Masquerade

by Jessica Burkhart

  I sped up, squinting as I saw the courtyard come into view. I followed the sidewalk down to the center, and through the fog, someone walked toward me.

  “Nice timing!” I said, smiling at Drew. We both reached the fountain at the same time.

  He nodded. “No kidding.”

  Drew looked très adorable this early in the morning. His hair was a little ruffled, and he had a slight pillow-crease imprint on his left cheek. He was dressed to run in red Adidas, black pants, and a black T-shirt.

  “Want to stretch here?” I asked.

  “Let’s do it.” Drew smiled at me and put a foot on the fountain rim. He leaned forward, grabbing his ankle.

  I stepped back, giving us both room. I spread my legs until I felt a slight pull from my inner thighs to my knees. Bending forward, I slowly inched my hands toward the cobblestones. My legs started to burn, so I let myself straighten, took a few seconds, and then bent forward again. This time, I was able to place my palms on the cobblestones. I repeated the stretch a couple more times.

  “Do you have a set stretch routine that you always do?” Drew asked. He was stretching his hamstrings.

  “Most of the time, I do the same stretches, just in a different order from the last time I ran,” I said. “But if I read about a different stretch in a magazine or online, I’ll try it and add it to my routine if I like it.”

  Drew nodded, sitting and flexing his feet. “I’m the same way. I like variety, but with stretches I know work.”

  I raised my right arm, bent to the left, and grabbed my left ankle. I kept my right hand pointed up and held the pose for a few seconds before switching to the other side.

  “That’s a cool one,” Drew said.

  I blushed, wiggling my toes in my shoes. I didn’t know he was watching watching.

  “It’s good,” I said. “You should try it sometime. I’ve been doing it forever.”

  Drew watched me do the stretch again, then mimicked me. “That feels great,” he said. “Cool. I’ll have to think of one to show you.”

  Drew and I stretched for a few more minutes before my muscles felt loose and warmed up.

  “I’m set, if you are,” Drew said. The pillow crease was gone from his cheek, and his eyes were wider and he looked more awake.

  “I’m ready to run, Adams,” I said, grinning. “You get a pass this time because you know the campus and have to show me the best running trail.”

  “And that’s a pass how?” he asked as we left the courtyard.

  “I have to keep pace with you and not run ahead or I’ll get lost,” I said. “But next time . . .” I shrugged. “I just might have to leave you behind.”

  “Ohhh, Lauren.” Drew shook his head, his lips pressed together. “I was going to take it easy on you the first time out, but I think I have to take that back. You have to keep up with me or you’ll get lost. I hope you brought a GPS.”

  We increased the speed of our walk as Drew led me toward the woods.

  “Please,” I said. “All I brought is this.” I flashed my wrist at him. “To keep track of how long it takes you to catch me at the finish line.”

  Drew smiled and we both laughed.

  “You’re a lot of fun at five in the morning,” he said. “I usually don’t want to talk to anyone this early.”

  “I am a morning person. But running with a partner is going to be different. If it’s anything like stretching with you, though, I think I’ll like it.”

  We reached the edge of the woods. I recognized one of the trails I’d been on a few times with Whisper and some friends.

  “Are we going on a horse trail?” I asked.

  “No.” Drew stopped, looking at me. “Walkers and runners are supposed to stay off the horse trails. There are usually riders on the trails either conditioning their horses, or getting a breather—something. There are too many twists and turns for people to be walking where someone could be cantering behind them.”

  “I’d hope I’d hear a horse coming, but . . .” My mouth formed an O. “I’ve usually got my iPod on.”

  “Exactly. That’s the dangerous part. Last year one of the guys on the swim team got confused about what trail to take. He guessed and ended up on a horse trail, unknowingly. He was walking to catch his breath and he had music blasting.”

  “Uh-oh,” I said.

  “Almost.” Drew shook his head. “One of the older riders, a legendary older rider, I should add, was cantering her horse with her friend. They came around a sharp corner and almost ran over the guy.”

  “Oh my God.” I covered my mouth with my hand.

  “Their horses swerved at the last second, apparently, and the guy didn’t even know horses had been close until dirt clods flew back at him from the horses’ hooves.”

  “Um, maybe we should run on the track instead,” I said, only half joking. “Please make sure we go on a human trail.”

  “Promise,” Drew said.

  Fog surrounded us, making it feel as if there was no one else for miles. The moment felt like something out of a book.

  I realized it was my turn to talk and I hadn’t said a word. “Okay. Let’s go—I’m trusting you here.”

  Drew bumped my shoulder with his. “You can trust me.”

  “Who was that rider?” I asked as I followed him into the woods. “The ‘legendary’ one?”

  “Sasha Silver.”

  I sucked in a breath at her name. Sasha Silver. Sasha Silver. Her name rolled around in my brain as I followed Drew on autopilot as we entered the woods. We’d stepped onto a well-worn path. The dirt was marked with shoe imprints instead of horseshoes. Without a word, we started at a slow jog, side by side.

  “Where did you go?” Drew asked. He had a soft smile on his face.

  “What do you mean?”

  “You’re here, but you looked far away. Like you were thinking about something serious.” Now our footsteps hit the dirt in tandem.

  “Oh, I was just thinking.” I paused midsentence. “You said ‘Sasha Silver.’ She and I are kind of connected in a way.”

  Drew motioned with his hand to the left side of the trail where it forked into two separate paths. We kept our jogging at a steady pace. When we really started to run, if we were doing it right, we wouldn’t have the breath to talk.

  “Don’t tell me—she’s your stepsister,” Drew said.

  I laughed. “No. But she and I both trained at Briar Creek Stables with the same instructor before we came to Canterwood. Her family still lives in Union, too, where my family is.”

  “Wow,” Drew said, looking over at me. “Working with the same coach as Sasha is an incredible opportunity. Also a little scary and intimidating, I bet.”

  Drew got me. I don’t know how, but he just did.

  “You have no idea,” I said. “You’re the first one here to pick up on the scary part without me having to explain it first. Usually, I tell people that I trained at Briar Creek after Sasha and I get the ‘Omigod, you were in the same stable as Sasha?! With her instructor? Did you see her?’ and a zillion questions like that.”

  I adjusted my stride as my legs continued to warm up.

  “I completely understand that,” I continued. “Like you said, though, on the flipside I feel as though people are expecting me to be just like her. To be the next Briar-Creek-to-Canterwood-Crest prodigy.”

  “Do your parents make you feel that way?”

  “Oh, not at all!” Thinking about them even for a second made my chest tighten. I missed them. “My parents are the best—they’re not stage parents, and they don’t want to micromanage my career. They were always there for me but never pushed me to compete.”

  Drew smiled. “They sound cool. I’m glad they didn’t make you feel like you had to be Sasha two-point-oh when you came here.”

  “Not for a second. Mr. Conner hasn’t either. I mean, I haven’t even seen Sasha yet. The stable is always so busy. I’m not exactly looking for her, but I’d try to get enough courage to introduce myself if I ev
er see her.”

  “This is a small school,” Drew said. “It doesn’t feel that way, to me anyway, but you’ll see Sasha sometime. When you do, I know you’ll be fine—talk to her like the Lauren I’m chatting with now.”

  I smiled, knowing I was blushing. Hopefully, Drew would think it was because of the exercise.

  Under the cover of trees, we were still shaded from direct sunlight. It came through in patches, lighting different spots of the trail, and had begun to burn off the fog.

  “Thanks, Drew,” I said. “If and when I do see Sasha, you’ll be the first to know.”

  He grinned. “Good. Want to pick up the pace?”

  I nodded. “I’m always ready.”

  A “FRIENDLY” LITTLE RACE

  DREW MOVED FORWARD, FASTER. I MATCHED him, starting to feel endorphins kick in.

  “At The Sweet Shoppe, you told me that you live with your dad,” I said. “How is he about your riding?”

  “Supportive all the way,” Drew said. Sunlight glinted off his black hair as we ran through a less shaded stretch. “He was happy when I found riding. I’d been swimming and had tried a bunch of different sports, but I was missing something. He even tried sports with me—archery, indoor rock climbing, golf—everything.”

  “That’s a good dad,” I said, smiling.

  “I think he was afraid that I wasn’t totally happy because of my mom leaving. He cut back hours at work to be home more, made it clear that I could have friends over on the weekends, and did everything he could to compensate for my mom not being there.”

  “I know I said it before, but I’m sorry.”

  We were quiet for a few seconds. The only sound was the whoosh of our breaths, getting faster, and our shoes hitting the dirt.

  “Thanks, Laur. I don’t really talk about her much, but I don’t know if I was missing a mom or if I just knew there was something else for me out there.”

  “How did you find riding?”

  My question made Drew smile. “A coworker of my dad’s invited us over for a barbecue. The guy and his wife had horses, and they asked if I wanted to ride. I didn’t even hesitate. They saddled up a really old Appaloosa and explained the basics to me. The horse—Clark—was their daughter’s old horse. She was in college, and she used to compete in Western classes on Clark.”

  “Oh, neat,” I said. “Did you ride Western that day? I’ve never tried it—I really want to.”

  “Yeah, they put Western tack on Clark and led me to a small arena. I got on and everything just . . . clicked. I loved riding the second I sat in the saddle.”

  I grinned. “I love this story.” It was a little harder to get words out—the faster jog was taking most of my breath.

  “They let me ride Clark as long as I wanted. When I got in the car with my dad, I started to ask him if I could take lessons.” Drew laughed. “But before I could ask, Dad told me he wanted to look into a nearby stable about lessons if I wanted to try riding. He said his coworker told him that he’d never seen anyone pick up riding so fast.”

  “That’s so cool! Omigosh! And you said yes, of course, to the lessons, right?”

  “I started the next weekend. Dad promised that I’d get my own horse if I still loved riding after a year.”

  “Enter Polo.”

  “My instructor helped me find him. I tried Polo and one other horse before I said I didn’t need to ride any others. Polo was my guy.”

  “Aw, I love it.” I brushed a bead of sweat off my forehead.

  Drew checked his watch. “Want to really go for it? We’re going to hit a straight lane really soon. It takes us out of the woods—my usual stopping point. We’ll end up behind the cafeteria. I usually cool down by walking back to my dorm, or if I’m really hot, walking back and forth between my dorm hall and the caf.”

  “Let’s go!”

  Without waiting for him, I dug my shoes into the dirt and kicked into top gear.

  “Towers!” Drew yelled. His shoes pounded the dirt, a few paces behind me.

  I held back my laughter and focused on my breathing. Drew caught up, matching me stride for stride. Together, we ran.

  And ran.

  And ran.

  Like we’d never run out of breath.

  Like the path was never-ending.

  Like we were feeding off each other’s energy.

  We ran until we broke an imaginary yellow finish-line ribbon in a dead heat. If it had been a track meet, judges wouldn’t be able to determine a winner. Even with playback.

  I bent over, hands on my knees, gasping. That’s what not running consistently did to me! My breaths were ragged, and I gulped air. Beside me, Drew grabbed the hem of his T-shirt and lifted it up to his face. He wiped sweat from his forehead.

  I tried not to stare as he exposed flat abs. He had the lean body of a swimmer combined with the strong, muscular body of a rider. I blushed, looking away as my breathing started to slow. I reached down, grabbing one ankle, holding the position, then switching.

  The fog had disappeared—I hadn’t even noticed when it had completely lifted—and sunlight, strong for October, illuminated the campus, which had been dim when I’d last seen it. Running through the woods had felt like time had skipped ahead.

  “What did you think?” Drew asked as we started walking side by side.

  “That was awesome,” I said. “I love that trail. It’s the perfect length, and the shade is definitely welcome for this time of year.”

  “I’m really glad you liked it. It’s my favorite outdoor running path.”

  “I—I had a lot of fun running with you,” I said. I looked at him, and he locked his eyes on mine. It almost made me forget what I was going to say. “Thanks for showing me the path and for going with me. You got me out of my head for a while, and I really needed that.”

  Drew grinned. “Even though you cheated at the end—”

  I gasped. “I would never!”

  “Even despite that,” Drew continued, laughing, “I had a lot of fun too. I feel great and ready to tackle the day. You said you’re used to running alone, but if you ever want to run together again, count me in.”

  “I’d love that. Maybe we can run together, like, three or four mornings a week before class?”

  Getting to do this again with Drew would definitely make it easy for me to get out of bed so early.

  “Sounds great.”

  Drew and I smiled at each other. I couldn’t wait to tell Khloe! Maybe it was the endorphins from exercise, or getting to spend time with Drew before classes, but I was giddy.

  We chatted about our day as we cooled down, and Drew walked me to Hawthorne before heading back to Blackwell.

  Best. Early. Morning. Yet.

  COSTUME CONFESSION

  BACK IN MY ROOM, KHLOE WAS IN THE SHOWER.

  I knocked and cracked open the bathroom door. Steam poured out with a wave of Khloe’s strawberry body wash.

  “Mooorning!” I sang.

  Khloe stuck her head out of the shower curtain. “Someone’s happy this morning.” She peered at me, then grinned. “Your run with Drew was awful, wasn’t it?”

  I nodded. “Horrible. When you get out of the shower, I’ll tell you all about it.”

  Khloe made a pretend-sad face. “I’m sorry. I’ll be out in five, and then you can tell your roomie all about it. I’ll do my very best to make you feel better.” She winked at me and disappeared back behind the curtain.

  Smiling, I closed the bathroom door and slipped out of my sweaty clothes. I tossed them in my overflowing hamper. Laundry was on my to-do list this weekend. I put on my terry-cloth white robe with multicolored polka dots and sat at my desk.

  I opened my laptop and pulled up my blog. I clicked “new post” and started typing. My fingers flew over the keys, and just as Khloe turned off the water, I was proofreading my post.

  Lauren Towers’s Blog

  7:02 a.m.: Life is good!

  I don’t have much time to write this morning, but I feel like I’
m going to burst if I don’t!!! I already blogged about one thing in my last post, but I’ve had time to reflect on it, and I have a few more thoughts. The second awesome-slash-amazing thing just happened.

  About the show: I blogged last time that Whisper and I attended the schooling show hosted by Canterwood. It was our first show together, which on its own is something that makes me très, très proud.

  As I’ve said a bunch of times, the schooling show was the first competition since Red Oak. The show that wouldn’t let go until I competed again. I couldn’t have been happier with the results of the schooling show.

  Whisper is incredibly green and new to the show circuit compared to most of the other horses we were up against. She’s only five, and we’ve been a pair since summer. I would have been truly happy if we’d attended the show, gotten Whisper the experience and feel of a competition, and not won any ribbons.

  It would have also been enough for me to show and not place. I had everything to prove. Not to anyone else, either. To myself. I needed to get back in the arena at a competitive level and prove it to myself that I could do it. I wasn’t trying to make myself do something that I didn’t want to do—I’d been excited about the show since Mr. C had announced it.

  Excited and terrified.

  Getting back into the competitive circle, though, was my ultimate reason for joining Canterwood’s riding team. This schooling show was the parfait (Oops, right. Promised KK that I’d translate all French words on my blog! Will do starting here.) opportunity for me as an equestrian. I didn’t have to travel, worry about how that would affect Whisper, and get the both of us used to new riding spaces. Obviously, we can’t always show on home turf, but it was exactly what Whisper and I needed for our first competition. Next time, we’ll be ready to take the next step and travel.

  Okay, so (I need to get to the point!) completing two classes with Whisper and being more than happy with our rides would have felt like a huge win to me even if we hadn’t placed.