by Kate Lattey
Colin wagged his tail at me, then focused his attention on Hayley again. I grabbed a couple more towels and laid them over my sister, then touched her clammy shoulder.
“Hays? I’m going for help. I’ll be right back, I promise.”
Her eyelids fluttered but she didn’t reply. An overwhelming sense of desperation filled me, and I took a breath, turned towards the door, and started to run.
CHAPTER THREE
I didn’t want to go to school the next morning but Mum made me. She’d called the ambulance right away, but by the time the paramedics arrived Hayley was in bed trying to sleep it off. All they’d done anyway was check her blood pressure and temperature, then told my parents that her seizure might have been a one-off and may never happen again, which they didn’t find as reassuring as the medics had clearly intended. Hayley was still in bed, sleeping it off, while Mum fussed around her like an anxious hen, and the rest of us were ordered to resume our daily lives.
I didn’t tell my friends what had happened until lunchtime, when my silence alerted them to the fact that something was wrong, and one of them thought to ask what was going on. Their reactions were predictable, at least to me. Jodie had ambitions of being a doctor, and she immediately started rattling off possible reasons for an unexplained seizure, which she soon backed up with the help of Dr Google.
“It could be PTSD,” she suggested with a swipe of her thumb. “Says here that traumatic events can trigger seizures. Has anything really bad happened to her lately?”
Other than me threatening to sell her beloved pony? I shook my head, wondering if that could be it. Surely it wasn’t upsetting her that much, although I made a mental note not to even suggest it to Hayley, because she’d be sure to grab onto it as a likely reason and a perfect excuse to make sure Misty got to stick around.
Evelyn was leaning over Jodie’s shoulder and reading out loud. “Exhaustion? What about a recent concussion? Has Hayley fallen off recently and whacked her head?”
I shrugged. “No idea. She wouldn’t tell us even if she had.”
Admitting to failure or injury wasn’t in Hayley’s repertoire, and she’d once hidden a fractured wrist from our parents for three weeks because she wanted to ride in Pony of the Year, and was worried that they wouldn’t let her if she was in a cast. By the time she’d been forced to confess because she couldn’t hold Misty with only one working arm, she’d made the fracture so much worse that it was cast for almost twice as long as would’ve been required. But she was back on Misty within a matter of days, and still managed to have her cast off in time.
“What about an aneurysm?” Jodie wondered out loud, and Mia let out an exasperated sigh.
“Stop it you two! Can’t you see you’re upsetting Tess?” Mia shuffled closer to me on the bench seat and wrapped her arm around my shoulders, giving me what she thought was a reassuring squeeze. In reality, the vice-like grip of her bony arm was more uncomfortable than comforting, but at least it made the other two shut up.
“Can we just change the subject?” I asked.
“Sure. What should we talk about?”
There was an awkward pause as they all looked at each other, stumped by the thought of trying to induce conversation. I stared straight in front of me, trying and failing to get the image of Hayley lying prone in the bathtub out of my brain. Across the courtyard, a group of boys were standing around, idly kicking a slightly deflated soccer ball back and forth between them as they chatted. I was staring at them without realising it until I noticed one of them staring back. I blinked hard and looked away, but not before Jonty had taken a hesitant step towards me.
Oh help. I looked at Evelyn quickly, turning my body towards her and away from Jonty. “Did you see that new movie on the weekend?”
She gave me a blank look. “What movie?”
Come on. “Weren’t you saying last week that there was some new movie coming out that you wanted to see?”
Evelyn’s heavy brow drew down into a frown. “Um, did I? I can’t remember.”
“It had that guy you like in it.” I had no idea what I was talking about, but Evelyn was always going on about some hot actor or another, and how desperate she was to see their latest movie, so I’d thought it would be a safe bet for a conversation topic. But Evelyn still looked confused, and she turned back towards Jodie, clearly seeking her guidance.
But Jodie’s attention was focused over my shoulder, and as a shadow crossed the space between us, I resigned myself to the inevitable.
“Hey Tess.”
I turned to look at Jonty, feeling immediately awkward. He had his hands in the pockets of his school shorts, and was looking at me from under his thick fringe of dark brown hair. His socks sagged around his ankles and his jersey had a small burn hole in it. I wrinkled my nose slightly at the smell of stale cigarette smoke and he shifted his weight from one foot to the other.
“Is everything okay?”
“Yeah, fine.” I was aware that my friends were all staring up at Jonty as he spoke, and one of his mates whistled at him across the courtyard as he talked to me. He glanced over his shoulder and looked embarrassed, but he didn’t take the cue to leave.
Fortunately, the bell rang and saved us from the ensuing awkwardness. At least, I thought it would, but as I got to my feet and started walking towards my next class, Jonty fell into step next to me.
“It’s just that I saw the ambos up at your place yesterday, so I was wondering if everything was all right.”
I gritted my teeth, wondering what to say. We reached the doors into the building and Jonty stepped across in front of me, pulled the door open and held it there, waving me and Mia through. She blushed red and scurried through with a smile, and I gritted my teeth and followed, walking quickly down the hall. But Jonty caught up, his longer legs keeping pace easily.
“I mean, I can see you’re okay,” he said, motioning to me as though I couldn’t tell for myself. “Was it for Hayley? I saw she wasn’t on the bus this morning. Is she okay?”
We were surrounded by people. I couldn’t talk about it here. I couldn’t talk about it at all, not to someone I barely knew. The last thing I needed was for Hayley’s medical problems to get spread around the school. She’d have my head on a plate if she ever found out I’d been talking about her behind her back, and I wasn’t going to risk incurring her wrath if I could possibly avoid it.
“It’s actually none of your business,” I told Jonty, locking my eyes on the open classroom door up ahead. “So just leave me alone, would you?”
He dropped back, and I kept walking fast, hurrying into the classroom and making a beeline for my usual seat. I dumped my bag on the floor next to me and I sank down gratefully into the hard plastic, trying not to think about my sister.
Mia sat down next to me. “That was rude.”
“I know, right?” I agreed. “What does he expect me to do, start spouting off about Hayley’s medical problems in the middle of a crowded hallway?”
But Mia was giving me a weird look. “I meant you were rude to him,” she clarified.
“What?” I thought back over my words, and realised she was right. “Maybe I was,” I conceded. “But it’s got nothing to do with him. Just because he lives down the road doesn’t give him the right to start prying into our private business. It’s not like we’re even friends – I hardly know the guy.”
“You still didn’t have to treat him like that.” Mia pulled her books out of her bag and set them on her desk, her cheeks flushing red.
“Like what?”
“Like he’s beneath you.”
“I did not!”
“Yes you did. You can be a real snob sometimes, Tess.”
I stared at my so-called friend in shock as our teacher came into the room and told us all to be quiet and face forward.
“I don’t think he’s beneath me,” I told her, horrified that she’d even think such a thing. I didn’t think less of Jonty just because his family were poor. And it wasn’t as
though my family was made of money either, although we had a lot more to our name than the Fishers did. But we’d worked hard for what we had. Jonty’s dad was what my father called a ‘dole bludger’, someone who just lived off a Government benefit because he was too lazy to go and find another job. Dad had been making noises again last week about telling them to move on, but he was looking like being short-staffed this summer so he was debating hiring Nate as an extra hand, much to Mum’s disgust. She was always complaining about them, looking down her nose at them, and I wondered uneasily if some of her attitude had rubbed off on me without me even noticing.
I flipped open my workbook to the assigned page and started reading, but my mind wasn’t retaining any information. I wondered why Mia was so resolute in defending Jonty. She didn’t know him either, as far as I was aware. Then something startling occurred to me, and I leaned across my desk towards her.
“Wait, do you like Jonty?” I whispered to Mia.
She flushed an even deeper shade of red and pretended she hadn’t heard me. But I kept my eyes fixed on her until she finally turned and glared in my direction.
“See? You’re so horrified by that, because you think he’s not good enough for me.”
“I…” Was that what I’d been thinking? I shook my head. “It’s not that at all. I’m just not sure he’s your type.”
Actually, what I meant was that I was pretty sure Mia wasn’t Jonty’s type. He’d had a pretty obvious crush on Hayley forever, which wasn’t that surprising since most boys did, but Hayley’s brash confidence was a long way from Mia’s bookish reserve. She was so shy that she made even me seem outgoing by comparison, and I was fairly certain that she’d never even spoken one word to Jonty, nor was he likely to have any awareness of her existence.
“How would you know?” Mia whispered back at me. “You just said you hardly know him.”
“Do you?” I asked her, quickly discovering that was the wrong thing to say, as she turned her upper body away from me and leaned over her desk, burying herself in her book.
Oh, great. Once again I’d said the wrong thing and put my foot in it. This was why it was much easier being friends with Bayard than any of the girls at school. I could never predict how they were going to take things, and I could somehow never predict what stupid thing was going to come out of my mouth. Bay would’ve just shrugged that comment off. Not that I’d ever be discussing Jonty with him anyway, much less whether or not they were the right type for each other. The very thought of it made me smirk, an expression I quickly wiped off my face as I caught my teacher’s eye. I’d been staring across the classroom instead of down at my book, and he didn’t miss my inattention.
“Something funny, Tess?”
I shook my head, feeling my palms start to sweat as Mia’s head swivelled back towards me.
“No? Nothing you want to share with the class?” I shook my head harder, and he mercifully backed off. “Eyes on your work.”
I snapped my attention back towards my Economics workbook, but I could see the rigidity of Mia’s spine from the corner of my eye. I knew she’d thought I was laughing at her. You made a real meal of that one, I thought grumpily to myself, fully aware that I’d hurt Mia’s feelings. And that wasn’t going to go away any time soon.
The house was quiet when I got home. I crept through carefully, changing into jeans and boots before heading out to ride Rory. I was going to have to ride Misty soon too, but I was hoping to put that off for a day or two. Or a week or two, if possible. I closed the door quietly behind me and looked around for Colin as I jumped off the porch. Usually he met me at the gate, but there was no sign of him, so I figured he’d gone to help with the stock. He wasn’t the most well-trained or helpful of our dogs, although he always meant well and tried his hardest. He just sometimes had different ideas from Dad about what the right thing to do actually was, which was why he’d been sacked from the working team and became my pet.
I found him up by the barn, and he came loping eagerly towards me as I approached, then skidded to a stop and wagged his tail as I reached down to scruff his head.
“What’ve you been up to?” I asked him. “I thought you’d be out working, but you’re just slacking off up here, huh?”
Colin led the way back up to the barn, glancing over his shoulder at me as I followed, as if he had something really important to show me. I sped up a little, wondering what he’d got up to now. Last time he’d done this, he’d found a litter of newborn kittens and was proudly standing guard over them. Our barn cat was terrified of dogs, and she’d been frantic with worry as Colin unknowingly held her off. He’d been so enamoured of the kittens that we’d had to banish him from the barn until they’d grown up enough to stay out of his way.
Colin trotted up to the stable next to the tack room and sat down in front of it, his tail thumping the concrete floor while he waited for me to catch up. It didn’t take me long to realise what he wanted me to see. Hayley was in one of the stables, saddling Coppertop.
“Hey.”
She glanced over her shoulder at me, then shot a disparaging look down at Colin. “Oh good, you’re finally home. Your dog has been following me around like a bad smell all afternoon.”
Good boy. “He’s worried about you,” I told her honestly.
“Well, he can stop. I’m fine.” Hayley picked up Copper’s bridle and flipped the reins over his head. Concerned by her abruptness, Copper flung his head up and rolled his eyes at her, and she glared at him. “Settle down, idiot.”
I shifted my weight from one foot to the other as I watched my sister bridle her horse. “Are you allowed to ride?”
“Why wouldn’t I be?” There was a challenge in her voice that she backed up with the look she was giving me, and I ground my teeth as she finished buckling the noseband. “Can you get out of the way?”
I should’ve stood my ground, but I didn’t. I capitulated, stepping sideways as she led Copper out into the barn aisle and grabbed her helmet from the table outside the tack room.
I tried again. “I don’t think you should ride alone.”
She raised an eyebrow as she settled her helmet onto her thick curls. “Who’s going to come with me? You?”
I swallowed. I hated riding with Hayley, because she had no consideration for anyone else, and would race off up a hill when I was still trying to close a gate, or while I was in the middle of tightening my girth. Rory’s one fault was that she hated being left behind, and Hayley would always take full advantage of that. After the day she’d galloped off while I was in the middle of remounting, and Rory had spun around and I’d caught my foot in the stirrup and almost been dragged, I’d refused to ride with her again. She’d laughed it off and accused me of being a drama queen, but she hadn’t experienced that moment of blind panic when I’d seen myself being dragged up the rocky slope, flopping around like a rag doll as Rory raced in mad pursuit of Misty.
I didn’t think Hayley wouldn’t be trying any galloping today, but if she did – and if she fell off – she shouldn’t be alone. I plucked up my courage.
“I’ll get Rory in,” I told her. “Give me a few minutes to catch her.”
“No way. You’re boring to ride with, and I don’t need a babysitter.”
Hayley led Copper out to the upside-down concrete water trough that we used as a mounting block and swung herself into the saddle. Copper danced sideways, and she shortened her reins and swung her leg forward to tighten her girth. I stood helplessly by, wishing I had the courage to grab Copper’s reins and stop her, but I didn’t. Hayley let her tall chestnut horse stride out of the yard, shooting a triumphant look over her shoulder at me as she headed out through the open gate and up the track towards the ridgeline.
I tried to reassure myself that she’d be fine. I grabbed a mouldy looking carrot out of the tub in the feed room, picked up Rory’s shabby old farm halter and went down to the paddock to catch her. She lifted her pretty head and watched me approach, ears forward and expression docile.
Misty ignored me until he heard Rory crunching up the carrot, then he came barging over and demanding his share. I gave him what I had left, but it wasn’t enough to satisfy him, and he aimed a double-barrelled kick at Rory as I led her back out of the gate.
I took Rory up to the barn and threw her saddle and bridle on, planning on heading out after my sister and at least keeping an eye on her. But when I led my pony towards the mounting block, I noticed something that I had somehow failed to pick up on earlier. The front shoe that had been a little bit loose last week had come off entirely, and was probably lying around somewhere in the paddock. Rory didn’t have particularly strong hooves and there was no way she’d make it up the rocky tracks to the ridge and back with one of her shoes missing, without going seriously lame.
I swore and pulled her tack off again, then took her back to the paddock. She was pleased to be returned to Misty’s company, and he immediately shot me a wary look and cantered off to the other side of the paddock in case I was considering riding him instead. The thought had crossed my mind, but only fleetingly. Instead, I whistled to Colin and took off at a jog towards the sheep yards.
Dad was there, treating foot rot in a few of our ewes. He looked up as I ran over to him, and his blue eyes crinkled into a smile.
“Where’s the fire?” he teased, but when I told him what was going on, his smile disappeared quickly. “She did what? She knows she’s not allowed to ride. Not for at least a week, that’s what the doc said.” He looked at me in my boots and helmet, and turned towards his quad bike parked up in the tractor shed. “Let’s go.”
I clung onto the back of Dad’s homespun wool jersey as we battered down the raceway and then headed up towards the ridge. Not all of our tracks were wide enough for the quad, and he had to take a different route to the one Hayley would’ve taken, but we were hoping to head her off. Colin raced alongside us, and I called to him to go find Hayley. He looked at me eagerly, then took off up the hill. For a moment I was filled with immense pride in how well trained he was, until I saw the rabbit that he was pursuing. It disappeared down a hole and he skidded to a stop, then shoved his nose into the hole and snuffled around, scrabbling at it with his front feet. I rolled my eyes and whistled him back. Some dog you are. At least he came back when he was told to these days.