Tim's Adventure 9
by Wordshop
Sadly, the private picnic lunch for Tommy and Tim did not happen on schedule. At about 8:30 the next morning, Gary received a telephone call informing him of the death of a very good friend. About a half-hour after that, Tommy received a telephone call informing him that he needed to work the booth that his boss had taken at the county fair. All in all a screwed time for all concerned. The woman who had died and her husband had been friends of Gary's for over thirty years. Her husband had expired first, and Gary had been the organist for his funeral mass in California. When she passed, she had been over ninety years old, and Gary would serve as organist for her memorial as well. Mike had taken Gary to the airport in El Paso, where he was booked on a flight to Hollywood-Burbank Airport. In Los Angeles, he would do the Enterprise Rent-a-car Rumba and drive to the San Fernando Valley for the Memorial he was to play. People do not as a general rule pick when they are going to leave this world, and the timing of this particular death was bad for both Mike and Gary. Gary had to make up a music program for the memorial service and perform this program on an instrument for which his only feeling was contempt.
The additional work time for Tommy at the county fair had been totally unexpected. Tommy had not even known that there was going to be a booth for the gym at the fair. The owner of the gym where Tommy worked as a personal trainer for the first time rented space to promote his gym. He was deathly afraid that one of the big chains of bodybuilding gyms were going to set up shop near him. Right now, he was the only game in town, but how long would that last? He wanted to do a big membership "push" to try and get everyone he could before that happened. Tommy was literally exhausted between his clients, his own training, and then every free moment left over at the fair grounds. It was hell week for everyone, Gary in California, Mike also got stuck at the fair because of their livestock, and Tim was then of course thrown to the wolves running the ranch totally on his own for the very first time.
The week was especially hard on Tim and Tommy. Tim was out and on horseback by the time Tommy awakened from sleep. In the beginning, until he knew each of the workers, he was himself going to be there to begin to see what he could trust them to do, and to see where he needed to keep an eye on things.
The county fair closed its doors for exhibitors at nine P.M. and this meant that by the time Tommy got home at night, Tim was already in bed fast asleep. Tim had been literally living on sandwiches, soda pop and fruit juice, and this was beginning to get to him.
Mike had brought home such incredible culinary delights as The Colonels Chicken, Pizza, Taco Treat, and even a visit to Burger Queen. All of this crap was definitely counterproductive to Tommy's training, but there was little opportunity for decent food during this time crunch.
Tim had to drive the one hundred miles from the ranch to El Paso to pick-up Gary at the Airport that Friday, Tommy's penance for the gym would not end until Saturday. Mike was the worst off supervising the handling of stock not only for their ranch, but for the ranch of one of their neighbors because of an injury that the neighbor had suffered during the week. Mike would be stuck with fair commitments till Sunday afternoon.
Tommy had already re-scheduled his Monday clients, and he considered both Sunday and Monday to be "off-limits" to anyone or anything that would take him away from Tim. Tim had planned for Sunday, but, did not know that Tommy was going to expand their time away from the pressure and their time WITH each other through the next day.
On Sunday morning Mike was still a little down from the funeral, but, he was awake writing bills when Tim in a bathrobe padded in to the kitchen.
"Mornin' sport!"
"Did Tommy tell you anything about our miniaturized get-away?"
"Only that if you were disturbed that we would hear the scream without amplification wherever we were."
In the bedroom, out of sight, Tommy looked at the things that Tim had packed. The one thing that bothered Tommy a great deal were the two cell phones. At this point in time, he did not want to be disturbed and he wanted time to be with Tim that was not going to be interrupted.
Tommy removed both cell phones placing them in the drawer of his nightstand out of sight. He was not going to permit any type of interruption no matter what it took. Oh No! They're not going to get us and if there is no buzz, vibration, ring, or other signal there would be no interruption.
Tommy had a place in mind that was at the northeast corner of their spread. The altitude in that area was a little greater, things were a little greener and there was a stream up there with decent water. Tommy packed some overnight things for Tim in his own gear because he had not even told Tim that this was going to be an overnight "camping" trip.
Tim had tried to bribe Rogelio to saddle up Rosie, and as usual he was afraid of the animal. He did however bring the saddle to her stall, and Tim was surprised to see that the saddle was different than the one he usually used. Rogelio had been told not to tell Tim that they were going to pack into the little cabin and stay overnight by Tommy, so when Rogelio handed Tim a different saddle for Rosie, Tim wondered what was up. Rosie, the over wrought spoiled equine juvenile delinquent would only let Tim do the honors so he had to bit, and attach all the rest of the hardware for their ride. After Tim went back into the ranch house, Rogelio added the rest of the supplies to the packsaddle that Tommy had left there earlier.
While taking a leak in their bathroom, Tim wondered what would happen between Rosie and Gypsy. The horses had never been together in this way before. Would Rosie nip at Gypsy's flanks? Rosie was a certifiable pain in the ass to everyone but Tim. She absolutely hated Mike and Gary, would kick at the hired help if given the opportunity, and just tolerated Tommy.
Initially, Mike had suggested Ranger instead, and Tim simply stated that we have to know what she'll do in this circumstance, and there's only one way to find out. There was also no bond between Tim and Ranger, which in spite of her problems, made Tim feel safer on Rosie.
When Tim went back to the barn and saw all the supplies attached to the packsaddle, he did not really have time to argue with anybody. Tommy and Gypsy were nowhere to be seen and he needed to mount and get his ass moving.
Tim could tell that Rosie was not in love with the packsaddle because she continually turned her head to look at it trying to figure out why it did not feel like what she was used to. Each time she did this, Tim talked to her softly and laughed telling her that everything was going to be all right.
Tommy was waiting near the front of the ranch house for Tim. When they were at each other's side, the trip began. The ride took about an hour and there was no hurry on the part of either one of the riders. The weather was still a bit brisk, but the daytime temperatures were actually kind of nice, with the nights in the lower forties. Cool yes, but definitely not dangerously cold unless wind chill were a factor. The winds were calm. They picked a place that was one of several gathering places, used when cattle roundups were in progress. There was a little weird one-room cabin with no electricity and no running water. It did provide shelter and it did have beds and a chemical toilet in it. There were ice chests, which (thanks to Rogelio) had some fresh ice in them. And, there was a wood burning pot-bellied stove that would allow very primitive food preparation. The only lighting was a couple of kerosene lamps and one far brighter mantle-lamp.
There were also two corrals and horse shelters for the animals. The cabin, if one could call it that, would serve as a place away from people for the next twenty-four hours. Tommy and Tim tended to the horses and Tim noted that there was some feed and water for them in each of the corrals.
Inside, Tommy took two of the beds and pushed them together. He then tied the legs so that they would not move apart. The next thing he did was to lay out some blankets over the plastic covered mattresses. To Tim, the place actually looked almost clean. (Little did Tim know, but Tommy had cooked this up and had heavily bribed Rogelio's wife Luisa, to drive a jeep up there, and do a clean-up before they arrived.) Over the top of this bed arrangement Tommy unrolled a very large sleeping bag that was large enough for both of them.
The wood box was well stocked and was kept that way year round. Gary and Mike periodically used this as an escape themselves when they absolutely had to have some peace and quiet.
As the sun began to set, and the temperature began to drop, Tommy prepared the fire in the pot-bellied stove and also started to prepare a meal. This time Tommy was determined that he was going to do this and to not look like just a muscle-bound idiot. He needed at this point in time to prove again to himself that he had value. He was still feeling down and like he had badly neglected Tim.
By nine P.M. both had retired to bed.
This was a very special time for both as it was the first time they had been together without interruption since Tommy's injury. Tommy's butt had healed completely and he wanted Tim to ride him till he couldn't stand it any more. Mike had checked Tommy's butt and the treatment he had received would prevent any injury from ever happening again.