Chapter 15 - The Sign
Robert called Emily.
"She wants the sign."
Emily groaned.
"I know."
"Why?"
"She won't tell me."
The sign was thirty feet wide.
Robert offered a smaller printed replica.
June refused.
"That's fake."
"The original won't fit in your bedroom."
"I don't want it in my bedroom."
"Where do you want it?"
"Mesa Dawn."
Caleb heard and said no.
Then June explained.
Mesa Dawn had an old indoor wall beside the youth classroom.
She wanted one section of the original sign.
Not the whole screen.
Just the printed banner used below it:
$1,000,000 CHALLENGE - CONTROL THE UNCONTROLLABLE.
June hated the last word.
She wanted to hang it beneath a photograph of Titan standing loose in a pasture.
Caleb frowned.
"That sounds like a museum exhibit."
"It's one sign."
"You're eight."
"Nine next month."
"Powerful legal distinction."
Robert donated the banner.
June crossed out CONTROL THE UNCONTROLLABLE with a strip of white cloth.
Under it she wrote in blue paint:
FIRST FIND OUT WHY THEY'RE AFRAID.
Caleb stared.
"Who helped you write that?"
"Ms. Torres."
Her teacher.
"I knew it."
The sign became popular.
Visitors photographed it.
June hated that too.
"They're doing the same thing again."
"What?"
"Making Titan content."
Mesa Dawn moved the sign into the classroom where cameras were not allowed during youth sessions.
Problem solved.
That year Robert created a restitution fund for riders injured during the rigged challenge.
Not branded.
Managed externally.
Some riders accepted.
One sued instead.
He won more than the fund would have paid.
Robert's attorney called that unfortunate.
Robert said, "For us."
His attorney looked annoyed.
Good.
Caleb's relationship with Robert remained strange.
They sometimes talked about horses for an hour without discussing the case.
Then one sentence would bring it all back.
One afternoon Robert said, "I should have trusted you."
Caleb answered, "No. You should have checked."
Robert stopped.
That was more accurate.
Trust had been the problem.
Trusting Grant blindly.
Distrusting Caleb completely.
Verification would have been better than either.
June walked past carrying a feed bucket.
"Why are you two staring at each other?"
Caleb said, "Old-man contest."
"Dad, you're forty-two."
"Cruel."
Robert laughed.
For a moment, the past was not gone.
It simply was not the only thing happening.
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