Pony Jumpers 1- First Fence

by Kate Lattey

  “I like your pony.”

  I shot Katy a suspicious look, wondering whether she was making fun of me. Nobody really liked Squib, because he was so naughty and difficult to control. Even the coaches who said that he showed potential as a jumper thought that I was stupid to have bought him, and kept saying that I should sell him and buy something more experienced. But I loved him, and I knew he could be a superstar one day. I certainly wasn’t going to sell him to someone else and let them have all the glory.

  “Thanks. I like yours too. Is he a good jumper?”

  Katy nodded. “Yeah, he’s not bad.”

  I looked across at the other riders, who were now cantering fairly competently over the two jumps, which had been raised to about eighty centimetres.

  “Are we going to get to jump again, do you think?”

  “Yeah, Mum’s just waiting until these numpties are done and then she’ll put the jumps up for us.”

  It clicked into place then, and I wondered why I hadn’t seen it before. “Deb’s your mum.”

  They looked so similar that it was ridiculous of me not to have realised. Same dark hair, same slender build, same light brown eyes and high cheekbones. Same air of calm competence, although Katy had a reserved edge to her that her friendlier mother didn’t seem to share.

  I watched Deb set up a third fence and send the others down the line again. Squib shifted his weight restlessly, and Lucas flickered an ear at him.

  “I haven’t seen you at rallies before,” I commented, and Katy shrugged.

  “We only come at the start of the season. Got to get the rallies in so we can get into team events. But we don’t usually bother because it’s so much standing around, and if I wanted Mum to teach me she could do it at home.” She sighs, and pats Lucas’ rump. “I wish she’d hurry up though. I’ve got three more ponies to work and an English assessment due on Friday that I’ve barely even started. Finally!”

  Katy sat up and picked up her reins as Deb waved us over. I shortened Squib’s reins as he followed his new friend, and soon we were cantering down the line of jumps. Squib was as speedy as ever, but when Deb put the jumps up higher he had to slow down to avoid crashing through them, and I felt a little more under control.

  Down the line we went, and up went the jumps until the oxer at the back was immense. Lucas was jumping flawlessly, so Deb told Katy to cross her stirrups and do it with her arms folded. I thought she was joking, but Katy obeyed, barely moving in the saddle as her pony soared effortlessly over the jumps without any guidance from her.

  “Your turn,” Deb said to me, and I swallowed hard.

  “I don’t know what he’ll do if I don’t have the reins,” I admitted, and she laughed.

  “You can keep your reins and stirrups! I’m just trying to make life a bit harder for Katy. You just go down as normal.”

  I was relieved to hear it, but there was nothing normal about the height of that last jump, which still looked huge from where I was sitting. Still, if Katy could do it without stirrups or reins, surely I could do it with the benefit of both.

  Squib’s blood was up and he cantered excitedly to the crossbar, flinging himself over and racing the two strides to the vertical. Deb yelled to me to sit up and hold him, and I did my best as we made the three strides to the oxer. Squib never flinched at the height, seeming to view it as a personal challenge, and he flew over easily. I was grinning as we landed, but not for long. Squib was so thrilled by his own efforts that he gave himself a victory lap, pulling the reins out of my hands and launching into a series of triumphant bucks.

  I was thrown from the saddle, and as the grass came rushing up to meet me, all I could think before I hit the ground were two simple words.

  Worth it.

  CHAPTER TWO

  Dax was barking as I walked up the driveway, and I quickly let myself into the house, ruffling his ears and telling him to shush. I could hear them in the living room, my sister’s voice carrying as always as she yelled at Dax to shut up. She loved our dog as much as the rest of us, but she could never handle his loud bark, or any other loud noises - with the notable exception of her own voice.

  “Sorry I’m late,” I said as I went into the room with Dax panting on my heels.

  Everyone was sitting around the kitchen table – everyone except Mum, of course, who was working late as usual. There was a big bowl of spaghetti bolognaise in the middle of the table, and I quickly sat down in the empty chair next to Alexia and started to fill my plate.

  She wrinkled her nose. “You stink.”

  “Eau de horse,” Dad said with a smile. “How was Pony Club? Did Squib behave?”

  Anders made a disparaging noise, and I shot him a dirty look as I added salad to my plate.

  “He did, actually. Well, he bucked me off once but we jumped some really big jumps. There was this girl there called Katy, and she’s a really good rider. And her mum was coaching, and she was super helpful. She said that Squib…”

  “Can I be excused?” Alexia asked abruptly, interrupting the flow of my conversation.

  “Not yet,” Dad said calmly. “AJ’s only just started eating.”

  “But she’s late. It’s not my fault that she’s late.” Alexia pouted at him, slapping her cutlery down onto the table irritably.

  “I don’t mind,” I said quickly, sensing a storm building, but Dad stood firm.

  “No. We’ll wait.

  “Don’t worry Lex, at the speed she eats we’ll be out of here in no time,” Anders said comfortingly, but Alexia just slumped back in her chair sulkily.

  “You were saying?” Dad asked me.

  “Don’t make her talk, she’ll just take even longer to finish eating,” Anders told him. “Besides, nobody cares what her pony did today.”

  I kicked him under the table, but he moved his leg and I got the chair leg instead. As I winced at the stabbing pain in my toe, Anders leaned back on his chair and grinned at me.

  “Serves you right.”

  “I hate you.”

  “That’s not very nice,” Astrid piped up from the other end of the table, and Anders winked at her. “You shouldn’t hate anybody, right Dad?”

  “That’s right, Chicken.”

  I shovelled more food into my mouth as Dad looked at me again, and he diverted his attention to my eldest brother, who was finishing off the spaghetti I’d left in the bowl.

  “Do you have a game this weekend?”

  Aidan nodded. “Saturday morning. Anders is playing in the early afternoon, so we’ll go together.” He looked at Anders. “Which means an early start for you, bro.”

  “I live for early starts,” Anders assured him.

  “You’ll sleep the whole way there and back again,” Aidan replied. “Good thing I still don’t trust you enough to drive.”

  As Anders started trying to defend his driving ability while everyone else reminded him of the long list of dents and prangs and speeding tickets he’d already picked up in his few short months of driving, I scoffed down the rest of my dinner, well aware of Alexia’s eyes boring into me as I ate. My sister had never been any good at sitting still or waiting for other people, and her irritation could build into a tantrum really quickly. It wasn’t her fault. It’s just how she’s wired, as Dad often reminded us. But I’d always do my best to keep the peace, and not set anything off. Alexia in full screaming mode was no fun for anybody, least of all her.

  It wasn’t until later that night, when I was doing homework in the study because Astrid had already gone to bed and we still shared a bedroom, that Dad got to finish his conversation. He always tried really hard to listen to all of us, perhaps more aware than we were of how much time and attention went into keeping Alexia copacetic.

  “So.” He sat down on the window seat and looked at me attentively. “You fell off, you said?”

  “Yeah, but I’m fine.” I appreciated his efforts to talk, but I was in the middle of a series of complicated algebra equations, and I didn’t need the distraction.
“No harm, no foul.”

  “Well. I’m glad.” Dad sat for a moment longer, watching as I concentrated on the work in front of me. I was almost there, but the next step was eluding me. I chewed the end of my pen, and Dad seemed to realise that his presence wasn’t helpful. He slapped his hands onto his knees, then stood up.

  “Don’t stay up too late.”

  I shook my head. “I’m almost done.”

  “Okay. Good night, Possum.”

  Always with the nicknames. Sometimes I wondered why he bothered giving us proper names at all, since he never used them. The solution leapt out at me then, and I quickly scrawled it down. Done.

  “Night Dad,” I said, but he’d already gone.

  “Hey, AJ! Wait up!”

  I turned to see Katy walking towards me, schoolbag slung over one shoulder as she shoved her way through the crowded hallway. Her hair was tied back in a messy ponytail, her school shirt was crumpled and her socks sagged around her ankles. It took me a moment to recognise her as the perfectly polished rider I’d seen at Pony Club only the day before.

  I stopped and waited as she caught up. “Hi.”

  I hadn’t expected her to talk to me – we didn’t exactly move in the same social circles. Although I wasn’t really sure which social circles she was even a part of. But I smiled at her and she shot me a brief smile in return as we made our way out into the sunlight.

  “Would you consider selling your pony?”

  I was so surprised that I stopped walking, until an older boy rammed into me from behind and swore at me, prompting me back into motion. Katy had paused to watch me, and when I caught up with her again I shook my head emphatically.

  “No way. He’s not for sale.”

  Katy looked disappointed. “Shame. He’d make a super Grand Prix pony. Is that your goal with him?”

  “Um…” I hadn’t ever really thought about that. Competition was something we did when we got the chance, but we didn’t have many of those. And getting Squib under control had always been my first priority, with the idea of competing a very distant second. The way he behaved right now left a lot of room for improvement, and Donna had told me more than once that I had a lot of work to do before he would be safe to take out in public.

  “Not really,” I told Katy. “I don’t compete much.”

  She looked at me as though I was crazy. “Why on earth not? Competing is the best part of riding.”

  I bit my tongue for a moment before I responded. “Well, we don’t have a float, so I can only go to shows that are within riding distance, or sometimes I get a ride with people from Pony Club. But it’s hard to find people who want to take Squib because he’s not very good at loading.”

  That was a nice way of putting it. Squib’s aversion to horse floats had started last year when he’d baulked at going onto Donna’s float, after she’d reluctantly agreed to take me to a mounted games day. I’d wanted to stop and let him take his time, but we were running late so Donna had taken over, trying to bully him into it. Half an hour later, a trembling Squib was finally in the float, but he’d travelled badly, behaved terribly at the show, and it had taken almost two hours to get him on again to travel home. Since then, I had always had to allow at least an hour to get him loaded, and sometimes it took more than that. Not surprisingly, it was pretty difficult to get people to volunteer to take a naughty pony who was a devil to load and kicked the sides of the float the whole way there and back.

  “That’s easily fixed though,” Katy said with a shrug. “You should’ve seen what Robin was like when we got him. Just stood at the bottom of the ramp and dug his heels in. But Mum did a ton of work with him on the ground and got him really good, and now he goes in by himself without even being led.”

  I looked at her hopefully. “Could she help me with Squib, do you think?”

  “Sure, why not? It’s not that hard. You just have to get their trust and respect on the ground. Helps when you’re in the saddle too.” She stopped at the next block of classrooms and pointed towards the Art room. “I’m in here now. What’re you doing tomorrow?”

  “Um.” I thought quickly. “No plans.”

  “You should come over. Bring Squib. You can ride to ours, it’s not far.” She gave me quick directions. “Any time. If you come over in the morning you can help me work the ponies. I’ve got far too many at the moment and they all need work at this time of the year. I’m trying to get Mum to put Robin on the market, but she’s holding back until he’s got a few more ribbons to his name.” She rolled her eyes. “I cannot wait to get rid of that useless lump. He’s honestly the most boring pony ever.” Her eyes lit up suddenly. “You can ride him if you want.”

  I raised an eyebrow. “You’re really selling him to me.”

  Katy grinned. “Fair enough. We’ll flip a coin or something. You’ll come though, right?”

  I nodded. I had no other plans for the weekend, and getting some help with Squib sounded wonderful. “Of course.”

  “Awesome. See you tomorrow. Any time after ten or so is fine. Bye!”

  And she turned and hurried into school without a backward glance.

  CHAPTER THREE

  Squib was excited to be going somewhere new, and he tossed his head and yanked at the bit eagerly as I turned him down Katy’s road towards her house.

  “Simmer down,” I told my pony as his hooves danced along the edges of the sealed road. “Don’t dislocate my shoulders before we even get there.”

  I’d woken early that morning, putting on my cleanest jodhs and the smartest polo shirt I owned. Katy might be scruffy at school, but I knew that her standards of turnout for her ponies were extremely high. I’d gone down to the paddock early, and since Squib had actually let me catch him on the first attempt, I’d had time to scrub the grass and manure stains off his hocks and even wash his tail, which was now hanging damp and stringy between his back legs. His tack was as clean as I could get it and he had his best purple saddle blanket on, which I usually reserved for shows.

  I counted the numbers on the letterboxes as Squib spooked and bounded along the road, unable as usual to walk like a normal pony. Why behave sensibly when you can impersonate a carousel horse? The road seemed to stretch on forever, and I was already sweating under my red polo when I finally saw the white post and rail fence and green letterbox that Katy had told me to look out for. A quick glance confirmed that the number was correct, and I turned Squib down the pine-edged driveway and let him trot on. His eyes popped out of the sides of his head as he made his way down at a springy trot, propping and spooking at invisible monsters as he went.

  On the last bend, a bird flew out of the low bushes next to him and he properly spooked this time, shooting forward with his head in the air. I lost a stirrup and even if I hadn’t, I knew I couldn’t stop him. When he dropped the bit like that and ran off on me, all I could do was hold on and hope he’d settle down again soon. Donna always told me to pull him in a tight circle, but that only worked when you had room to turn, and I didn’t. Plus, the last time I’d done that Squib had just about fallen over on top of me, a terrifying moment for both of us that I wasn’t keen to repeat.

  So all of my attempts at looking professional and respectable and not like a complete muppet were utterly destroyed by Squib as we came careening around the corner sideways with his nose pointing at the sky, and my lost stirrup swinging around and hitting him in the flank. And any hope I’d had of managing to get him under control before anyone noticed was quickly squashed, because he skidded straight into the middle of a small yard where both Katy and her mother were standing.

  Katy was sitting on the back of a gorgeous bay pony, the reins slack on its neck as she chatted with her mum, who was fussing with the bridle. They all spun around and stared at me as Squib bolted towards them, and Katy’s pony snorted and backed up swiftly, eyes wide.

  There was barely enough room to turn Squib, but I had to try, so I grabbed at the left rein and pulled him away from Katy’s unhappy pony as D
eb jumped out of the way.

  “I’m so sorry,” I managed to shout over the clatter of my pony’s hooves as I hauled him around.

  Fortunately the sight of another pony had piqued Squib’s interest, and he was relatively easy to stop. He stood still at last, blowing hard as he stared excitedly at Katy’s pony, then tossed his head and pawed the ground.

  “Talk about your dramatic entrance,” Katy said as she urged her pony forward, while Deb walked up to Squib and rubbed his head.

  “Morning.”

  “Hi. I’m so sorry,” I said again as Katy’s pony baulked at coming any closer to mine, and I can’t say as I blamed her.

  “Does he do that a lot?” Deb asked, looking carefully at Squib’s snaffle bit.

  My heart sank as I waited to hear the inevitable next comment, about how I should put him in a Pelham bit, or a gag, so that I would have more control. Except that I’d tried both of those bits, and they’d both made him worse. Besides, although I didn’t know much about riding, I’d read lots of books on horse training and they all said that milder bits were better, and horses that were hard to control in gentle bits just needed more schooling.

  “Have you tried him in a copper roller, or a Waterford?” Deb asked me, confirming my expectations. I shook my head. I had no idea what those bits were, but I didn’t really want to take him out of his snaffle.

  “And at least a martingale. Stop him sticking his head all the way up and getting away from you,” Katy added.