Cowboi

The Harvest

  When Juvencio’s pickup arrived, everyone ran to the homestead.

  Juliano returned. He's slimmer. His nose seems better, it was kind of heavy, is better balanced now. A trimmed beard hides the scars. His eyes are still a little red; the words continue to come out like blowing.

  Mariana runs from the stall, she is the first to hug him. Maria Pia leaves the van with some packages. Women surrounded her, they want to see the news from the city, she also changed her hair.

  Juliano walks to the balcony and sits down. All these days reposing, all the blood lost, the surgery, he is weak, any effort and he gets sweat.

  Everybody is saying things and asking questions at the same time, Juliano’s head spins. Mariana enters the house with her father.

  – Did you have fun with your friend? – Juvencio questions.

  – Yes – Mariana answers. – What are the doctor's recommendations?

  – Not many, bed and food until he feels better. What worries me more is that he can’t forgive himself. He keeps on thinking about the accident and doesn’t admit having done this crap. I'm tired of talking to him. These things just happen. I think that for Christmas he'll be fine.

  My God! – Mariana thinks – it's the end of the year; we have thousands of things to do. Christmas in the USA is different, the snow, everything is already done… Here we are in the middle of the season, wrong time to celebrate, she prefers St. John feast, in June.

   

  The air at the farm, Pia’s food did miracles for Juliano’s health, life’s back to normal.

  They planted corn and sunflower. When the flowers are opened and the seeds get the point, everything will be cut, crushed and compressed into large trenches and covered with tent material, the silos. Fermentation will keep food all right until the tropical winter, when the rain stops and the pastures back to sleep.

  This year they planted one more grass field, Mariana wanted to gradually replace the food in silos with hay, instead of fermenting, drying the grass, as in Texas.

  The school year ended and Manuela went on holiday to Lins, her hometown. Juliano got healthy and dove headfirst into work, forgot that nonsense of guiltiness. He shaved his beard, mostly forgot the sunscreen, the scars got darker, not much.