Summertime on the Ranch by Carolyn Brown (leveled readers txt) 📗

a sewing factory, supporting Billy Joe’s life-threatening drinking habit. She wasn’t supposed to be on a stage, belting out songs by famous artists.

Patty started a strong rhythm and Angel stepped off the stage and mixed with the people in the dancing crowd, singing into a cordless mike. Then she sat down on the table right in front of Clancy, wiggled her shoulders and sang to him as she looked right in his eyes. He wanted to say something, but what could he say? Words wouldn’t turn him from a jerk into a decent guy, so he just sat there without saying a word, shaking his head in disbelief.

She looked something like the old Angela, except she wasn’t wearing glasses. She leaned toward him far enough that he could see down the front of her vest, and a red heat stirred inside him as he remembered her body against his. She kept singing while the girls provided backup, then suddenly, before he could blink, she was back up on the stage.

* * *

“Hey, Mike Griffin, pull that woman up a little closer. You sure danced closer than that when we were in high school,” Angel teased in the middle of another song, a more romantic one, while the band played the break.

She glanced at the table to her left, and saw that Clancy still had a bewildered look on his face. Angel could still list his every accomplishment. Quarterback from tenth through twelfth grade, taking the team to the state championship all three years. Debate champion, too, winning the regional trophy during his senior year.

Angel would bet dollars to donuts that if Clancy had to hop up on the stage right now and speak, he’d be as awkward as he’d been that summer night just before everyone was leaving for college. He couldn’t hide his feelings then and he obviously still hadn’t learned how. Because his long face told her he was having a hard time dealing with her putting on a show for the alumni organization. In fact, his ego appeared to be severely deflated.

“We’ll have a fifteen-minute break while we grab something to drink.” Allie pulled her microphone close to her face. “See y’all in a quarter of an hour.”

* * *

Before Clancy could make sense of his thoughts, Angel had gone out the side door surrounded by her band. He stretched out his long limbs, amazed that he’d sat still for an hour and a half while memories and her presence tormented him. He smiled and nodded at several of his old friends as he made his way to the doors leading out to the balcony, where he could see the bus parked in the lot behind the ballroom. It was black with gold metallic lettering that sparkled in the light from the streetlamps. The word “Angel” had a crooked halo slung over the capital “A” and “The Honky Tonk Band” had little gold devils with pitchforks sitting on each of the “o” letters.

He remembered the nights when she’d sung along with the radio in his new red Camaro, and he hadn’t been able to tell which was the real singer and which was Angela. Who would have ever thought she’d be running around in her own bus with a band of women who looked like candidates for the Dallas Cowboy Cheerleaders?

Tonight had been crazy. Clancy hadn’t even thought about Angela showing up. She was almost the one voted most likely not to succeed. Although hardly a day had gone by in the past ten years that something didn’t make him think of Angela Conrad, he’d long since learned to disassociate himself from what had happened that summer. It was as if it had happened to someone in a book, and he’d just read about it. He hadn’t really sat on the creek bank with her late into the nights and let the minnows nibble their toes. He hadn’t actually walked away that last night, knowing she was crying. No, it couldn’t have been him. It was someone else in a novel, or a movie, and he just remembered the details too well.

* * *

“Whew.” Allie dabbed her face with a tissue. “Pretty lively crowd for a bunch of has-beens.”

“Hey,” Angel giggled nervously. “I graduated from this place. I belong to that crowd.”

“Yeah, like I belong at the pearly gates of heaven.” Susan’s blue eyes twinkled. “You outgrew them years ago. Don’t let these hicks make you think you still belong to their world.”

“Thanks.” Angel pretended to slap her cheek. “I needed that.”

“Well, I can see why you were so stuck on that Clancy. He fills out them Wranglers pretty damned good.” Patty sighed. “And those big, wide shoulders about gave me the vapors.” She fluttered her long eyelashes. “Maybe you oughta give him another chance, Angel. Lord, handsome as he is, I’d give him a chance if he wasn’t already wearin’ your brand.”

“Hell,” Angel snorted. “He never wore my brand. He’s free for the taking if you’re interested. I don’t think he’s still married. If he is, his wife didn’t come with him. But rest assured, he’s about as trustworthy as those two little devils painted on the side of this bus.”

“No, thanks,” Patty said, putting on fresh lipstick. “You can keep him. Then tame him or kill him, but don’t give him to me.”

“Me neither.” Mindy gulped in the hot night air and looked up at the starlit sky to see if there might be a stray cloud with a few raindrops to spare. “Hey, look up on the balcony when you come outside, Angel. Clancy’s up there staring down here like he can’t believe his little eyeballs.”

“Yeah? That’s nothing new. He always did look down on me.” Angel was suddenly tired. Her bones ached like they never had before during a performance…and so did her stupid heart. “Another hour and a half and we’ll take this bus home and park it. Then I’ll forget about Clancy Morgan and get on with life. I was here