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"Landed. Driving the rest."

"Why?"

"Just made more sense."

"I'm glad you made it. Sorry you have a drive ahead of you."

"It's okay. How is everyone there?"

"Babies are eating now. Mom has Hildie. They are as happy as clams."

I take a deep breath, reminding myself that I can't be in two places at once and I need to be here.

"I'm glad it's a good night."

"I miss you," she says. "We all miss you."

"I miss you guys. Let me go so I can figure out how to get out of here. Give the babies a kiss for me."

The interstate empties out past Cheyenne, and it's the headlights and the reflectors and the mile markers ticking down. I stop once for gas and burnt coffee. I've been moving since the twins woke us up at six, and my back has kept a record of every hour.

I hit my gate around two. The yard light's on because Wade knew I'd be home late tonight.

I sleep maybe an hour and don't fight it when I can't get more. Before the sun is even trying to come up, I walk the property.

The stackyard's short. There's a bald patch of gravel where forty acres of hay ought to be stacked and isn't, because those forty acres never got cut. The corrals need work before I can run a head through them safe, two gates hanging crooked off dropped hinges and sixty feet of plank gone soft or split. The bulls are still in with the cows, past when they should have come out, and they'll have to stay there another few days, at least, because I can't sort anything until those gates hang.

Down in the east pasture a stock tank's float has quit. Wade wired the valve open with baling wire and left a hose trickling so nothing goes dry. It works. It's the kind of fix a man makes when he's covering ground that isn't his.

The cattle are fine. Two hundred forty pairs, fat and slick, grazing grass that's starting to go gold at the tips.

Ninety minutes in, I start a list.

Wade rolls up at seven, same coat, moving carefully on his bad knee.

"Didn't know if you'd make it back."

"Yeah, I had to keep pushing it back."

"We made it work."

He isn't picking a fight. He's making a statement, and I don’t blame him if he’s frustrated. I nod at the tank down the hill.

"How long's it been like that?"

"Since the tenth. Didn't want to spend your money on a float without asking."

"Spend it. We have to have it right."

By eight I'm at the kitchen table with a pencil, and the list has run to two pages.

For the first five days, Mackie and I talk every night before she goes to bed. I'm usually in the barn around that time, so it's short.

"Graham took four ounces."

"That's a good amount. He's going to be a big boy."

I almost tell her you can always pick out the calves that eat hardest.