My Little Shorties - 4. Chapter 4

Lonely

Prompt 117:

"What is that smell?"

“What the hell are you doing?” his father asked.

“Sitting here letting my horse grazes,” Simon said sitting on the grass watching his horse munch at the clover.

“You have chores to do. Have you cleaned your horse stall yet?” Peter was not happy seeing his son sitting there watching the world go by.

“Not yet. I am letting him eat a little then was going to put him in the round pen to run while I cleaned up his stall.” Simon did not look up at his dad, already knowing the look he would have on his face.

“Get it done soon, we have more horses coming on today and I will need your help with them,” Peter said and walked off knowing that he would get very little out of Simon.

Simon was sixteen and a loner. He stayed to himself a lot. He was homeschooled by his mother so he did not have many friends. What friends he did have worked on the ranch and they were a lot older than he was. He was a very quiet boy, keeping his thoughts to himself letting nobody in his head. Always daydreaming of the places, he wanted to go and see.

Simon got up and took his horse to the round pen. He went into the barn to clean the stall. When he got to the gate of the stall, there was a kid about his age standing there. “What do you want?” Simon asked.

“Nothing, just looking around, waiting on my uncle to get his business taking care of in the office with the owner,” Jared said, looking at Simon.

“Well go outside and wait. You can’t be in here with the horses,” Simon told the kid.

“What is that smell? It stinks,” the kid said.

“It is horse shit. You are in a horse barn, and horses do shit in here.” Simon looked at this kid as if he was off his rocker.

“I was just wondering what it was, you don’t need to bite my head off,” the kid said and walked out of the barn.

Simon looked at the kid walking out of the barn, thinking that he wished he could go back to school and make friends. He is so lonely being the only kid here on the ranch.