Danilo
"Start the truck," I eagerly stood up in the bucket of the truck as I scanned the field with binoculars looking for a sign of Pa.
"Pa said we should wait for him," Daniele screamed from the driver's seat.
"Well start the damn truck so that when he gets here it's ready."
"You're wasting gas," Benecio chuckled from the passenger seat smoking a cigarette before letting out a loud cough.
Daniele and I were quick to crack up with laughter at his embarrassed face. "Smoking ain't for little boys ol'son."
"Don't start that," Benecio sat on the window frame of the door, his torso out of the truck as he glared at me. The baseball cap on his head doing very little to protect his face from the sun. "I got bronchitis."
"Since when!" I hollered, "you just smoking because Molly said she likes boys who smoke."
"Do you think I'm that stupid to start smoking because Molly likes guys who smoke? Do you seriously think I'm that desperate for the most beautiful girl I have ever seen to start noticing me despite my good looks and the fact my surname is Taylor-Pereira?" Benecio pressed his hands to his chest in a fake offense.
"You only nineteen you shouldn't be stressing about Molly," Daniele rolled his eyes, "there's many Molly's out there."
"There ain't Molly's like her. She ride them Broncos so well I can't help but fall in love every time I see her," his grin spread from ear to ear showing off those dimples that got him GQ magazine's hottest athlete of the year.
"If Molly don't see you now she never going to see you," I shook my head.
Benecio opened his mouth to answer me but quickly shut it when we all felt the rumble of the ground below us. At first I thought it was an earthquake until I saw the dust storm coming towards us.
The binoculars in my hand nearly fell to the ground when I tried to quickly put them back to my eyes. "They be far," I yelled to Daniele.
"You idiot you holding them the wrong way!" He screamed as he desperately tried to start the truck.
I let out a chuckle before turning them around and looking again. "What in the Alabama hell is going on!" I stood up straight as in front of what looked like a hundred cows, there was Pa running like the fastest man on earth.
He tried to hold onto his Cowboy hat but with the bulls and cows on his heels he didn't seem to care what happened to it. He was a blur as he waved his arms. I could not make out what he was saying until it felt like he was meters in front of us. "For the good Lord, start the damn truck!"
"Start the truck!" I screamed hitting the hood as Daniele desperately turned the key. It screeched and the exhaust let out a massive black cloud choking us all. "Daniele!"
"I'm trying!" He screamed as he hopped in his seat.
Pa's chest was huffed out and when he was close enough we clasped hands and I hoisted his body up in the bucket. "I'm too old to be doing this shit! Daniele start the damn truck!"
When the first cow butted heads of the bucket of the truck it nearly flew me overboard if it wasn't for Pa holding onto my underwear that peeked out of my jeans. I let out a loud scream in pain from the most painful wedgie I had ever received brought tears to my eyes.
In all the chaos Daniele's truck finally decided to come to life and we were blazing through the fields. The cows right behind us.
"What happened to getting Lettie?" I asked Pa once the ease of my underwear being pulled from my spirit had eased.
He waved his hand pulling out a cigarette from his pocket and his lighter despite the mess we were in. "That old girl be resting and it would take long to warm up another horse. I felt my legs would do a better job."
"You herded cows by yourself!" Benecio screamed from the front.
Pa gave us his signature grin, gap toothed and deep dimples. The only sign that he had aged being the crows feet at the corners of his eyes, "A true Cowboy don't need no horse to herd cows. As long as you got the best boots in the country ol'son you can do anything."
"Pai ain't going to be happy," Daniele screamed from the driver seat.
"And you gon shut your big mouth and not tell him," Pa glared. When he tried to take a puff of his cigarette a Bull knocked into our truck so violently the back of it swerved knocking Pa's cigarette straight out of his hand. "You owe me twenty cents," he screamed at the Bull who let air out of his nostrils looking ready for round two. "Do you see how he be disrespecting me?"
"I see Pa," I let out a loud laugh, my stomach hurting from the disbelief on his face.
"Back in my day I would have ridden you until you forgot your mama's name," he threatened, holding his fist up, "you better sleep with one eye open or you'll be tomorrow's steak."
All four of us let out howls of laughter as the cows and Bull finally got tired of chasing us. When we got to the main gate I jumped out to close it before climbing back in.
The drive back to home consisted of loud singing to country music on Daniele's terrible radio. As soon as we approached the large iron wrought 'World Champion' and extremely tiny at the bottom 'World's richest man' it felt like I could breathe knowing we weren't going to be caught up in a stampede of angry animals.
Yet when we approached the house stood the most dangerous animal of all.
"Bobby!" Pai screamed his hands firmly on his hips as he was dressed in a black tracksuit with matching boots.
"Fofo," Pa beamed before jumping out and skipping to Pai. "Whatever it is I didn't do it."