by Kate Lattey
“So have you put your name forward for Ireland yet?” Katy asked me later as we sprawled out in her truck, eating pizza out of the boxes.
“Yeah, Dad sent the application in a couple of days ago,” I told her. “You?”
“Mmhmm.” Katy picked a mushroom off the piece of pizza in her hand and flicked it back into the box, then took a small bite. “Signed, sealed and delivered. Well, emailed.”
“Ugh, I’m so jealous,” AJ grumbled.
None of us said anything. Even without her injury, AJ didn’t have the experience or competition record to be in the running for a team event like that. I would’ve liked to have her on the team though, I realised. Of all the people in the room, she was the one I liked the most.
“I’m not,” Tess said firmly, tossing a crust back into the pizza box and picking up another slice. “You’re welcome to it.”
“You just don’t want to go because you wouldn’t be able to take Jonty with you,” Katy teased her. “You’d have to spend more than twelve hours apart.” She gave a dramatic gasp and clutched at her chest. “Heaven forbid.”
“Don’t be jealous, Katy,” Jonty told her, stretching his legs out in front of him and scratching the bottom of one foot with his opposite toe. “Just because Tess got in first.”
Katy spluttered. “Hah! Not if you were the last person on earth.”
“Hey now,” Tess retorted, indignant on her boyfriend’s behalf, and he turned and grinned at her.
“At least someone loves me.”
Katy gagged and looked at me, bringing the subject back to her original topic. “So anyway, I’ve been asking around about who else has put their names forward, and I reckon you and I are guaranteed the Junior spots.”
AJ snorted, but Katy ignored her.
“That’d be nice,” I said cautiously. “Better not get ahead of ourselves though.”
Katy waved a hand dismissively. “You have to be under sixteen, so that wipes out the likes of Anna, although I heard she’s gunning for an Intermediate spot, which she’ll probably get because her family’s loaded and they’ve been putting her forward for teams since she was about twelve.” Katy wiped melted cheese off her chin and took another small bite of her pizza. “But in the Juniors, there’s pretty slim pickings. Who else are they gonna take? Grace Campbell’s way too feeble, and Emmalee Wilkinson is too much of a midget. Besides, she’s even more ineffectual than Grace. She only gets round because that pony she’s got is a complete rock star.”
She had a point, but she’d forgotten someone. “Lily Christianson won both the title classes at Nationals,” I pointed out.
Katy pulled a face. “If they put that kid in the team, in her first – first – season of show jumping, then I’d pull out. I’m not even kidding. What a farce that’d be.”
“She’s a good rider,” Tess said. I stopped chewing and looked at her, unsure whether she was playing devil’s advocate, or if she actually thought Lily was a better choice for the team than me or Katy.
“She’s a good poser,” Katy corrected her, unfazed by Tess’s rebuttal. “She can sit in the saddle and look pretty, and she’s got a half-decent eye for a stride. But everything she’s ever ridden is a total pushbutton ride. Chuck her on Misty and see how she gets on,” she suggested with a glint in her eye, and Tess grinned and shook her head.
“He’d probably kill her.”
“Exactly.”
Tess looked over at me, and I felt like I could read her mind. Your ponies are pushbutton rides too. I spoke before she could.
“Another reason I’m glad we bought Forbes,” I said. “He’s given me a chance to prove that I can ride more than just easy ponies.”
“Exactly,” Katy nodded. “And you rode Squib that time, which proves you’re pretty much up for anything.”
AJ immediately intervened in her pony’s defence, and Jonty backed her up as Katy threw her hands up in surrender.
“Fine, Squib’s perfect and wonderful and sublime, whatever,” she said deferentially. “The delusion is real.” She was grinning though, and ducked as AJ threw a piece of mushroom at her head.
“I heard that Stacey Winchester put her name forward,” Tess said, cutting through their squabbling. Everyone stopped talking and stared at her in surprise.
“Seriously? Speaking of delusional. And she’s too old.”
“She wants to go Intermediate,” Tess clarified, making Katy snort again. “Her dad was talking to Mum earlier. He kept going on about them having family over in the UK, and how he has ‘contacts’ that could help the team get set up with the best horses for the competition.”
“Oh please.” Katy rolled her eyes. “You can’t buy or bribe your way onto the team.” Her brow furrowed suddenly and she looked at me. “Can you?”
“I don’t know,” I snapped as everyone’s eyes followed hers. “Why’re you asking me?”
“Keep your hair on, it was just a question,” Katy said, looking offended. “Man, you’re sensitive tonight.” She leaned back against the kitchen cabinet and nudged the pizza box towards me with her foot. “Eat more pizza. That always cheers AJ up.”
AJ ignored her dig. “Speaking of Stacey, I heard she’s bought a new horse.”
We all looked at AJ with interest. The swapping and changing of horses and ponies was a regular occurrence on the circuit, though it happened mostly at the beginning and end of the season.
“I haven’t seen it,” Katy said. “She was only riding that fat black thing today.”
“Be nice, Gothic’s cute,” AJ told her.
“There’s more to a good pony than how cute it is,” Katy retorted.
AJ glared at her. “You only think that because your ponies-”
“Whose horse has Stacey bought?” I asked, interrupting quickly before their bickering got out of hand.
“One of Connor’s,” Katy said casually. “The one they got from Aussie for Grace.” She rolled her eyes disparagingly. “Anna rode it at Nationals, said it’s super hot. How Stacey thinks she’s doing to ride it when she almost got killed the last time she rode anything hot is beyond me, but you can’t fix stupid.”
Star.
As much as I hated Connor, I still liked that mare. And Katy was right that Stacey wasn’t the right rider for her.
“That’s going to end badly,” I concurred. “I tried that horse last weekend, and it…” It was my turn to be interrupted as my cell phone started ringing. I dug it out of my pocket as AJ and Jonty started arguing over who was going to eat the last piece of pizza, or rather who wasn’t, because they were both insisting that the other should have it.
I looked at the screen of my phone to find out who was ringing. Home.
“Hello?”
Mum’s voice, sounding anxious. “Honey, it’s me. There’s something wrong with Buck.”
I felt as though the ground had fallen out from underneath me. “What? What d’you mean? What’s wrong with him?”
Everyone else in the truck had stopped talking and were staring at me in alarm.
“I don’t know.” I could hear the anxiety in her voice. “I’ve called the vet, but he’s been coughing all day and now he’s not breathing properly.”
My heart was pounding, and I was having trouble breathing myself. “What’d the vet say?”
“She’s on her way now.”
I stood up, tossing my half-eaten pizza slice back into the box. I wasn’t going to sit around here while Buck needed me. I owed it to him to go home and check on him.
“I’ll tell Dad. We’ll head out tonight.”
Mum didn’t argue. “I think that’d be best. I’ll ring you back when the vet gets here.”
“Okay.” She hung up before I could, and I stared at the phone blankly for a moment, then looked around at my friends’ concerned faces. “I have to go.”
“Is everything okay?”
“I don’t know. Buck’s sick.” I stared down at the warm phone in my hand, wondering how such an innocuous object co
uld be the bearer of such bad news. “I have to tell Dad. We need to go home.” I was repeating myself, but I couldn’t think of anything else to say.
AJ got to her feet next to me. “We’ll come and help you pack up.” She put her one good arm around my shoulders and squeezed me briefly towards her. “He’ll be okay.”
I wasn’t sure about that, and I knew AJ wasn’t either. But as we flowed out of Katy’s truck as a group and split up, AJ coming with me to tell Dad and get the truck ready, the others going to the yards to pack up my ponies and bring them over to load up, I was immensely grateful that I had friends like these.
CHAPTER EIGHT
~ MAKING PROMISES ~
Much to Dad’s disgust, it was Lesley who attended the call-out. Dad had sworn after her last visit that he wouldn’t have her back, but you couldn’t pick and choose in an emergency.
“Could be a couple of different things,” she told us, her calm voice sounding tinny over the truck’s speaker phone. It was a three hour drive home from Taihape, and we were still on the road when she called to report her findings. “Hard to say right now. I’ve given him something to help him breathe, which he’s doing a bit more easily now.”
Dad’s irritation with her was palpable. He liked straight answers, and didn’t have much patience for people being unsure what the problem was. “Do you have any idea what’s affecting him, or are you just taking a stab in the dark?”
Lesley didn’t seem perturbed by his anger, maintaining the same calm tone. “It looks like bronchitis. Usually caused by a viral infection, but could be allergic. Has he always been stabled at night?”
“Yes. Ever since we’ve owned him, and we’ve had him going on three years now.”
“Anything else in his routine changed?”
Dad glanced at me, and I shook my head. “No. Nothing,” he told the vet. “Everything’s just as it’s always been, except that he picked up this cough when we were down at Nationals last week.”
“Could be a virus then. Just have to make sure it doesn’t get worse, or he could end up with pneumonia. And I’ve taken blood samples, just in case.”
“In case what?” I asked.
“Well, there are a couple of other things that it might be. Just want to be on the safe side, that’s all.”
“What do you think it might be?” I asked nervously, racking my brains for possibilities.
“Oh, there’s a few things.” A hesitation came into Lesley’s relaxed tone at last, as though there was something she wasn’t sure she wanted to say. “He’s running a temperature and I don’t like the colour of his nasal discharge. He’s also got a bit of swelling around his throat. Could just be from all the coughing and breathing trouble he’s been having, or…” She hesitated for a moment, then said the words that made my blood run cold. “…it could be a symptom of strangles.”
Her voice went fuzzy as we hit a patch of bad reception, and I zoned out while Dad yelled at the phone, as though the volume of his voice would help us get better service. Strangles was rare in New Zealand, but it was present. There’d been a couple of recent cases, and although they’d supposedly been successfully contained, it was highly contagious and spread easily. If Buck had picked it up at Nationals, it would be spreading around the country like wildfire right now. I wrapped my arms around myself, shuddering at the thought of him in the middle of all those ponies in the covered yards. He’d been coughing during the whole show. Skip and Forbes could be infected, and any other pony he came into contact with. My heart pounded at the recollection of Buck touching noses with Grace’s pony Summertime at the start of the week. If my pony ended up being responsible for spreading an illness like that right before Horse of the Year, my social outcast status was going to be well and truly fixed for life.
When the line finally cleared, Lesley assured us that it was a highly unlikely scenario, but she thought she’d mention it, just in case.
“It hasn’t been around for a while, but we can’t rule it out just yet. Keep him isolated from the others,” she recommended. “And not stabled, if you can help it. Could just be a dust allergy that’s affecting him, so he’d be better off outside. In a small area though, not a big paddock so he’s not tempted to run around. He should be able to see your other horses, but not get close to them in case he’s infectious. Of course,” she added, “it could be a pollen allergy, in which case he’d be better off inside. Up to you, really.”
I watched Dad’s knuckles whiten on the wheel. “Make your bloody mind up! You’re supposed to be the expert here. You tell us what to do.”
Her steady voice remained calm. “Well like I said, it depends on what’s causing it. But if he was mine, I’d put him outside. Rug him up so he’s warm but not overheating, and keep him in a small, sheltered paddock with a medium amount of grass. Take him off hay and chaff for a few days to see if that makes a difference. If you must feed him hay, make sure you soak it. Sorry, but I’ve got to go. I’ve got a colic to treat. Ring me in the morning and let me know how he’s getting on.”
And the line went dead.
Dad was livid, raging the whole way home about useless vets who couldn’t make a decision to save their lives, and how they wouldn’t give anyone a straight answer any more in case they were wrong and got sued for it. I didn’t point out that he would be the first person to sue if someone misdiagnosed Buck. I knew that Lesley was right that there were any number of things that could be wrong with Buck. I only hoped that we weren’t looking at the worst case scenario.
I just wanted my pony to be okay.
Dad straightened up and wiped his forehead with the back of his arm. “Think that’ll do it?”
I nodded, lowering the torch and looking around. We hadn’t had rain in weeks, and the grass was dry and burnt across our whole property. Finding somewhere to paddock Buck that wasn’t too dusty had been the only thing I’d been able to get Dad to discuss reasonably on the way home. In the end, we’d settled for the back lawn, which had been watered by Mum’s sprinkler system all summer and was the only green grass we had. We’d had to put up electrical tape around the borders to keep Buck off the flowerbeds – not because Dad or I cared particularly about Mum’s plants, but because we were worried that he’d eat something he shouldn’t and make himself even sicker.
Not that he looked very interested in eating anything. I haltered him in the barn and led him out to the lawn, and he walked slowly behind me with his head down. I told myself that it was just the sedation that Lesley had given him taking a while to wear off, and that he’d be perkier in the morning. I led him through the tape gate that Dad was holding open, and stopped him in the middle of the lawn. Buck looked around with vague interest for a second, then sighed and lowered his head again.
I unbuckled his halter and slipped it off his head, then slid a hand under his cover to test his body temperature. He felt warm, and I was worried about him overheating. But if he had pneumonia, I didn’t want him to get a chill, and he was still running a temperature. I wished I knew what to do. I leaned my head against his neck and closed my eyes, listening to the rustling of the trees that surrounded the lawn. At least I’d be able to look out of my bedroom window and check on him.
Skip whinnied from the paddock, where he’d been turned out with Forbes. I’d put them out before I’d been allowed anywhere near Buck, in case he was infectious. They’d both had run around in the paddock like idiots once I’d let them go. Buck had barely reacted at the time, which had worried me, but as Skip’s high-pitched whinny rang out in the night air, Buck lifted his head and let out a throaty attempt at a whinny himself.
I wrapped my arms around his proud neck and hugged him gently. “Feel better soon, buddy. I’ll be down to check on you as soon as it’s light.”
Buck just lowered his head again, and I let him go. He sniffed at the grass at his feet, then sighed, disinterested in food. I pushed down my concerns and gave him one last scratch on his withers as I walked back to the gate, where Dad was waiting.<
br />
“I think I’ll sleep out here tonight,” I told my father.
I expected him to argue, but he just shrugged.
“If you like.”
I nodded, looking back over my shoulder at the dark silhouette of my pony. I couldn’t let anything happen to him. Not on my watch.
I owed him that.
* * *
I woke at dawn, as the birds in the garden started announcing the morning. Stirring slowly, the world came to me in a grey haze at first, and it took me a moment to realise where I was, and to remember why. Then it came back to me, and I sat up quickly, looking around for Buck. For a few heart-stopping seconds, I couldn’t see him at all, but then I located his dark shape standing under the kowhai tree. Struggling out of my sleeping bag, I walked barefoot across the cold grass and spoke softly to him.
Buck turned his head and looked at me, his ears swivelling forward. His eyes were a little brighter, but he still looked miserable. Any dreams I’d had of a miracle recovery were scuppered by the sight of him, and I slipped a hand under his thick rug again to check his temperature. His coat felt damp, and I unbuckled the cover and pulled it back to reveal that he was sweating. Guiltily, I stripped the rug off and ran to the tack room for a lighter one. It only took me a few minutes to find his one, but by the time I got back to Buck’s side he was shivering slightly in the cool morning breeze.
“Sorry buddy.”
I threw the lighter cover over him and fastened it quickly, trying not to think about the way his belly was tucked up under his ribs. Whatever the vet had given him yesterday hadn’t worked. I was supposed to ring her this morning and give her an update, but knowing Dad, he’d refuse to have her back and be looking for another opinion. I bundled up the discarded cover into my arms and took it to the gate, then stopped. If Buck had strangles, this rug would be contagious. And I’d touched him, then gone into the stables and touched all the covers on the racks. I dropped the rug onto the wet grass and sank down on top of it, furious with myself. Balling my hands into fists, I thumped the heavy cover angrily. My temper flared, raged inside me like an angry beast, and I let it take over, punching and kicking the cover until I was out of breath. I threw it as far from me as I could and stood there staring at it, sweat breaking out on my skin despite the morning chill. Buck was staring at me in alarm, his nostrils flared wide.