Head Above Water

by Caitlin Ricci

  “He’s been fine up until tonight,” Daniel said, sounding a bit desperate. “What’s wrong with him?”

  “Is he yours?” Kai asked him, and Daniel instantly nodded. “He’s beautiful. Cleric has colic, but it’s a hard form called torsion colic. It means that his gut is all twisted up. And he’s probably been feeling it for a few days now, but it started to really bother him tonight. In the early stages surgery would have been an option.”

  Daniel was shaking now, and I walked over to take his hand, because I knew what the vet was saying. If any of us had noticed there was something wrong before tonight, surgery could have happened. “So there’s nothing to do?” Daniel practically whispered to Kai. He didn’t pull away from me, and I squeezed his hand.

  “I’m sorry, Daniel, but at this stage his guts are so jumbled together, and he’s in so much pain, that he’s suffering. He also has some ruptures from where he was trying to digest but what was in there burst through the walls of his intestines. Do you want to use my stethoscope to listen to them? Hear them for yourself?” he offered.

  The vet sounded so sad, which I think Daniel needed, but I wasn’t actually sure if he was listening at all as he stared at Cleric. When Cleric wanted to lie down this time, Daniel let him, and I stopped trying to help as he knelt next to Cleric in the arena. He pulled Cleric’s head into his lap, stroking his golden cheek, and cried over him as I rubbed my brother’s back.

  Kai came forward and crouched on the other side of Cleric’s neck. He kept kicking at his belly, sounding like it was hurting him, neighing loudly as if he was freaking out too. I couldn’t imagine the kind of pain he was in. “He’s hurting, Daniel,” the vet said. “I can make this easier on him, but there’s nothing we can do for him. Not anymore.”

  No one tried to tell Daniel what to do. Cleric was his horse, and this was his choice. But I knew what he would choose. He cared about Cleric and would never let him suffer for even a minute if he could help it. He gave the vet a nod and bent over to kiss Cleric’s forehead. “I love you,” he whispered to him, and I gave his shoulder a squeeze. “It’ll be okay soon. You’ll see.”

  The vet got a few syringes, and I kept my hand on Daniel’s back. I hadn’t touched him that much in probably ever. But I wanted to be there for my big brother, because he needed someone. He could be a complete ass, but he didn’t deserve this. This was my worst nightmare, and I couldn’t help thinking about Witchcraft as I saw her, Magic, and Blue watching us with their heads over their stall doors as if they knew what was going on. They probably did, actually, and that made me hurt for them.

  “This one will help him go,” the vet started to explain to Daniel as he held up first one syringe and then the other. “And this one will actually make him go. I’m sorry there’s nothing I, or anyone else, could have done for him at this stage in his colic. You’re doing the right thing, though. He’s in so much pain.”

  Kai stroked Cleric’s neck, and Daniel rubbed his ears. He put the first needle in, and Cleric tried to fight it, but Daniel lay over him, holding him down. Normally he didn’t cry. None of us did. But he was right then. I could even hear him as he wrapped his arms around Cleric’s beautiful, strong neck and buried his face in Cleric’s blond hair.

  Cleric was gone minutes later. The vet checked his pulse, then moved away from him. “What arrangements would you like done?” Kai asked Daniel, but he was crying too loudly to hear him, so he turned to Uncle Caleb. “What should be done?”

  “Cremation,” Daniel answered, his voice rough with his pain. “I want him cremated.”

  The vet nodded. “I’ll arrange for a company to come get him, then. They work around the clock and can be here in an hour or two. They’re good people. They’ll take care of him and make sure he’s treated right.”

  Uncle Caleb shook the vet’s hand, thanking him for coming out. I sat down in the dirt next to Daniel. “I’m sorry,” I told him. Sam and Ben came and joined us, all of us finding a place around Cleric but not touching him. Daniel hadn’t moved, but his tears had slowed as he ran his hand over Cleric’s face.

  “Me too,” Sam added.

  Ben nodded. “He was a good horse.”

  “He was the best horse ever,” Daniel corrected him.

  None of us argued with that. Cleric was special, in the show ring and out. He was beautiful, but he’d been kind too. And so very smart.

  Chapter Twelve

  Sam

  WE SAT like that for hours. The night was warm, but I couldn’t help the chill I was feeling as we sat around Cleric’s body. Magic was double his age. I’d been afraid of this with him, but I never imagined Cleric would be the first to go. He was so strong, and I felt like crap for not seeing he was in trouble. I took care of them. That was my job. And I hadn’t noticed anything was wrong with Cleric at all. Maybe he’d slowed down on his food; maybe he hadn’t been drinking enough. I tried to think back to something, anything, that would have told me he was in trouble. But I couldn’t remember anything that really stood out, and I felt horrible for it. He’d been completely fine until tonight.

  The company came to get him at about two in the morning. They put a chain around his back legs and used a machine to pull him onto the back of the truck. Daniel cried again as they put a tarp over him, strapped it down, and then drove out of the arena.

  Then Robbie started crying as Witchcraft was the first to call to Cleric as he left. Blue joined in too, and even Magic did. I wasn’t used to seeing Robbie cry at all. He never did when he was around me. Not even on the anniversary of his mom’s death. Sometimes I thought he was crying, but it wasn’t like this where I could see the tears on his cheeks. I held him tightly, and he clung to me.

  I felt bad for not liking Daniel as he stood there alone and watched Cleric be taken away. This sucked for him, and I wished I knew what to say to make it better. But I couldn’t think of anything. I didn’t know if there was anything. He loved Cleric with everything he had. I was sure of it. And now Cleric was gone. I didn’t know what would happen to Daniel now. He’d only ever seemed okay when he was with Cleric. Now he just looked so lost and alone. And, as his tears dried up, he started to appear angry again. I was used to him looking like that, and it was nearly comforting, but that didn’t make it all better when he stormed past us as if he was mad at all of us for what had happened.

  “Should we go back to sleep?” I asked Robbie as Ben started heading back to the house. Everyone else had already left.

  He shook his head. “Hawk still needs to be fed. And I don’t want you to go in a few hours. Let’s stay in the barn tonight.”

  We held hands as we went back to the barn. He went to Witchcraft, holding her face between his hands, and I stroked my hands down Magic’s neck and kissed him on his cheek. He was such a good old man. He was the perfect horse for me. And I couldn’t imagine losing him. Not now or ever. I knew it was coming since he was so old, but I didn’t want to think about having to say good-bye to him.

  With Cleric going tonight, I was thinking about it, though, and it made me hurt. Robbie made another bottle for Hawk and started feeding him. Even though it was my turn to do it. I came into the stall and helped him, but we didn’t say anything, just sat there together. There wasn’t really anything to say either. As soon as Hawk was done, Robbie got into my arms in front of me, and I hugged him tightly and kissed the side of his neck. He was ticklish there, right where his hairline ended, but he didn’t laugh. Not tonight.

  “Poor Daniel,” he said softly as he tangled our fingers together.

  I nodded. “It sucks.”

  “I don’t think he’ll be okay.”

  I didn’t think he was all that great even before tonight. “Maybe eventually.”

  “Maybe,” Robbie quietly agreed with me.

  We stayed like that well past daylight, and since neither of us had our phones with us, no one was able to call us. Mom didn’t look mad when she found us, though. Instead she just looked sad. “No school today. Go get shower
ed and come to the house for breakfast. We’re having french toast and scrambled eggs.”

  We silently followed her, and I didn’t want to go back to my room to get clothes, so I was glad when Robbie went to his dresser and pulled out a pair of workout shorts and a T-shirt for each of us. Like most of his shirts, the one he handed me had a horse on it. He barely seemed to notice what he was doing as he grabbed some clothes for himself. He showered first, and I sat there on his bed, still feeling like I’d missed something when Daniel walked past the room.

  I got up to go talk to him. “Hey.”

  He turned back to look at me. “What do you want?”

  This was the Daniel I was used to, so his attitude didn’t bother me in the least. It was actually kind of good if he was back to being a jerk so soon. “I’m sorry I didn’t see that something was wrong with him.”

  “You should be. It’s your fault he’s dead,” Daniel snapped at me, making me feel like he’d hit me.

  “Screw you!” I shouted at him before I could think better. He was hurting; I should have given him a pass. But what had happened to Cleric wasn’t all my fault. “You were his owner. I only fed him and turned him out. You can’t put this all on me. That’s not fair at all.”

  We were on the landing right outside of the bedrooms, which was horribly dangerous for fighting, but neither of us seemed to care as he lunged for me, and I grabbed at him. Punching him didn’t make anything better, but it was better than being hit by him. “Sam!” Robbie screamed at me.

  I heard people running up the stairs, and someone grabbed me by my arms and pulled me off Daniel. He was bigger than me, but somehow I’d managed to actually hit him a few times. He’d gotten some really painful punches in on me too, and my ribs hurt where he’d kneed me a few times. Robbie held on to my arm tightly, and Caleb held Daniel back. He was bleeding from a cut on his cheek, and I tasted blood on my tongue.

  Mom touched the side of my face, then shook her head. “Into the shower with you. Now.” I didn’t argue with her, and when I came out, completely dressed and feeling a lot cleaner, everyone was already at the big dining room table Caleb had bought to fit all of us on colder days. The picnic tables on the deck were enough seating in the summer, but they weren’t good when it was snowing. I wasn’t sure why I was thinking about sitting out on the picnic tables with Robbie right then, but I was as I came down and took the empty seat between Mom and Robbie.

  Daniel was three chairs down from me, next to Trent, and he glared at me. I scowled right back at him. He’d had a horrible night. There was no denying that, but that didn’t get him a free pass to be a jerk to me and tell me Cleric’s death was my fault when it absolutely wasn’t. We all felt bad for what happened. I knew that as I looked between Robbie and Ben, who wasn’t eating at all despite how much I knew he loved my mom’s french toast. But this wasn’t only on me.

  No one really spoke while we kind of ate breakfast. Mom’s food was great. Normally we would have all had seconds. Or maybe even thirds. But not so much today. I ate because I didn’t want to maybe insult her, but Robbie only had about half before he was getting up and putting his dishes in the dishwasher. He was the first to be done, and I followed right behind him. We didn’t wait to be excused from the table as we got on our boots and headed back down to the barn. There was still work to do.

  As soon as we were under the overhead lights of the barn, though, Robbie turned back to me and hugged me tightly. “Don’t fight with Daniel again. Please?”

  “He blames me for Cleric’s death,” I said, ready to argue with him.

  “He’s an idiot. But I don’t want to watch you get hurt again.”

  That made far more sense, and I hugged him back. We kissed then, like we needed to, like we had to. I held him as tightly as I could and promised myself I wouldn’t give him any more reason to worry about me if I could help it. “I felt like that all the time Dan was here before. I knew something was wrong, but you wouldn’t talk about it, and you still won’t.” I tried not to make him feel bad about that. It wasn’t Robbie’s fault at all what Dan had done to him, and I didn’t want him to feel like it had been. But sometimes it still bothered me he couldn’t say what had happened. The guy he’d thought was his dad had been beating him up. He’d been abused, and I simply wanted Robbie to be able to say those words. He couldn’t, though, and I had to find a way to be okay with it.

  “I’m sorry I couldn’t talk about what was going on,” Robbie said as we started doing the morning barn chores. They were supposed to be my responsibility, but I wasn’t about to tell him he couldn’t help me take care of the horses.

  “It’s okay.” It really wasn’t, but I didn’t want to push him on it. I didn’t think that would be very fair to him.

  “Did you know what was happening?” he asked me as we got hay for the horses. It was hard not fluffing out a flake and putting it into Cleric’s stall. Robbie simply watched me sadly as we both kind of looked at that empty space for a long time, neither one of us really sure what to do about it.

  Wanting to distract myself from what had happened to Cleric, I focused on answering his question. It was only marginally better. “I had an idea, but I didn’t want to believe it. You’re not that good of a liar, though.”

  Robbie gave me a sad little smile and bumped his shoulder against mine as he filled each of the water buckets. “No. I guess I’m not. I didn’t want you to know, but I did kind of want you to figure it out. Sort of. It doesn’t make a lot of sense. But I was ashamed and yet I wanted someone else to know what was going on. Ben never said anything, but I didn’t expect him to either. And Daniel….” He shook his head.

  I asked something I was afraid to know… but had to. “Did he ever beat you up too?”

  Robbie ducked his head and shook it, but since he wasn’t looking at me I knew that wasn’t the whole truth. “He didn’t. But he was mean to me. Like hearing him talk, even now, sometimes sounds like it’s Dan talking to me, and not my big brother. Like he was brainwashed by his dad or something.” He shrugged like it was nothing, but I could tell it bothered him.

  “I’m glad he didn’t. If he did I’d go back and punch him.”

  “You just did.” Robbie said with a grin as we finished up with the horses.

  We’d give them a little while to eat their breakfasts while we fed Hawk. Then it would be time to turn them out in the pastures. I realized, as I looked at Cleric’s empty stall again, that Blue would go in with Witchcraft and Magic now. Blue got along with everyone, like Magic did. But since Cleric had pushed Magic around, Blue and Cleric had been paired so Cleric wouldn’t get lonely. Now they could all go together. I reached over and touched Cleric’s fine leather halter and lead, where his name had been engraved, and wished something could have been different for him.

  I sat down next to Robbie in Hawk’s stall and petted the soft colt while Robbie fed him. “Think he’s settled in enough to try to put a halter on him?”

  When Robbie didn’t answer me, I looked over at him to see what had his attention, then followed his gaze to where Ben stood quietly in the shadows of the barn.

  “Hey,” Robbie said to him.

  Ben gave us a wave. “Can I help turn Blue out?”

  He sounded so sad asking that, and it was weird that he thought he had to ask for permission to do something with his own horse. “Of course,” I said quickly. “You don’t have to ask.”

  He didn’t move from the wall across from us. “It’s your job, though.”

  Shrugging, I ran my hands over Hawk’s lanky body. He wasn’t too sure of us all, I didn’t think, since he wasn’t completely relaxed. But he kept nursing so I continued to pet him. “The deal was that if I took care of the horses, Caleb would give me riding lessons. He hasn’t given me a lesson in a while, so now I help out in the barn because I want to. I think I learned everything he had to teach me.”

  Ben nodded and walked away to get Blue. When I turned back to Robbie, I found him looking at me. “Do you w
ant to ride double later? On Magic?”

  We’d never ridden double before, but if any horse in the barn could handle both of us, it had to be him. He was built like a giant bear. “You gonna be upset if I don’t use a bit?” I didn’t want to tack him up like Robbie did with Witchcraft, and I hadn’t put a bit in his mouth in at least six months. There was no reason to when he was perfectly fine without one.

  Robbie nodded. “Yeah. That’s fine. I only want to go riding, but I don’t really want to stop being near you either. I know it sounds weird. It’s just…. Seeing Cleric die last night, and seeing you fighting with Daniel, it’s too much right now. Like if I was okay being away from Witchcraft I would be upstairs with you next to me right now, and I wouldn’t want to get out of bed. It hurts. You know?”

  I wrapped my arm around his shoulders. The bottle was empty, and Hawk moved away from us to explore his stall some before he found a place to lie down and sleep off his breakfast. Robbie got closer to me, and I felt him shudder a little. “I wish there was something I could say to Daniel.”

  “Me too. But I don’t think it would help. There isn’t something to say, that I know of, that makes up for losing your best friend.”

  Robbie was probably right about that. I couldn’t imagine losing him.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Robbie

  WE LET Magic graze for a little bit, and wake up too, before Sam brought him back and did his version of tacking up the old, nearly white, gelding. I was skeptical. I didn’t ride without the full gear of a bit, bridle, breast collar, saddle pad, and saddle. But a second lead on his halter and Sam thought we were ready to go. Oh well. I’d asked him to go riding with me like this, so I gave him my best smile, even though it felt like I was forcing it, and got on the picnic table with him.

  “Where do you want to go?” he asked me as I slid onto Magic’s impossibly wide back behind him. Wow, he was a fat pony. Sam called him a horse, but he looked like a pony, a fat draft pony who felt far too comfortable. No wonder Sam rode him bareback all the time. It was like being on Uncle Caleb’s beat up old sofa.