Page 34 of Seeing Harper

Scotty’s eyes widened and he threw out an arm to point at his other two sons currently snarling and growling at each other as his oldest son held his youngest son — his Tiger that is — in a headlock. “I got two like that! Just be glad between the two of us and four kids between us that one of them feels a connection to the land. It’s not fair to force them into something they don’t want to do anyway. Their lives are their own. They don’t have to live what we did, or do. Between all of us giving a little here and there, we’ll make it work, we always do. She’s feeling something different, let her.”

“You don’t understand what I…” Travis started angrily.

“Pride! That’s what I understand. You have too much of it,” Scotty said.

“It’s not Pride, it’s a matter of principle,” Travis said.

“Whose? Yours or hers?”

Scotty’s two other boys charged into the area Easton was working in while his father and his uncle watched over him and taught him the right way to prune a Christmas tree so that it would grow into a perfectly shaped tree. They ran as quickly as they could, snarling, swiping at each other and doing their best to trip each other as they ran. Dillon of course, did trip, rolling head over toes as Evan’s Tiger used his front paws to send him into a tumble, nimbly sidestepping him as he went down.

Dillon bellowed with rage as he came back up and kept running.

Evan darted right past Easton, but Dillon, however, saw an easy target to let out some aggression and frustration and dove onto Easton’s back rolling him two or three times before Easton started swinging on him and then ended up in a flurry of fists and teeth.

“Alright! That’s it! Don’t bite your brother!” Scotty yelled, grabbing Easton by the shirt and pulling him away from Dillon.

Travis grabbed Dillon and yanked him up off the ground. “What the hell is wrong with you?! Don’t you see Easton trying to work?”

Dillon’s feet were swinging in the air, frantically searching for purchase so he could go after Easton again. “He bit me!”

“Because you attacked him!” Travis said.

“I was mad!”

“At Evan, not Easton. You want to fight somebody, fight the one that made you mad!”

“Let me go!” Easton demanded, trying to pry his father’s hands off his shirt so he’d let him go and he could go after his older brother.

“No! You two stop it! Now! Or I’m calling your mother and you know what she’ll do when she gets here!” Scotty threatened.

“I didn’t do nothing! I’m trying to learn!” Easton shouted angrily.

“Yeah, I know. Unfortunately, though, you can’t bite your brothers.”

“They’re idiots,” Easton spat.

“Any other day you’d be right in there fighting with both of them,”Scotty said.

“It’s not fair!” Dillon yelled. “He always wins!”

“I do not!” Easton yelled back.

“Not you! Him!” Dillon said, pointing twenty feet away to where Evan’s Tiger sat relaxedly licking his paws, lazily flicking his tail as he waited for his father and his uncle to release either or both of his brothers so he could whip their asses again.

“He’s the youngest, how does he always win?” Travis demanded.

“He’s got a Tiger! He uses it against us!” Dillon said.

“And why do you think he needs to do that?” Scotty asked. “Maybe because the two of you gang up on him and he has to so he can even the playing field.”

“It’s not fair he’s got a Tiger,” Dillon said again, less angrily and more sullenly.

“You have a Tiger, too. And the sooner you learn to listen to it the better off you’ll be,” Scotty said.

“I can’t turn into a Tiger!” Dillon said.

“Turning into one doesn’t make his Tiger any stronger than yours. Or yours,” Travis said, shooting a glance toward Easton. “You just have to learn to hear him. He’ll help you, make you stronger.”