As We Continue with Two Cowboys, Chance and Rooney

Continuation of part 2

Here's what happened when they got to "Al's." It was later described to me at the hospital. Oooppps I'm getting ahead of my story.

Chance went directly to the machines and Rooney plopped that handsome tush at the bar. Sitting next to him was the Professor, a rustic, unshaven redhead from out East. To escape a nasty divorce, he stopped teaching and headed to Montana. Rooney and the Professor began talking and drinking with Rooney's three drinks to one of the Professors.

The evening wore on. Chance ran out of gambling money and said he was going to the truck. He crawled in the back and immediately fell asleep between two large spools of fence wire.

Rooney, still at the bar, was surrounded by local college girls. He kept tossing down drinks and wasn't really listening to the Professor's stories. He was thinking about getting laid, now that he was all liquored up but the Professor was yammering on about his fourteen year old kid who was spending the summer and how he was teaching him to shoot a gun and making a man out of him.

Closing time was announced and people started leaving. The Professor had somehow lost his truck keys but Rooney said they'd give him a ride home.

Out at the truck, the Professor got behind the wheel since Rooney was in no condition to drive. They took off in a typical Montana-bar-closing scene with Chance bouncing around in the truck-bed admid the fencing tools.

When they reached the Professor's trailer, the door was locked and his key was with the lost truck keys. Chance awoke and wondered what the hell was going on as he got out of the pickup. He and the Professor banged on the door but couldn't wake the boy. Rooney was in the drive way puk'n and Chance and the Professor were trying to find an open window. Hurray, they found one small, high-up unlocked window. The only person who would fit in that small opening would be Chance, so the Professor gave him a boost and he disappeared into the darkened room.

Bang........

There was a muffled shot. The next moment chaos reigned supreme. The kid came screaming out the door with the gun in his hand..... "Pa, Pa, someone's trying to break in and I think I shot him." Rooney stopped puking and was suddenly stone sober. Neighbors came rushing from their trailers. "Call an ambulance" someone shouted. Poor little Chance's body lay crumbled on the floor in a bright red pool of blood.

When my phone rang at 3 A.M. I thought, "Rooney's in jail again." I picked it up and all I heard was Rooney's incoherent blubbering. I finally made out that Chance had been shot.

"Is he alive?" I gasped.

"Barely. We're at the hospital."

"I'm on my way." I hung up the phone, slipped into my jeans and ran to my pickup.

When I got to the hospital, Chance was in surgery. We waited a couple of hours with Rooney pacing like a caged mountain cat, spewing prayers and making bargaining promises to God.

Finally a string bean looking doctor in blood-stained scrubs poked his head into the waiting room. He either had the perfect doctor's non-committal countenance or he played a lot of poker. After the usual bla bla bla introduction, he said simply, "he's going to be OK." Rooney broke into tears and I said my silent little prayer of thanks.

Dr. String Bean added, "He's sleeping but come back around noon."

Rooney and I stepped outside as a thin pink band of light showed across the Eastern sky. We buttoned up our jean jackets to ward off the remnants of the cool Montana night.

"Come on. I'll cook breakfast," I said, as we headed for my pickup.

"Yup, looks like it'll be a fine day for fenc'n," chimed in Rooney.

The ever lov'n End

Two Cowboys.....Chance and Rooney

I went up to the ranch today. Fences are sagging, weeds had grown up, it looks sadly abandoned. I guess it really is abandoned, except my neighbor's living there now since his house burned. He keeps the house and yard up but why mend fences when all the critters are gone. Llamas and angora goats used to grace every field and cranny. It was my fiber farm.

Something in my throat wanted to scream but nothing came out. I feel so alone. Everyone is either dead, grown up, moved on or just too busy to visit the ranch. I should have sold it years ago but it's so hard to let go of good memories.

My attention was drawn down the mountain to the network of paddocks, all connected with a thread of fences. Fencing kept my hired hands, Chance and Rooney, doing sweat labor all one summer. Try putting a fence post in solid rock. Good workers, the boys were, but typical for Montana. Work hard all week, get your paycheck, drink or gamble it away and come home broke. It's the cowboy creed.

Where you saw Rooney, you saw Chance. They did rodeoing together, too. Rooney riding the bulls and broncs and Chance being rodeo clown. Chance, with his diminutive stature, stood as high as Rooney's armpit. He'd flash that boyish grin along with his gift of gab and charm the pants off of any gal in the grandstand. The young ladies hung around like bees in a hive but the boys had other vices as priority. I don't mean shades of Brokeback Mountain. Not that. Chance, with a name like that, you know gambling was his. Chance never touched a drop of whisky.

Not so with Rooney. He'd take a bottle over a woman any day. Of course, I didn't say a woman couldn't entice him "with" a bottle. Rooney was so gorgeously handsome, it'd drive the gals into a frenzy of pure lust. Have you ever seen a man so handsome, that your breath stopped somewhere between your throat and your belly button? That was Rooney, with rugged physique to match.

It was one summer on a Friday night when the boys came up to the house for their pay. I knew they were itch'n to get over to "Al's Saloon," the local watering hole. Already that money was burning a hole in their pockets. Not even a small attempt at a scam this time. They usually tried, needing extra cash for a saddle, or a clutch for the pickup, you know scammers. I knew scammers but often I'd go along with them. Pisces are like that. But money was mostly post epso facto, for getting Rooney out of jail for drunk N disorder after a Friday night spree.

Here's what happened when they got to "Al's." It was later described to me at the hospital. Oooppps I'm getting ahead of my story.

To Be Continued