Pony Jumpers 7- Seventh Place

by Kate Lattey

  “Have you put her name down for the team going to Ireland in May?” the woman asked, and Lily’s mother nodded.

  “Of course, Lily’s so excited about the prospect. We’ve got our fingers tightly crossed!”

  I frowned as I watched Happ jumped tidily through the double, Lily still posing perfectly on his back. She looked good, but if she’d only started riding two years ago, how could she realistically have enough experience to compete in a big team competition on borrowed horses? It was only Happ’s honest nature and impeccable schooling that was getting her around the course clear today. They came down to the treble combination, and Happ steadied himself as he approached the line of fences, trying to get a read on the question. Lily misunderstood his intentions and spurred him on, thinking he was baulking. Obediently, the pony sped up, reaching the first fence with too much pace, and I sucked in a sharp breath. But he made it over the first fence cleanly, and Lily at least had the good sense to give him his head and let him get out of trouble. He was incredible and managed, somehow, to jump through clear.

  Lily’s mother started bleating on about how brave her daughter was, instead of praising the pony for his exceptional ability to get her out of trouble, so I turned Skip and rode away. I was sure my parents had been equally eager to gloat about me when I was younger, but it didn’t make it any less nauseating to listen to.

  I took Skip over the vertical once more as Anna jogged Saxon to the gate for her round. Dad returned with my gloves, and I thanked him as I pulled them on. I actually hated riding in gloves, but it was a bit late to change my mind now.

  Lily rode out of the ring, patting her pony enthusiastically as the announcer confirmed that she’d had a clear round. “We have two riders left to jump, and they both need to go clear to stay in the running for the overall Championship,” the announcer said gleefully. “The points are very tight at the top of the table, and there is no margin for error.”

  Great. I declined Dad’s suggestion that I jump one more practice fence, and went to the gate and watched Anna go. Saxon jumped the first half of the course well, but he slipped on the way to the treble and had the first rail down.

  “That’s her out of it,” Dad said, sounding annoyingly smug. “Now, remember. You have to go clear, and you have to finish first or second in the jump-off to get the win. Well, you can manage third if Lily doesn’t place above you, but if she beats you then you’ll drop down to second…”

  I did my best to tune him out as Anna completed the course. She didn’t have any more faults, but she looked bitterly disappointed as she cantered through the finish flags, knowing that her last shot at the title was gone.

  “And now we have our final rider on course,” came the call, startling Skip sideways as we trotted past the speaker. “Susannah Andrews and Skybeau, currently at the top of the table by a whisker, and needing a clear round within the time to progress to the jump off.”

  I took a breath, squeezed Skip up into a canter, and let everything else fade out. No crowd. No pressure. Nothing except the pony beneath me, the rhythm of his strides as he cantered across the hard ground.

  One, two, three.

  Skip’s breaths. The arch of his neck as he lifted his head to sight the first fence.

  One, two, three.

  The reins between my gloved fingers. My seat sinking into the saddle on the approach. My legs wrapping around his sides.

  The lightest touch of the spur.

  One, two, three.

  Over the white oxer, and around the corner to fence two. Skip’s legs tucked up tight beneath us as he cleared it. The gentle thud as we landed.

  One, two, three.

  Someone shouted, and there was a clatter of poles at the practice fence. People all around us started moving, turning away, their attention distracted by whatever was going on outside of the ring. Skip slowed down slightly and I kicked him on. Too hard. He launched forward and flung himself into the air over the rustic oxer, but hit the back rail hard on the way down.

  I shouldn’t have done it – it’s a cardinal rule of show jumping that you don’t look back. You should never look back. But I had to know whether the rail had fallen, whether my chance was gone. So I turned my head, only for a moment. Just to check.

  The rail was still sitting in its cups. But my relief was short-lived as I looked back to where we were headed and realised that Skip had locked onto the blue vertical – but it was the wrong fence. I pulled him out sharply, and he flung his head up, startled. Fence five, a wide triple bar, was right in front of us and at a nearly impossible angle. For a second, I wondered whether I should just pull out and circle, conceding four faults for crossing my tracks, but not asking my pony to do the impossible. But I didn’t. I had to commit to the fence, or Dad would give me hell all the way home. So I sat down harder and spurred Skip on, sure that he could do it if he only tried hard enough.

  Skip shot forward, snatching at the bit, his head high in the air. Too late, I realised that we wouldn’t make it. Too late, I realised that I’d asked too much of my gallant pony.

  Too late.

  Skip knew, moments before I did, that I was asking him to do the impossible. He started to add a stride, then gave up and slammed on the brakes. His forelegs collided with the front of the jump, and poles rained down as the wings knocked into each other, demolishing the entire fence.

  The bell rang to stop me, and I backed Skip slowly out of the wreckage and gave him an apologetic pat, my heart sinking. He jogged nervously, sweating hard, his eyes rolling.

  “I’m sorry mate,” I murmured to him. “That was entirely my fault. I’m so sorry.”

  I circled him, continuing to rub his neck reassuringly as he slowed to a walk, starting to relax a little. I leaned against his neck and put an arm around him, giving him a cuddle. He tucked his nose in and let out a deep breath, and I reached forward and rubbed behind his ears, talking softly to him the whole time.

  The bell rang again, and I straightened up and shortened my reins. Skip danced underneath me, his nerves returning, and I took a deep breath of my own. Looked towards the jump, and saw Connor.

  He was moonlighting as a ring steward and had helped them to reset the fence. Now he was walking back into the centre of the ring alongside the course designer. Watching me. He smirked as he caught my eye, and my insides clenched up reflexively.

  Ignore him. Just go. I picked up a canter, and rode Skip down to the triple bar, focusing hard on getting a better distance this time. My pony was still unsure, swerving slightly on the approach, but I got him to the base and this time he cleared the jump.

  “Good boy,” I told him as we cantered around the corner. We were out of the running now, but I wanted Skip to regain his confidence before I took him out of the ring.

  One, two, three.

  I should’ve quit while I was ahead. Skip was still rattled, and he hit the planks, spooked at the wall, and backed off so much at the treble that it was all I could do to keep him cantering through it. He scraped over all three jumps, but he wasn’t happy about it, and I felt terrible as I cantered through the flags, knowing that we’d just put in the worst performance of our career.

  Dad met me at the gate, so angry that he could barely look at me. He just walked alongside me as I rode back towards the truck, his only concession being to pat Skip briefly on the neck, recognising that it wasn’t the pony’s fault that we’d had such a disastrous round. He stayed quiet while I untacked Skip and hosed him down, took out his studs and gave him a feed. He didn’t say anything as I bandaged the other ponies’ legs and got them ready to travel, ignoring me as much as he could while he mucked out and tidied the yards, packed up our buckets and emptied our haynets.

  He saved his remonstrations until we were ready to go, with the ponies on board and the truck packed tight. He climbed up into the cab and turned the key, waiting for the glow light to go off before he started the diesel engine. I rolled down the passenger window to let some fresh air into the hot cab as the
loudspeaker blared out over the show grounds, giving the final results after the jump off. Lily had won. Dad snorted and started the engine, drowning out the announcement of the remaining placings. I heard cheering as Lily rode into the ring, and Dad finally spoke.

  “That should’ve been you.”

  I flinched as he finally spoke, and dared to look in his direction, but he was staring straight ahead.

  “What were you thinking?”

  “I lost focus, that’s all,” I muttered.

  “That’s all?” He took a breath, preparing to continue, but I cut him off.

  “Dad, don’t. I know, okay? I know that I screwed up. I don’t need you to tell me everything I did wrong, because I know. I got distracted. I looked back. I made my poor pony jump off stupid angles. I missed distances. I’m lucky Skip didn’t throw me into the jumps in disgust, and I would’ve deserved it if he had.” I racked my brains for more things that Dad might say, wanting to say them out loud before he could. “I’ve wasted your time and your money and I’m sorry, okay?”

  Dad looked at me as he drove slowly out of the show grounds, then nodded, accepting my apology.

  I rested my head back into the corner of the cab and closed my eyes, trying to forget. Dad turned the radio on, filling the cab with upbeat pop music.

  …’cause I am a champion, and you’re gonna hear me…

  I flinched, and Dad hit a button, changing the radio station. I closed my eyes as the new lyrics swirled around me, trying to ignore the clenching in my stomach.

  Who do you think you are? Running ‘round, leaving scars…

  This song was even worse than the last one. I tried to refocus my thoughts, tried to concentrate on the round I’d just jumped, mercilessly picking apart my own performance as I strove desperately to ignore the other voice in my head. The one that didn’t care about how badly Skip had jumped. The one that was still freaking out about last night.

  But it wouldn’t be silenced.

  I wish I had missed the first time that we kissed…

  I wished I could go back, could rewind the clock three days, could do this entire weekend over again. There were so many things I would’ve done differently. And never striking up a conversation with Connor in the first place was right there at the top of the list.

  But you knew, the voice inside me said. You knew who he was, and what he was like. You knew better, but you couldn’t help being flattered by the attention. You thought maybe you were different, not like the other girls. You thought maybe he really truly liked you. The voice gave a mocking laugh. But why would he?

  I shook my head, trying to make the voice shut up. I opened my eyes again and stared out at the rolling brown hills on either side of us, trying really hard not to let my father see me cry.

  CHAPTER SIX

  ~ FIGHT OR FLIGHT ~

  It was almost a relief to be back at school on Tuesday. Nobody there knew anything about what had gone on at Nationals – the handful of other girls in my year who were riders weren’t competitive enough to compete at the same shows as I did. They rode at a local riding school, borrowing ponies for Pony Club, still desperately trying to talk their parents into purchasing one for them. Susannah Andrews, with her string of show jumpers and obsessive parents, was outside of their realm of experience, and they seemed to want to keep it that way.

  I sat through our introduction assembly, barely listening as the Headmistress and her offsiders prattled on about applying ourselves and being the best we could be, while all around me girls fidgeted and whispered and compared nail polish and tan lines. I pretended to listen, my thoughts still at home, in the paddock behind the barn, where Buck was grazing in a paddock alongside the other two ponies. I hoped he was okay.

  He hadn’t had another coughing episode until we got home, but he’d developed a murky discharge from one nostril that was concerning enough for Dad to call our local vet clinic for a second opinion. Much to Dad’s disappointment, our usual vet Donald was on a six month sabbatical. Dad liked Donald, because he’d always listen carefully to my father as though he knew what he was talking about, and always pretended to take his opinion into account. He also always prescribed some form of medication, even if it was one of the many occasions when Dad had called him in for next to no reason. I wasn’t sure whether it was to make Dad feel like he’d got his money’s worth or because he just wanted to milk us for all we were worth. Probably both. I was fairly certain that Donald could’ve bought himself a holiday house with the money that Dad had pumped into his practice over the years, but at least he knew how to keep my father placated.

  The new vet, Lesley, didn’t have the same finesse. She was a small, youngish woman with a thick mane of auburn hair and a firm handshake. Dad had immediately tried to tell her how to do her job, so she’d promptly ignored him, turning her back on him to examine Buck, even shushing him while she’d listened to my pony’s heartbeat. It would’ve been funny if it hadn’t made Dad so angry. She’d concurred that Buck appeared to have contracted a very mild cold, but that he wasn’t running a fever, so she simply prescribed isolation and rest for a few days until he was back to himself. When Dad had told her that it was midsummer and a ridiculous time for anyone to get a cold, she had simply smiled at him and said that he was probably right. She’d swabbed a small amount of clear nasal discharge but had refused to give us any antibiotics in the absence of clear symptoms. Dad had been livid at what he interpreted as a refusal to adequately medicate Buck, and her suggestion to feed him crushed garlic in a bran mash “if you must give him something” had met with further anger, which she’d continued to seem utterly oblivious to. Eventually she’d offered to inject Buck with a placebo if it would make Dad feel better, and he’d stormed out of the barn. Lesley had just winked at me as she snapped her kit shut, and told me to ring her if anything changed.

  People around me started to move, and I realised that we were finally done. I checked the timetable that I’d downloaded last night and headed towards my new classroom, stopping off on the way for a visit to the toilets. There was a crush of girls in there, peering at themselves in the mirror and applying makeup, telling each other to hurry up, they’d be late and they didn’t want to be in trouble on the first day. Everyone was waiting for at least one other person, chattering non-stop as they admired each other’s new hair colour or new jewellery or surreptitious tattoos that were barely hidden under ankle socks. I felt their eyes sliding across me as I waited impatiently for a cubicle, blending into the background of their laments about the classes they’d been put into, the teachers they’d have to suffer through, the tragic loss of summer’s freedom.

  When I finally got access to a cubicle, I shut the door behind me and twisted the lock, then I saw something written on the back of the door that made my skin turn cold.

  For a good time, call Susie.

  It wasn’t about me, I told myself. Nobody here called me Susie, and it wasn’t my phone number underneath, but it rattled me nonetheless. I took a deep breath and pressed the heels of my hands against my eyes. Calm down. Just breathe. I felt like a skittish horse in a new situation, with no idea of how to react, and an overwhelming instinct to run away. Fast.

  Horses have what’s known as a flight instinct. Like other prey animals, their natural predisposition is to run away when they feel threatened. Unlike predators, who are far more likely to stand their ground and fight. I’ve always been a fighter. I come from a long line of fighters, of people who won’t back down, no matter what.

  And look where that’s got us.

  I gritted my teeth, hating the tightness in my muscles, the roiling in my stomach, the cold sweat on my skin. I wanted to run, but there was nowhere to go, and nothing to run from. But there was nothing to fight either. Just bad memories. I shook my head, telling myself to be strong, and put what had happened at Nationals behind me. It hadn’t even been that big of a deal, that much of a terrible thing. Far worse things than that happened to other people all the time, and they cou
ld still get out of bed in the morning and function normally.

  So what was wrong with me?

  I heard the outer door swing open, and a woman’s voice. “Everyone get to your classrooms now, come on. There’s no time for lollygagging about.”

  Even if I hadn’t instantly recognised Ms Bryant’s cheerful tone, I’d have known her for the use of such a ridiculous turn of phrase as ‘lollygagging’. I’d had several sessions with our guidance counsellor last year, and although I’d actually found her surprisingly easy to talk to, I froze up at the thought of her calling me back into her office this year.

  I wanted to have good news for her, but nothing good seemed to have happened lately.

  “Sorry I’m late! I’ve got a note.”

  I lifted my head and watched as Callie Taylor strode across to Miss Rutherford’s desk with her trademark self-assurance. If there was a most popular girl award for our year, Callie would win it. Tall, blonde and beautiful, she turned heads every time she walked into a room, and she knew it. I watched her, wishing that I had a fraction of her self-confidence.

  She waved a piece of blue paper at Miss Rutherford, then slapped it down on her desk and spun away, her glossy hair swirling around her shoulders. The note lifted into the air, caught up in Callie’s wake, and slipped between Miss Rutherford’s fingers as she reached for it. I watched the slip of paper flutter to the floor as Callie scanned the room, deciding where to sit. There was an empty desk next to her best friend Esther Blake, sitting a couple of rows back, but Callie sat down at the empty desk next to me instead.

  Miss Rutherford scowled as she used a long fingernail to lift the paper from the floor, and the low murmur of conversation picked up in volume again. Callie crossed her legs and turned in her chair to face me with a friendly smile.

  “Hi Susannah. How was your summer?”

  “Um, good. How was yours?” I tried to play it cool, as though she talked to me all the time, while my heart hammered in my chest in astonishment at being singled out for her attention.