Rip - Trust (Completed)

Rays of Hope

Things continued pretty much the same for the next number of weeks. Rip continued to call his uncle Mr Dutton, barely spoke to anyone but remained obedient and just about polite enough.

Samuel and his father had talked some more on that weekend and had been in regular contact with each other since. The social worker who was supposed to check in on them never did. McCluskey had told him he was glad to see the back of him and obviously meant it. 

Mr Dutton agreed to try and avoid corporal punishment. He promised to continue to focus on "keeping the boy good" by giving him lots of positive attention and praise. He told his son that he was not going to ground the boy however, or confine him to his room should he have to punish him. His instincts told him not to and his son did not really disagree, remembering Rip's reaction to him closing the door behind him. Samuel tried to explain that Rip would need to be able to express his negative feelings and wasn't allowed to bottle them up, but this made no sense to the older man, which worried him. They both agreed, no matter what, he was never to lose his temper with him.

Monica, the private tutor Samuel had suggested to his father started after Rip's fifth week at the ranch. Rip was obedient and polite with her too but made a minimal effort with his schoolwork. The teacher tried to find out what the boy was interested in, but Rip was not volunteering any information about himself. He appeared equally bored with all subjects and always distracted. Progress was very slow, and the boy remained far behind his peers. 

The teacher told Mr Dutton it would take much more than a few weeks for Rip to catch up. He did what he was told though, so there was nothing more that could be done the teacher felt and was glad that Mr Dutton agreed the boy needed more time to adjust and connect with his teacher. It was common enough for children that lived so remotely to be home-schooled, so it was agreed that he was to have the summer off and she was to continue to school him a few days a week on the ranch in the fall.

It was around week eleven or twelve, when they all first started to notice a slight difference in Rip. 

Jacob had started to give him riding lessons from the very beginning and the boy it turned out was a natural. He became very skilled, very quickly. The otherwise so anxious boy, who so often seemed contemptuous around people had no fear of the animals but respected and adored them, something his teachers shared with him. 

Monica used their love of horses to get him to engage with the other subjects and found it worked. She often joined him in a riding lesson or took him out on rides through the countryside until she finished for her summer break. By the end of May, she felt she finally had found a way to connect with him and was looking forward to coming back to the ranch to teach the boy in the fall.

Rip spent all his spare time around the horses, helping out and watching Jacob work. He was often joined by Robert who had always been equally fascinated with his brother's ability to tame the most cantankerous animals. They often spend time just standing at the arena together quietly watching Jacob work with an unruly horse. The quiet disposition of the boy suited Robert who was rather reserved himself and at times they were also joined by Jamie. Slowly the boy changed from being standoffish with the three to being quietly content when he was around the young men. 

Mr Dutton observed the change but did not experience it himself. The boy continued to be reserved with him, calling him Mr Dutton and avoiding him whenever he could. In the evenings after dinner when the men sat together in front of the fireplace or out on the porch, Rip enjoyed the occasional game of checker with him and liked listening when he was reading out loud from a book to them but only stayed as long as one of Mr Dutton's sons were also present. 

He felt uncomfortable in the old man's company, who insisted on calling him son, forever corrected his manners and continued to make him feel like a little boy. He preferred the company of his sons, who although making him work hard treated him more like an equal. He started to call them by their first names, dropping the "sir" unless they were giving out to him. When they did it started to pain him immensely and he became very embarrassed whenever they scolded him, trying even harder to show that he could work like a man and do his tasks well.