Ambition: (The Eventing Series Book 1)

by Natalie Keller Reinert

  With everyone out in the paddocks and the barn empty, I took stock of what must be done. Sadly, I couldn’t get away from the bloodstain in the barn aisle. Every time I walked a horse past it, Marcus was lapping at the brownish spot until I was sure his tongue must be raw. He was a vile dog, forever eating manure and getting sick off bits of hoof leftover from the farrier, but I loved him, and I didn’t think it was healthy for him to be licking the aisle all day long. There had been years of medications and chemicals administered in this old barn. Who knew what had staying power and what had long been washed away?

  It ended up taking the better part of a bottle of bleach and the destruction of a nice corn-straw broom, but after a half an hour of hard labor, I managed to mellow the bloodstains down to a dark patch on the concrete paving, something that I could attribute to overturning a gallon of hoof oil. I wiped my forehead with the front of my shirt, exposing my sweaty sports bra to exactly no one. Occasionally it was convenient to be so utterly alone in one’s workplace.

  The stall wall was next — I leaned into Mickey’s empty box and eyed the damage, deciding how much effort it would take to patch the walls. The stalls had been designed to convert into foaling stalls — double-sized, twelve by twenty-four foot stalls for a mare and foal to share in relative comfort. Every other dividing wall was made of boards with their ends resting in vertical grooves. And they’d been resting in their grooves, one atop another, for a very long time. Florida’s climate had warped the boards’ ends, swelling them here and waving them there, until they were now more-or-less permanent, as much as if they’d been screwed into place.

  I was no handyman, and I didn’t have the time to try and wrench the broken boards out of place, but what I could do was patch them up. It wouldn’t be the prettiest fix, but it would be safe.

  There were spare boards in the rusty garden shed behind my double-wide, and after screeching at the giant spiders who had been living in the woodpile, I managed to get a few boards into the wheelbarrow, push them back up to the barn, and nail them over the gaping hole in the stall wall. Then I stood back and admired my work. It looked a bit awkward, the extra wood nailed over the original stall wall, but who was looking? It was just me here anyway.

  I dusted off my hands, walked into the barn aisle, and realized that Mickey had been standing in the wash-rack while I cleaned and did minor construction work for the better part of an hour and a half. I slowly turned and gazed towards the wash-rack, half-expecting my sobered-up new tenant to be long gone, his broken halter hanging from one dangling cross-tie while he was out flirting with the dangerously beguiling mares, never knowing he was one wrong move away from a crippling kick. I didn’t know a damn thing about this horse, and I’d left him to stand alone like an old school-horse. What was it with the self-sabotage this morning?

  Mickey, standing politely in the wash-rack, craned his neck to see me around the wall. He nickered, as if he’d never been so pleased to see a face in the entire world, and nodded his head, swinging the cross-ties like jump-ropes.

  “You’re darling,” I told him, dizzy with relief, and I meant it. He was leaning forward, practically on tippy-toes, to see me, his black-tipped ears pricked in anticipation. “And wide-awake, I see,” I went on, going to him. I put a hand on his dark muzzle and felt his nostrils quiver against my palm, breathing me in. He didn’t really know me, but he was happy to make my acquaintance again, I could tell.

  That was nice, considering the bulk of our time together had consisted of me giving him an injection in the muscle of his neck and then scrubbing his head wound with iodine. A very forgiving horse, in addition to being good-natured and gorgeous.

  “You’re a problem,” I sighed, running my other hand under his dark mane. “A big beautiful heart-breaker.”

  Mickey very delicately took his left foreleg, the one farthest from me, and reached out. He let it hang there in mid-air, leg half-extended and regarded me with melting brown eyes. I had to laugh. “Someone taught you pawing was bad!”

  He put his hoof down again at the word “bad.”

  A heart-breaker, seriously. I had to get my head on straight. This wasn’t my horse. I was just his baby-sitter. I tapped him on his nose. “You want out? Fine. You can take your happy butt outside and nose around the hay out there.”

  Mickey nickered again in response, a throaty, deep murmur of interest, and I had to smile. I had a thing for horses that talked back.

  In the tack room, I found a mesh fly mask that covered the head and ears, and wriggled it over his nose like loose panty-hose. I poked both ears into their individual nets and let the elastic edging snap into place well behind the raw flesh of his poll, which I had adorned with neon pink fly-repellent ointment. Then I smeared his pink nose with sunblock. The sun in Michigan would never have prepared his skin for the UVs outside my barn.

  “You look ridiculous,” I told him approvingly, and led him out to the front paddock, right outside of the barn, that I had kept empty for him. Right across from Dynamo’s paddock. I considered the little field a place of honor. Closest to the barn, closest to my ministrations, always on my mind.

  The big gray horse lurched away from me as soon as I unclasped the lead shank, breaking into an airy, elegant trot as he launched an investigation of his new surroundings.

  There wasn’t much to see.

  There are incredible vistas in Florida’s horse country, rolling hills we like to call mountains, ancient live oaks which have been cutting out their gnarled corners of green grassland for hundreds of years, their spreading branches draped with cloaks of Spanish moss which are as buggy as they are romantic, black-board fences cutting through fields dotted with shimmering horses, broodmares grazing as their foals dance around them, the heat rising up around them to a sky of incomparable blue.

  And all of those vistas cost money. Quite a lot of money.

  I lived along with the rest of the other half, with the late-comers and the less-than-wealthy, who wanted a piece of the horse-country pie but who couldn’t afford the seven-figure prices. (Or eight, or nine, needless to say.) The outlying country around Ocala’s heart was more typically Floridian, from the piney forests to the palmetto scrubland. And portions of it to the west of town were even drier and sandier than the rest of the peninsula. The hopeful horsemen who bought out here often spent three times what they had expected to in hay and fertilizer, fighting against a micro-climate that the realtors never mentioned. The ninety-nine percenters of the horse world, fighting uphill to hold on to their hardscrabble hopes and dreams.

  Green Winter Farm was neither too dry nor too wet in a good season, but neither was it the verdant wonderland to my east. We got our share of storms and flooding — the fields were damp enough today, after last night’s three-hour deluge, that the depressions around the water troughs and gates were ankle-deep with black water.

  All ten acres of the farm were cut out of one vast pasture, and except for the nice live oak in the little hollow between the barn and the house, and the sparse stand of black jack and turkey oaks across the parking lot, guarding some unused space against the front property line, there were hardly any trees at all.

  No trees: just one long gentle slope of grassland, slipping downwards from the south to north, a contradiction to my mental map of the world. A little prairie of my own, walled to the north by a stand of plantation pine trees that stretched, in my imagination, infinitely towards the wastes of the empty northern peninsula, to the south by the cracked asphalt of a two-lane county highway, wandering indiscriminately westwards towards the swamplands that would eventually block hopeful tourists from the Gulf of Mexico’s uncertain shorelines. To the east and west, only cattle and a few cowhorses, wandering overgrown fields.

  Mickey might be looking for trouble, horse-like, but the only interesting thing in the paddocks were the little three-sided run-in sheds set against each back fence, and he snuffled greedily at the scents of horses sheltered in the past before squealing, spinning, and darting
across the quarter-acre of space at a full gallop, his tail flagged and his head high, red nostrils flaring from beneath his clownish net cap.

  I admired his movement for a few minutes, waiting to be certain that he would turn at fences and not, in fact, run right through them (you’d be surprised) and then went back into the barn. I thought I might be able to steal thirty seconds to pop open a Diet Coke before my student arrived for her riding lesson. I didn’t look in the filthy stalls or at the bedding and manure dragged across the barn aisle by the hooves of the horses I’d led to turn-out. I couldn’t do anything about it right now, so I’d deal with it when I could. Until I had figured out the help situation, I was just going to have to take it one ride at a time.

  Marcus followed me into the tack room and right up to the battered old fridge, tail wagging with the eternal hope of the beggar beagle, and I tossed him a carrot to gnaw on. He sighed with pleasure and took the prize to his bed under the saddle racks, where he would carefully gnaw it to bits without ingesting a single speck, leaving a pile of orange slaw I would have to sweep up later.

  I was just downing half the soda can, sitting the wrong way on a broke-back office chair in the tack room, when I heard the sputtering of a barely-functioning car rambling up the gravel driveway, and I rolled my way over to the door to peer out at the parking lot in front of the barn. My blue dually looked lonely out there. Its only regular company was Becky’s boring beige mom-sedan, missing today, and the approaching car, a falling-apart red hatchback.

  The vehicle was a picture of equine bohemia, the ideal equipage for the dirty horse hippie. The sticker on the back window proclaimed “EVENTERS DO IT FOR THREE DAYS,” the radio antenna was fastened into place with orange baling twine, and there was a bridle hanging over the passenger seat headrest, slapping regularly against the window with every bump in the lot. I winced as the snaffle bit rapped against the safety glass with a rhythmic clunk-clunk-clunk, but the window somehow survived the onslaught. Like the rest of the car, it had been through a lot and probably thought that it was kind of pointless to die now.

  The hatchback came skidding up beside my truck with a hailstone of gravel pebbles. Almost before it had been thrown into park, the driver’s side door was flung open.

  A girl my own age with a long dark braid climbed out and spread her arms wide. “I’m here!” she announced. “Let’s get this party started!”

  I peered past her, looking into the car. “Lacey, is that my good Edgewood bridle? Because I will kill you. I’ve been looking for that thing all week.”

  “I took it to Quarter Pole to get the noseband restitched,” Lacey said unrepentantly, putting her hands on her hips. “You were gonna look like crap out there with a bum noseband. I can’t ride for no bum trainer.”

  “You can’t ride, period.”

  “Shut it, nag.” Lacey stuck her tongue out at me.

  “Whatever.” She lived to torment me. Lacey was my favorite student (and my only student outside of Becky), although she was more like a best friend/bratty sister combination than the dedicated acolyte, devoted to soaking up every last drop of my equestrian wisdom, that I had envisioned a favored pupil to be. She’d come from Pennsylvania to get a tan and ride horses, she liked to say, and so far she had the tan and every now and then I let her ride a horse. But her day job was at a coffee shop in Gainesville. She could’ve done that in Pennsylvania, she complained.

  Lacey leaned back into the car to retrieve the bridle. She straightened, tossed the tack over her shoulder, poured out half a can of Diet Coke that had probably been her breakfast, and skipped past me into the barn, flashing me an unrepentant grin as she went. “This place is a shithole!” she announced from inside. “You should try mucking stalls once in a while. I hear it’s all the rage at the big farms now.”

  I shrugged and decided to beat it for the house for a few minutes. She could figure out where her lesson horse was and tack up all by herself. I needed something more than Diet Coke — my stomach was starting to remind me that sometimes pouring acid and sugar substitute into it wasn’t the best idea without some sort of padding, and I was having visions of a cup of yogurt and a few glorious moments of air conditioning. Lacey went on shouting, because Lacey thought shouting was the best way to cheer me up when I was in a mood. She thought her shouting cracked me up. Sometimes she was right.

  “Holy God, what the hell is that? You have a horse out here with a pink head!”

  “That’s Mickey,” I snapped, poking my head back into the barn. “The Michigan horse? He tore up his head when he took apart his stall last night. That’s Swat on his head.”

  “I swear to Christ I nearly freaked out when I saw a horse with a pink head. I thought he was some kind of crazy albino or something. Like maybe you got into color breeds. Like next week we’re going to be riding paints or something. In Western saddles, with diamonds and rubies on them. You finally decided you just have to be fancy. I knew this day would come. Can we wear blue eyeshadow when we show? Like, sky-blue. Not regular blue.”

  “Just tack up Margot, will ya? I’ll be right back.” My stomach made a threatening grumble. Yogurt. I set off for the house, a hop and a skip away, but a world apart in terms of temperature. It was positively tropical out in the sun. From the barn, Lacey went on with her stand-up act.

  “Her stall’s empty — I have to go get her? Oh my God. Are you for real? She’s in the back pasture, isn’t she? Jeez. Just once, you can’t keep her in for me?” Her voice climbed to top volume, chasing after me as I traipsed off to the house. I ignored her. It was the usual rant, but Lacey knew the score — if Margot didn’t get out for a nice roll and a few bucks at liberty, she’d take it out on her rider. And Lacey hated riding a bucking bronco. She was a decent rider, just about ready to start eventing Novice level, but equine aerobatics were the chink in her armor.

  On the way to the house I paused, turned back to look at Mickey where he could be seen in the gap between the barn and the house, and took a picture of him with my phone. He was the image of contented bliss, grazing in a green paddock and it was a relief to see him so calm and happy. I wished I could be so calm and happy, but my heart was suddenly thudding in my throat.

  Because, as I just remembered, I still hadn’t called his owner.

  CHAPTER TEN

  Calling owners was one of my least favorite things in the world, even when I had good news. Calling about an injury? At least I was in the air conditioning. I rubbed my bare foot against Marcus, who had sprawled himself belly-down across the cool linoleum of the kitchen floor, and dialed Eileen’s number.

  The phone didn’t even get the chance to ring. Not a single time. Her breathless voice was on the other end immediately, as soon as I placed the glass against my ear. I spent a few valuable seconds wondering just how she’d done it, while her frantic voice assaulted my ear.

  Ugh, I hated talking on the phone.

  “Yes? Is Mickey okay? Is everything alright? Did he travel okay? Did he eat his breakfast? How are you? I’m so sorry — how are you this morning? I just have been so worried… You understand, I’m sure.”

  There was no doubt that she cared about the horse, anyway.

  I gulped down my nerves, put a smile on my face, and let loose with a burst of enthusiastic explanation points, hoping to match her own keyed-up energy with equal measures of cheer and reassurance. “Eileen! Hi! We’re fine! Mickey is fine! I meant to call you but you know! It just gets so busy!” I paused for breath and she went gushing on in my momentary silence. Which was fine — ebullience was never my strong suit.

  “Oh of course! Oh you must think I’m silly, but I just worry so much about him! I’m just so fond of him!”

  Of course you are, I thought. But you know he’s too nice to keep as a pasture pet. That was tough. Being fond of investments was never a good idea.

  I shifted the hot phone against my cheek, wishing I’d put in my earbuds in preparation for a lengthy conversation, and gazed out the kitchen window at the act
ion in the paddocks. Lacey was trying to catch Margot, but Margot was avoiding being caught with her usual panache. The mare kicked out as she took off running. Lacey ducked and only narrowly avoided decapitation. The other two mares then joined the party, ears pinned and tails flagged, flinging mud from their hooves as they wheeled and galloped around the paddock.

  Mickey was watching curiously, his head high, one hind leg cocked as if he’d been caught mid-nap. I was already obsessed with Mickey. What a beast, too gorgeous to be just a pet. I loved seeing him standing out there in my field, the perfect sport horse specimen, and so easy to pretend he was mine, as he stood on my grass, wearing my fly bonnet. While his real owner went prattling on and on about heaven knew what… I checked in, heard “he likes to pick up his right hoof before his left hoof,” and tuned her right back out again.

  Lacey caught Margot, immediately looping the lead-rope around the mare’s neck so that Margot couldn’t escape before the halter was fastened behind her ears. It was a nice move. That’s what I need in a working student, I mused. A little common sense without the attitude. That’d be a welcome change.

  “Carrots,” Eileen announced.

  “I always have carrots on hand,” I replied, hoping that’s what she was talking about.

  “He likes the organic ones, with the tops?”

  “Of course,” I agreed, trying to imagine a financial reality in which I could afford organic carrots to give to horses.

  Eileen must have it good. I tapped a fingernail against the lid of a soda can. Such a doting mommy could come in handy. She’d be more likely to take an “only the best will do” approach to training… Which could be a lifesaver if I managed to score his training contract.

  Nice new tack could be shared, expensive supplements could be carefully split with one or two other horses who needed a little extra oomph… Dynamo came to mind.