Page 77 of The Rancher’s One and Only

“Walk me through what you do at the museum.”

She explained her job, from cataloging to creating displays, but when she got to the part about how she managed the children’s programs, he stopped her. “I want to know how you manage these programs.”

“You sound so skeptical that I can.”

“I guess I hadn’t gotten to read on what you thought about kids.”

“I like them. Selectively. But I think it’s really important that they’re allowed to follow their interests. You know I have a difficult relationship with my parents, but one thing is true—they let me follow my interests. And that made me better. Because I was able to find what I liked really early, I’m where I am now. So if I can be part of sparking something in a child, giving them access to something that might change their lives, then I want to do that. Kids aren’t embarrassed about being curious. At a certain point, adults get embarrassed about it.”

“You’re not, really,” he said.

She considered that for a moment. “No, I’m not. Because to be a good scientist, I have to be. But curiosity exposes all the things you don’t know, and so many people are scared of admitting they don’t know something. I’ve always found that my life is improved significantly when I just ask questions. Like…” she said.

He laughed, and she was glad that he did. “Right. Well, I have to agree, it was effective.”

“I could’ve pretended to have more experience, but at the end of the day, that’s foolish. You shouldn’t pretend to know more than you do. It doesn’t help. Anyway, that’s something I really like about kids, and an aspect of them that I want to foster. Keep asking questions. Don’t be embarrassed to ask for new information or to say that you don’t know something.”

“That’s incredible life advice.”

“Thank you.”

“You’re a very wise person.”

She was completely blindsided by the compliment, her cheeks going hot. It was just such a nice thing for him to say.

“I… Thank you. I don’t always feel like it. I feel like I’m missing big pieces that would be good to know. Really valuable insights that I wish I had a little better handle on. So it’s nice that you think I…that you think I might know anything. It’s very nice.”

“I think you got a lot of the deep, important stuff,” he said. “The kinds of things that so many people spend a lifetime never understanding. I think it’s rare to meet somebody as successful as you are who doesn’t also have an ego.”

“I have an ego,” she said. “To be clear. It’s just maybe not centered on some of the same things that most people’s is centered on.”

“Well, that’s perfect. It’s still the kind of contrast I need.”

He was so open about enjoying the things that made her weird. Or the things that other people found weird about her, anyway. He never called them out. And she realized then that her worries about him seeing her apartment were about her. They were not about him.

He navigated the city traffic with ease, and she had to check her surprise, because she had forgotten for a moment that he had spent many years living in the same area, and then in Las Vegas when he was fighting.

She wanted to know more about that. She was hungry for every piece of information about him, and she wasn’t sure that anything beyond a total and complete scientific log of his life would suffice.

“What was it like to be a professional fighter?” she asked as they cruised off the off-ramp toward the neighborhood her town house was in.

“It was exactly like you would think. A little bit too loud, a little bit too fast. A lot of poor decisions.”

“What kinds of poor decisions?”

“I don’t want you to disrespect me, Ernestine.”

Maybe he was meaning to be frivolous, or maybe he was genuinely warning her, but she was flattered by the statement. He had insecurity about himself too, where she was concerned, and she found that a little bit more comforting than maybe she should.

“You can tell me. I won’t judge you.”

“Okay. That means too much alcohol, some other substances, a lot of sex that didn’t mean anything. It was a lot of living in the moment. And for a little while, that worked for me. I would train, then I’d have a fight, and I basically have a bender for a week afterward. Because I had spent so much of my life living for the future. Trying to figure out how to get out of the situation I was in. Trying to keep my head above water, trying to be better. Because of that, I think I lost a little bit. Lost myself a little bit. But I never went totally off the rails. It was just… I needed a vacation from being so serious about life, does that make sense?”

“Kind of,” she said. “Though a vacation from structure sounds a little bit like my nightmare.”

“I can see that.”

“I don’t drink,” she said. “At all. The idea of losing control on that level really bothers me.”