"I heard you had a difficult week."
He was quiet.
Then he said, "That's one way to put it."
She looked toward the cactus fields.
"How many have you kept?"
Roy hesitated.
"Forty-three."
Marlene nodded.
"How are they doing?"
He sighed.
"Not well."
For a moment, neither spoke.
Then she said, "I've been working with a livestock nutritionist on emergency cactus forage. If you're interested, we can discuss whether it makes sense for your remaining animals."
Roy didn't answer immediately.
Then he laughed bitterly.
"You're offering me cactus."
Marlene closed her eyes.
"Yes."
He was quiet.
For several seconds, she could hear machinery in the background.
Finally, Roy said, "I don't know whether I can take that kind of help."
Marlene felt her chest tighten.
She understood.
Accepting help from a woman he'd mocked for years would require him to admit that his certainty had been wrong.
She took a slow breath.
"Roy, this isn't about proving anything."
He remained quiet.
She continued.
"It's about whether your cattle need something you can use."
He swallowed.
"I'll think about it."
Marlene nodded.
"All right."
Before ending the call, she added, "Please don't wait until they're in worse condition to ask for professional help."
Roy didn't answer.
Then the line went dead.
Marlene sat at the kitchen table for a long time.
She wanted to be angry.
Part of her was.
But when she pictured the animals standing beside empty water tanks, anger didn't seem particularly useful.
She opened the reserve inventory and continued planning.
Wade Haskins refused help longer than anyone.
He had sold more than half his herd by late August, but he continued telling neighbors that the drought would break before winter. His ranch had once carried more than six hundred cattle. By September, the number remaining was a fraction of that, and the cost of keeping them alive had become almost unbearable.
The stock tanks were dry.
The supplemental feed bills were enormous.
And the wells could barely meet the remaining water demand.
Wade spent his mornings calling hay suppliers and his afternoons driving through pastures that no longer looked like pastures.
His wife, Helen, watched him grow quieter.
They had been married thirty-two years.
She knew when he was frightened.
But Wade had spent most of his life treating fear as something a rancher should never admit.
One evening, he sat at the kitchen table staring at a stack of bills.
Helen placed a plate of supper beside him.
He didn't touch it.
She sat opposite him.
"How many more weeks?"
Wade looked up.
"What?"
"How many more weeks can we keep the herd?"