“Either way, she looks good,” I said. “And she hasn’t tried anything underhanded this time around.”
“Why would she? She got a good horse to ride so all she really needed to do was sit there and look pretty.”
“Think she’ll cave to the pressure of the show?” I said.
“I don’t know,” Becka sighed. “But Lindsey is never going to make the team and she’s not going to be happy about it.”
We watched as her horse refused a yellow and black oxer and she fell over its neck and into the grass.
“Think we should sleep with one eye open?” I asked.
“Probably wouldn’t hurt,” she said.
CHAPTER THIRTY FOUR
The show was all anyone could think about. People who had become friends now suddenly kept to themselves, plotting how they could get that coveted, guaranteed spot on the team.
“It’s not fair,” Hadley said. “To give a spot to the winner? Winning is just luck anyway.”
“And talent,” Becka chimed in.
We’d all crashed back in our room for the night after a rather uninspiring dinner of beef stew which Jess had refused to eat. So had Lindsey.
“I’m a vegetarian,” she whined.
“I can’t eat gluten,” Jess told her.
It was like a competition to see who couldn’t eat the most and I knew what Lindsey was doing. She was trying to form an alliance with Jess. Maybe even get her to help sabotage our chances in the show but Jess didn’t seem to care and why should she? Her horse was perfectly capable of winning the class and with the way she had been riding, so was Jess. This time she didn’t need underhanded tricks. But Lindsey was desperate. I could tell.
“I don’t know what you’re worried about,” Hadley told Lindsey. “Patrick is just as bad as Woodstock. We both sucked this afternoon.”
“Is that supposed to make me feel better?” Lindsey groaned.
“Just concentrate on going clean,” I said. “That’s all we can do. Then if there is a jump off, go as fast as you can.”
“Duh,” Lindsey said. “Obviously. We all know what the point is and you have the best horse now anyway so what do you care?”
“I don’t have the best horse,” I said. “You want to know who the best horse is? The one who is sitting in her stall that I am not allowed to ride. Sure, Gulliver is amazing but if it comes down to a jump off, he’s not going to be that handy against the ponies. He’s too big.”
“Oh boo hoo, poor you,” Lindsey said.
“That’s it,” Becka jumped up. “I’m going to punch her.”
It took five minutes to calm everyone down again and in the end Lindsey slept on the couch, which I was sure she would use as an excuse for riding badly. But at least we all weren’t worried about her suffocating us with our pillows in the night.
And then it was the last day before our mock show. In the morning Miguel had us working on a gymnastic exercise that was three jumps set up in a line in the middle of the arena. He had us canter over them in a serpentine, working on getting our changes and not falling out on the turns. It was hard. Gully’s stride was so long that our serpentine was much bigger than everyone else’s.
“Turn him sooner Dickenson,” Miguel yelled at me. “It’s supposed to be a serpentine, not three circles.”
I shortened my reins and tried again but it was hard to find a combination of contact where Gully didn’t try to run through the bridle without sacrificing steering control.
“See, I told you,” I said to Becka as I went back to join the line. “He’s not that handy.”
We watched Jess execute the exercise flawlessly and gain a round of applause from Miguel and then it was Lindsey’s turn. Woodstock was a plucky bay gelding and while he was pretty handy, Lindsey was not. She tried to copy Jess by fixing her back and sitting pretty but Woodstock took advantage of her and refused the middle jump.
“No, no, no,” Miguel yelled at her.
She tried again and this time, even though she should have been expecting it and therefore prepared, Woodstock dug his heels in at the last minute and Lindsey soared over his head like she had out in the field.
“Has she been this bad all along?” I asked Becka.
“Pretty much,” she shrugged.
“Well how did she ever make it past the first selection round?”
“She probably has a push button pony back home who is a saint,” Becka said.
“Or has been beaten half to death,” I said.
We watched horrified as Lindsey got to her feet, grabbed the horse’s reins from where he was standing patiently waiting for her to get up, and then smacked him hard across the neck with her crop. Woodstock flew back, his eyes huge and frightened. He pulled the reins from her hands and took off around the arena at a gallop, snorting.
“You,” Miguel yelled at Lindsey. “Get out of my arena, now.”
Lindsey’s face was red. She knew what she’d done and by the way she’d done it, I was more than sure that it was instinct. She probably did it all the time back home. It was a cruel thing to do and she knew it.
Woodstock galloped back and forth, refusing to be caught. Eventually he snagged a leg through his reins and managed to pull his bridle off. Then he decided to jump a few of the jumps for good measure. Miguel had us all stand still and wait for him to calm down. I was just glad that Gully didn’t seem to care about the wild horse flying past as I knew that Fury most certainly would have wanted to join in and I wasn’t sure I would have been able to stop her.
Woodstock finally came to a halt, his sides bellowing in and out and neck streaked with sweat. Miguel walked calmly up to him, his arms wide and palms up. He put his hands on the bay horse’s neck and patted him gently. Then pulled a thin rope from his pocket and fashioned it into a halter and lead.
“How did he do that?” Becka whispered as he walked Woodstock past.
“I don’t know but we totally need to figure it out,” I said.
“I don’t ever want to see any of you strike a horse in anger,” Miguel said sadly as he walked past. “The crop is a reinforcement of your aids, not a tool for punishment. I see anyone else behave like that and they will never ride with me again. Got it?”
We all nodded. Never in a million years would I strike a horse like that but I’d seen other people lose their temper and hit their horses, including Jess. It was a small comfort that if she ever did it around Miguel, she’d be kicked out once and for all.
CHAPTER THIRTY FIVE
That night we all stayed up and tried to figure out how to fashion halters out of pieces of rope. It was a welcome distraction from the looming last day and the pressure of the show. Lindsey had been kicked out of the clinic. She packed her bags and her mom came to get her. I wasn’t sorry to see her go. She never would have made the team anyway and all she was doing was making our lives a living hell.
That afternoon Miguel had let us work on whatever we wanted. Becka and I went out to the jump field where we worked on turns and speed with Rufus and Gulliver.
Becka had done a really good job with Rufus. He’d come a long way from the cart horse who couldn’t be bothered to move from his stall. I watched her fly over the course with him and knew that she was probably going to be my biggest competition.
Gulliver and I went next. He did have a tendency to rush more out in the open field but only because he got so excited. If the jump course for the show was going to be held outside, that was something I would be able to use to my advantage. I just wasn’t used to navigating such a big horse around in a jump off. I was used to my handy pony who ducked between fences and turned on a dime. This was a whole new ball game.
That night I couldn’t sleep. I tried to imagine what the course would be like. Knowing Miguel, it wouldn’t be easy. He wanted to test us and he wasn’t just going to give away that winning spot on the team without having us fight for it. I’d only been riding Gully for two days. He may have been Miguel’s horse but that didn’t make him easy. He had all these quirks
that I hadn’t figured out yet. I wished I had more time.
CHAPTER THIRTY SIX
Show day dawned bright and sunny. I know because I was up when it was still dark, braiding Gulliver’s mane. I had to find a step stool in order to reach it. Some people had decided not to braid but I always thought that a well braided horse trumped an unbraided one, even though braids weren’t technically required in the jumper ring.
Gulliver’s neck was so long that it took much longer than I had expected and I was just finishing up as the sun broke over the horizon.
“You finished yet?” Becka hung on the outside of the stall. “I’m starving.”
“How can you think about eating on a day like today?” I said.
“Because if I don’t eat then I’ll probably pass out half way around the course and end up face down in the dirt. You will too so come on. I heard Dan is cooking up a special breakfast for us.”
“Alright,” I said. “Do you think he looks okay?” I pointed to Gulliver’s braids.
“Fine. Great. Whatever,” Becka pulled me out of the stall. “You should see the hack job I did on Rufus. His mane is too thick to braid. It looks like he has a bunch of golf balls running down his neck.”
“It can’t be that bad,” I said.
“Wanna bet?” she laughed.
We caught a whiff of the special breakfast wafting down the barn and ran the rest of the way to the lounge where Dan had on his ‘kiss the chef’ apron. There was sizzling bacon and mounds of freshly buttered toast, pancakes and waffles and jugs of hot maple syrup.
“Wow,” I said. “You’ve really outdone yourself this time.”
“Why thank you,” Dan grinned and took a bow, waving his spatula in the air.
“I seriously which I could live here forever,” Becka said, stuffing the top of a blueberry muffin into her mouth.
“Me too,” I said.
“I don’t think I could survive you guys permanently,” Dan said, looking a little pale.
“You know you love us really,” I told him.
“Some of you,” he winked. “Others, not so much. You see this?” he pointed to a stack of rather brown looking pancakes. “Gluten free,” he said. “For the Princess.”
“That’s going above and beyond the call of duty,” Becka said. “You should get a medal or something.”
“Trust me,” Dan said. “I know.”
We sat at our usual table, eating and talking all at the same time. I looked around the room and felt a little sad. I didn’t really want it to end. I didn’t want to go home. I wished that I could bring Bluebird here and stay forever.
Hadley was telling everyone how she had managed to get alternating black and white braids in Patrick’s mane and Becka was retelling the story of the golf balls that Rufus was now sporting. Even Jess joined in with a tale of a mystery manure stain that had somehow ended up on her gray mare’s forehead. That evolved into a story Justin had about a horse at his barn that was always getting balls of manure inside its ears. We were all grossing out about it when Miguel walked in and a hush fell over the room.
“Good morning,” he said.
We all mumbled good morning back. Miguel was apparently taking this mock show as seriously as he expected us to. Instead of his usual dark breeches and polo shirt, today he had on white breeches and a starched white shirt. I heard a couple of girls sitting at the next table over, whisper how hot he was.
“Here is the course for today’s class,” he said, holding up a piece of paper. “Study it. You will be permitted to walk the course two hours before the class and not before. You will be expected to report to the ring for warm up after that.”
He pinned the page to the bulletin board.
“Good luck,” he said.
He walked over to get his own breakfast and we flocked to the piece of paper like it was the last watering hole. There was pushing and shoving and someone stepped on my foot.
“I give up,” I told Becka, backing out of the crowd. “I’ll look at it after everyone else has.”
“Yeah, I don’t need to get injured in a stampede of people before I even get to ride,” she said. “Let’s get seconds instead.”
So we went back for more food while people were fighting over paper and pens so that they could copy the course down and study it like Miguel said.
“You girls ready?” Miguel asked as he saw us loading our plates with the last of the bacon. He had been talking to Dan and they both stood there looking at us as we grabbed more food.
“I was born ready,” Becka said.
“Me too,” I agreed.
“Glad to hear it,” he said.
And despite everything, I was ready. The mock show didn’t seem scary at all. In fact it felt like it was going to be fun.
CHAPTER THIRTY SEVEN
The course was thirteen jumps. Becka said it was lucky thirteen but I wasn’t so sure. It was a bending, twisting course with two combinations, a double and a triple. We traced the line with our fingers, trying to memorize it. The class was at eleven. That meant we had two hours before we’d be allowed to walk the course. We spent it cleaning our tack, ourselves and our horses for a second time.
“Look at this,” Becka cried as she ran a white towel over Rufus’s dark coat and it came away clean.
“Impressive,” I nodded. “Gulliver seems to attract dust just standing in his stall.”
“You going to come up and get dressed?” she asked, sliding the stall door shut.
“In a little bit,” I said.
I snuck into Fury’s stall. The chestnut mare was standing in the corner with her head down and eyes closed when I startled her. She instinctively pinned her ears and then pricked them as soon as she recognized me. I fed her Pop Tarts and brushed her silky coat.
“I wish I was riding you today girl,” I told her.
She rubbed her face on my shirt, leaving a dirty brown mark on the front.
“Thanks,” I laughed. “Good job I haven’t changed yet.”
I sat with her for a while, imagining what it would have been like to ride her over the course. She was quick and handy, there were times I suspected she had more speed than Bluebird and he was pretty fast.
“It would have been great,” I sighed. “If you hadn’t been so burned out and I hadn’t ruined everything by getting lost, we would have made a really good team.”
The whole clinic felt like some great big missed opportunity. If I had picked out a different horse then things would have turned out nothing like they had. Then again if I hadn’t been stuck with Fury, maybe she wouldn’t even be here by now. Miguel wouldn’t have kept a pony no one, including himself, could ride.
“Wish me luck,” I told her. “I’m going to need it.”
Upstairs everyone’s nerves were running rampant and people were trying to psych one another out.
“If you don’t gallop through the triple, you won’t have enough speed to make it out,” one girl was telling Hadley.
“Have you even seen Patrick go?” she groaned. “Not going fast enough is the least of our worries.”
In our room Becka was trying to braid her messy hair into a bun.
“It’s not co-operating,” she cried.
“Let me help,” I said, taking the comb and the hair band.
I smoothed her hair into a respectable looking braid with minimal fuss.
“Here,” I said. “Slap a hair net on it before it all starts springing out all over the place. Your hair is worse than mine.”
“I don’t think I’m going to win,” she threw herself down on my bed. “Rufus is too slow.”
“And Gulliver isn’t?” I said. “I feel like I’m riding a horse on stilts.”
“We’re both not going to make it then,” she threw her arms back in defeat.
“Stop it,” I said. “We’re going to do our best. That’s all that counts. Our riding is all we have. Remember? That’s what you’re always telling me, isn’t it? So we are going to go out there and we’re
going to show Miguel that we have learned something while we have been here. Maybe we’re not the best. Who cares? We are who we are and he’d be lucky to have us on his team.”
“You’re right,” she sat up and grinned. “I don’t know what I was thinking.”
“You were listening to everyone out there trying to freak each other out, that’s what you were doing. Now come on. Help me find my show clothes and let’s go walk this course. We have a spot on the team to win.”
The course walked fine, although there seemed to be some debate over the striding between a red vertical and a black and yellow oxer. Some people were just standing there looking confused, like they’d never walked a course without their trainer before.
“I think we may be ahead of the game,” I said to Becka.
“No kidding,” she replied.
After everyone finished, Miguel had us draw numbers out of a bucket for the order of go. I drew first. Pretty much the worst position you could get. Going first meant you didn’t have a chance to see if the course rode the same as it walked. It seemed pretty straight forward but knowing Miguel, there had to be a trick somewhere in there. Becka was last.
“First and last,” she said. “I guess at least we’ll open and close strong.”
“Want to swap?” I said but she just laughed.
In Gulliver’s stall I brushed the last speck of dust off him.
“I know you don’t know me very well,” I said. “But I’d really like you to do your best. Can you do that for me?”
He didn’t reply. When it came to personality, he certainly had the least of all the horses I’d ridden. Or maybe it was because I hadn’t got to know him well enough yet. He did seem like he was pretty shy. But I knew the one thing that lit him up like a Christmas tree and that was jumping. He was a horse who really loved his job. I could only hope that would translate into a win for me today.
“You coming?” Becka called from down the barn aisle.
“Yes, I’m coming,” I said.
I had my new breeches and show jacket and the silver horseshoe bracelet for luck. I was riding one of Miguel’s own personal horses. I’d worked my butt off all week to help a pony that no one else could figure out. If I couldn’t pull out a win today then I had no business being on the junior jumper team in the first place.
Last Chance (Show Jumping Dreams ~ Book 6) Page 10