Training Harry

by Meghan Namaste

  “Who said I was stopping you?” Amber snapped, and stalked away.

  I returned to my cereal. It was soggy in places and dry in others. It was still damn good, though. You couldn’t ruin Cookies ‘n Cream Crunch.

  Afterward, I decided to do the dishes. They were piling up. Amber didn’t do dishes. Yet another of her many charms.

  I heard Amber flop onto the couch. Then I heard the beat of “Just Dance”. “Amber!” I hollered.

  She shut down her CD player. Ripped off her headphones. “What?”

  “Our new headphone policy doesn’t work if you crank up your music so loud that I can hear it through your headphones.”

  She took a quick, sharp breath. “You can’t.”

  “I can.”

  “I don’t believe you.”

  “Why would I lie about this?”

  “Because you’re a fucking liar,” Amber said maliciously.

  “Go live on the street then, if you hate it here so much. I don’t care anymore.” I really didn’t, I realized. I wasn’t bluffing.

  Amber almost looked a little stung. She shut up for a little while. I could feel her watching me, but at least the silence was nice.

  She came toward me. I kept an eye on her. If her fists started flying, I had to guard that left shoulder.

  “You’re not using your left arm,” Amber said. She was closing in on me.

  “I’m trying to even myself out,” I told her. I was left-handed, but polo had forced me to be ambidextrous. I’d had to build up my inherently weak right arm and improve my coordination in order to make the shots.

  Before I could move, she reached out and softly ran her hand up my bicep, reaching my shoulder with her fingertips. I flinched as she made contact. I couldn‘t help it.

  “Bullshit,” she said.

  I sidestepped Amber and went back to the leaning pile of dishes, my left arm hanging uselessly.

  “What’d you do to yourself?” Amber asked, softly for her.

  “I don’t want to talk about it,” I mumbled. I knew I might as well have said “Ask me about it some more!”

  “What is going on with you?”

  I was silent.

  “Seriously. What’s with you?”

  She wasn’t going to shut up. Her every word bored into me like a drill. “Amber,” I said wearily. “Leave it. Please. Just leave me alone.”

  Amber gave me a look that said We both know that’s never gonna happen.

  “You’re acting really weird,” she stated obviously.

  I looked at her helplessly. “Maybe I have a good reason, Amber. Did you ever think I might possibly have a reason?”

  “Fine. What’s the reason?”

  “I don’t want to talk about it.” I was hitting that same wall again. That wall was pretty damn familiar now.

  Amber looked smug. “Of course. Because you don’t really have a reason. It’s fake.”

  I turned away. I couldn’t look at her anymore. I couldn’t talk about this anymore. I couldn’t do any of it. I dried my hands and went for the door.

  “Where the hell are you going?” Amber didn’t like it when people ran for it in the middle of a fight.

  “Mandy’s.”

  “Weren’t you there last night?”

  There was no point in lying. “Yeah. I was.” I was almost within reach of the doorknob.

  “Lawrence. Wait,” Amber called out.

  I stopped. I turned back. I wasn’t that good at being heartless.

  “I’m worried about you,” Amber said.

  I almost broke down and told her everything right then.

  “I’m concerned you’re in danger of becoming even more of a man whore than you already are.”

  I felt the sharp, rapidly spreading sting, like she’d shot me with a small-caliber rifle. Felt the heat rise to my face. “Amber?”

  Erica

  I drove down the Allsteen’s driveway. I couldn’t help but notice two of their large bushes had been hacked down and sculpted to form a little girl and a pony by some topiary artist. I came very close to tasting my breakfast burrito again.

  I parked and got out of my truck. It was nine. I inhaled deeply and stepped over the crest of the hill, fully expecting to see an empty arena. I was not prepared for what I saw. Maggie held her fully tacked pony by the reins. She had her helmet, boots and sparkly gloves on. Maggie was waiting for me.

  Whoa. I did not see that coming. I was glad it took a minute to get down to the arena. I had absolutely no idea what to say to Maggie. I couldn’t believe she was coming back for more after her last intense lesson. Maybe she just wanted me to suffer. Maybe she was just an odd little masochistic kid. Maybe she actually wanted to learn. Nah. I dismissed that notion swiftly.

  “Good morning, Maggie,” I said hesitantly when I reached the arena gate.

  “Hi.” Maggie said the word with her usual disdain.

  “What would you like to work on today?” I asked pleasantly.

  Maggie’s eyes rolled. “There’s no point in even telling you. You’re not gonna let me do it.”

  She set me back on my heels a little. “You’re right,” I finally said. “I probably wouldn’t let you do it.”

  I looked around for a longeline. “Go ahead and mount up,” I said. “Walk Twinkle around on a long rein to warm his muscles up. I have to go get something.”

  “You’re gonna get a leash, aren’t you?” Maggie said snarkily.

  “Yes, I am. Enjoy riding around on your own while you still can.”

  Maggie dragged Twinkle over to the mounting block and hurried to mount up. I smiled as I went off in search of a longeline.

  The stable was immaculate. Everything looked swept and polished. I sure hope Juan earns a decent living. There were three stalls, one of which had a gold-plated nameplate screwed onto the door. Twinkle’s Little Star, it read. I gagged again. Suddenly Twinkle’s barn name didn’t seem so bad.

  I found the tack room and picked up a longeline. Leaving the stable, I realized it was absolutely beautiful, but lacking somehow. It had no soul. It was like a movie set.

  When I got back to the arena, I found Maggie trotting Twinkle along the rail. She pulled him down when she saw me coming. She looked at me defiantly, with just a little trace of fear in her wide eyes.

  “I said to walk him,” I said calmly.

  “I got bored. It’s boring to just walk,” Maggie snapped.

  “Well, that’s why you’re going back on the longeline. You need to learn to appreciate the walk.” I took the reins from her and knotted them, then clipped the longeline to Twinkle’s bit. “Drop your stirrups,” I told Maggie. She sighed dramatically and slipped her feet out of the stirrups. I crossed them over Twinkle’s withers.

  “You’re gonna make me walk the whole time, aren’t you?” Maggie whined.

  I took a step back. This was proving strangely enjoyable. “Nope. I’m gonna let you trot all you want, Maggie. And more.”

  Maggie looked slightly taken aback. Before she could ask what I meant, I said, “Twinkle, trot!” I said it with enthusiasm, and Twinkle bounced into a trot for me. Maggie’s hands clutched the pommel, but to her credit, she didn’t grab the reins. She was tense. Suddenly she looked like a little kid instead of a miniature bratty teenager. Her fears had taken her down a few notches and removed her usual sneer. “Sit up,” I called out. “Let your legs hang. You can balance if you just relax!”

  Maggie’s face tightened up with concentration and exertion. As she went around me, time after time, I began to see a startling transformation. Maggie wasn’t whining anymore. She didn’t say a word. She was focused. Maggie was surprising me. She really did want to learn. I could work with this. “Good, Maggie,” I said loud and clear. “Just follow him. You’re doing fine.”

  Maggie’s eyes flickered over to me. She nodded briefly and then stared straight ahead again. Her grip loosened. Her hands slipped off the pommel and fell to her thighs. She was really trying. This is not a bad kid, I
thought as I watched her. Maggie, like Assault, was a product of training. Bad training. Her parents had created a monster with too much love, and nothing to balance it out. But Assault was better now. And Maggie could get better, too. Standing in the middle of Twinkle’s steady circle, I felt like I served a purpose that went far beyond teaching Maggie to ride. Riding could make Maggie better. Maggie needed discipline. Riding was discipline.

  Maggie was settling into the rhythm of Twinkle’s trot. She was loose. She followed. Her legs hung around the pony’s sides like they belonged there. She didn’t bounce and lean like an unsteady passenger. She wasn’t just sitting on Twinkle’s back anymore. She was riding.

  I was smiling. Twinkle looked a bit pleased, and a lot relieved. I knew it couldn’t have been pleasant for the pony to carry such an unskilled and belligerent passenger around all this time.

  “Walk, Twinkle,” I said. The pony smoothly transitioned to the slower gait. Maggie slouched a little in the saddle. I could see her breathe. I could almost feel the quivering of her stretched and strained muscles. I knew that feeling well. I walked up to Twinkle, rolling up the longeline. He stopped when I reached his head. I untied the reins and handed them to Maggie. She took them from me gently.

  Twinkle’s chest was sweaty. He was breathing a little hard in the hot sun. “You can dismount now,” I said.

  Maggie slid off the pony’s back, staggering a bit when she landed.

  I uncrossed the stirrups. “Do you know how to run up the stirrups after you get done riding?”

  Maggie stared at me blankly.

  “Okay. See how it’s done?” I ran up the stirrups while she watched. “You should always do that after you ride. If you leave the stirrups hanging down he could get caught on something and freak out.” I lifted the saddle flap. “You should loosen the girth, too. It’s more comfortable for him.”

  Maggie was watching me, and she appeared to be learning. It was time for a test.

  “Now you can take Twinkle for a walk,” I said to her. “You need to lead him around until he stops breathing so hard and his chest is dry.”

  Maggie gaped at me like I was talking advanced physics. “Why?”

  “Because that’s what you do for him after he’s worked hard for you. It’ll help keep his muscles and his legs from hurting. And it will help your muscles, too.”

  Maggie made a nasty face. “Fine.” She walked off, and Twinkle followed.

  I sat on the mounting block and watched her walk Twinkle around. It was miraculous. I had a reason to believe in myself now. I had really needed that.

  After a while, Maggie led Twinkle up to me. “Is he okay now?” She asked timidly.

  I stood up and felt Twinkle’s chest. His breathing had stabilized. “Yes, he’s cool now. Let’s go untack him and brush him.”

  Maggie followed me to the stable. Juan was around, of course, but he seemed to realize he wasn’t needed. I showed Maggie how to take off the saddle and bridle, and she took them to the tack room. Then I gave her a brush, and she started to use it on Twinkle, tentatively at first, but as the pony began to melt under the brushstrokes and show a sweeter, more personal side than his usual aloof, professional demeanor, Maggie brushed him with more authority, and I watched them actually begin to connect.

  After we returned Twinkle to his lush, secluded paddock, I steeled myself for an inevitable encounter with Maggie’s parents. I was reluctant to leave this newly improved Maggie. “Good job today, Maggie,” I said to her. “Good riding.” There was a deeper meaning behind my words that I hoped she got.

  “Thanks, Erica.”

  I turned to go find a couple of my least favorite people in the universe.

  “Where are you going?”

  I turned back. “I have to find your parents.”

  “They’re not home today.”

  “Oh.” Of course. “Well, I guess I’ll just have to get paid next time,” I said with clear resentment in my voice.

  Maggie stuck her hand in her pocket and nonchalantly pulled out a hundred dollar bill. “Here.”

  I took it from her and stared at it dumbly. “Thanks. I, uh, don’t really have change for this…”

  “You didn’t take your money last time,” Maggie said. “Duh.”

  “Oh, right.” I was about to say I didn’t deserve it, but I realized things had turned out just fine for Maggie. Maybe I did deserve the money. I definitely needed it. “Thanks,” I said again.

  “It’s just money,” Maggie said, rolling her eyes. “Are you, like, poor or something?”

  I laughed out loud. “Pretty much. See you later, Maggie.”

  I started back up the hill. Maybe I was okay at this training thing.

  Lawrence

  I crept up the front steps. Everything was quiet. If Amber locked the door, I’m fucked, I realized.

  The knob twisted in my hand. Thank God. I slipped inside, bracing my body and closing the door slowly, slowly. It still clicked, and in the dark, quiet house, it might as well have been a gunshot. I cringed and quit breathing. No sound. I started feeling my way through the blackness and piles of stuff. I really do have too much shit in crammed in here, I thought as I sidestepped a stack of saddle pads.

  This is ridiculous. Sneaking into my own house. I couldn’t believe I had sunk this low. I couldn’t believe this was my life. I felt like I was trapped, and I knew I had trapped myself, which was even worse somehow.

  It didn’t take too long to get to the bedroom, even though I couldn’t see and I couldn’t move faster than a crawl. I collapsed onto the bed, onto my right side, drained of energy. Amber was probably going to kill me in the morning. I couldn’t avoid her forever. But at least I can sleep for a while. I took off my clothes, even taking the time to wriggle painfully out of my shirt, and got in bed. Sleep was going to come easily tonight. All day I’d been avoiding what was banging away in my head. Things that were proving difficult to forget. I was tired of fighting. I was ready for the blankness of sleep.

  I was almost glad about my ruined shoulder. It provided intense, undeniable, physical pain. It wasn’t pleasant, but it was steady and uncomplicated and something to focus on.

  I focused on it. It was a stupid, boring injury. It did nothing to keep me awake. I went under effortlessly.

  I woke up at six AM. I woke up fast. Amber was standing over me. She didn’t have a weapon, but she didn’t really need one.

  “What are you doing?” I demanded shakily. “You shouldn’t be watching me sleep. If I ever did that to you, you’d kill me.”

  “I wanted to see what’s going on with your arm. You’ve been so weird lately.” She was staring at my shoulder, looking a little ill.

  I angled my head to get a look at it. It had gone purple. It looked even less like a shoulder and more like congealed blood with a layer or two of skin holding it in. I looked away. My own stomach was starting to revolt at the ugly sight.

  “What happened to you?” Amber asked. Her voice was soft.

  “I ran into a hoof,” I told her, without a hint of humor. I told her the short version.

  Amber got a flinchy look on her face. She looked almost like she wanted to comfort me. “It hurts, doesn’t it?”

  “Like you wouldn’t believe.”

  Amber looked pained on my behalf. She patted my opposite shoulder tenderly.

  She probably thought I meant the bruise.

  Amber

  Everything was weird. And not just in the normal way. Things were really strange between us now. For three years, we’d had our roles in the relationship, and suddenly everything had been displaced. Our roles had switched somehow. I was civil and forgiving, and he was moody and evasive.

  I moved around him more carefully, unsure of myself. This guy I loved like family (he was my family), this person I knew better than anyone else who had ever drifted into my life, was different. I didn’t let on, but it hurt. It worried me.

  I sat on the couch consuming apple pie, trying to find something to watch
on three channels. When the president came on to talk about where all the jobs went (or something to that effect), I gave up. I left the house, leaving the pie on the counter. The one trait of Lawrence’s that remained was his strong aversion to pie. Oh, and the old sex drive hadn’t really wavered.

  I made the short walk to the barn and leaned on Soiree’s door. She greeted me with her usual eagerness. “At least you still like me,” I murmured into her silky mane. Soiree was steadfast and loving.

  I stayed with Soiree for a long time, smoothing the fine hairs on her face and neck, holding her teacup muzzle in my hands. A vehicle rolled into the driveway, but it barely registered. I was calm and unmovable, and I bent my head to kiss Soiree between the eyes. Then I heard someone’s scratchy footsteps on the concrete. I jerked up and backed away from Soiree, focusing on the backlit person in the doorway.

  “Oh, hi, Amber,” Erica said softly. She sounded nervous. It pissed me off that she’d already assumed I was just a hateful bitch.

  “Hi.” The word came out strained. I was going to tell her where Lawrence was, but I didn’t know. I waited for her to ask me so she could go away.

  She didn’t ask the question. She went to Soiree’s door instead. The filly nickered and stuck her head between Erica’s arms. She looked back at me. “I love this horse.”

  I looked away. “Mmm,” I managed. I shifted back and forth uncomfortably while she petted my horse who wasn’t really mine.

  Finally she let Soiree go. “She’s so wonderful and…pure. It makes me so upset to think of where she could have ended up.”

  I stiffened. So she knew the whole story. What else has he told her? I wondered, strangely angry.

  Erica was looking uncomfortable. I wasn’t following the social code, I knew. She prevailed through her tension and made eye contact. “Do you know where Lawrence is, Amber?”

  “No. I have no idea.” The words fell harshly from my mouth.

  “Okay. His truck is here. I’ll just have a look around.” She turned to leave. “Thanks, Amber.”