“Why does that boy always look like he just invented ice cream?” Dad muttered. I nodded in bewildered agreement. Much as I adored my brother, I rarely understood him. Henry was born with a uniquely sunny disposition and a charm that meant he could talk his way out of any scrape. That was fortunate, because he also found his way into more scrapes than most.
“Well, aren’t you two peas in a pod,” Henry laughed when he neared.
“Plowing is dusty work, Henry,” I reminded him. “You wouldn’t know because you’ve never done any.”
He threw back his head and laughed, then waved a hand vaguely toward my dusty body.
“I didn’t mean because you both look like someone buried you alive. I meant because you’re both standing there with your hands on your hips. You’re even wearing that scowl you both love so much.” I glared at him, and Henry laughed again. “Are you done with the tractor? I have a date with Betsy tonight, so if you want to plow again tomorrow, I need to get started now.”
I liked Betsy and I wasn’t jealous that Henry had someone special. Despite our dire financial situation, he still went out several nights a week to see her, but I didn’t begrudge the gas he used driving the Model T into Oakden. They’d been dating for over a year and Henry had wanted to propose for almost as long.
I’d been on enough dates these past few years to have quietly decided that romance wasn’t for me. I liked simpler things—the feel of sandy dirt on my skin after I plowed a field, the joy of a new foal’s birth, the sight of those first green shoots breaking through the soil as the wheat seeds germinated. There was nothing I enjoyed more at night than to sit out under the stars, taking cautious sips from the bathtub gin Henry secretly brewed in the barn, enjoying the silence of the high plains with my brother by my side. But admittedly, on nights Henry was out with Betsy, I felt awfully lonely. I had no idea what I was going to do when he finally had the money to marry her.
“You can’t take the car tonight,” Dad said abruptly, turning toward the tractor.
“What?” My brother’s trademark smile slipped into a frown. “But, Daddy, me and Betsy were—”
“We need to save the gas.”
Before Henry could say another word, Dad climbed up and started the tractor. The engine roared to life, and without delay, he drove it past us. I coughed as the tractor sent a fresh wave of dust over me, and it was Henry’s turn to scowl.
“I can’t even call her to tell her I’m not coming,” he grumbled, shaking his head. Dad said we couldn’t justify the monthly service fee to have the telephone connected. “What’s gotten into him? Today didn’t seem like a bad day.”
“Maybe he’s just tired from being on the tractor for five hours.”
We started walking back toward the house in silence, until Henry muttered, “It might be the wheat, you know. Judge Nagle told me last night that even the best crops were only fetching sixty cents per bushel.”
“What would he know? He doesn’t know a single thing about farming, as far as I can tell.”
Judge Nagle was Betsy’s dad, and the wealthiest person we knew. As the little northwest Texas town of Oakden had grown over those past few decades, he’d purchased and rented out most of the town’s new commercial properties. The Nagle family attended the Oakden Methodist Church, the same as we did, and I’d known him long enough to notice he was prone to condescension when it came to those of us who grew the food he ate.
Henry pursed his lips but didn’t say anything, so I pressed on. “Dad said it didn’t matter that we didn’t even harvest a thousand bushels because the price would be higher.”
“I remember what Dad said. It made no damned sense at the time, but I trusted him because he seemed so sure about it. The papers say that people in the cities don’t have any money now with this Depression. They don’t even have money for food. The price of wheat changes based on demand.”
“What happens if we really did only get sixty cents a bushel?”
Henry shrugged, then aimlessly kicked a rock in the soft dirt beneath our feet as he walked.
“I don’t know. I guess we try to sell the tractor.”
I stopped dead in my tracks.
“No,” I said flatly. Henry gave me a pained look.
“Lizzie, there’s not much else to sell.” Betsy’s family lived in a two-story house just behind the courthouse in Oakden, and her home had multiple living areas and indoor plumbing. We didn’t even have electric lights and I considered myself lucky that the outhouse was closest to my bedroom so my midnight runs to the bathroom were short. Every step counted on those bitter winter nights. I knew we were humble folk, but I’d never thought of us as poor.