I gave her horse a pat on the nose. He was beautiful. ‘You’re heaps lucky. I didn’t even see an actual horse in the flesh until I was about nine.’
Baylor smiled in a ‘poor you’ kind of way. ‘You’re a pretty good rider for someone who’s only just started.’
‘Thanks,’ I said, but she’d already gone. She was back out and onto the next jump. The pony club woman gave her a big thumbs up and a wide grin, and Baylor powered through like she owned the ground, the little kids on their ponies getting out of the way whenever she came through.
I grinned to myself. This would be fun. ‘Come on, Cupcake,’ I said, bending down to her ears. ‘We’ve got company.’
We charged out into the ground after Baylor, heading straight for the jump she’d gone over. This time it felt like Cupcake knew I had something on the line. She didn’t falter or take a wrong step. She just cantered and launched and jumped and landed and kept running, and together we felt unstoppable.
At the end of the ground, I turned Cupcake around so that I could see where Baylor was. For a second I thought she’d disappeared; her float was still there, but she wasn’t out in the arena any more.
Then I saw her. She was sitting on her horse, near the gate, just watching, but her eyes were fixed on me. I raised my hand to give her a thumbs up, but she didn’t move a muscle. Instead, she just kept watching me, her head slightly tilted, her mouth pursed and her eyes squinty like she was looking into the sun.
I rode over to her and pulled up close by. ‘You’re great. It’s awesome to have someone to compete with.’
She looked away for a second, then fixed her eyes straight out in front of her, like she was focusing on the view of the mountain in front of us.
‘Yes,’ she said. ‘You’re very competitive.’
When Dad picked us up later that day, I was hot, sweaty, messy and happy.
‘You’ve got dirt all over your shirt,’ Coco scolded as we got into the car after sorting out the gear and putting Cupcake back in the float. ‘Jodhpurs I can understand, but a shirt? I don’t even know how that’s possible.’
I shrugged and smiled. ‘Seriously? It doesn’t matter. Cupcake was awesome. Did you see how she went over that barrel jump? The third time was better than the fourth time, but the fifth time was the best of all.’
‘I stopped watching. I checked Facebook, then I walked into town for a drink. James met me there. We had milkshakes.’ She smiled, like she was remembering it. ‘Didn’t you notice I was gone?’
‘Really? I thought you were going to stay.’
Coco looked aghast. ‘I was there. At least, most of the time. But I was never going to watch every single jump. You knew that, right?’
My happiness dropped a notch. ‘Yeah, I know.’ Mum would’ve stayed. ‘How’s Mum?’ I asked Dad, looking out the window at the bush flying past the car. ‘Any better?’
‘Same as yesterday. Sick, sick and sick.’
‘Can I go talk to her when we get back? Tell her what happened?’
‘She’s gone to sleep. She said for no one to disturb her, not even me.’ He grinned at me apologetically. ‘She was even sicker than this when she was having you two. This actually isn’t too bad.’
‘Oh.’ I didn’t know what else to say.
‘You can tell me what happened, if you like. At least the highlights, anyway. Maybe in five sentences or less. Or two.’
I rested my forehead on the window. Close up, I could see smatterings of dust and spider web. Further out, the green and grey of the trees and scrub was mushed together into a big smudge of khaki.
‘It doesn’t matter,’ I said. ‘It’s not that important.’
But it was.
9
Chapter 9
At school the following week, something was different. I wasn’t sure what it was. Perhaps it was something about the way the girls looked at me. Or spoke to me. Or both, maybe. Whatever it was, it was oozing out of Baylor.
‘What were your scores at pony club?’ she asked me on Monday morning, shaking back her hair. ‘Did you get any penalties?’
‘Um,’ I tried to remember. ‘Three penalties. One on the second jump and two on jump five.’ I looked over at her, but she’d looked away and seemed engrossed in some other conversation. I shrugged and moved on.
On Tuesday she handed me an article she’d printed out from some horse website she followed. ‘Here you go. It just reminded me of you for some reason.’
I smiled and then looked down at the title.
So, you’re starting out show jumping? Six mistakes beginners make and how you can avoid them.
‘Thanks?’ I put it in my bag.
On Wednesday she had her phone out with a bunch of girls going ooh and aah around it. I didn’t bother looking. Things that make most girls go ooh and aah don’t thrill me too much, but I didn’t have a chance to not look. Baylor came over to me and put the phone right up to my face. ‘I’m ordering these for the Inter-schools comp.’ It was a picture of a pair of chaps. ‘Leather. They’re the best ones you can get.’
‘Oh, That’s nice.’
‘Yeah. I told Mum I had to have them. For competitions. None of mine are new anymore.’ She turned to me with a super-interested look on her face. ‘What brand are yours?’
I shrugged. ‘Who would know? Ness gave me an old pair of hers. I didn’t even have white joddys until she lent me some.’
Baylor’s nostrils flared and her eyes got wider. ‘Really?’ She pulled her phone away from me like I had some kind of virus and flounced back to the girls.
On Thursday she showed everyone a photo of her on her horse at last year’s State event saying, ‘Oh, it’s just an old one, I don’t even know why I got it up,’ and on Friday she cornered me after History. ‘Are you riding at the Show tomorrow?’
‘Yeah. I’m going with Ness and Tessa.’
Her nose wrinkled. ‘Oh. Well, I’ll see you there. Hopefully you’ll do well.’
I smiled. ‘Thanks. You too. You’re a good rider.’
Her nose wrinkled again and she looked away. ‘Oh. Um, thanks.’
Coco always says that the weirdest thing about me is the fact I don’t get mad with people. She carries grudges practically forever. Once, when she was five and we still lived in Sydney, she had a thing against Micah, a friend of Josh’s, because for about two months he teased her about having the same name as the ingredient for chocolate cake—cocoa. She hated Micah for years, even after he’d stopped doing it, and every time he came over to play, she’d play some kind of sneaky trick on him, like tie his shoelaces together or hide his hat. She didn’t do it to make a fuss and get attention, it was only to make his life more difficult.
I never cared about being teased, though. Even when Micah said to me, ‘Charlie’s a boy’s name,’ I just let it roll off me and got on with whatever I was doing. Getting mad wasn’t worth the hassle.
Having said that, of course, I’m not some Little Miss Perfect who loves everyone. There are people I don’t like. One of them was Coco’s stupid ex-best friend Samantha from Sydney. Not because she annoyed me or teased me, or anything like that. It was more that I could tell she was only out for herself. She didn’t care about Coco at all. I don’t like those kinds of people. But I don’t get mad about being teased and I don’t make a fuss about the people I don’t like.
Baylor was doing something. I wasn’t stupid enough to think she wasn’t. But whatever it was, I decided to let it slide off my back. Maybe she was having a bad week. Who knew? I shrugged. The more important thing to think about was the horse riding events at the Kangaroo Valley Show.
And even more important, the fact that I was going to be riding to win.
That night I stayed up washing, brushing and plaiting Cupcake, just like Tessa had showed me, before rugging her overnight. When I finally got into bed, I set my alarm for five am like Ness told me to. She was coming to pick up Cupcake in the float early, and Dad said he’d drive me and Coco over the mountai
n at six am for a seven am start. (Actually, he didn’t ‘say’ it. He started out with a lot of groaning and reluctance, but I insisted, so he finally growled, ‘Okay then. Six in the morning.’) I had an hour to pack up my stuff and the tack, and catch Cupcake. When I was all dressed myself, I woke Coco up gently, because she hates to be dislodged out of bed at all, especially on a Saturday morning.
‘You are insane.’ She tried to cover her head with her pillow. ‘Go away. I hate you.’
I batted her toes, which were sticking out from under her doona and, once she reached down to stop me, moved up so I could bat her ears.
‘James will be there.’
‘Argh. Alright.’ She made a big noise on the ‘right’. ‘I’m coming.’
Everything was sorted, the horses had been floated and sent off, and Coco was actually dressed and ready by the time I woke Dad up at five-fifty. Mum stirred next to him but she didn’t open her eyes. She still had a bowl by the side of her bed and the room smelled vaguely of puke. Not badly, but enough to hint at the fact that someone had vomited in there at least three times a day every day for the last four months. Dad obviously didn’t believe in bleach-based cleaning products the same way Mum did. Or maybe they made her sicker. I’d have to ask.
‘Ready?’ Dad said, but he didn’t wait for the answer. He didn’t even get dressed, pulling a pair of gumboots on over his pyjama pants and walking straight out the door to the SUV.
As we bumped and rumbled up the driveway, the sun peeked over the side of the escarpment and spread gold all over the morning. I poked Coco with excitement. ‘Eeek. The show. Can you believe it?’
She yawned, opened her eyes briefly and shut them again. ‘Why am I not asleep? What is this alternate universe you dwell in?’
I rolled my eyes, smiled and ignored her, looking out at the world waking up around me.
Half an hour later we were pulling up into the Kangaroo Valley Showground, all festooned with tents and caravans and sideshows, ready for a big day. I spied Ness running towards us. ‘You’re here! Great.’
Tessa dragged her feet behind her, and I spied James yawning behind a horse float.
Coco’s eyes suddenly sprang open. ‘I’ll just be over there,’ she sang out, leaving me to organise Cupcake.
‘You girls all okay then?’ Dad said. ‘I’ll be back at what? Five-thirty this evening?’
‘About that,’ said Ness. She came around to the back of the float with me. ‘How are you feeling?’
‘I’m fine. I think Cupcake’s fine too. She was easy this morning.’
Ness raised her eyebrows. ‘I thought so too. Good stuff. What are you wearing today?’
I looked down at my outfit: Ness’s cast-off jodhpurs and chaps, my boots and a polo shirt I’d found at the back of my cupboard. ‘This?’
She tilted her head and gazed at me. ‘Yeah, nah. I’ve got something that will be better.’ She took me around to the back of her four-wheel drive, filled to the brim with tack and boots and hats and anything else you could ever need for a day out with a horse, dug around a little bit and pulled out a shirt and a tie. ‘These will help.’
I shrugged and put them on. They fit okay, and Ness helped me do up the tie. ‘How do I look?’
‘A bit scruffy. Those chaps could do with a clean.’ She gestured towards my legs. ‘But it’s good enough. They want you to ride well but they like you to look right too.’
‘Hang on.’ I ran around the other side of the float to where Coco was sitting next to James, giggling her head off. ‘Hey Coco. Check it out. I have an outfit.’
Coco looked up and squirmed, just slightly. ‘Really? Okay, I guess.’
I laughed at her. ‘It’s not designer, obvs.’
She made a face and looked back to James.
‘It looks fine to me.’ He shoved his hand through his blond hair. ‘Anyway, who cares? It’s about the riding.’
‘Ugh. You just don’t understand.’ Coco rolled her eyes and punched him in the arm, giggling again.
Tessa and I tacked up, sipped water, got ready, and watched and waited. We walked through the show jumping course, pacing it out and thinking about turns and angles and lines.
When the events started, the littler kids went through their paces first; tiny little tots on white ponies cantering, trotting and lifting their little hooves over mini jumps and then being awarded small blue ribbons.
The heat started to come in in earnest about eight am, the flies started soon after that, and Coco started complaining loudly not long after I’d wiped the first sweat off my nose. ‘Seriously? Is it too early for a snow cone? Why aren’t any of the stalls open yet?’
‘Sit in the shade,’ I heard James say. ‘Do you want me to get you a drink?’
I rolled my eyes at Tessa and laughed.
Baylor had arrived in her big black setup, and walked around in her new jacket, leading her big horse behind her, all to the soundtrack of the seemingly inexhaustible competition caller, an old man with a microphone who roamed the oval, getting everyone in their places, and calling the hacking and sporting events all day as if he’d been doing it for a hundred years.
I entered three show jumping events. Tessa entered two and did hacking as well. The whole thing was more challenging than I’d thought.
‘You’ve got to be smart for this,’ I panted to Ness after my first round. ‘Like, you’ve got to remember where the jumps are and pace everything out, and stay in control.’
She nodded. ‘That’s exactly what I’ve been telling you. But you’re smart. You can do it.’
I nodded, and watched even more intently, impressing it all into my brain.
I pulled ahead in the first round, then Baylor got in front in the jump-off. Then I won the second jump-off, and she won the third. Both of us picked up blue and red ribbons throughout the afternoon, but at the end of the afternoon, when they called out the Supreme Champion, I knew it would be Baylor. I was okay with that; I had given it everything I had, and Cupcake had given it everything she had. We’d learned a lot, for a first time. And we’d be back.
‘Congratulations,’ I said to Baylor. ‘That was close.’
She gave me a big smile and touched her ribbon. It was green, white and yellow, with tassels sewn on the ends. ‘Not that close.’
‘Yeah, it was.’ I touched the Reserve Champion ribbon they had laid over my shoulder. ‘It was close.’
I smiled. I actually felt good. Now I knew what the competition was, now I understood how Baylor rode and how she competed on the day, I knew what I’d have to do to beat her.
I can do that, I said to myself. I can do it next time.
And I knew I could. I dismounted, put my ribbon in Ness’s car, tethered Cupcake with some water and feed, pulled off my tie and threw off my helmet. It was still boiling hot even in the late afternoon.
‘Is there time for me to get something?’ I asked Ness.
‘Coco and James are about to go get a drink. I’ll tell them to wait for you, if you like.’
‘Yes, please.’ I was hungry for victory, but thirsty for anything that was cold and wet.
10
Chapter 10
Nothing’s cheap at a show, and I’d stuffed my wallet down into the bottom of my bag, mostly so I wouldn’t be tempted to spend my money on rubbish I didn’t need. Coco’s the spender; I’m the saver. I’ve got a plan to buy a car when I get my licence in a couple of years, and if I pick the right one, I think I’ll be able to afford it.
Coco might be able to afford a steering wheel cover if she’s lucky.
She was always asking me to help her out because she’d just spent all her money on a new something or other, usually clothes, but she also bought a lot of makeup. I couldn’t figure out why anyone needed so much—she only had one face, as I told her constantly, but she assured me it was necessary.
‘Please lend me twenty bucks?’ she’d whine. ‘You’ve got heaps. You can afford it.’ I’d just laugh at her and tell her ‘no’. ‘S
ave your money and you’ll have heaps too.’ But she never listened.
My bag was at the back of the horse float and I had to go around the float to get to it. I dislodged it, hopped out of the gate of the float, and leaned against it with my hand shoved right down into my bag, grabbing around for my wallet.
I was looking into the distance ahead of me, that looking-but-not-looking thing that you do when you’re focusing on something else. There were kids and horses everywhere, and as my hand was digging around in my bag, my eyes travelled to a small girl who was struggling to get a saddle off her big palomino. Almost at the exact second that my fingers closed around my wallet, it was like I got an electric shock. Something jolted inside me, all the way down to my fingernails.
‘Ow,’ I said. I dropped my bag and shook my hand a few times. But there was no other pain, which was weird. I’ve had a shock before, trying to plug in a vacuum cleaner when I was about five, and wanting to be helpful to Mum. I remember the horrible scratchy feeling it gave me, and the pain in my hand afterward. But this was different.
I picked up my bag again, and reached down once more for my wallet, again letting my eyes drift over to the girl and her palomino, and the boy who’d joined them. As soon as I did it, I got another jolt. This one left me breathless. Like, actually with no breath. It was like all the air got sucked out of me in one sudden swoop.
I was so taken aback I felt like I had to lean against something while my lungs learned how to work again, so I stepped backwards towards the float. Unfortunately, I’d moved when I dropped the bag and the float wasn’t behind me anymore. Instead of leaning back onto the wall of the horse trailer, I leaned back into nothing at all, and fell straight back onto my bottom.
‘Ow,’ I said again. This time there was actual pain. I rubbed my bum and down the back of my leg.
‘You okay?’ Coco popped her head around the back of the float. ‘Are you getting your wallet? We’re waiting.’ She took a step towards me. ‘Why are you down there?’
Charlie Franks is A-OK Page 6