Catharsis

Amador had thrashed up until the moment the tranquillizers grabbed him and dragged him down into darkness. His eyes were vicious brown, his mouth frothing white, his broad black shoulders lathered full up in sweat.

Vanessa had never seen the big bull calm. Not a day since her Granpappy had bought the beast had he been brought to his knees.

Only now. Now he had to go.

Vanessa's Granpappy had been a bull rider. He had traveled all over Wyoming, Oklahoma and even Alaska, riding captured fire for seven seconds until he flew off and smacked hard on dirt. Vanessa had never seen this wild young man, he busted his hip up before Vanessa was born. Her Granpappy was the one who cautioned her not to come near bulls when they were out grazing in the fields. Her Granpappy put Vanessa's brother on his first bull and let him ride, while Vanessa leaned against the metal arena fence, occasionally being admonished for hanging her arms over too far.

Her Granpappy had flown planes in the war. He had bought a model plane and shown Vanessa and her brother where he had sat in the cockpit, but he had never talked with Vanessa about anything more than that. Her Granpappy had sat up late nights in his living room, on his favorite spot on the couch, feet propped up on the hand-carved coffee table. He had told Vanessa's brother about his trips across Europe. Vanessa only knew this because she would lean against her bedroom door in her satin nightgown, letting her tears paint polka dots on her knees, hearing the two voices play together downstairs in the den.

Her Granpappy had bought Amador on the day Vanessa graduated high school. Not as a graduation gift; while Vanessa crossed the creaky stage in her black satin robes, shook hands with Mr. Michealson and threw her cap into the air with the rest of her graduating class, her Granpappy was busy chasing the ill-tempered bull around the state. Withdrawing money from ATMs, calling in favors from other retired cowboy friends, flashing his pearl-handled pistol at Amador's seller, to show him that he meant business.

One of the caps belonging to Vanessa's classmates came down and the sharp cardboard corner cut her on the cheek. Her Granpappy bought his bull by eleven o'clock that night.

Her Granpappy yelled when Amador was violent, which made Amador more violent. Vanessa found she liked Amador's attitude. The way he challenged her Granpappy by being her Granpappy.

Her Granpappy was young when he died. It was something faulty with his heart. Amador had been present when her Granpappy had collapsed in the dirt outside. The big bull had beat his head bloody against the bars of his stall. Vanessa's Granpappy had never got around to making the bull any less mean.

Her Granpappy had left Amador to Vanessa in his will. The man who had told her to be afraid of bulls had given her one.

Vanessa had spent the full week after her Granpappy's funeral sitting in front of the arena watching the angry bull pace around, wondering what she was going to do with him. His head had scarred over and he looked like he was always scowling.

Vanessa tried to enter the arena one day. She got scared and backed out. She left the gate open and Amador bolted.

Vanessa never thought she'd see that big bull again. She cried as she combed through scrub grass for hoofprints, she screamed in the empty Wyoming landscape. She screamed at her Granpappy, and the sky opened up and started to pour. She lay on the ground and shivered herself into sleep.

Amador was standing over her when she woke up. His eyes were still flaming, but he didn't move when Vanessa reached out and touched his snout. Vanessa was still crying, her head ached with outpouring of emotion. Amador bent his neck. He breathed slowly and deliberately.

Vanessa apologized for not crying at his funeral. Amador nodded because he understood. Vanessa said she still loved him. That she didn't understand him but she loved him. And Amador told her that he loved her too, but it was a different kind of love.

Vanessa knew that. She knew that there were memories she had that weren't the ones where she was left out while her brother and her Granpappy talked in the living room, but thinking about the sad ones made it easier to accept that he was gone.

I'm not gone, Amador said.

Vanessa reached out and hugged his neck. The bull arched his neck around her shoulders.

Her Granpappy had once bought Vanessa thirteen different books on dogs, because Vanessa had once mentioned that she wanted a dog when she grew up. Vanessa still had all those books.

Her Granpappy had carried her on her shoulders when they traveled to Alaska for a rodeo. It was her prize for finishing a whole funnel cake all by herself. He had carried her under the Alaska State Rodeo banner outside the stadium and she had laughed as she was finally tall enough to touch the banner.

Her Granpappy had hugged her extra long at the airport when she was six and she was leaving and she wanted to stay at his Wyoming home and play in his living room with the model airplane he had and the Lincoln Logs. And she wanted to be where he was and she didn't understand that she could leave and he would still be there.

He would still be there.

Letting go of Amador, Vanessa saw the bone protruding from the bull's back leg. By the time the vet arrived, Amador had laid on his side, but was bitterly thrashing again, kicking his uninjured legs around. He bruised the vet's shin with his hooves.

He's a mean one isn't he?

The vet told Vanessa the bull had to be put down. His leg couldn't be splinted.

Vanessa was the one who had okayed the procedure.

She had cried as the tranquilizers seized the bull and took him from her. She watched him join her Granpappy. They were standing together against the background of rain and stars. They were made of mistakes and memories and tears. And they fluctuated and it was a swirling mess of love.

Vanessa missed them when they left.