But we’d been raised by Albert Kucera.
And in our family, important things were rarely said aloud.
I drove to the farm that afternoon to collect my inheritance.
The feed truck sat in the north section of the machine shed.
Exactly where Dad had parked it after feeding the calves on February second.
He’d died the following evening.
I found him the next morning, sitting in his recliner while the television continued showing cattle market reports.
He’d gone quietly.
And his old truck remained where he’d left it.
It was a 1994 International, once white but weathered nearly gray after decades of Nebraska winters.
The old diesel engine had carried feed through snow, mud, and summer heat.
There was a dent in the discharge chute from an accident Dad had never stopped complaining about.
I climbed into the cab.
Then I saw his gloves.
They were lying on the dashboard.
Two old yellow leather work gloves, darkened by grease and age.
The fingers had curled into the shape of his hands.
I sat behind the steering wheel, staring at them.
A faded seed-company cap lay on the passenger seat.
Fencing pliers rested on the floor.
The cab smelled of diesel fuel, ground corn, and peppermint candies.
Dad always carried peppermints, supposedly because he liked them.
We all knew they helped disguise the tobacco he kept chewing after his doctor told him to stop.
I touched the steering wheel.
For a moment, I could almost hear him telling me to stop wasting daylight.
The windshield began to fog.
I hadn’t realized I was crying.
Eventually, I started the engine.
It caught almost immediately.
I unplugged the block heater, carefully coiled the cord the way Dad always had, and drove the truck eleven miles to my place near Elba.
I didn’t move the gloves.
I couldn’t.
Theresa came outside when I parked beside our barn.
She looked at the truck.
“Well,” she said gently, “at least it’s paid for.”
I tried to laugh.
“Probably the only thing on that farm that is.”
I meant it as a joke.
I had no idea I’d repeated almost exactly what Dad had written in a letter I’d discover months later.
—
The following morning, reality caught up with me.
I owned forty cows.
I’d started the herd years earlier with six bred heifers Dad sold me at cost.
For more than two decades, those animals had grazed his creek pasture during summer and fed on his cornstalks through winter.
That had always been our arrangement.
I worked the farm.
Dad paid me wages.
And I used his pasture for my cattle.
But now the land belonged to Phil.
I couldn’t assume the arrangement would continue.
So I hooked up my livestock trailer and began moving the animals to my property.
Eight cows at a time.
It was calving season, the worst possible time to move them.
But I didn’t see another choice.
Phil arrived that Saturday while I was loading another group.
He stood beside the gate wearing a new work coat.
