“That was pretty good, wasn’t it?” Stevie mused. “I mean, I wouldn’t have done it if I’d known he would react that way, but it was funny. And the horses all calmed down eventually.” She smiled proudly. “I thought I was the master of practical jokes before. But I’m even better than I thought! Did I tell you about my moving image class project for school?”
It was an abrupt change of subject, even for Stevie. More importantly, it was a strange change of subject. Stevie rarely, if ever, talked about school.
“You mean the movie you were supposed to make?” Lisa asked. She vaguely remembered Stevie complaining about the project a couple of weeks before. “What about it?”
Stevie was taking an elective class this term about film and television. The teacher’s latest assignment was for each student to make a ten- to fifteen-minute film adaptation of a classic fairy tale. Students whose families didn’t own camcorders were allowed to borrow the school’s equipment. But the Lakes had bought a state-of-the-art video camera the Christmas before, and Stevie had already used it to complete several assignments for the class.
“I created a masterpiece,” Stevie said. Belle snorted and nodded as if in agreement, and Stevie scratched her horse’s neck fondly.
“What fairy tale did you do?” Carole asked. “And when did you do it? You’ve been at Pine Hollow with us practically every second for the past few weeks.”
“I know,” Stevie said. “That’s the best part. The movie was a snap to make. All I did was set up the camera in Alex’s bedroom and film him while he was asleep. I hid the camera behind the model planes on his dresser, and he never suspected a thing. It’s great. I have fifteen minutes of him in his old Batman pajamas, grunting, drooling, and murmuring some girl’s name.” Alex was Stevie’s twin brother. Stevie also had a younger brother named Michael and an older brother named Chad.
Carole looked confused. “How are you planning to pass that off as a classic fairy tale?”
Stevie grinned. “That’s easy. I’m calling it Sleeping Beauty.”
Carole laughed, but Lisa looked worried. Of the three girls, she took school the most seriously, and she always worked hard on her assignments. “I don’t know, Stevie,” she said. “It’s pretty funny, but do you think your teacher will like it? And don’t you think Alex will be awfully mad when he finds out?”
“That’s the point,” Stevie said. “I’m killing two birds with one stone. This is the perfect way to pay Alex back for the time last month when he released Michael’s entire cricket collection in my bedroom.” She grimaced. “All that chirping kept me up every night for a week. But this will get him back. My teacher says she’s going to show the best films to the entire school during weekly assembly. And I’m sure mine will be one of them. My teacher loves it when we’re clever. This kind of thing is right up her alley.”
Carole glanced at Starlight. She was ready for a change of subject, and her horse was ready for a good grooming and some fresh hay. “I think these guys are ready to go in,” she said. “Shall we?”
“Sure,” Lisa agreed. “I’ll see you both in the tack room in a little while.”
It only took the girls a few minutes to make their horses comfortable. Then they all met in the tack room to clean their saddles and bridles. It was one of their favorite locations for Saddle Club meetings. Max and his mother, Mrs. Reg, who helped run the stable, liked to see their riders keeping busy. But they didn’t mind if they talked while they worked.
Lisa decided to head off the conversation before Stevie started talking about her pranks again. “Can you believe Max’s announcement today? What a great surprise—I can’t wait for the competition,” she said. “It should be fun.”
“Definitely,” Carole said, picking up the saddle soap. She had been dying to discuss this subject with her friends ever since the end of class. But Stevie’s rehashing of the Great Veronica Prank hadn’t allowed it until now. “We don’t have much time to prepare, though.”
That day during the Horse Wise meeting, Max had made a surprise announcement. There was a brand-new Pony Club in the next town, and the members were eager to see an established club in action. Max had invited them to Pine Hollow to see Horse Wise give a riding demonstration. Best of all, he had decided that a fun and interesting demonstration for the new club would be a small-scale hunter competition, complete with ribbons. It would take place in two weeks. There hadn’t been any kind of show at Pine Hollow in quite a while, and all the riders were excited at the news.
“What are you going to put down as your goal?” Lisa asked Carole. Max always asked each of his young riders to write down a personal goal before each show they competed in. After the show, they were all supposed to think about whether they had met their goals, and why (or why not). Lisa had learned that there could be other goals besides winning a ribbon, and that a rider could learn a lot even if she didn’t win anything.
“I’m not sure,” Carole said thoughtfully, pausing to wipe a bit of soap off her chin. “I might put something about trying to keep Starlight focused before our round. He still reacts to an audience.” Starlight was relatively young. When he heard applause, he sometimes became distracted and forgot what he was supposed to be doing. Carole was almost always able to remind him, but she knew it would be better if he wasn’t distracted in the first place.
“That sounds good,” Lisa said. “I think I’ll make my goal trying to maintain an even pace through the course. That’s so important in hunter events, and it just so happens that Prancer and I have been working on it a lot lately.”
Carole nodded approvingly. “What about you, Stevie?”
“I don’t know,” Stevie said with a shrug. “I’m sure I’ll think of something.” The truth was, she had been so involved in her joke on Veronica that she had hardly paid attention to what Max was saying. But now that the news had had a chance to sink in, she was starting to get as excited as her friends. Stevie loved competing, and Belle was a good jumper. Lately Stevie had spent more time working with her on dressage, but there were two weeks before the competition—that would give Stevie and Belle plenty of time to work on their jumping form. In hunter competitions, horses and riders were expected to display smooth, even pacing and proper form, in addition to clearing all the fences. A horse that moved or jumped choppily was sure to finish out of the ribbons.
“Do you think Max will let us invite guests?” Stevie asked. “I bet Phil would love to come and see me win a blue ribbon.” Phil Marsten was Stevie’s boyfriend. They had met at riding camp. Phil lived in a town about ten miles away, so he and Stevie didn’t see each other as much as they would have liked. But they attended one another’s shows and Pony Club events as often as they could.
“I don’t know,” Carole said. “It wouldn’t hurt to ask. But you might want to wait a few days to give Max a chance to forget about your latest little prank.”
Just then the door opened and the subject of that prank walked in, carrying Danny’s tack. Veronica frowned when she saw The Saddle Club. Her hands were still streaked with red dye.
“Oh, excuse me,” Veronica spat. “I didn’t realize there was a meeting of the Sad-Dull Club going on in here.” Then, after dumping her dirty saddle and bridle, she whirled and stomped out, slamming the door behind her.
Stevie grinned. Being the master of practical jokes sure felt good.
STEVIE WASN’T FEELING so good about her pranks the following Monday afternoon. Her moving image teacher, Ms. Vogel, had asked Stevie to stay after school to talk about her version of Sleeping Beauty.
“But it was supposed to be clever,” Stevie said helplessly, slumping down in her chair to avoid the stern look her teacher was giving her. It was already clear that Ms. Vogel’s reaction to the film wasn’t the one Stevie had been expecting. “Sleeping Beauty. Get it?”
Ms. Vogel leaned back against her desk and crossed her arms. “Stevie, I have to admit I’m disappointed in you. I would have thought you would know the difference between being cl
ever and being lazy. Not to mention hurtful. I don’t think your brother would appreciate having that film shown in front of the entire school at assembly, do you?”
“I guess not,” Stevie muttered.
“That’s why I’m asking you to redo the project,” Ms. Vogel went on.
Stevie gulped. “Redo it?” she exclaimed. She had spent the last few minutes trying to prepare herself to take a low grade on her film. But she hadn’t imagined the teacher would make her do it over. When would she have time, with the Pony Club competition coming up in less than two weeks? Stevie would have to put in a lot of hard work at the stable between now and the show if she expected to win a ribbon.
“Redo it,” Ms. Vogel repeated firmly. “Your new film is due exactly two weeks from today. And it had better be good this time. I’d hate to see you fail this assignment.”
Not as much as I’d hate it, Stevie thought grimly. At her teacher’s last words, all thoughts of the hunter event flew out of her mind. She hadn’t even considered the possibility that she might get a failing grade on her film. If that happened, it would mean no riding at all until she brought the grade up. Suddenly redoing her project didn’t sound quite so bad.
“Don’t worry, Ms. Vogel,” Stevie said quickly. “I’ll do better this time. I promise.”
“I certainly hope so,” the teacher said. “I think you have potential, Stevie. I really do. You have a truly creative mind. But you don’t always use it in the best way. You like to make people laugh. But how often are those laughs at the expense of others? People like your brother?”
Stevie shrugged, not sure what she was supposed to say to that. She didn’t know what Ms. Vogel was getting so worked up about. Alex and Stevie embarrassed each other all the time, and they both always survived. As far as Stevie was concerned, it was just one of the things that made life interesting.
“The truth is, Stevie, you have to be careful,” the teacher went on, standing up and pacing back and forth in front of Stevie’s desk. “Sometimes practical jokes can backfire. And sometimes your audience doesn’t appreciate them as much as you think they will. That can make you unpopular pretty fast.”
Stevie shrugged again. Ms. Vogel was being awfully dramatic about this whole thing. Stevie’s jokes were just harmless fun. Nobody minded them—did they?
“Sometimes something you think is funny can seem mean or obnoxious to someone else,” Ms. Vogel went on. “Or just plain not funny.”
Stevie didn’t spend a lot of time worrying about what other people thought of her. Usually she liked most people, and most people liked her back. Or so she had always thought. But now, for the first time, she began to wonder. Her jokes were funny. Weren’t they? Or—the unwelcome thought floated into Stevie’s mind, along with the angry faces of her brothers, Max, Veronica, and countless others who had been the victims of her wit—did her jokes actually annoy more people than they amused?
Ms. Vogel wasn’t finished. “Creativity should be about doing something bigger or better or more original, Stevie, not just finding a way to get away with something. Because if what you’re doing is trying to get away with something, someday all your so-called creativity is going to catch up with you. And I’d hate to see that happen to you.” The teacher stopped her pacing and perched on the edge of her desk again. She gave Stevie a long, searching look. “Does what I’m saying make any sense to you at all?”
“Yes,” Stevie replied. And she meant it. She’d been trying to get away with things—especially her schoolwork—for too long. And now that she thought about it, the practical jokes really had been flying fast and furious lately. It had almost caught up with her—it had almost cost her her riding privileges. She had had a lot of close calls in the past, but this one was too close for comfort. She didn’t intend to risk any more close calls anytime soon.
STEVIE WALKED TO Pine Hollow slowly, hardly noticing the light rain that was beginning to fall. She was still thinking about her conversation with her teacher. The day before, she had agreed to meet Carole and Lisa right after school to practice for the competition, and she was already late. But they could wait a few more minutes.
Normally Stevie didn’t pay much attention to the lectures she was always getting from adults—teachers, parents, Max, and the rest. She wasn’t sure why this one was different. It could be because Ms. Vogel had made her wonder, for the first time, how her constant practical jokes were really received by their victims and onlookers.
She thought about her latest masterpiece. The whole riding class had laughed at the sign on Danny’s flank. But now that she thought about it, Stevie realized that Carole and Lisa had seemed less impressed with the whole thing than she herself had been. Now that she thought about it, she wasn’t entirely sure that Max had been amused by it after all. She suspected he didn’t like Veronica any more than anyone else, but another thing he didn’t like was having his riding classes disrupted. In fact, he hated it. And she realized she was lucky he hadn’t revoked her riding privileges on the spot.
The more Stevie thought about it, the more she realized she’d been riding on borrowed time for a while now. She could hardly count all the close calls she’d had because of her practical jokes. Max had threatened on more than one occasion to ban her from Pine Hollow. Usually she was pretty sure he was kidding, but still … Then there were all the times Stevie’s teachers had kept her after school because of some harmless little joke, cutting into her valuable riding time. And once her parents had grounded her because of a prank she had pulled on one of her brothers. That time, Stevie hadn’t been allowed anywhere near Pine Hollow—or Belle—for almost a week.
By the time she walked up Pine Hollow’s long driveway, Stevie had reached an important decision. The rewards just weren’t worth the risks anymore. She was through with practical jokes. Forever.
* * *
STEVIE FOUND HER friends practicing in the indoor ring to escape the rain, which was falling harder now, drumming steadily on the stable roof. She paused in the doorway and watched as Lisa took Prancer through a small course of fences. Prancer took each jump perfectly, tucking her hind feet up neatly behind her to avoid nicking any of the rails.
Stevie smiled, impressed. Her friend had worked hard with Prancer, a high-strung, spirited mare who had begun life as a racehorse. Prancer hadn’t been jumping for long, and it was partly thanks to Lisa’s dedication that she was doing so well at such a young age. When Lisa did something, she liked to do it right. That was one of the things Stevie admired most about her friend.
“There she is,” Lisa called, spotting Stevie walking into the ring.
Carole turned and waved. “Sorry we didn’t wait for you,” she said. “Hurry up and get Belle ready. We’re working on jump position.”
“In a minute,” Stevie called back. “I wanted to tell you guys something first. And ask you a favor.”
Carole and Lisa dismounted and led their horses over to where Stevie was standing.
“What’s up?” Carole asked.
Stevie took a deep breath. “Favor first, I guess,” she said. “I wanted to ask if you would help me make a film for my moving image class.”
“Another one?” Lisa asked. She patted Prancer soothingly when the mare stamped her feet restlessly, as if eager to get back to work.
“The same one,” Stevie corrected. “Um, my teacher didn’t like Sleeping Beauty very much. I have to do the project over. And I only have two weeks to do it.”
Lisa glanced at Carole and grinned. “Well, I won’t say I told you so, but I told you so.”
But Carole was frowning. “You have two weeks to do another film? That won’t leave you much time to get ready for the Pony Club competition.”
“I know,” Stevie said. “That’s why I need your help. Especially since this film has got to be really good.”
Lisa nodded. “Of course we’ll help,” she said. “What fairy tale are you going to do this time? Sleeping Beauty again?”
“Ugh. I don’t think so,�
�� Stevie said with a shudder. “I’ll have to come up with another one. I’ll start thinking about it tonight.”
“Good,” Carole said. “Then let’s get to work.” She turned and prepared to remount Starlight.
“Wait,” Stevie said quickly. “There’s something else I want to tell you.” She paused until she was sure she had both her friends’ full attention. This was important, and she didn’t want them to miss it.
“What is it now, Stevie?” Lisa asked.
Stevie cleared her throat. “I’ve made a very important decision,” she said solemnly. “You guys were right. My joking around has gotten out of hand lately. And it’s got to stop. That’s why I’ve decided I’m not going to play any more practical jokes ever again.”
Carole and Lisa exchanged glances. Then they burst out laughing, startling Prancer and Starlight a little. The horses snorted and tossed their heads, which just made Carole and Lisa laugh even harder.
“E-even Prancer and Starlight don’t believe you,” Lisa choked out, hardly able to speak because she was laughing so hard.
Stevie frowned. This wasn’t the reaction she had expected. “What’s so funny?” she demanded.
“Good one, Stevie,” Carole said through her giggles. “You almost had me believing you really had some important announcement to make.”
“Me too,” Lisa agreed with a grin. “But come on, how gullible do you think we are? As if you’d ever give up practical jokes!”
“But I mean it,” Stevie protested. She couldn’t believe her best friends were laughing at her resolution. Couldn’t they tell she was serious about it? “The thing with my film project convinced me. It’s not worth it. So I’m giving up jokes—cold turkey.”
“The film project, hmm?” Lisa said thoughtfully, still smiling. “I wonder about that, don’t you, Carole?”
Carole nodded, her eyes twinkling. “You mean, does she really have to redo the project? Or is all this just part of some elaborate Stevie Lake scheme?”
Stevie felt a little hurt. “Fine. Believe me or don’t believe me,” she snapped. “I’m going to go get Belle ready.”
Horse Capades Page 2