I asked her to wait in the house for me so she wouldn’t have to hear Uncle Hank tellin’ me I’d better give up on the rodeo, no better’n I’d done. Then Bill came runnin’ up with the news about Abo, and I plumb forgot Annalee was waitin’ for me. After that, seemed like she was gone before I knew it. As the weeks went on, I sorta got used to not seein’ Annalee, though I’d still get horny right often. I got to thinkin’ maybe I didn’t deserve her, maybe it was just a physical thing after all. Made me kinda miserable, to tell the truth. I wasn’t at the ranch when her little boy got bit. Damn, that was a hard thing to come home to. I thought about goin’ to the hospital, but Hank convinced me she didn’t want to see me no more. That come home to roost when she come to visit Tali. You’d have thought she was a porkypine, way she acted, all prickly and ‘don’t touch me’. Made me hot under the collar, and when I kissed her anyway, that got me hot all over. I didn’t know which way was up.
