A flutter of butterflies took wing from the pit of James’s stomach when he saw Elinor come through the door. He took no notice of it, she had always made him feel that way, even when they were children. He ginned and waved back at her. It seemed that a weight had been lifted just with the smile on her face.

She fell into his arms and hugged him. He hugged her back just as hard, his face nuzzling in her hair. God it felt good to be holding her again.

“Let a guy catch his breath, Rig” he gasped.

“Get over it, James. And get used to it. Now let's get my luggage and go home.”

“Always the bossy one,” he replied, reaching down and taking her hand as they walked through the small airport. “Yeah, let’s go home.”

They both were quit on the long drive home, wrapped in their own thoughts.

“It’s been a good spring,” James finally said breaking the silence. “Musta been close to two-hundred calves born this year. Only lost a dozen or so to coyote’s maybe. They paid for it though,” he added thinking about the rifle that hung on the rack behind his head.

“You got em all rounded up,” Elinor asked.

“No, not yet. Still got a couple hundred head down in the bottomland. I had Wil Wright fly his piper down there the other day. He says they are scattered all over the place. Can’t go charging in with planes and four-wheelers though.”

“Sand Hill Cranes…….,” she asked letting the question hang.

“Yeah, damn bird people say I can’t disturb em. Say the only way I can go in and get the cattle is on horseback. Hell, it’s my land, our land,” he corrected himself turning to look at his sister. “And I can’t even work it the way I want. If there was money in it, I raise cranes. Maybe they need more cranes to deliver all those babies being born in the world.”

“Those are storks James, not cranes,” Elinor said with a drool look on her face.

“Storks, cranes, same difference. Hey, I got an idea,” he added after a pause. “Why don’t you come down with me and the boys while we round up that last bunch of beef. All we have to do is ear tag em, castrate em, and let em go again. Should only take a week or less.”

“On horseback, you must be kidding.”

“Hell Rigby, its twenty miles down to the bottomland. I aint riding back and forth everyday. We’ll take the Winnebago down and pull the horse trailer. The boys can sleep on the ground or go home at night, like they did last year. You and I could just stay down there in the camper. You could do the cooking and the……cooking,” he said looking at her sheepishly. “Just think Rigby, nothing for forty miles in any direction ‘cept wide open space, clean fresh air, a night sky with nothing but a billion stars.”

James pulled the pickup into the yard and shut it off.

“Think about it,” he said. “It’ll do you go to get out in the middle of nowhere for a while.”

He got out and grabbed her luggage out of the back of the truck, and carried it toward the house. It felt good to have her home again, even if the circumstances weren’t the best.

It’s always better to share a cup of loneness with someone you love, he thought.