True Blue

by Jane Smiley

  As for Mom and Daddy and me, we said nothing important. Mom would have said that there was nothing like a long walk in the cold to get a man to think about things, and maybe that was true. For thinking, she always said, walking was way better than driving or even riding a horse. At any rate, Daddy did have his Bible at the breakfast table, but he didn’t open it for us or quote anything. Maybe he thought the Golden Rule would show up again, and the Golden Rule was clearly on Danny’s side, because if Daddy was going to buy horses, then he had to let others buy horses from him.

  All this did not mean that I was in a good mood when I went out to the stable to give Melinda and Ellen their lessons. I wasn’t. I thought it was a long trip and a lot of saying the same thing over and over, and yes, the money was good, but some days you were so lazy that even money seemed boring. I was in such a bad mood that I could not think of a single thing to buy with my money (if and when the time came to spend it) that might make it worth the trouble to earn it, but I didn’t say any of these grumpy things to Mom, because if I had, then I would have to be patient while she talked about being reliable and doing a good job no matter what and life is toil, and those sort of things, which are the sort of things that every person in the world who has horses already knows.

  I was there before Melinda, who was five minutes late, so Rodney had already given Gallant Man to me, and I was sitting on the mounting block scratching his ears when the limousine drove up with Melinda in the backseat. The chauffeur let her out and she came running over and hugged me and then hugged the pony, and then she petted the pony very carefully along the bottom of his mane, and took the reins, and pulled down her stirrups, and then stood him up next to the mounting block and got on without being told to or whining. Then she picked up her reins and lowered her heels and settled into her saddle. She looked me in the eye and said, “Ready?”

  I burst out laughing, and Melinda laughed, too, and the whole lesson was like that—nothing new, because you can’t have something new in every single lesson. Sometimes you just have to practice what you already know until you are doing it automatically, and that is what we did. The surprise was when she waited with me for Ellen, and then handed the reins to her when Ellen came running from the parking lot. Ellen scowled when she first saw Melinda, but Melinda smiled, and so Ellen smiled, and Melinda did a smart thing—she held on to the reins for just an extra second until Ellen remembered to say “thank you.” Melinda said, “You’re welcome.” And then, “Have fun!” And she hugged me around the waist before running away, I suppose, to find Jane.

  As we walked to the arena, Ellen said, in a very grown-up voice, “Did Melinda have a good lesson?”

  I said, “Yes, she did. Very good.”

  Ellen’s heels immediately went straight down and her chin went up and her chest went out. I said, “Remember last week when you rode bareback, and you had to sort of relax and sink into yourself and the horse in order to stay on?”

  Ellen nodded.

  “Well, try to have that feeling for your whole lesson today.”

  Ellen relaxed, and her position improved.

  We walked into the arena and I closed the gate. She said, “My mother dropped me off. She has to get her hair done. That could take hours.”

  I pretended not to know what this meant, but in the end, she did jump for about ten minutes—figure eight over a crossbar and then four cavalletti, which is a grid of poles that the pony trots through. Those got to be about six inches high, which was high enough to make Gallant Man arch his neck and use his back a little, and to give Ellen a big smile on her face. Ellen had evidently gotten a lecture about manners that week, because she “pleased” and “thank youed” the whole lesson, and then when Mom showed up while we were walking toward the barn, and she was still on the pony, she held out her hand for me to shake, and said, “See you Tuesday, then.”

  I thought this was so cute that it was me who kissed her on the cheek before I left. And so I was in a better mood when I got in the car than I had been when I arrived at the stable, just the way it had been with school the day before. And why not? As we were driving home, I listed all the things we were driving toward: Daddy and Danny circling one another like boxers, no Foxy for Barbie to ride, days upon days of no riding for me, homework, upset at church and probably conversation about that, and a ghost. I felt my good mood vaporizing through the roof of the car just the same way that the frost had melted in the morning.

  Quarter Pad

  Horse Head Pad

  Chapter 22

  AND THEN BARBIE WAS LATE—IT WASN’T HER FAULT; HER MOM had had a flat tire on the way home from the music lesson, and they had to wait for a truck to come, and then she had to change out of her music clothes and into her riding clothes, but, she said, “I told them I had to come, so here I am.” We were standing in front of the barn, between the two pastures. She said, “Where’s Foxy?”

  “Well. Well, my dad sold her. She’s gone.”

  Barbie’s eyebrows lifted, then she said, “Good.”

  “Good?”

  “I can ride—”

  “I thought Lincoln would be good. Amazon is easygoing, but she’s a little—”

  “Blue.”

  I started shaking my head before she even finished saying the word.

  She said it again. “Blue.”

  My wrist started throbbing. I cleared my throat. I had never actually said no to Barbie when Alexis wasn’t there. Finally, I got it out. “He’s not trustworthy. He’s spooky and sort of worried about things. I can’t let you—”

  “Sure you can.” I had seen this Barbie in school—the Barbie whose smile just got bigger when someone said “no.” Whose eyes twinkled more because now there was a challenge. Who put her hands on her hips and said, “Come on. It’ll be fun.”

  I said, “I thought it was Alexis who was the daring one.”

  “Comparatively, yes. Come on, let’s just go pet him.”

  She took my hand and walked me toward the gate of the gelding pasture. Of course, Blue was there to meet us, with his ears pricked and a very intelligent look on his face. He even beat Jack to the gate, because Jack was busy playing in the water trough. His forelock, which was pretty long, fell over his left eye, which made him look even cuter, and Barbie reached up and gently smoothed it down. She said, “You will like me. Everyone does.” And who was I to disagree with her? One of the things I liked about her, of course, was that she would say anything, and you only thought you knew if she was serious. She continued smoothing his forelock, and he dipped his head and softened his neck. She said, “Let’s just get him out. I want to pet him all over.”

  “What are you doing?”

  She looked at me and pushed her hair back. She said, “It’s called ‘the thin end of the wedge.’ ” She put her hand on the lock and said, “Don’t you remember when we learned about the five elementary machines, the lever, the pulley, the wedge, the screw, and the wheel?”

  I said suspiciously, “I only remember the wheel.”

  She laughed, then said, “You use a wedge when you want to open things. You get the thin end in, then you push.”

  She had that halter on Blue in about two seconds and was opening the gate. I had to wave Jack off, because he cantered over to us, ready to come out, too.

  I knew she would like him, and she did, because he walked along beside her at just the proper distance and speed, as always, pausing when she paused to unzip her jacket, speeding up when she sped up, and also moving over when she sidestepped a puddle. Someone like Barbie, a twin who played music, would certainly notice this, and she did. After they moved over to miss the puddle, she said, “Does he dance, too?”

  I wondered how to put my foot down. Finally, I said, “I’m going to get Lincoln.” I turned and ran back. But, of course, Lincoln did not come to the fence, and then he avoided being caught, and then when I had him, I dropped the halter because I was so awkward putting it on, and when I dropped the halter, he backed away, and I had to ca
tch him again. I could see from where I was standing that she had put Blue in the pen and that she was carrying the saddle out of the barn, so I unclipped the lead rope from Lincoln’s halter and ran for the gate, because, really, with a Goldman twin, you never knew what she would do, and didn’t they tell you that over and over from the first time you talked to them?

  Barbie threw the saddle up onto the top rail of the fence and turned back to the barn. I ran right up to her and was about to get mad, but she said, “Oh! Great! I brushed him off, and he was really sweet, and I think he’s such a nice horse that we can actually teach him to brush himself off, I don’t see why not, and then to clean the barn, hang up the tack, and make sure the doors are closed.” I paused too long before answering, and she turned and trotted toward him, the bridle in her hand. I ran after her. When I caught up to her, I was about to say, “So why are you the boss?” but Blue interrupted me with a big whinny, and Barbie said, “You are so right. I was just thinking that very thing,” and petted him down his neck.

  Finally, I managed to put my hands on her shoulders. She turned with her biggest smile. I lowered my eyebrows in a determined Ellen Leinsdorf sort of way and said, “You are doing a dangerous thing!”

  She said, “Am I?”

  I nodded.

  She said, “Then make it less dangerous.”

  I realized I could do that. Then I felt that thing that people dealing with the Goldman twins must have felt for years, that sense of being overcome, of saying, okay, have it your way. So they weren’t perfect after all. I stared at Barbie with my hands on my hips and then I said, “First we have to make him move and buck in the pen to see if he’s tense in his body, and maybe this is going to take a long time.”

  “That’s okay.”

  “It might get dark.”

  “That’s okay, too. Just doing something is fun.” While she was grinning at me, she did a little Irish jig and made me laugh all over again.

  So then I went to the middle of the pen while Barbie untied Blue, and I made him trot and canter and turn and trot out in bigger strides and halt and step under. Barbie watched me, and then came into the middle and took the flag and tried it herself, and he went smoothly and willingly. When he trotted, she smiled, and when he cantered, her eyebrows went up, and I saw that his special grace was visible even to someone who had only had two riding lessons. We made him work until he was breathing hard—that was the safest thing; for her lesson, she would certainly only walk and maybe trot a little, so that could be his cool-down period.

  I held him while she tacked him up, and then while she mounted, and there we were, doing the thing I thought we’d never do. I said, “I’m going to lead you around for a minute or two while you get used to him.”

  She said, “Okay. Thanks.”

  So I led him around the pen while Barbie arranged herself. As before, she was good about her hands—not too high but high enough, thumbs up—and her legs—relaxed, heels down—and her back and shoulders—straight—and her neck and head—loose and floating. We walked along. She seemed to settle into him. His ears were not pricked and not flopped, but in working position. His steps were relaxed. I kept my right finger on her left rein, but I moved a bit away and walked along beside them. Blue’s eye was calm, but he was looking here and there. When a branch over by the arena creaked, he glanced at it but kept walking. Then he did a strange thing. Barbie shifted her weight toward me, I don’t know why, but maybe to get comfortable, and Blue shifted, too. He shifted his balance to get himself under her. I said, “Wow.”

  Barbie said, “What?”

  “When you shifted your weight—”

  “I had a wrinkle in my jeans.”

  “Well, when you shifted your weight toward me, he moved to come under you.”

  “Is that unusual?”

  “I think so.”

  She shifted her weight to the outside, and he moved to come under her again. She said, “That’s very considerate.”

  “Yes, it is.”

  I backed toward the middle of the pen a step or two, and let them go around me. It wasn’t getting dark, but it was thinking about getting dark, so the shadows were longer, and everything around us was more mottled and spotty, just the sort of atmosphere where I would expect to see a ghost—where I would expect Blue to see a ghost. The ghost. I shivered. But the two of them walked around, and then Barbie picked up her reins and asked Blue to trot. Her posting wasn’t great, yet, and she bounced for a couple of steps, so Blue slowed his pace to a jog. When she got her balance and rhythm, he sped up. Pretty soon they were going around the pen very nicely. Barbie said, “Very good!”

  I said, “Yes, actually. Very good.”

  Barbie’s hand crept forward on the rein, and then she asked him to turn. He made a smooth loop and went back the other way. Every time she lost her balance a little, he slowed down, and then went on. His eyes and ears kept track of leaves and acorns and even Rusty, who trotted by on her way to the house, but he never changed his attentiveness to Barbie. I just stood there. They kept trotting, made a few more turns, and then she said, “Whoa,” and they came down to a walk and then to a halt. She said, “I do like him better than Foxy.”

  I said, “That is the least selfish horse I have ever seen in my life. My dad isn’t even going to believe he exists.”

  Barbie leaned forward and petted Blue in front of the saddle. She said, “I’m glad you said that, because I wouldn’t want to think I was crazy thinking this horse was reading my mind.”

  “Well, he’s not reading your mind. He’s reading your body.”

  Barbie said, “What’s the difference?”

  I watched while they worked for another five or ten minutes—nothing strenuous or beyond her, but very interesting to me. Finally, I said, “He’s behaving much better for you than for Daddy or even Danny. Maybe it was them he was scared of and not the ghost.”

  Barbie said, “What ghost?”

  I said, “Oh.”

  Barbie said, “What ghost? Come on and tell me what ghost.”

  I went over and took Blue’s rein and scratched him on the forehead. Barbie sat there in the saddle looking down at me. I said, “It’s really stupid.”

  “Alexis told her ghost story, so you can tell yours.”

  “Well, let’s put him away first. I’ll tell you while we’re giving the horses their hay.”

  “Oh, I love that,” said Barbie.

  The ground had dried up some, but not enough for the wheelbarrow, so as we walked back and forth to the haymow beside the barn, I said, “Did I tell you that we got Blue because his owner was killed in a car crash on Highway 1? She ran into a tree.”

  Barbie shook her head.

  “Well, she had only moved here at Christmas, and she didn’t seem to know anyone. Jane, my friend out where he was boarded, tried to find out if there was someone back in Ohio, but there wasn’t, so we got him because there was no one to pay his bills. He came with lots of stuff.” I waved my hand toward the trunks. “And I didn’t change his name—”

  Barbie said, “So she found him!”

  She meant the ghost. I hadn’t thought of that as a reason to change his name.

  We headed toward the mares with flakes of hay in our arms. I nodded toward the arena and said, “I saw her the first time, just coming around the barn like a regular person, walking. I could barely see her, but I knew she was wearing high boots. And she was tall and slender, with dark hair. She just walked around the corner of the barn and disappeared, but Blue was really afraid of that end of the arena.”

  “Why did you think it was her?”

  “It wasn’t Mom, and it wasn’t anyone else we knew. Besides—”

  “What?” said Barbie.

  “The next time I saw her, she was floating in my room, and she had Spooky in her arms. Or Spooky’s mom, because it was a full-grown cat. I think she was wandering around here, maybe riding Blue late at night, and she found a dead cat, and she kept it.”

  “Who’
s Spooky?”

  “Our kitten. Our kitten that Rusty brought in from somewhere and can’t be related to any of the barn cats.”

  “Why not?”

  “The black one has been spayed and the other one is a tabby.”

  “What color is the kitten?”

  We walked along the fence and threw the hay over to Amazon, Happy, and Sprinkles.

  “Black. He’s in the house.”

  “Rusty didn’t kill it?”

  I shook my head. “I was sitting in the barn thinking about the ghost and Rusty brought in the kitten and dropped it just inside the door.”

  “Mmm,” said Barbie. We turned back toward the barn.

  “The ghost has come to my room twice.”

  “Wow!”

  “But that wasn’t the scariest thing.”

  “What was the scariest thing?”

  “Well, there were two. The first was that the ghost of Spooky’s mom, I guess, got under my covers in the middle of the night and was gone by morning.”

  “That gives me the creeps.”

  I nodded. “And the second was that the other night, when it was rainy and windy, I was out checking the horses because Daddy had that virus, and she touched me on the shoulder and whispered in my ear, ‘He’s still my horse.’ ”

  Barbie took a deep breath.

  “And I might not have noticed or believed that, but Rusty, who never goes into the house, ran up behind me and just had to get in the house. Just had to.”

  “What did she see?”

  “I was too scared to look!”

  “Wow!” said Barbie again.