Appaloosa Summer (Island Trilogy Book 1)

by Tudor Robins

  Text from Slate:

  Cherry pie irrelevant (although delicious). Is he hot?

  Chapter Eleven

  I’m stalling. I know I am. Leaning over the fence as far as I can reach, arm extended, clucking and calling for the little pinto horse I’ve been making friends with during my morning runs. “Hey Paint! Over here!”

  I just want to give him a carrot. That’s true.

  It’s been too long since I’ve patted a horse. OK.

  I don’t know what I’m going to do for the rest of the day. That’s more like it.

  It’s my day off. Which should be good. Except … it’s a long day stretching ahead of me.

  And I’m already nearly done my run, and it can’t be later than seven-thirty.

  I meant to sleep in, but my mind wouldn’t still. One of the biggest shows Slate and I were supposed to be going to is this weekend, just outside Toronto. I couldn’t stop thinking about it – not the classes, or the ribbons – but of the Tim Horton’s stops we would have made on the trip, and decorating Major and Obsidian’s stalls to make us all feel more at home, and begging Slate’s mom to let us order room service, until she caved and let us eat pizza in bed.

  If I was at home, and we were still going, I’d be so busy today; probably shampooing Major, and packing for both of us.

  As it is, here, nobody needs me today.

  Paint, at least, takes pity on me. He wanders over, pausing now and then to grab a particularly lush mouthful of grass, and finally ends up in front of me, ears pricked forward, tail whisking the flies away.

  “Hey buddy, boy.” I balance a carrot medallion on my outstretched palm. “Is that good?”

  He lips it away, and lets me rub his ears, pat his face. Within seconds, my hands are crusted with black grime. “Man, have you ever been brushed?” He pushes his neck against my scratching fingernails, and I laugh.

  “Hey there!”

  “Geez!” Paint sends a disapproving noise rattling through his nostrils, and backs up with his head thrown in the air. I whirl around to face Jared. “How did you do that? Where’s your tractor?”

  He points to it about a hundred metres away along on the shoulder of the highway. “I was patching the fence. I saw you. I walked over.”

  “You just about stopped my heart.” I point at Paint. “And pissed him off too.”

  “About him …”

  “What ‘about him’?”

  “What are you doing today?”

  I’m suddenly conscious of the sweat beading along my hairline, the possible smell of my laundry-overdue t-shirt. “Um, it’s my day off. Wednesday’s my day off. And this is Wednesday. So, um, running, and then swimming and then … stuff.”

  “Stuff?”

  “Yeah, super-important stuff.” Like laundry, maybe.

  He shrugs. “OK, fine. Don’t want to interrupt super-important stuff.”

  “Wait! Why? What would the interruption be?”

  He shrugs again. “Oh, nothing really. Just, maybe, something that will help both of us.”

  “How?”

  “I know a guy who needs some help with his cattle. If you can be ready to go in half an hour, he’ll give us a day’s work.”

  “And, other than the sheer joy of spending the day with smelly cows, this helps how?”

  “He’s got a horse. It was his daughter’s, and she’s moved away. I hear he wants to get rid of it. Maybe swap it for a day’s work?”

  I raise my eyebrows. “Sure …”

  “Great, that’s good.”

  I open my mouth to explain my “Sure”, meant “Yeah, right,” not “Yes, OK.”

  “What?”

  “I, uh …” Shut up, Meg. I was just wondering what to do with my day off, and here’s an answer. “… nothing.”

  The lure of another slice of carrot has overridden Paint’s disgust at my earlier outburst. He pushes up against the fence again, and nuzzles at my neck.

  “Maybe it’ll be a nice horse like this.”

  I wrinkle my nose.

  “What? Isn’t he a nice horse?”

  Paint whiffles the sugar cube from my palm, and I tease a burr out of his forelock. “Well, apart from only having one eye …” I smooth my hand over the long-healed bump where Paint’s second eye once was, in his younger, prouder days.

  “Hmmm. Yeah. Now that you mention it, even I can see that.”

  “Well, apart from that, he’s a pinto. Solid-coloured horses are a safer bet. Judges tend to like them better. It probably sounds silly to you …”

  Jared interrupts, “No: it’s the same with cattle. They’re judged on their looks too. It makes sense to me.”

  “What about you, though? The people. The handlers, I guess you call them. Do you have to look good too? Because we do, in riding.”

  A smile grows on Jared’s face. I know that smile already. Something inside me lifts in response to it. “From the looks of some of the people who’ve beaten me, I’d have to say no.”

  “Well if you didn’t win, clearly handlers’ looks don’t factor in.” Oh my God, am I flirting? At seven-thirty in the morning? Slate’s message pops into my head – Is he hot? A race of butterflies starts at my toes and flutters up to my neck where I shiver it loose. I break eye contact. “I should get going.”

  “So, pick you up in half an hour?”

  “OK.”

  “OK.”

  I move away from the fence, and step back onto the road, ready to take off on my run again.

  “Hey, Meg?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Is there anything worse than a pinto?”

  “Oh yeah. An appaloosa. Kiss of death.”

  “An appa-whatta?”

  I strike off running, call over my shoulder, “Loosa!” I yell, “Google it!”

  **********

  I’m ready in twenty-five minutes so, while I wait, I stand in the magic spot on the front lawn of the cottage where I can sometimes get a cell phone connection. I answer my mom’s latest text warning me not to run the dishwasher when I’m not home – Don’t worry; not using dishwasher – then realize that will give her a heart attack if I don’t add: Doing all dishes by hand.

  Next, I thumb a belated reply to Slate. Hot? I start, then pause. How am I supposed to describe Jared’s relaxed, outdoor, hay, sun, and baseball cap look in a hundred and sixty characters? Type: IMHO, yes, and press send just as Jared’s truck rolls down the driveway.

  “Hey, again.”

  “Hey, again.”

  “Morning.”

  “Morning.”

  I settle in, buckle my belt, and Jared points at a travel mug leaned precariously against the seat back. “Tea OK? Green?”

  “Yeah, thanks, love it.”

  “My mom said you would.”

  Once we’re rolling down the highway, I take a sip of my tea. “So, what do you get out of this?”

  “Pardon?”

  “You said it was ‘something that could help us both’ and then you told me I might get a horse out of it, so what’s in it for you?”

  “Money.”

  “Money?”

  “It’s not volunteer work.”

  Money is a normal motivation for a day’s work, but it seems flat, somehow. “Oh.”

  “Oh, what?”

  I shrug. “I guess I just thought it would be something bigger. Something more.”

  “Fine, then. Helping you get a horse.”

  “Why would you care about me getting a horse?”

  “To make you happy.”

  My instinct is to giggle, or snort, or say Yeah, right. Except he’s serious – at least his tone is.

  And, so, I leave it at that. Shut up, watch the fields whip by, and sip my tea. It doesn’t really matter. As if I’m getting a horse today, anyway …

  **********

  When we step out of the truck, four guys turn to face us. They look me up and down. Jared pokes a thumb in my direction. “This is Meg. She can handle livestock.”

  A
couple of nods, a couple of hats tipped, and it appears I’m in. I sure as heck hope Jared’s right; that I can handle livestock to their expectations.

  We work all day: hot, dusty, sweaty work. My jeans stick to me, and I can feel the back of my neck turning brown. My farmer’s tan is developing nicely.

  We settle into a groove; filing cows through a rusty contraption of rails, springs, joints and gates. I stay well away from the levers and mechanisms, afraid I’ll pull up when I should push down, free a cow into the field instead of trapping its head to let the more expert cattle handlers do their stuff with it.

  The others move around, taking turns doing different jobs, but I stay at the back, driving animals through the chute. Yelling “hya!” and waving my arms, slapping rumps if necessary.

  I work mostly with Jared’s younger cousin, Will. I’d guess he’s about eleven or twelve. He’s a small boy with a big grin, and time flies as we work side-by-side, trying to make sure there’s always a cow ready to move forward.

  “You’re not so bad for a girl,” Will tells me as we sit in a circle at lunchtime, and Jared says “Whoa, hands off; she came with me.”

  Everyone laughs, and Will and I both blush.

  I’m grateful when Will’s dad, Rod, jumps in. “Speaking of hands off, do you know what he did the other day? You know my brand new truck? The one it took me all year to buy? Well, I came in from the fields and it was nowhere in sight. Turns out, that one …” he points to Will whose eyes are wide as saucers, palms up in a ‘who, me?’ gesture, “… drove my new truck to the back barn to collect the eggs, and then forgot he drove, and walked back. I found it sitting there, all shiny in the grass. I could have killed him.”

  It seems like the forgetting of the truck was worse than the eleven-year-old driving it. Seriously, not in Kansas anymore. Jared catches my eye and grins. I wonder if he has any idea what I’m thinking.

  After shrugging off his dad’s story, Will nudges me. “You wanna work together again after lunch?”

  Jared leans over, tips his cousin’s hat over his forehead. “You’d better watch out. Next thing you know he’ll be trying to take you home.”

  To which Rod graciously speaks up, “And most welcome she’d be too,” which brings lunch to an end, and sends us all back to work.

  The sun’s shadow is starting to lengthen as we file the last cows through. I’ve done the exercise equivalent of about four runs, and it’s a bad sign that hidden muscles are already starting to sing. What’ll happen when they stiffen up?

  Just before they climb in the truck, Will asks his dad something and, getting a nod, runs over to me. “We have a big barbeque every summer. It’s coming up in a bit. Dad says I can ask you to come. Will you?”

  I laugh. “Sure. Probably. Thanks.”

  Will runs back to the truck, and Rod yells, “Jared knows all about it. Hope to see you soon!”

  I turn back to Jared to ask “What’s all that about?” and he’s gone.

  “Jared?” I spin in a full three-sixty and spot him talking to Tom, our boss for the day.

  “Hey, Meg!” He waves at me. “Come on over here. We need to go see this horse!”

  The horse. Of course. I’d put the horse at the very back of my mind. It was a bizarre idea. Nothing would come of it. In my world, horse purchases are carefully planned, involving appointments and commissions, vet checks and two-week trials. Horses cost a lot of money. Nobody just says, “Hey, thanks for helping with my cows, can I interest you in a horse?”

  This is crazy. I smile and walk over to Jared and Tom. Crazy.

  Tom points her out in a field that slopes down to the river. She’s standing in the middle of a herd of cows and a donkey.

  He whistles and her head flies up, ears pricked in our direction. She’s black with a bright star and a tiny snip on her face. Her ears, outlined against the blue sky, have a slight inward curve. “She’s nice-looking.”

  “I don’t claim to know much about horses, but I think she is. I can bring her in if you want a closer look at her.”

  Jared speaks up. “Sure, that would be great.”

  As Tom unhooks the chain on the gate, a current of activity runs through the herd. The cows shift, leaving the mare in full view. I suck in my breath.

  “What is it?” Jared asks.

  “Remember you were asking me what an appaloosa is?”

  “Let me guess. She’s one.”

  **********

  We’re driving home from our long day of work with the appaloosa in a trailer behind us.

  I pinch a fold of skin at my wrist. This cannot be true. But a quick glance in the rear-view mirror shows Tom’s trailer – borrowed for the trip – behind us, bumping and rattling over the rutted road.

  Her name is Salem. She’s seven or eight. Maybe. Tom’s daughter used to jump her. He has a pile of jumps in one of the barns at the back of the property that he’ll give us in return for another day’s work.

  “He’s scamming us, you know,” says Jared.

  “Pardon me?” I pull my gaze from the mirror to look at Jared.

  “It’s just Tom’s way of getting more work out of us. He doesn’t have any use for those jumps. In fact, they’re taking up room he could use for something else. But there’s no way he’ll just give them to us when he can get another day’s work out of the deal.”

  “Oh, that’s OK. I don’t mind. Jumps are really expensive.” I shake my head. “Sorry, unless you don’t want to have to deal with getting them. I totally understand. It’s no big deal.”

  “Meg?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Shut up. I’m happy to get the jumps.”

  “But not today. I’m really, really, ridiculously, completely tired out.”

  “Can’t tell.”

  “Really?”

  “Well, maybe a little, but you did good. Will’s right: you’re not half-bad, for a girl.”

  I swat at his leg, and he protests, “Watch out, I’m pulling valuable cargo!” and I go back to gazing in the rear-view mirror and wondering how, exactly, this all happened.

  Chapter Twelve

  As I run the kinks out of yesterday’s work-stiffened muscles, I’m half in denial that Salem will actually be there, in Jared’s field, where we turned her out last night.

  The day’s grey, with clouds so low they almost meet the drifting fog, to form a wispy, shifting curtain. It fuzzes the landscape and swallows trees, barns, fences. It distorts sound, so that a truck passing on the highway sounds closer than the cow lowing next to me. In this unreal landscape it’s not a stretch to imagine Salem as a ghost horse as well; an unlikely figment of my imagination.

  She’s not, though. She’s alive and real. Pacing the fenceline. Wearing a path in the long grass. Whinnying long and hard when she sees me. Nostrils flared, sides heaving. “It’s OK.” I slip her a carrot. “You’re fine.” I pat her neck, and clouds of dust rise from her coat. “You need a clean-up, don’t you?”

  She is so not Major. She’s shorter, stockier, spottier.

  She snorts, tosses her head. I don’t like the way she’s pacing. “Just a sec.” Tom threw half a bag of sweetfeed in with Salem. In fact, jumps aside, I thought he was quite generous. He also handed over a bridle, a bareback pad and several brushes.

  I reach into the feed bag, load a good scoop’s worth in my t-shirt, and, with grain dribbling out behind me, duck through the fence and over to the big tree in the middle of the field. I hold my hem out and spin, and sweetfeed flies out all around me in a big circle.

  It doesn’t take long for Salem to come nosing over to see what I’m doing. I slip her a palmful of feed I saved and, as she crunches it down, I point her nose at the ground.

  I leave her whiffing through the grass, searching out the tiny grains with her dexterous muzzle.

  On my way back past the field, she’s still nose-down, wandering. I don’t slow down – I’m glad she’s distracted – I’ll see her this afternoon.

  The morning continues s
ombre and unsettled, with showers sweeping in from the river, racing across the fields. I time my run up to the B&B between downpours.

  When I step inside, Betsy has a message that throws me even more off balance.

  “Your mom called yesterday afternoon. She has meetings in Toronto; she’s going to stop here overnight on her way.”

  “Oh.” This, perhaps, is not great timing.

  In a way, I’m in good shape. I vacuumed last night. Of course, it was mostly because I tracked dirt across the floor when I came in from working the cattle all day, but my mom doesn’t need to know that. She’ll just see the fresh vacuum tracks on the area rugs and, even if I haven’t done as good a job as she would, the cottage as clean as I can make it.

  Still, tidy cottage or not, I have this funny feeling it would be better for my mom not to know about Salem just yet. She might not understand.

  I hardly understand.

  I smooth the sheets on the bed in the front room, looking out over the meadow. I have to check on Salem this afternoon. Everything at Jared’s is still new to her. But how much time will I have between work and my mom’s arrival?

  I plump the pillows. Should I tell her after all? It might be easier. No. Bad idea.

  Arrange fresh towels neatly on the towel rail. And if I’m not telling her, I probably shouldn’t mention it to Betsy just yet.

  I scoop up the dirty laundry and carry it downstairs. Is the cottage clean enough? The cottage, my mom, Salem … a headache pinches at my temples.

  “Meg? Meg! What do you think?”

  “What? Sorry! Pardon, Betsy?”

  “I’ve asked you three times if you want to have dinner up here with your mom tonight.”

  “Really?”

  “Of course. Your mother will be exhausted after working all day and then driving here. She won’t want to cook. You can help me put a nice meal together this afternoon and we can all eat here when she arrives.”

  “I … oh no … look!” I point at fresh raindrops dotting the windows. “I’ll get the laundry! And, yes, please. Thank you. Dinner here is a great idea!”

  I yank the sheets off the line under a spattering of fat drops. Later, I end up caught in the chicken coop, tapping my foot as a sudden sweep of hard rain drums on the roof.