to change, Henry,” the voice repeated kindly. Suddenly coming to his senses, he lowered the gun while at the same time raising the bottle up in front of his face. He stared at it for a long time, his mind racing through all of the bars, all of the bottles, all of the jobs and all of the time he had wasted. A feeling of overwhelming anger shot through his body and all of it was aimed at the symbol of his agony: the bottle he held in his hand. He tossed it with all his might, raised his pistol and began shooting at it as it flew.

“You son of a bitch!” he yelled at the top of his lungs. On the third shot, the bottle exploded in midair, but Henry continued to fire the weapon until all six rounds had been expended. The hammer clicked on several empty chambers before Henry finally quit pulling the trigger and lowered the gun to his side. Out of breath and exhausted, he fell backward against the front of the truck. The desert was quiet now and as much as he longed to hear it again, Annie’s voice had gone quiet, as well.

A peacefulness slowly washed over him, and he suddenly felt as though the weight of the world had been lifted from his shoulders. He glanced up at the sky and for the first time, saw the beauty of the full moon above him, and it brought a genuine smile to his face. Henry hadn’t realized until just then, but the day’s date was March eleventh—it was his birthday. He was fifty-two years old.

CHAPTER 21

The old horse had been in a lot more pain lately than anyone really knew, but because nobody ever took the time to watch him move around inside his pen, nobody ever noticed it. While Tug had been looking out for Zip’s well-being by keeping him in the pen for the winter, limiting his movement was the worst thing he could have done. The overall lack of movement the pen provided was causing the gelding’s joints, already limited in movement by the debilitating arthritis he suffered from, to become even less active, and thus more painful. In the past month, things had gotten so bad he began limiting himself to trips to and from his water tank and feed pile, and very little else. Even his manure ended up in one small area of the pen, a fact the men cleaning the pen took for him consciously wanting to keep it relatively unsoiled, rather than the old horse not being able to go elsewhere to defecate.