by Kate Lattey
“Incoming!” I yelled, and they scattered. Skip baulked slightly, but I closed my leg and rode him forward, and he flew over, clearing it with inches to spare. I was halfway down to the triple bar when I realised that its back rail was still on the ground. Worse, it had landed on an angle, half a stride behind the fence. If Skip jumped it, he would land on the rail and trip over, so I was forced to pull him out at the last moment. I came back to a trot as I turned to the stewards, who were moseying towards the middle of the ring, deep in conversation.
“The rail’s still down!” I called to them. One of them looked back over his shoulder at the wall, and the other looked at me vaguely until I pointed out the problem. Skip spooked sideways as my arm moved, wired by his efforts, and I spoke gently to him, bringing him back to a quiet walk and rubbing his neck until he started to settle.
The stewards had finally realised what was going on, and ran over to the triple bar to reset it. The cups were on breakaways and had disappeared into the grass, and it took them a while to locate them, and then argue over which hole to put them in, but finally they were done.
I looked over at the judges. I hadn’t heard the bell ring to stop the time, and I wasn’t sure when it was going to ring again. One of the judges gave me a wave, so I picked up a canter and rode Skip down to the fence. It was a big, wide obstacle but he gave it everything he had, landing cleanly and going on to jump the last few fences well.
I gave him a pat as I brought him back to a walk, pleased with his efforts. I was riding out of the ring when I heard the announcer.
“Clear jumping but twenty six time faults for Susannah Andrews and Skybeau. Next to jump, High Fidelity and Brooke Holland.”
My head snapped around and I glared at the judge’s truck. Dad was at the gate, his expression darkening quickly.
“I shouldn’t have time faults,” I told him as I reached his side. “It was their fault! The fence was down when I got there.”
“I know.” Dad gave Skip a pat on the neck as I rode past him. “I’ll go sort them out.”
I nodded, riding back towards the warm-up where I’d left Katy and AJ. People still muttered as I rode past, shooting me dirty looks, but I didn’t care. Katy saw me coming first.
“How’d you get so many time faults? Did you trot the whole way or something?” They hadn’t seen my round, but had heard the announcement.
“There was a rail still down and I couldn’t jump the triple bar until they put it back up. They must not have stopped the clock for me.” I rolled my eyes and kicked my feet out of the stirrups, then slid to the ground. “Bunch of muppets.”
“You should lodge a complaint,” AJ said.
“Dad’s on it,” I told her as I slackened off Skip’s girth, then noticed that Katy was giving me a weird look. “What?”
“Oh, nothing. It’s just that Hazel Grey was judging today, and she’s…well, you need to be pretty diplomatic with her.”
Small chance of Dad being any such thing. I frowned. “But it was their fault. It was obvious, and anyone watching could’ve backed that up.”
“Well, yeah.” Katy didn’t say anything else, but I knew what she was thinking. If the verdict was going to rely on other people’s support, my chances were pretty much scuppered.
Katy was right. While the judge had eventually conceded that she’d been wrong not to stop the clock when I’d pulled Skip up, she’d insisted that I hadn’t been going quickly enough around the track to have made the time, and would’ve incurred at least one time fault. Dad argued the point, but she’d threatened to have me eliminated from the class because he was abusing the officials, so he’d been forced to back down. Buck had still gone well around the jump off to finish in third, and Katy had won the class, so it hadn’t been entirely disastrous. Just disappointing.
The good part though, was that Katy was livid on my behalf. She was still grumbling about it as we sat in their truck that afternoon, and eventually Deb got so sick of listening to her that she told us all to take the ponies for a ride.
“Go on, get them out of the yards and let them stretch their legs. They’ve been shut up in there all morning.”
“Lies. Puppet and Gull jumped already, so did Molly. It’s just Forbes that hasn’t been ridden,” Katy replied, tearing open a muesli bar and taking a bite.
“And Squib,” AJ added, leaning over and stealing a mouthful of her friend’s snack before Katy could snatch it away. “Yum, that’s nice. But they’ve got a class later.”
“Not until at least four, at the rate that ring’s going,” Deb said. “They’ll be climbing the walls by then.”
She had a point. The ground was a bit soft in the second ring and horses had been skidding and sliding all day long. Katy snorted and threw her half-eaten muesli bar onto the seat next to her.
“That’s because stupid people don’t put studs in their horses’ shoes and then wonder why they fall on their butts.” She shot a look at AJ that I didn’t understand, then stood up. “Fine, let’s go then.”
AJ got to her feet, grabbing the rest of Katy’s muesli bar on her way, and I followed reluctantly.
“I’ll just go do some homework then.” I didn’t mean it to sound the way it did, like I was mad at being left behind, but from the expression on Katy’s face, I think that’s how she heard it.
“Gross,” AJ said through a mouthful of food. “Homework sucks. Why don’t you come with us?”
“You gonna double her on Squib?” Katy asked.
AJ snorted. “Only if Susannah’s got a death wish. But you were saying this morning that you need to get Puppet out of his yard more at shows. Why doesn’t she ride him for you?”
Katy looked indecisive, swinging a lead rope back and forth in her hand, but Deb stepped in.
“That’s a good idea. And it’ll do Puppet good to have a different rider for once.”
Her daughter scowled at her. “I don’t think a stranger on his back is what he needs when he’s trying to learn to be relaxed, actually.” She looked at me. “But you could ride Forbes, I guess.”
“Sure, if you like.” I tried hard to control my voice, to sound relaxed about it.
Katy shrugged, then handed me the lead rope and pointed down the line of yards. “He’s the dark bay, on the end.”
“I know which one he is.”
I walked towards Forbes’ yard, my heart beating faster. I’d wanted to ride this pony since the first time I saw him. The spitting image of Buck, but younger and feistier and, from what I could tell, even more talented. He was the reason I had asked for a young pony. I’d told Dad and Bruce that I didn’t have a pony in mind, but it was a lie. I’d wanted this pony as soon as I’d laid eyes on him. He was exactly, precisely, one hundred percent the pony I wanted, but I’d given up on that dream a long time ago.
I’d asked, of course. As soon as I’d seen him, but Katy had been unequivocal in her response. Over my dead body. Those words had hurt, but they hadn’t stopped me from coveting her pony. Hadn’t stopped me from watching him as surreptitiously as possible whenever she rode him, from dreaming that I was the one in the saddle.
And now here I was, about to ride him. I wondered if Katy had the faintest idea what this meant to me. I decided that she probably didn’t. She was just being nice, offering me a ride, the way you do for your friends.
Friends.
I rolled the word around in my head as I brushed the loose shavings off Forbes’ coat, saddled him and bandaged his legs with the polos that Katy had thrown in my direction. A test, probably, to see if I really was a spoiled little rich girl who had no idea how to look after her own ponies. To be fair, two years ago I’d have given her a blank look and asked why she didn’t just buy a pair of tendon boots and save herself the bother. But I knelt down and dutifully wrapped Forbes’ legs, keeping the pressure even, starting in the middle and wrapping down to support the fetlock, then back up and ending at the top.
As I finished the second one, I saw Katy leaning over the yard
railing and inspecting my work. Her head tilted to the side, and she frowned. I closed the Velcro fastener and rocked back onto my heels, looking at the bandages. They looked okay to me, and I hoped I wasn’t about to get my head chewed off as Katy came under the railing and into the yards.
“Huh.” I glanced up at her nervously, but she seemed genuine. “You’re really good at that.”
“I’ve had a lot of practice. Only time I use boots instead of bandages is at shows.”
“You bandage every day?” she seemed surprised, and I nodded.
“Of course.” I tried not to sound smug as I smoothed my hand down the exercise bandages, then stood up. I was willing to bet that it had never occurred to her that I might take better care of my ponies than she did of hers. But the way her expression shifted as I spoke made me quickly clarify. I didn’t want to piss her off.
“Bruce started me doing it,” I explained. “Said I had to do my best to protect my ponies’ legs, especially since ‘they’re none of them spring chickens’. His words, exactly.”
Katy nodded slowly. “Well, they look perfect. He must’ve taught you well.”
I smiled and accepted the compliment, deciding to leave out the part where it was my former groom who’d actually given me bandaging lessons. Lucy was good at everything, and I’d made sure that she taught me most of what she knew before she’d moved on to work at a stud farm. Bandaging was just a small part of it.
AJ called to us as she led Squib out of his yard. “Hurry up you two, before Squib tramples over the top of me!”
Katy went back to Puppet while I grabbed Forbes’ bridle and slipped the reins over his head. He threw his head up and gave me a wary look. I glanced at Katy, but she’d disappeared, and AJ was already outside, trying to convince Squib to stand still long enough for her to mount. Forbes noticed his friend was leaving and plunged forward, whinnying shrilly at his friend.
“Hey now,” I told Forbes as he almost flattened me into the railing. “Settle yourself down. You can go out there in a minute, but you have to let me put this bridle on you first.”
Forbes looked at me as I pushed on his chest to back him up. He resisted for a moment, then took a grudging step backwards.
“Good boy.” I rubbed his neck, then tapped his chest again. “Go on, back up and give me some room here.”
Another grudging step, then another. I reached up and rubbed his poll, then pulled his ears gently through my hands, feeling him start to relax under my touch.
“There you go. Much better.” I lifted the bridle up towards his head, and he tensed up, but I kept speaking to him and he let me slip the bit between his teeth and pull his ears carefully through the headstall. “See now, was that so hard?”
I was buckling the throatlatch as Katy came back, her helmet swinging from her fingertips and a bridle over her shoulder. “I can’t find Puppet’s bridle, so I’ll use Forbes’ on him and he can have Molly’s…” Katy bit off the end of her sentence and stared at me.
“Oh.” I realised what she’d been saying, and started unbuckling the throatlatch again. “Sorry, did you want this one?”
“Did you just put his bridle on?”
I wondered if I’d done something wrong. “Yes.”
She blinked at me, three times in rapid succession. “Huh. I’m just surprised that he let you. He’s usually a pain in the neck to bridle.”
“He was a bit tense, but he’s okay.” I stroked Forbes’ neck, and he pushed his muzzle against my other hand. “Did you want me to take it off?”
“Nah, leave it. Now that you’ve got it on, there’s no reason to create any unnecessary drama. I’ll make Molly’s fit Pup.”
She started bridling Puppet as I fastened Forbes’ noseband and led him out. AJ was on board Squib now, and he was pirouetting excitedly.
“About time! Come on, let’s get moving before Squib explodes.”
“Didn’t I tell you that he needed to go for a walk?” Deb said smugly as Katy came out with Puppet.
“Yeah, yeah, you were right. What do you want, a trophy?” her daughter responded, and I cringed. I’d have been slain for talking to my mum like that, but Deb didn’t seem to mind at all, taking it as a joke.
“Wouldn’t say no,” she replied with a grin as I opened the hatch on our truck and pulled my helmet out. Forbes waited impatiently as I put it on, catching Squib’s excitement to be off. I snugged his girth up another hole and pulled my stirrup down, preparing to mount.
“I’ll give you a leg up,” Deb said, grabbing my lower leg and boosting me into the saddle. “We try not to get onto them from the ground if we can help it. Strains their backs.”
I knew that, but I just nodded politely as I pulled down my offside stirrup and slid my foot into it. Deb turned towards Katy, who promptly mounted Puppet from the ground and stuck her tongue out at her mother before leading the way forward.
Squib squealed with excitement and bounded to the front of the ride, Puppet flattened his ears back and tried to bite him, and Forbes danced along at the back, tugging at the snaffle bit and making funny whinnying noises, telling his friends to wait up.
“Have fun!” Deb said with a laugh, and went back into the truck.
Forbes was a handful, spooking and dancing along behind the other ponies, but I couldn’t wipe the smile off my face. Not just because of his arched neck and springy hooves, but because of the way that AJ was motioning to me to catch up, and the way that Katy kept glancing over her shoulder to check on me. My whole show career had been spent on the outskirts of the social scene, and finally I felt as though I was part of it.
The camaraderie between pony riders had never extended to me – I was always the other, the outsider. My parents had kept me apart from the rest for several years, and when I had escaped their clutches and tried to join in, I’d ended up making more enemies than friends. Looking back, it had been entirely my own fault. I’d been foolish enough to repeat the things my parents had been saying about one of my rivals, expecting that the other riders would have felt the same way. Not realising that walking into a group of friends and slagging one of them off was not the way to ingratiate myself. It seems stupid to have ever thought otherwise, but that was how things worked amongst my friends. If you wanted to get into the group, you created a space for yourself by picking off one of the others. I knew all too well how that worked, having been on the receiving end of it more than once. Now I just kept my head down and didn’t give anyone reason to challenge me.
But today was different to any of that. We rode past the rings, and past other people’s yards. People smiled and said hello to Katy and AJ, asking how their day was going, admiring their ponies, laughing and gossiping as we passed. And today I was one of them, was part of it. It might not last long, but I was going to make the most of the feeling.
We approached the stables at the back of the main arena, and the track narrowed between a couple of trailers parked inconveniently close together. Two top Grand Prix riders came towards us on their big horses, and I watched Squib barge past as AJ frantically apologised for his rudeness. Puppet flung his head around, half-reared, then shot forward in pursuit, despite Katy’s scolding. I held Forbes back, making him wait and let the bigger horses through the narrow gap. He expressed his distress by cantering on the spot and letting out little irritated snorts, and I couldn’t help laughing.
This pony was everything I’d dreamed of, and I was having was so much fun. He felt like an overgrown rocking horse, rocking back and forth with his neck arched, bringing his forelegs slightly further up off the ground each time. The first rider passed me with a nod, and I was still grinning when I realised that the second rider was Bruce on his big grey stallion.
He raised an eyebrow at me, then looked at Forbes, and frowned. “He’s a handful today. Not like him.”
I shook my head, keeping Forbes barely contained as he became more and more frantic to catch up with the others. “It’s not Buck, this is one of Katy’s. I’m just exercising
him for her.”
Bruce nodded, comprehension dawning on his face. “Looks like he’s doing a pretty good job exercising himself. You having fun?”
I nodded, still smiling. “Definitely.”
“Well, let him go forward before he goes up in the air,” Bruce suggested, then rode on.
I relaxed my fingers on the reins slightly and let Forbes canter slowly forwards to re-join the others. Katy shook her head at the pony as we reached her side.
“He’s such a cabbage sometimes.”
“He’s great,” I told her honestly. She gave me a weird look, and I clarified. “My ponies never play up.”
“Nice for some,” she replied, turning Puppet around and following Squib, who’d given up waiting for us.
“Not really,” I said as I let Forbes trot on. “This is way more fun!”
As we rode, I felt Forbes’ stride opening up underneath me, his mouth flexing softly against the reins. He’d been schooled correctly, but he was still green. He still wanted to drag my hand forward and lock his jaw against me, so I rode a couple of steadying half-halts to correct him. Then he decided to suck back behind my leg and drop the contact, but I lifted my hands and pushed him back up into the bridle. Forbes shook his head in annoyance and turned his neck to the left, bulging out through his shoulder, but I squeezed my right rein and pushed him forward, making him drive from his hindquarters and straighten his body.
Katy looked over at me as he trotted up level with Puppet, who immediately started trotting faster, trying not to let Forbes past. There was open space in front of us, so I closed my legs and let Forbes move forward a bit more. He resisted for a moment, then lifted his back and started powering across the ground. It felt incredible, like we were floating above the ground instead of touching it. The muscles in his back stretched and contracted with each stride, and the sheer power of his pace pushed me up out of the saddle. This was one extraordinary pony, and I was falling more and more in love with him with every step he took.
We left Puppet behind and came up level with AJ. Squib immediately picked up a canter, determined not to be passed, but Forbes just trotted even bigger and stronger than before. There was so much power and strength underneath me, and the sensation was intoxicating. None of my ponies had ever felt like this, and I felt a pang of regret that I’d never get to find out what Forbes could really do.