El Toro: Ages 12-16 Spring Story Contest Winner

by Abigail Jones

San Joaquin Valley, March, 1883 – one month before Heartbreak Trail

“You can’t just treat me like a little girl anymore!” Andrea Carter yelled at her brother. “I’m just as capable of taming a horse as any of your cowhands.”

Chad Carter’s face was flushed with anger. “You’re a fourteen-year-old girl! I don’t want you in there with that crazy stallion.”

“It's not like I asked to work with him all by myself!”

“You know as well as I do that if I let you help me work with Fuego, you’ll end up in the corral with him by yourself!”

“I will not!” Andi shouted back.

“I’ve already agreed to let you work as a cowpoke during spring roundup. Can’t you just be satisfied with that for now? I don’t want you in Fuego’s corral. If something goes wrong, that horse could kill you.” Chad stood in the doorway of the Circle C tack room, his jaw set.

Andi knew what he was thinking about. The same thoughts had been running through her mind all morning.

“Remember what happened a few years ago when you got too close to Prince Loco?” he asked.

Andi shuddered at the memory. She could still see the stallion’s magnificent form towering over her as his front feet stretched to the sky. She could never forget the gut-wrenching fear that she had felt the instant before Chad yanked her out of the way and the giant hooves crashed down right where she had been standing. 

No, she would never again be so foolish. “I’ll be careful this time. I promise.”

“A promise just isn’t enough, Andi. I don’t want you that close to Fuego.”

“Just give me a chance!”

“No. You just cannot help me with that stallion. And that’s final!”

Andi bit her lip in an attempt to keep the angry words in. But it didn’t work.

“I hate you! I hate you!” As soon as the words left her mouth, she regretted them. But there was no way to take them back now. Fighting back tears, she ran past Chad and into the wide aisleway of the main Circle C barn.

“Andrea Carter! You come back here right now!” Chad’s thunderous voice reached all the way to Taffy’s stall on the other end of the barn.

But Andi didn’t turn around. She grabbed the rope halter from its hook by her horse’s stall door, unlatched the door, and opened it enough to squeeze inside. She half-expected to hear Chad’s footsteps coming toward her, but the heavy silence was all that she could hear.

Her palomino mare raised her finely shaped head and nickered as her mistress entered. Andi leaned her forehead against the warm, soft fur of her horse’s neck let a few tears escape. No one but Taffy heard Andi’s whispered words of anger and regret as they stood there.

Andi finally lifted her head and wiped her eyes. After slipping the halter over Taffy’s head and securing it, she tied the loose end of the rope back to the halter itself as a sort of makeshift reins. Then she led Taffy from the shadows of the barn into the midmorning California sunshine.

“How does a bareback ride up to the creek sound, Taffy?” she said, as she led Taffy to the fence of a nearby empty corral. 

Right now, there was nowhere that she would rather be than her special spot by the creek. As for the bareback part of the ride, she wasn't willing to go back into the tack room, where Chad was probably still fuming.

 After stepping onto one of the wooden rails of the fence, she pulled herself onto Taffy’s back and turned the mare away from the bustle of the ranch. Even with the wind whipping through her hair and the early spring blooms racing past her, Andi couldn’t push the argument with Chad from her mind.

Chad had no right to treat her like she was a china doll. Working with a half-wild horse was by far not the most dangerous thing she had ever done.

After fuming for the first half of the ride, Andi finally settled down. Maybe the sunshine and fresh air were doing some good. Once she reached her special spot, she ground-tied Taffy and walked to the creek bank. She was just about to pull off her boots and stick her feet in the cool water when she heard a faint cry.

Taffy’s ears pricked up as Andi strained to hear the sound again.

“Moooo!”

Now she could clearly make out the sound of a young calf. But where was it coming from? The east pasture, which her creek ran through, wasn’t in use now.

Andi shoved her dark hair from her eyes and started out in the direction that the plaintive cry had come from. Soon she spotted a black form tangled among the branches of a scraggly bush. She quickly began pulling aside the branches until the calf could make his way out of the brush.

“What are you doing here, little fellow?” she asked in a soft voice.

The calf only mooed again in response.

As Andi coaxed the calf back towards the creek and Taffy, she noticed something familiar about the calf. Even at only a few days old, he looked different from most of the Circle C cattle.

“El Toro!” she finally exclaimed.

The calf, dubbed “The Bull” by Diego, was one of Chad’s special calves. He had been working for several years to produce a bull that would improve the Circle C bloodlines, and her brother had been thrilled to find that one of this year’s calves was the best ever born on the ranch – and possibly in the whole San Joaquin Valley

But what was her brothers’ prize calf doing up here, a good half-mile out of the pasture that he had been born in?

El Toro lay down in a heap on the soft spring grass near the bubbling creek. She considered taking the calf back to the ranch, but she decided against it -  at least for a little while longer. It would be better to give Chad more time to cool down before telling him that his prize calf had somehow gotten out of his fence.

“Stay right here,” she told El Toro. She would have to trust that the calf wouldn’t wander too far away while she looked for his mother.

“Andi!”

Andi looked about her. In the distance she could see a horse and rider coming from the direction of the north pasture. A little closer, and she could make out Mitch on his horse, Chase. Her brother had no sooner reached the creek than he swung off of his horse and rushed up to her, still gasping for breath.

“Andi, the calf – El Toro – he’s-he’s.” He stopped and took a few deep breaths.

Before he could go any further Andi pointed to the calf lying on the ground behind her. “He’s right here, safe and sound,” she said. “I was just fixing to go look for his mama.” What had gotten her easygoing brother so upset?

“No need.” He paused once again, though his breathing had slowed down. “I found her dead halfway between here and the north pasture. There was a break in the fence, and I reckon they’d wandered out. Some drifter had shot her for meat, but I think I scared him off. I’ve spent nigh on three hours looking for that calf. Chad sure wouldn’t be happy if I had to go back and tell him that El Toro was lost.”

“Chad’s not happy now, anyway.” She lay back on the ground, one hand stroking El Toro, and told Mitch of their argument. “I guess I should apologize. Chad was only trying to keep me safe. But he was so upset that a simple sorry probably won’t fix things.”

Suddenly she sat straight up. “That’s it!” Her voice was loud enough that Taffy looked up from her grazing. In a burst of joy, she wrapped her arms around the small calf. El Toro mooed again and looked up at her. She laughed and rose to her feet. “Why didn’t I think of that earlier?”

“What are you talking about?” Mitch asked, chuckling.

She grunted as she scooped the calf into her arms and hoisted him onto Taffy’s back. Then, keeping one arm on El Toro and the other on Taffy’s reins, Andi stepped onto a large rock and mounted Taffy. She turned the palomino back towards home. “I’ll tell you on the way back.”

Only when they had settled into a fast walk did Andi speak again. “If I bring Chad’s calf back to him, maybe he won’t be so mad at me. I start helping with spring roundup a week from today, so I can’t risk being on his bad side. He can stay mad for weeks if he has a mind to. And I riled him pretty good this morning.”

Mitch nodded but didn’t say anything.

It was nearly noon when they reached the cluster of barns, corrals, and horses. The only person in sight was Sid McCoy, the longtime Circle C foreman. “Where’d you come across this one?” he asked as he laid one hand on the calf.

“By the creek in the east pasture,” Andi said, hoping that Sid wouldn’t recognize El Toro. To her great relief, the grizzled foreman didn’t seem to notice anything special about the calf. “Where’s Chad?” she asked.

“At the corral on the other side of the barn.”

“Thanks.” Andi directed Taffy behind the large barn, with Mitch following close behind. She spotted Chad leaning on the top rail of large corral, talking to Diego. The ranch hand beamed a smile at Andi and called out a greeting.

Chad whirled around and stared at the calf. “Andi, what in the world--”

As Andi had expected, her brother had recognized El Toro immediately. “He had somehow gotten out of his pasture. I found him stuck in a bush near my creek.”

Chad’s face clouded. “Where’s his mama?”

Mitch explained the situation to his older brother as Andi slid off of Taffy and pulled the calf down. El Toro stood quietly at the Andi’s side, already seeming to have attached himself to her.

Chad bit his lip and nodded grimly. “I’m not giving up on him yet. There’s a chance that we can get another cow to take to him soon. Either that or we’ll have to raise him ourselves, though I don’t really have the time for that.”

A smile spread slowly across Andi’s sun-tanned face. “Could I raise him, Chad? It wouldn’t be that hard to bottle-feed him for few weeks. I’ll do all the work.”

Diego had an amused look on his face. “Won’t he turn out to be more of a pet than a toro?” he asked.

Andi shot him a withering glance. If he ruined her chance to get back on Chad’s good side...

“Seems like the best option,” Chad said, though reluctantly. Andi sighed in relief. “But you’ve already promised to help me with the spring roundup.”

“I can do them both,” Andi promised. And he should be grown enough for me to leave him to go on the cattle drive next month, she thought. But now wasn’t the time to bring that up.

“I’ll settle our little bull in an empty stall before I head back out to finish checking the fences,” Mitch offered.

Chad nodded. “Andi, you take care of Taffy while I see if I can find a bottle and some milk.”

After putting Taffy back in her stall and giving her a good rubbing-down, Andi walked through the barn until she came to the stall where the calf lay. She sank down beside him and stroked his soft hide.

Soon Chad reappeared with the large bottle that they had used for an orphaned filly last year. As Andi took the bottle from him and let the eager calf suck on it, she looked up at her brother.

“I’m sorry about this morning,” she said slowly. “I wasn’t thinking like I should have been. You were only trying to keep me from getting hurt. I’ll stop bothering you about helping with Fuego.”

She paused for a long moment, watching El Toro drink greedily from the bottle. She didn’t dare to look Chad in the eye. “Are you still mad?”

Chad shook his head and kneeled down in the straw. “No. I shouldn’t have let my temper get the best of me either. Forgive me?”

Andi smiled, though still looking downward. Her plan seemed to have worked. “Of course.”

The only sound for the next few minutes was that of El Toro sucking warm milk from the bottle.

Then Chad put one finger under his sister’s chin and lifted it up until she found herself looking into his eyes. “I have a feeling I know what’s going on here.” Andi started to say something, but Chad held up his other hand to stop her. “You were afraid that I would still be mad, even if you tried to apologize. So you thought that by bringing my prize calf back to me, you could somehow convince me to forgive you.”

Andi chewed on her lip and nodded.

“It doesn’t matter how many calves you bring me or anything like that. I know that I seem pretty hard to get along with sometimes, but you are my little sister, and I still love you. It doesn’t take a peace offering to gain my forgiveness.”

Andi looked deep into his blue eyes. Chad made it sound so simple.

“Just ask. Okay?”

Andi nodded and let the warm bottle fall to the ground as she wrapped her arms around her older brother.

Chad chuckled and hugged Andi back. “I know we both have more than our fair share of Carter stubbornness. And I’m quite sure that this won’t be our last argument. But maybe we can both learn something from this.” He paused, then added, “And maybe sometime I’ll let you work with one of my stallions.”

“Thank you,” was Andi's only reply as she squeezed her brother tighter.

El Toro mooed from behind her, complaining because she had dropped his bottle. Andi giggled, released her brother, and held the bottle so that the calf could drink from the milk once again.

With Chad still squatting beside her, all traces of his earlier fury gone, Andi felt peace welling up inside her.

Thank you, God, she prayed silently. Then, laying one hand on the calf, she said softly, “and thank you, El Toro.”