by Natale Ghent
When we get to the barn, the lane has been plowed. A truck with a horse trailer is idling in front of the barn. We exchange nervous glances, then go inside. The Gorilla is there, packing up his things.
“Damned if I’m going to keep my horse in this barn,” he rages. “If it’s not people stealing my tack, it’s beams falling down. I’ve had enough!”
I remember the noseband in my coat pocket and feel a rush of guilt. Cid and Queenie don’t even know that I still have it. I tried to put it back that night Cheryl and I were here. I never meant to keep it.
Despite our fear, we walk cautiously to the back room. But the only reminder of the horrible event is the fallen beam. It’s been pushed to one side, the butt end still resting in the trough where it ended Jed’s life. Ted Henry is nowhere in sight.
“You won’t find anything to gape at,” the Gorilla calls after us. “The sordid deal has been addressed. You kids should get out while you can. The whole damned place could come crashing around your heads.”
The Gorilla continues to rant like this as he cleans out his belongings. He sure didn’t waste a minute finding another barn to keep his colt, which makes me wonder what he was doing here in the first place. I mean, it definitely wouldn’t be my choice if I had a choice at all. But three kids with a free pony and a paper-route income can’t be choosers, so to speak.
We sit and watch him as he leads the colt from the barn and into the trailer. I even help him with the door. When the colt is secure, he starts to back his truck out slowly.
“Wait!” I shout, running up to the truck. I pull the noseband from my coat pocket and hand it to him.
He stares at it, then looks at me.
“I’m sorry,” I mumble.
The Gorilla sighs and nods knowingly. “Keep it,” he finally says. “And good luck.”
I walk back to the barn, the noseband in my pocket, my heart as heavy as a stone. “What about Smokey, Nat?” Queenie asks. “What if more beams fall?”
“They won’t,” I say, even though I am afraid that they will. “This old barn has been standing for 100 years and it will stand for 100 more. That beam fell because Jed got his head stuck like that. It won’t happen again.”
We all stand there saying nothing, the weight of my words pressing down on us. None of us feels good about the situation. I wish we had a truck with a trailer and somewhere else to go, but we don’t.
Back in the barn, Queenie fashions a little cross out of straw and places it on the trough where Jed fell. When she’s done, I tie a piece of binder twine across the doorway that leads back to that part of the barn. It isn’t much, but somehow it makes us feel better, as though the twine somehow separates us from the horrible event and all it signifies.
We take extra care grooming Smokey. We stop every so often just to look at him and to hug him, which we always do, but today we do it more than ever. The mood is heavy and sad, nomatter what we say to change it. We don’t talk about what happened to Jed or even mention his name, but our eyes and our faces show how we really feel.
chapter 16
and no birds sing
With all that happened over the holidays, I forgot about my anger over Cheryl. Now I’m walking to school and I haven’t a clue what to do when I see her. Maybe I’ll ignore her like she isn’t even there. Or maybe I’ll give her a piece of my mind and tell her what a little witch she really is. Maybe I’ll punch Tyler in the face in front of the whole school and then walk over and plant a kiss right on Cheryl’s mouth. I’ll do that, then walk away and leave her standing there wishing for more.
But I don’t do any of these things. When I get to history class, she’s sitting in her seat. I just sit in my seat too and try to think of a way to turn around and take a look at her, the same as always. When I do manage to catch a glimpse, she doesn’t even notice me. She’s bent over her book—in her blue sweater and looking prettier than ever—poring over some boring bit of history. Just looking at her, so beautiful like that, I suddenly know that I’m doomed. I’ll never beable to say no to her, or be mean to her, or ignore her. I’ll never be able to get over her, ever.
It’s the same way in English class, only she sits in front of me, so I have no control over the situation. We’re studying John Keats and I finally understand why he wrote “La Belle Dame sans Merci.” I am that “wretched wight” loitering on the cold hillside, and Cheryl is the ruthless faery child, luring me in with her beauty and her enchanting faery song. She stole my heart and made me think she loved me. I even gave her a ride on my horse, just like the man in the poem. And now my soul is damned to wander like the pale and gaping kings and princes and warriors that Keats wrote about, their “starv’d lips” held open in eternal warning. No wonder Keats died at twenty-six. I let out an involuntary moan and look up to find the entire class—including the teacher—looking at me.
“Would you like to share with the rest of the class?” Mr. Schneider asks.
“No, sir.”
Mr. Schneider looks at me with curiosity. The rest of the class just stares, all pale and gaping like those damned souls in the poem—except for Cheryl, whose icy blue eyes give me nothing.
The bell rings and I’m set free to wrestle withmy plight. I feel a bump on my shoulder and turn to find Cheryl brushing past me, as though we had never spoken. Tyler is waiting in his car in front of the school. Cheryl jumps in and they speed off around the corner. So that’s the way it’s going to be.
The kids shove past me on the stairs. My heart aches like it’s being stomped on by a thousand dirty sneakers. My legs feel weak and I think I’m going to faint. And now I wish that Cheryl really had never spoken to me. I wish she’d never enchanted me with her beauty and her faery song. I was fine before, when I thought I didn’t have a chance, but now I’m lost forever.
* * *
I leave school early and race up the hill to get to the barn. I have to see Smokey. I have to feel his warmth and life against me. Cid and Queenie will catch up to me later, I tell myself as I crunch through the snow up the hill.
That’s when I see the silver Pontiac. It drifts right past me and slows to a stop at the top of the hill. I tear up the street and skid alongside the car, pounding my hands on the driver’s side window.
“Dad!”
The man turns and looks at me, and I feel asthough I’ve been shot through the stomach. It’s not my dad. It’s some stranger I’ve never seen before. He rolls down the window.
“Can I help you, son?”
I shake my head and back away like I’ve seen a ghost. “I … I’m sorry, mister. I thought you were someone else.”
I turn and run across the street to the lane that leads to the barn. I feel stupid and embarrassed, but most of all, I feel mad. I know now that Dad will never come back. I guess it’s pride or disappointment that makes me decide this next thing, but whatever the reason, I can’t help it. I decide not to tell Cid and Queenie about the Pontiac. I decide that as far as I’m concerned, I don’t care if I never see my dad again. As far as I’m concerned, he may as well be dead.
Inside the barn, I discover several empty stalls. In fact, nearly all of them are empty. Pip and the palominos are gone. There are only two horses left, Flag and the quarter horse mare named Silver. Silver will be next to go, I think.
Smokey snorts softly as I walk along the aisles of abandoned stalls. He must know that something is up. I feel sorry for him, not knowing why all the other horses are leaving. I go in Smokey’s stall and he leans against me, his gentle eyesblinking in confusion, his head lowered against my stomach.
“It’s okay, boy,” I tell him.
I rub his mane and speak words of encouragement, but they sound empty, even to me. There’s a bang on the door and Cid and Queenie tumble in from the cold. They see my sad face and look around the empty barn.
“Where’d they all go?” Queenie asks.
“They’re gone. Same as the Gorilla. Nobody wants to keep their horse in a barn that’s falling down.”
Cid looks at me in dismay. “But you said it wasn’t falling down. You said it’s been standing for 100 years and it’ll stand for 100 more.”
She says this with concern, not anger, because she wants me to tell her that everything’s going to be okay. But I can’t. Not today. Not after everything. Not after Dad and Cheryl and Jed and all the empty stalls. It’s too much, even for me.
“What does this mean, Nat?” Queenie asks.
“It doesn’t mean anything. We’re going to stay until we have to leave. Those other people left because they felt guilty. They never took good care of their horses and they’re afraid the same thing will happen to their horses as happened to Jed. They’ve probably gone off to some stupidfancy barn where other people feed and ride your horse for you.”
Cid and Queenie say nothing. I’m sure they’re thinking the same as me about choices and options and whatnot. But we can’t all start thinking like that or we’re done.
I pull the Gorilla’s noseband from my pocket.
“Nat! How could you?” Cid gasps, thinking I’d stolen it.
“It’s okay,” I tell her. “He gave it to me. He felt sorry for us, I guess.”
Cid thinks about this, then nods solemnly.
“Come on,” I say at last. “Let’s gear Smokey up and take him for a ride around the field.”
We spend the next hour taking turns on the sled. Smokey draws us along without a fuss. He doesn’t once try to bolt. Even he seems to understand that things will never be the same.
chapter 17
things fall apart
By the time the first green of spring is pushing up through the snow, all the other horses have been moved out. The barn is lonelier than ever now. The sliding doors creak and bang in the wind, but it isn’t the same haunted sound as before. It’s empty, like the sound of something giving up. I can’t even feel Clem hanging around in the rafters any more.
This makes us uneasy for the future of things, but at least we don’t have to worry about sneaking around to get hay and straw for Smokey. There’s enough in the loft to last a small pony for years. And we don’t even have to pay rent, because Ted Henry is never around. I guess he doesn’t feel right taking our money when we’re the only ones left. Or maybe he’s just ashamed to talk to us after what happened with Jed. Besides, 10 dollars a month won’t buy him enough of anything to justify the asking.
We tend to Smokey as always, but we’re empty of joy. We go through the motions, just waitingfor the axe to fall. With every day the feeling grows that we’re running out of time.
* * *
I’m sitting in class when an announcement comes over the PA system for me to go to the office. The other kids stare at me as though I’m in the worst kind of trouble, but I can’t imagine what I’ve done. The secretary is waiting for me in the office.
“Your mother phoned. There was a fire at the barn.”
She stares at me to see my reaction. My mind goes white. “What do you mean? Where’s Smokey? What about my pony?”
“The fire’s out, but I don’t know anything about your pony. Your mother said to let you out of school early, so you’re free to go—if you want to.”
She adds this last bit like it would be a bad decision for me to leave. Of course I want to leave early! What did she think I was going to do? Hang around in class while my pony burns in a fire? I don’t even grace her with an explanation. I just turn and run out of the office.
The first thing I think is that I’d better grab Cid. I can’t face this by myself. I run across the street as fast as I can. There’s a group of no-goods smokingin front of the high school. One of them hollers at me as I run by. I’m afraid of getting lost inside the school because there are several stairways and every one seems to lead to nowhere, but then I see a small sign that says “Office,” so I run down the hall in that direction.
The secretary at Cid’s school is no better than mine, thumbing slowly through a binder looking for Cid’s homeroom number like she has all the time in the world. She finally finds what she’s looking for, then calls over the PA. Cid appears in the doorway almost immediately. I tell her about the fire and we all but fly out of the office, leaving the secretary just standing there.
We burst out the school doors, running towards the barn. Then suddenly I stop. “What about Queenie? We can’t just go without telling her.”
“But what if Smokey’s dead?” Cid says. “What if he’s all—”
She doesn’t finish but I know what she’s thinking. What if Smokey’s all burned? I can’t let my mind rest on this thought.
“We have to get her. It’s only right that we go together.”
The principal at Queenie’s school doesn’t want to let her go, but I convince him he has to. I even tell him to call Ma, which he does, and Ma confirmsour story. The next thing we know, we’re running full tilt up the hill. With every beat of my shoes on the pavement I move one step closer to what I’m sure is disaster. I don’t want to think such bad thoughts but my mind won’t stop. I see Smokey trapped in his stall, the flames jumping and leaping all around him, his eyes rolling in terror as he tries to kick his way out. I imagine his tail and his mane all singed. I see him jumping over the fence in the field and running off, only to be hit by a car and killed.
I imagine all these things until I feel like I’m going to scream with fear and worry. I think about how the fire started and why. I can’t help thinking that Ted Henry himself must have done it, for the insurance or something. I’m all ready to blame him, even though I have no idea if he’s responsible or not.
“This is so horrible,” Cid keeps saying, over and over.
Queenie runs beside us, her face a picture of worry. I’m sure she’d love to disappear inside her head and dance the whole thing away. But she can’t. Not this time.
When we get to the barn, I can see that the roof has collapsed. The smell of burned wood and hayhangs in the air. There are a few gawkers standing around.
“Where’s our pony?” I yell at one of the men.
The man looks at me in shock. “He’s all right,” he finally says. “He’s ‘round back in the field. A neighbour saw the fire and let him out. You kids are lucky, all right,” he adds. “This could have been a catastrophe. A real catastrophe.”
He says this as though it was our fault the barn caught on fire. I guess it must seem strange to him that we’re the only ones keeping a horse here in these conditions. I guess he thinks we have choices.
We rush around the barn to the field. Smokey whinnies loudly when he sees us and canters up to the fence. We jump the fence to check him over. He is so happy to see us, he places a hoof on my shoe in greeting.
“He’s fine. He’s okay,” I tell Cid and Queenie, who go over him looking for scratches and bruises. “Aside from being really lonely, I think he’s none the worse for the situation.”
But none of us wants to leave. We stay until it grows really dark. Before we go, we fill a bucket with water and place it in the field with Smokey. I check the latch on the gate to make sure it’s secure.
“What are we going to do now, Nat?” Queenie asks.
“He’ll be fine here until we can think of something. There’s enough grass coming up to keep him fed, and now that it’s warmer, he should be okay staying outside overnight.”
“What about all our stuff—Smokey’s sign and our brushes? Do you think they were burned in the fire? And what about the sled?”
I was thinking all these things too, and I didn’t have an answer. “Well, we can’t go in just yet. We’ll wait until things die down so we can sneak in and get our things. But we’ll have to wait until tomorrow or maybe even later, when no one’s around.”
Ma is waiting for us when we get home. Her face looks old and drawn.
“Is Smokey all right? The man who phoned couldn’t tell me much.”
We tell her all about the fire and what we think happened. We tell her about Smokey being fine out in the field. Ma listens intently. S
he doesn’t ask many questions but lets us tell the story without interruption. When we’re finished, she leans back in her chair and lets out a heavy sigh. She looks at us long and hard, and I can tell she’s ready to drop a bomb.
“There’s no easy way to say this. We have to sell the house.”
“What?!”
“We have to sell the house. We have no choice. I can’t keep up with it.”
Cid and I howl in protest. Queenie slips into the living room and starts to dance.
“You can’t sell the house, Ma! Where are we going to live?”
“There’s an apartment up the street for rent. It’s big enough for all of us.”
“What if we don’t want to live in an apartment? What if we don’t want to go?”
“Nathaniel, we have no choice,” Ma says with resignation.
“But I can help you, Ma. I can help pay the bills.”
Ma stares at me, her shoulders rounded and her eyes sad. “I know you would, Nat. I know. But the money you earn from your paper route isn’t enough to dig us out of the hole we’re in. We have no choice but to sell. I wasn’t going to tell you just yet, with the fire at the barn and all….”
“Sounds like you’ve already made up your mind.”
Ma looks at the floor. “I have. A man came around today saying he has a buyer. All I have to do is sign the offer.”“How much are they going to pay?” I ask with disdain.
“It’s a good offer, Nat. It’s more than we paid for the place.”
“So that’s it?” Cid shouts. “That’s all there is to it? We just leave and never see our house again? And then what? We just keep moving and moving forever? Why don’t you just shoot us all in the head!”
Ma’s voice disappears to a whisper. “My hands are tied.”
Cid and I leave the table in disgust. I feel bad leaving Ma like that. I can tell she is tired and broken. I can tell she can’t go on struggling any more. But I can’t help myself. I don’t know how much more I can take. I thought the barn catching on fire was bad, but this is worse.