by Terri Farley
Dad had given a curt nod, but that was all. He hadn’t told her what he would have done for the mare if he’d been in her place. He hadn’t agreed that Preston should be grateful to her for finding his long-lost police horse. He hadn’t even answered when she asked if she’d be punished.
Dad had just stared out the truck’s windshield until they pulled across the bridge over the La Charla River and drove into River Bend’s ranch yard.
He stopped the truck and put on the emergency brake. Without looking at her he said, “I am downright embarrassed by you, girl. That’s all I’m gonna say.”
Sam had run from the car to the front porch, aware of Dallas, Ross, and Pepper watching from the bunk house and of Ace neighing from the ten-acre pasture.
Eyes clouded with tears, she’d tripped going into the kitchen, but when she tried to run upstairs and close her bedroom door against everyone’s disapproval, Gram had called her back to tell her what a mistake she’d made. Then Brynna had joined in, and the worst part was that Brynna had tears in her eyes when she talked about losing her job.
Now, tears ran into Sam’s ears as she lay crying on her bed.
Honey was fine. Dr. Scott had said so. He’d admitted that Jake had done a good job of tending her cut. He said there was nothing a vet would’ve done that Jake hadn’t. So if Mrs. Allen hadn’t broken her promise to keep the mare’s presence a secret, none of this would have happened. Sam wouldn’t be in trouble. No one would have forgotten every single good thing she’d done in her life and focused on the bad.
Best of all, the honey-colored mare would be poised to return to freedom. In days, the Phantom’s lead mare would have been back where she belonged.
But Mrs. Allen hadn’t kept her promise. Sam stared up at her bedroom ceiling, but her mind didn’t conjure images of horses cavorting among clouds. She saw no fantasies at all, only swoops and whorls of old plaster.
She would never tell anyone’s secrets. Sam sniffed, reached for a tissue from the box on her nightstand, and accidentally knocked her alarm clock to the floor. When she rolled over to get it, she bumped Cougar and he yowled.
“I’m sorry. Come here, baby,” Sam said, trying to draw the cat’s soft body close for comfort. But the cat didn’t want a hug. He squirmed and growled, and when she tried to coax him to stay, he gave her knuckles a quick bite that drew blood.
Sam sucked at her knuckles and listened to the sounds of voices and footsteps waft up from downstairs. She stopped crying and strained to hear what they were saying. They were probably talking about her and how they’d punish her. Why didn’t they just come up, tell her, and get it over with?
The torture of waiting was part of the punishment, Sam decided, but suddenly her mind was filled with Jake’s face. And Jen’s. Then Darrell’s.
Her friends were the best. Sam remembered them lining up beside her and almost started crying again. Tomorrow at school, everyone was getting hugs whether they wanted them or not.
Sam turned on her left side and stared toward her bedroom window. Dusk wasn’t far off, so why hadn’t someone come up to explain what was going on? She didn’t want to leave her room to shower because she was afraid someone would call her down to dinner. Or bring it up to her, if she was confined to her room. They had to feed her, didn’t they? She’d refuse whatever they offered, of course, but wasn’t it kind of medieval to starve her for punishment?
Finally, Sam couldn’t stand her dirty hair and sticky skin anymore. She showered, did her homework, searched her backpack for food, ate the gross packet of peanuts Brynna had given her from her last plane trip, and crawled into bed.
More than anything, thought Sam, she wanted to call Jen. But then she revised her wish. More than that, she wanted to walk down to the river and find the Phantom there waiting for her. She wanted him to kneel in the shallows and invite her to climb upon his back, and then they’d gallop away to his hidden valley where nothing bad ever happened.
Sam yawned. Her eyes closed. Just as she fell asleep, the mattress dipped. Cougar crept across her quilt, curled up in the crook behind her knees, and settled down for the night.
Dad drove her to the bus stop Monday morning.
As soon as Sam climbed into the truck and closed the door, she noticed Dad hadn’t brought her a cup of cocoa to sip on the way. In fact, he hadn’t even brought himself a cup of coffee.
Trying to head off a lecture, Sam asked, “Can we just not talk about this?”
“I reckon that’s what I’d like, too,” Dad said. Then, before her shoulders could sag in relief, he went on. “But this isn’t something we can skip over. You thought you knew what was best for that horse, but the horse wasn’t the only thing to consider. The horse is never the only thing to consider. This time, you mighta thought of Preston and Heck Ballard. And Trudy Allen.”
Sam shifted in her seat. Dad didn’t know how Mrs. Allen had let her down.
“Really think about Trudy a minute, will you? And her rescue ranch, and her already under investigation for animal cruelty before you dumped a wrecked horse on her. And what about Jake?”
“Jake can take care of himself,” Sam said, smiling.
“Oh yeah, I heard he wanted to have it out with Preston, a retired cop. Heck had himself a chuckle over that, but I don’t happen to think it’s a bit cute. What if they’d really gotten into it and Jake had been arrested for assault?”
Sam looked down at her folded hands and wished the miles would pass faster beneath the truck’s tires.
Finally Dad pulled over to the side of the road. Sam looked up. They’d arrived at the bus stop. She could see Jen in a hot-pink blouse and jeans. Standing on tiptoe, trying to see Sam, Jen looked like a flamingo.
When Sam grabbed for the door, Dad’s hand touched her arm, but it was his cold eyes that stopped her.
“Louise always thought she knew what was best, too, and it got her killed.”
Sam sucked in a breath. Dad almost never talked about Mom. This wasn’t fair.
“You think that’s harsh? It is, but it’s true. You do not always know what’s right.”
Sam stared at her hands lying limp on her knees as she waited. Her fingers were pale, as if all her energy had drained out and they’d wilted.
“To give you time to think this over, you won’t be riding this week. Not at all, so don’t ask. You go to school and you come home. Anyone wants to see you, they can come over, but no secret talks will go on. You’ll sit at the kitchen table. Same goes for telephone calls. Someone will be listening to everything you say.”
“Don’t I deserve some privacy?” Sam asked.
“You can have all you want when you’re alone. Other than that, no. You pretty much gave it up when you kept the mare a secret.”
“But you didn’t ask! I came home after riding out early in the morning and you didn’t even ask!”
“Samantha, you know staying quiet amounted to a lie. I just won’t have it. One other thing. I hear you were pretty rough on Trudy Allen. You’re phoning her with an apology.”
“Oh, no, I’m not.”
“Samantha—”
“She lied to me, Dad. She promised to keep a secret and she told!”
“How old are you Samantha, fourteen or four? Some secrets just can’t be kept.”
“But she promised.”
Dad sounded worn out when he said, “She promised before she knew Preston’s police horse had been stolen and you had it! Cat’s sake, girl, use the brain you were born with. Now, here comes the bus. Go to school and learn something useful.”
Sam felt like a sleepwalker as she climbed out of the truck. She closed the door and leaned against it for a minute, her mind spinning.
When the bus driver tapped his horn to hurry her along, Sam saw Jen had already disappeared inside the bus. She sprinted to join her friend.
“So, how’d that go?” Jen asked once Sam was settled next to her.
“How’d what go?” Sam asked, wishing she’d develop a tougher skin. Just
because she hadn’t burst into tears when Dad was yelling at her didn’t mean she hadn’t felt like doing it.
“Well, the truck was kind of jouncing around and you and your dad were leaning toward each other and unless you had the radio turned up really loud, I kind of heard—”
Sam gave Jen a friendly shove to make her hush.
“It was terrible,” Sam said.
“Let me distract you with my mom’s struggles trying to get Golden Rose ready for this weekend’s parade,” Jen said. “I’m not sure she’ll disgrace the Kenworthy palominos forever, but…Want to come live with us?” Jen asked when Sam kept staring out the bus window, watching the range slip past.
Sam pretended to consider Jen’s offer.
“Your dad doesn’t like me,” she said finally.
“Sure he does,” Jen said. “He just thinks you’re sassy, have the Forster stubborn streak, and that you’re a bad influence on his darling daughter.”
“Ha!” Sam said and Jen laughed.
“Little does he know,” Jen said in a sly tone. When she went even further to amuse Sam with an evil laugh and waggling eyebrows, Sam remembered that she owed her best friend a hug.
The school day passed quickly. Sam was a little baffled that she hadn’t seen Jake or Darrell all day, but the order and structure of classes and bells had Sam feeling almost normal by the time she reached Journalism class.
“Ally!” she said as soon as she saw the girl who’d called on Saturday.
Allison looked even more delicate than usual. Besides the violet veins that showed in her hands and temples, dark shadows covered the tender skin under her eyes. She stood just inside the classroom door, holding her school books in front of her like a shield. Sam wondered why she hadn’t taken a seat yet.
When Allison didn’t say anything, Sam touched her arm. It always surprised her that the other girl was actually taller than she was.
“I’m so sorry I didn’t call you back,” Sam said, talking over her shoulder as she moved toward her desk. “I had the worst weekend!”
“Yeah?” Ally said weakly, but she didn’t follow along. “Me too.”
Sam didn’t really think about what Ally had said. She was too eager to take some film into the darkroom.
As photo editor, Sam had a choice of using digital or traditional photography in the school newspaper, and though digital was easiest, she loved traditional black-and-white photography. Even more than that, she adored the darkroom.
She liked the solitude and the process of swishing the photo paper around in chemicals and watching things develop. In the quiet little lab, she controlled the amount of darkness and light, and enlarged what she thought was important.
After Mr. Blair had taken roll, Sam slipped inside the darkroom and sighed at the peace and quiet. It was a haven, especially today.
Sam realized she’d been humming when Ally appeared beside her in the darkness and she fell silent. Sam waited for Ally to convey a message from Mr. Blair, but Ally just stood there.
“What’s up?” Sam asked, finally.
“When you didn’t call Saturday, I thought I might get a chance to talk to you at church yesterday.”
Rather than pour out the details of the desensitization class, Sam said, “I had this horse thing to do. Sorry.”
Since she was concentrating on her work, it was several minutes before Sam turned to look Ally full in her face. Of course the red photo lights cast an eerie glow, but Ally’s expression was strained and anxious.
“You said you had a terrible weekend, too,” Sam began. She didn’t get a chance to finish.
“He took my money,” Ally whispered. “I was saving to buy a mandolin. I’ve always wanted one. That’s why I started making money of my own—because there never seems to be any extra…”
Sam’s mind raced, trying to make sense of the torrent of words pouring from Ally’s mouth, but she didn’t want to interrupt her.
“…started babysitting and playing my guitar at parties where they actually paid me to entertain. Of course I wanted to help out with family finances, and I know a church choir director doesn’t make much money and it’s not easy being a single parent, but I wanted something of my own, too, the mandolin…”
So Ally was talking about her father. Mr. McClintock was a tall, thin man. Secretly, Sam had always thought he looked like a mortician, but he was a talented musician who devoted his life to the church choir, even though she’d heard people say it was a case of “pearls before swine,” because he was so good, few in the congregation appreciated him.
“…but then he stopped asking permission. He just took my money!” Outrage had made Ally’s voice rise to a normal tone and Sam watched the darkroom door, too. “It made me mad that he was sneaking, so I kept moving it—first in my guitar case, then in the can the tennis balls came in for my P.E. class last year. That worked for a long time,” Ally said proudly. “Remember last year in English, we read ‘The Purloined Letter’? And in it, that secret letter everyone was looking for was framed on the wall or something like that? Well, I tried it and it worked! I hid my money in plain sight. For months that can rolled around on my bedroom floor, but then I made the mistake of putting a handful of quarters in it and I guess he must have bumped it with his foot, and…”
Sam tried not to let her shock and disillusionment show on her face.
The church choir director was stealing from his own daughter. Couldn’t he just ask for a raise?
“Ally,” Sam said, “that’s not right.”
“I know, and—” Ally glanced wide-eyed toward the darkroom door when someone bumped a desk outside, but no one came in. “That’s not the worst of it.” Ally took a deep breath. “I shouldn’t tell you, but I have to tell someone.”
Dread made Sam shiver, but she told Ally, “Go ahead.”
“You promise you won’t tell?” Ally stared at her with beseeching eyes.
“Believe me, you couldn’t have picked a better person or a better day to ask that,” Sam insisted.
“Okay, if you promise.”
“Absolutely,” Sam said.
“Saturday, when I called you, he’d been acting weird, and then he said there was a special choir practice and I knew that wasn’t true, and when he came home late…” Ally glanced at the darkroom door again and lowered her voice to a whisper. “He smelled like cigarette smoke and no one’s allowed to smoke inside the church! I was scared and I asked him where he’d really been, and he…” Ally pushed up the sleeves of her blouse. Even in the red darkroom light, Sam could see twin bruises on Ally’s forearms. “Shook me. Really hard.”
“Oh, Ally,” Sam said.
“He apologized Sunday morning before church,” Ally said, “but—”
“That’s not enough. No way. Something’s wrong. Ally, you’ve got to talk to someone,” Sam insisted.
As she watched, Ally’s face was transformed from scared to watchful.
“I’m talking to you,” she said.
“Sure,” Sam told her, “but I mean, someone who can help. The minister, Mr. Blair, or maybe your counselor. Wait, do you know Mrs. Ely?”
Sam paused.
Ally held a hand over her mouth as if she regretted opening it in the first place. You’ve got to do better than this, Sam told herself, then softened her tone and tried to sound more convincing. “Mrs. Ely is really nice, and so smart. Or, like I said, maybe Mr. Blair?”
“No.” Ally’s voice was strangely level.
“If you want,” Sam said, quickly, “I’ll ask Mr. Blair what we should do.”
“You can’t talk about this to anyone,” Ally hissed, glancing at the door a third time.
Was Zeke playing drums in the other room? Was Rjay hitting his fist against the classroom wall for order? He did that sometimes, but Sam was pretty sure what she heard was the sound of her own blood pounding through her veins, fast and hard and panicked.
“Ally, you’ve got to get him some help. Maybe your dad’s sick, or…”
Without warning, Ally buried her face in her hands.
“What have I done?” she whispered.
Sam had never heard anyone say that in real life. Ally was so overwhelmed, her hands shook and her teeth chattered as if she were cold.
“It’s okay,” Sam said, patting Ally’s shoulder.
“I shouldn’t have told,” Ally said. She shook her head repeatedly. The lab light turned her hair crimson as fire. “It isn’t that bad. It was just hard to keep inside, but I should have. I thought I could trust you.”
“You can,” Sam said dully. She hated traitors. She couldn’t become one. “I won’t tell. We’ll think of something.”
“Really?” Ally said, looking up at Sam. “He could lose his job if you tell, and he’s never hurt me before. I bet he won’t do it again. I think he’s just—”
The bell to end class rang and Ally didn’t finish.
“We’ll think of something,” Sam repeated as Ally left the darkroom. The door slid closed behind her, shutting out the light. “But I don’t know what.”
After a long, quiet ride home, Sam and Jen climbed the steps down from the school bus.
“Cheer up. They won’t be so mad when you get home,” Jen said.
“Oh, it’s not—” Sam pressed her lips closed. She’d almost told Jen what she was really twisted in knots over. “It’s not that bad. I’ve got lots of reading in English this week.”
Jen nodded in understanding. “And I’ve got loads of physics! Yeah!” She gave an excited thumbs-up and Sam thought, again, that her best friend was definitely one of a kind.
The afternoon weather couldn’t have been better and Sam tried to push aside her worries and be glad of that.
It was warm, but a cool breeze scudded clouds around overhead, keeping the playa from radiating heat waves up to sizzle through her shoes on her walk home.
Now that Sam was alone, this new secret crowded out other thoughts. She’d tried to block Ally from her mind while she was around Jen. It was hard not to ask for her best friend’s help, but she had promised not to tell.