No Horse Wanted

by Melange Books, LLC

  “I’ll call and find out,” Felicia said.

  “Don’t,” I said. “Let’s quit wasting time on this. That price is definitely a mistake.”

  The two of them ignored me. What else was new?

  Mom called the number and talked to somebody. In minutes, we were on the way north to Arlington. I stared out the truck window at the evergreens and alders that marched alongside the highway. Sunshine danced off the glass.

  “There it is.” Felicia pointed to the next side street.

  Mom slowed down for the turn. She went to the third driveway on the left, parking next to another truck, between the house and a large row of kennels.

  I looked around. I didn’t see a barn or even a shed. “Where is this cheap horse?”

  “I don’t know,” Mom said. “We’ll have to ask the owner. She told me someone else was coming to look at it.”

  “Good. Maybe they’ll buy it.” I saw a shape in the dusty corral behind the house. Was that a horse? I opened the passenger door of the pickup and slid out. Felicia followed me. I headed for the corral and stopped when I heard a growl. Did they have a dog? I didn’t see one. When I scanned the caged runs, I spotted a giant cat. “What is that?”

  “A cougar,” Felicia said.

  We shared a look. What kind of nutcase would have a wild animal like that?

  “Lovely,” Mom said. “It’s lucky we left Jack home. He’d want us to take it, too.” Sighing, she shook her head. “I’ll go find the owner.”

  “Okay,” I said. “We’ll hunt for the horse.”

  Mom walked away, and we headed off to the corral. My breath caught. Felicia grabbed my arm, nails digging into my skin.

  I just stared at the skeleton pretending to be a horse. Red brown hide stretched over the bones, and I counted every rib. He was male, but I didn’t know if he was a stud or gelding. I hadn’t gotten close enough to see. Hips protruded, sunken sides, and he was absolutely filthy. Dirt covered his legs, up past his knees and hocks. Chunks of hair had fallen out of his mane. Maybe he’d rubbed them out. Half his tail was missing too. When he shifted, I saw yellow patches on his neck, side and one on his rump. So, he must have some paint blood too. Why else would he be a pinto?

  “Let’s go, Robin.” Felicia pulled on my arm. “It’s hopeless. He’s hopeless.”

  I almost went with her. Then, the horse lifted his head and looked at me. And I stopped. “No. He’s the one.”

  “What?” Felicia hissed. “I don’t believe you.”

  “Well, you should,” I said. “He’s the worst horse I’ve ever seen, and I’m taking him home.”

  Chapter Four

  Saturday, September 14th, 4:15 p.m.

  Felicia gave me one of her older sister dirty looks that she’d practiced over the years. It meant I was being a spoiled brat, but I didn’t care. I kept most of my attention on the horse. He flicked his ears and cocked his head my way, flashing a white blaze, but his big brown eyes nailed me. And there was no way I’d leave him here to die of starvation. I turned and scuffed through the dust to the back porch. I carefully climbed the rickety steps and knocked on the door.

  I’d concentrate on making him look good, like a horse again, not a skeleton. Later, I’d find him a good home and sell him. And nobody said I actually had to ride him in the meantime. He could just hang out in the barn with the rest of the hay-burners. Once I sold him, I would put the money toward my car. My car, my car, my beautiful car—well, if I got Brenna a down-payment, she’d save it for me. I knew she would. In this down economy, she’d take installments if that was the best I could do.

  I pushed open the back door and saw my mother sitting at a kitchen table talking to a scrawny, older woman wearing the worst wig I’d ever seen. “Mom, I’ve found him. I found my horse.”

  “He’s not yours yet,” Mom said. “Mrs. Bartlett tells me there’s another buyer coming to see him.”

  “Who else would want him, but me?” I asked. “He’s a wreck. Of course, once he’s all the way dead, a vet student might take him to study the bones.”

  “Roberta Lynn, that’s enough. Stop being rude. You have better manners. Use them.”

  I folded my arms and waited. The door opened behind me, and I saw Felicia standing there. “What?”

  “A old fat guy just got here with the worst trailer in creation. And he’s feeding your want-a-be horse grain. It’s gross.”

  “What’s gross about it?” I asked. “At least someone cares enough to feed him.”

  “He’s scarfing it so fast he almost chokes on each mouthful. Every time he spills some on the ground, he eats the dirt and the grain. He’s going to colic.”

  “I don’t suppose anyone cares if he dies of that either.” I brushed past my sister and returned to the corral. Sure enough, she was right. A guy older than my dad stood with a bucket of feed. “What are you doing?” I asked. “He’s not yours yet.”

  “He will be.”

  I nodded. “Well, you’re feeding him. That’s something. He won’t be hungry or abused.”

  “Nope. My partner and I will put some weight on him and run him up to Stanwood. They’ll ship him to the slaughter house in Canada.”

  “You can’t!” I watched the horse nudge the guy for more feed like the two of them were best buddies. “He likes you. Come on. All he needs is a stall and regular meals for a while.”

  “And six months to a year’s rest before he could be trained or ridden.” The man shook his head. “Nope, he’s history even if he’s too dumb to know it.”

  “Then, why waste grain on him?” Mom asked, as she joined us, Mrs. Bartlett limping along behind. “Or are you just trying to win his confidence to make him easy to load?”

  That earned a snort of laughter. “Lady, this grain is heavily salted. In a couple hours, he’ll be ready to tank up on water. By the time I run him to Stanwood next week, he’ll be more than a hundred pounds heavier.”

  “And since they’ll pay by the pound for him, you’ll make more money.” Mom put an arm around my shoulders. “Sometimes you need to know when to walk away, Robin. This could be one of those times.”

  “Or not.” Felicia walked over to the fence and pushed down the bottom strand of barbed wire with her boot. She lifted the second line and climbed into the pasture. Murmuring reassurances, she walked up next to the horse. “I want to see his teeth.”

  “I’ve looked at his papers,” Mom said. “He is barely two and a purebred Morab. Half Morgan and half Arabian.”

  “And nobody’s ever faked registration documents,” Felicia said.

  She sounded almost as snarky as I did when people irritated me. I saw Mom roll her eyes. Okay, so we were all channeling teenagers. What was it about this situation that brought out the immaturity in each of us?

  Mrs. Bartlett leaned heavily on her cane. “Two people want Twaziem. That’s amazing since I only put the ad in the paper for one day. Mr. Johnson, you’ve shared your plans for the colt. Young lady, what are yours?”

  Her tone reminded me of my track coach’s when my times sucked and I needed more practice to be considered for state competition. I straightened up to my full five-feet-six. “I’ll put him in a stall, feed him up, and do everything our vet says he needs to look like a horse again. Once he’s ready for training, I’ll turn him over to Rocky at Shamrock Stables and she’ll break him to ride.”

  Utter silence, which always made me nervous, so I added, “I don’t know why they call it ‘breaking’ because I’ve never seen Rocky do anything mean to a horse or pony.”

  The comment led to a lecture from Felicia about the history of horse training, like anyone really cared. Blah, blah, blah. I could turn her on, and since she knew everything about everything, she never shut up. While she blathered, she looked in Twaziem’s mouth, then felt around with her fingers.

  “What are you doing now?” I cut her off mid-sentence. “He has teeth or he wouldn’t be able to chew the horse-killer’s grain.”

  Dirty looks all ar
ound. Hey, I calls it as I sees it. Most people figured I was charming because I was blonde. A girl has to use what she’s got.

  New lecture from Felicia. This one was about how horses had two sets of teeth in their lifetimes and how the permanent set came into the mouth in a certain order. Twaziem would get so many as a two-year-old, more as a four-year-old, some kind of hook when he turned five and he’d really groove at seven. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So, what? Who really cared?

  I turned to Mrs. Bartlett. “So, who gets him? Me or the guy who thinks The Godfather was a great movie?”

  She eyed me, then looked at Mom. “Do you really want him?”

  “I’ll be honest with you,” Mom said. “I prefer horses to the teen boys who chase my daughters and most of the girls who constantly call and text my son. This is the first horse we’ve seen all day that Robin has wanted. She’s got a mean mouth and a crappy attitude, but she’s the best person I’ve ever seen with a sick or needy critter.”

  “She brings home every stray in the world, and then she visits them when she finds places for them to live. None of them ever go to the pound or shelters.” Felicia picked up Twaziem’s left front foot, inspecting the hoof. “I was really surprised she hadn’t found any more puppies or abandoned dogs when I got home from college.”

  “I probably will before too much longer,” I said. “What are you looking for now?”

  “Stone bruises, abscesses and chipped or cracked hooves.” When she finished with the hooves, Felicia moved onto the horse’s legs. He continued to ignore her, hassling the old guy for more grain. “Well, he doesn’t have splints.”

  I dreaded the next lecture, but I really wanted to know. “What are those?”

  Mr. Johnson answered before Felicia could. “They’re bruises or swellings that become permanent growths on the cannon bones. And they’ll limit what he can do.”

  My sister nodded agreement, but before she could add to what he said, Mr. Johnson hurried on, “I sympathize with your desire to save this horse, but it’s not very economical.”

  “My husband’s an accountant,” Mom said. “He’d probably agree with you about the cost of saving him.”

  Felicia and I shared a look. Was she talking about our father—the guy who always quoted Sir Winston Churchill at us? “The outside of a horse is good for the inside of a man...” Before either of us could say anything or argue with her, Mom gave us the evil eye and we shut down.

  She turned on Mrs. Bartlett. “I’m sure you’ll agree that the horse hasn’t done anything to deserve death, and if he did, he’d have a more humane end if you just turned him in with your cougar.”

  I almost cheered, but I didn’t. Go, Mom!

  “You have a point.” Mrs. Bartlett glanced past us to Mr. Johnson. “I appreciate you coming out, but Twaziem should have a chance for a happy life. And Robin will give him one.”

  “Got that right,” I said. “Nobody will ever hurt him again. I swear it.”

  Chapter Five

  Saturday, September 14th, 5:05 p.m.

  Mom went off with Mrs. Bartlett to sort out the registration papers. Mr. Johnson handed me the can of grain. “You got yourself a horse, missy. Take good care of him. Don’t water him for at least two hours.”

  That was a weird thing to say. I watched him leave, and then turned back to Twaziem. “What do you think?” I asked Felicia. “Should I give him the rest of this?”

  “Sure. It can’t hurt him, and he’s already had enough that he has to stay away from water anyway.”

  “I don’t get it. Why?”

  “Colic, Robin. If he waters up, it’ll flush the grain into his gut and cause an impaction. So, we’ll feed him when we get him home, but we’ll wait to fill his tub.” She headed off to the truck and came back with the halter and lead I’d gotten for my birthday. “Okay, he’s all yours. Get him ready to go.”

  She held the barbed wire strands apart so I could climb through them. I walked up next to Twaziem and slid the noseband of the halter over his face, buckling the headstall behind his ears. The whiskers on his nose tickled my hand when I offered more grain. He didn’t care who fed him. He kept nuzzling me. Now, I was his best buddy.

  Felicia walked away to meet Mom, and while she was gone, I told Twaziem about not particularly liking horses or really wanting one. “I want my car. Well, it’s not mine yet, but it will be. I just have to start earning money for it. No offense, Twaz, but I stopped loving horses when Cobbie died. Even if I don’t love you, I’ll never let somebody kill you or starve you or abuse you. Deal?”

  He nosed me for more food, and I figured we understood each other. I scooped out more grain. He wouldn’t ask me for a lot of emotional stuff, and I wouldn’t let anyone hurt him. He’d been hurt enough. He nickered softly and nudged my arm. I gave him the last of the grain from the coffee can and began talking about the Thunder Kittens, who lived in the hayloft and stomped around on the ceiling above the stalls.

  “You just have to remember that to them it is the floor. They like to make noise. If you ignore them, you’ll be fine. They love to annoy Singer because she always has conniptions.” He didn’t care about kittens or my talking. He pushed at me with his head. “There’s no more grain, but we have a lot of hay in the trailer. Come on. Let’s go find that instead.” I led him over to the gate, unlatched it, and gave it a push away from me. The bottom hinge let go and the thing fell partway on the ground. Twaziem looked at it like the gate was some kind of performing clown. He snorted, but he didn’t spook. He just stepped around it and followed me to the back of the horse trailer.

  Loosening the rope so he could graze beside the driveway, I unlatched the door and opened it. I stepped up into the two-horse trailer and gave him a little tug. “Hey, you. Step up here.” He did. He balked at the opening, but I pretended not to notice. I could reach the hay in the net and grabbed a handful. I held out the alfalfa to him. “Want it? Come here and get it.”

  He stretched out his neck and tried to reach the hay in my hand. When he couldn’t quite get it, he hesitated. Slowly, he lifted one foot and cautiously placed his left front hoof up inside, on the trailer floor. He tried again. The hay was still too far out of his reach. He picked up his right front, put it beside his left. Okay, so now he was halfway in the rig. I held out the hay, and he got a taste. He wanted more and I wanted him to come the rest of the way so I backed up. With a sudden scramble of his hindquarters, he followed. I gave him the handful of hay. Crunch, munch, and it was gone. Then, he found the hay net and the rest was history. He started pulling out a mouthful and chewing. If a horse could look blissful, he did. I praised him, ducked under his neck, and tied him securely to the ring on the wall. He not only had the net of alfalfa grass hay, the manger was full too.

  How far had Jack thought we’d have to go to find a horse? Canada? Petting Twaziem’s neck one more time, I eased past him to the back door of the trailer. Mom waited for me, Felicia beside her with a file folder of papers. “What do you have?” I asked.

  “A bill of sale,” Felicia said. “I made sure that his poor condition was detailed. We don’t want a hassle from the Animal Control people. And his papers are in order. You just have to send them to the registry to transfer him to your ownership. His registered name is actually Twa Ziemlich Sonne, which is a bit strange. Twa means ‘two’ in old Scots and Zeimlich Sonne is ‘pretty sun’ in German, but normally you’d say...”

  I tuned her out again and locked the trailer door. Hmm. I wanted to make money, but I didn’t have to buy a lottery ticket. I could just sign her up for Jeopardy. She’d win thousands. Would she give me enough for my car? While she blathered about Twaz’s name, I eyed Mom.

  “Can we go now? Or do we have to stay forever? And do we have to take her? Maybe, they could feed her to the cougar.”

  “I don’t think so.” Mom patted my shoulder. “And I’m proud of her. When she and Mrs. Bartlett got to talking about cancer, Felicia provided some very good resources.”

  “Who has can
cer?” I blinked and looked back at the trailer. I could hear Twaziem chewing away. “Is that why he didn’t get fed? Was she in the hospital? Now, I feel really bad for getting on her case.”

  “That’s kind of you,” Mom said, “but she could have had someone check up on her grandkids and make sure they were feeding the horse.”

  “Well, who fed the cougar?” I asked. “And why?”

  “He hasn’t been here that long,” Felicia said. “The animal rescue people brought him when he was injured in the woods. They fed the horse when they came to take care of the cat. It’s the only reason Twaziem made it. And can you imagine what would have happened if they hadn’t fed the cougar, and he got loose? He’d have gone hunting, and it might not have been your colt that wound up as dinner.”

  Those were all good points, but I didn’t tell Ms. Knows-Everything. Her head was big enough. She didn’t need me saying she was smart. She already knew it. In our family, Felicia was the brilliant one, Jack was the brave one, and I was the beautiful one. We all had our roles to play, and they didn’t change.

  We climbed in the pickup, and Mom started the engine. “I think we found the perfect horse for you to ride, Robin.”

  “Not until he turns three,” Felicia said. “That’s next April, a little more than seven months from now.”

  “Works for me. He has to be old enough and strong enough,” I told them. And a lot could happen in that amount of time. By then, I’d convince my parents he was ready to move onto a new home. I’d get him the best one I could find. Maybe Rocky would help with that. She always had people looking for safe, sane mounts for her beginning riders and Twaziem might turn out to be perfect for them. All anyone had to do was feed him and he obviously thought the person was a friend.

  It took over an hour for us to get home because of the traffic. Mom always drove carefully, and when she hauled a horse, she took more precautions. She signaled for turns early, slowed down before she braked, stayed five miles under the limit and pretty much ticked off every speed demon in forty miles. It didn’t bug me as much as usual, not with Twaziem on board.