High Hurdles Collection Two

by Lauraine Snelling

  Ears nearly touching at the tips, Major watched everything around them as she led him into his stall. He snuffled her shoulder, then nosed the hay rack and checked out the water bucket. The horse on the other side of him banged the stall wall and laid back his ears.

  Uh-oh, got a nasty one here. DJ patted Major’s nose and left the stall to get her grooming bucket.

  “Watch out for the snots in the next stalls,” Bunny whispered as DJ opened the tack box. “They really think they’re something.”

  The butterflies in DJ’s middle took a practice flutter.

  Another squeal from the stall next to them grabbed her attention. The other horse, ears flat against his head and teeth bared, lunged at the bars between him and Major.

  Chapter • 14

  If entering the practice ring sent her butterflies cartwheeling, what would the real one do?

  DJ warmed Major up carefully, not taking any chances of him pulling a tendon or something. Walking and then slow trotting around the ring gave them both a chance to look at some of the other entries. As Joe had said, there were some classy horses here.

  She patted Major’s shoulder, not wanting him to feel bad but knowing she was the one comparing, not him. She glanced up to see Brad and Jackie at the rail, smiles on their faces, waiting for her to see them.

  They trotted over, and Brad stroked Major’s nose while he greeted her.

  “You two are looking good. He’s moving easy.”

  Jackie cocked her head. “Forgive him. He’s got father flutters.” She grinned up at DJ.

  “Father flutters?”

  “You know how you felt when your students were showing and you were wringing your hands?” Brad made a worried face for her. DJ nodded. “Well, multiply it by a hundred. That’s how I feel.”

  “I’d rather show myself any day than watch someone I love in the ring.” Jackie nodded and slipped her hand through the bend at Brad’s elbow. “I’ve got to keep him on the ground here.”

  DJ smiled and then giggled. Her father did indeed look—well, running his fingers through his hair had disturbed the way it usually lay, and his fingers drummed on the fence rail. “If I could, I’d give you all my butterflies to go with yours.”

  “Thanks a heap, kid.” He smiled up at her. “You need anything? Can I get you something to eat, drink?”

  “He wants an excuse to get a cup of coffee.” Jackie winked at DJ. “We’ll be back.”

  “I’ll take a doughnut,” DJ said and turned Major back into the ring.

  Waiting in line to enter the ring for the first time took three hours. At least, it felt like three hours by the time the gatekeeper signaled DJ’s turn. Junior Hunter Seat Equitation sounded easy, but when she looked at the horses ahead of them, her butterflies created new aerial maneuvers.

  Walk, trot, canter, reverse. Major took it all like a pro, and DJ settled down after the first circuit of the ring. But with twenty entrants, they didn’t place.

  Not that she’d expected to. But DJ still felt a bit of a letdown. Winning a ribbon, even last place, felt good.

  “That’s okay, Deej. You two did a good job out there. You were just out-classed. Pretty counts here, you know.” Brad’s attempts to comfort her made her feel worse.

  Maybe we shouldn’t even be here. DJ banished that thought as soon as it cropped up.

  Even having her own motel room didn’t keep DJ awake that night. She and Joe left the others sleeping when they headed back to the barn in the early morning to care for Major.

  By the next afternoon, DJ had endured three classes, all without ribbons. At her fourth and final class, DJ stiffened her spine, then ordered herself to relax. This time they had fences to take. She patted Major’s neck and smiled at the gatekeeper as they waited for his signal.

  Please, Lord. The prayer went no further. The signal came, and she nudged Major into a trot and entered the ring.

  “Shame she doesn’t have a better horse.” The comment came from someone along the gate. DJ started to turn her head, but Bridget’s drilling came to her rescue. Focus. Focus. Only think of your horse and the jumps.

  Major slowed. DJ stared straight between his ears at the single post and rail in front of them. “Easy, fella, here we go.” With that they sailed over the jump with air to spare. And again at the brush box with greenery growing out the top, then the in and out. The chicken coop was last. It looked like a pup tent made of plywood painted in red-and-white stripes.

  DJ leaned forward. Too soon. Major stopped. DJ didn’t. She ended up on his neck, her helmet over one eye. Major flicked his ears and popped over the fence.

  DJ wished the ring floor would open and they could fall in. Instead, she found her stirrup again, gathered the reins, and as she signaled a canter again, pushed her helmet back in place. If only they could ride out of the ring and keep going until she found water to bathe her flaming face.

  The refusal was all her fault. She’d hurried.

  “Sorry, Major.” But what could she say? She caught a glimpse of Bridget’s raised eyebrow as they left the ring. Since they’d legally completed the jump, they were still in the running. Only DJ’s pride had been bruised. Major took the second round without a pause, the way he would have if she hadn’t messed up.

  Back at the barn, as DJ put Major away, the horse next to them reached around from his stall door and tried to bite Major again.

  “Can’t you make your horse behave?” DJ felt like hitting the beast with a two-by-four.

  “Get over it.” The girl stood talking with her teammate, and her upper lip curled.

  The snobby answer made DJ clamp her teeth and clench her fist. What a brat! She led Major into the stall and began removing his saddle.

  “Ugly old plug like that doesn’t belong here anyway.”

  DJ knew they meant for her to hear it.

  “Ignore them,” Tony Andrada said from her stall door. “People with attitudes like theirs are losers.” He raised his voice more than just for DJ.

  DJ nodded. Bunny had warned her that people at rated shows acted differently than those at local and schooling shows did. But still …

  She could hear Gran even over the pounding of her heart. “Pray for those who do you wrong.” Pray for those snobs? Not on her life.

  “That’s okay, Major, beauty is only skin deep. And if I had a mean horse like that, I’d shoot it.” She whispered the words into his ear, making him shake his head and lean his forehead against her shoulder.

  DJ came from putting Major away after their final event in time to watch the jump-off for Junior Hunter. Bridget and Amy sat with her family, halfway up in the stands.

  “No pretty ribbons, huh, DJ?” Bobby said softly.

  “Poor DJ.” Billy shook his head, a sad face getting sadder.

  “Nope, not one.” She tried to say it as though it didn’t matter, but they all knew her too well.

  “You did your best.” Amy scooted over to make a place for her.

  “Yup, and my best wasn’t good enough.”

  “Yet.” Bridget leaned her elbows on her knees, concentrating on the rider in the ring.

  Nothing. Even at my very first horse show, I brought back one ribbon. “I musta let the butterflies get to me. Those jumps weren’t hard. I just—” Catching a look from Bridget, DJ shut her mouth. I knew better than to let what that guy said bother me.

  She felt a hand on her shoulder and turned to give Brad as much of a smile as she could muster.

  “So you had a bad day. That means you got over that, through your first rated show, and now you’ll be able to go forward.”

  Jackie took the seat in front of DJ. “At least you didn’t fall off.” She said that just after the rider in the ring took a nose dive to the collective gasps of the audience.

  “Pretty close.” But she didn’t say more, knowing that Bridget would turn and give her a look.

  “I can remember the time my horse took off on me in the ring. I thought I would die of embarrassment.”

>   “You should have seen her face. She was so mad, she was steaming. Lobster red, she was,” Brad said with a chuckle.

  Another rider entered the ring. Bridget had already identified him as one of the better riders in the area.

  “Watch his hands,” Bridget said.

  DJ concentrated on his hands and …“He’s behind.” The horse ticked a rail that wobbled and stayed in place.

  The flashy bay ran out at the next jump.

  He finished the circuit, but the pair exited the ring with no chance of a ribbon.

  “Now, what did you learn?” Bridget turned to DJ.

  “He was having a bad day?”

  “Could be. What else?”

  “He made some mistakes. He dropped him and the horse ran out.” “It happens to all of us, DJ. You have a choice. Keep beating on yourself, or let it go and put what you learned to work for the next show.” “Amen to that,” Jackie added.

  “That Bridget has a good head on her shoulders,” Joe said on the way home.

  “Umm.”

  “You’re not very talkative.”

  DJ knew she had to throw it off. “I feel like I let Major down.”

  “Okay. That’s a feeling, and you’re entitled to your feelings. But that doesn’t mean that’s the whole truth.”

  “I know. But I hate messing up.”

  “Don’t we all?”

  The silence stretched again.

  “Those girls in the stalls next to us were meaner than—”

  “I know. I saw what was happening.”

  “As if they were perfect. They’ve got perfect horses and—”

  Joe cut her off. “You’ll meet those kind of people everywhere. Just have to learn to not let them bother you.”

  “I wanted to bother them, all right, with a two-by-four.”

  Joe chuckled. “Now, that would have made your grandmother proud.”

  “Wish she could have come today.”

  “Me too, but she couldn’t leave that painting. They wanted it a week ago.”

  “I know.” But still she missed Gran. It seemed like they never got time together anymore.

  A few miles passed before Joe asked, “Did you hear the good news?”

  DJ roused herself from a half sleep. “What?”

  “Andy’s buying your old house.”

  “Really?”

  “Shawna wanted to come today, but they’re getting their house ready for sale.”

  “Good.”

  But the heavy feeling hung on, no matter how DJ tried to talk herself out of it. If only she could go back, go home again. Yes, she wanted to jump in the Olympics, and yes, she would keep going, but … The but stopped her.

  “Are you moping?” Lindy asked on Tuesday night. “Feeling sorry for yourself?”

  “I don’t think so,” DJ said, turning from studying the green of the hills as they drove. “It’s like I’ve got to work this thing out in my head.”

  “Well, you let me know if I can help.”

  “Okay.” She wasn’t sure she had done her best; that was part of it. And the feeling of rushing, like she’d rushed that jump. And wanting to go back. Life in her old house seemed easier in her memory. She had even pulled out her old bedspread, but it didn’t look right on the new bed.

  When they handed out midterm reports on Thursday, she was afraid to look at hers. She couldn’t go back on restrictions. Her mother wouldn’t do that, would she? After DJ had been trying and trying so hard?

  “So what’d you get?”

  “Haven’t looked.”

  “Darla Jean Randall, what am I going to do with you? Give me your report card.” Amy held out her hand.

  DJ dug it out of the front pocket of her pack and handed the envelope over.

  Amy looked at it, shrugged, and handed it back. “Guess that B minus in algebra will keep your mom happy.”

  DJ snatched the report back and read down the line. Four As, one A minus, and the B minus in algebra. She felt like running across the parking lot screaming and dancing. “Guess it will.” The two swapped high fives.

  Since no one was home when she got there, she changed and rode her bike over to the Academy. The new way was much shorter than the other, but she missed the time she and Amy used to have together.

  After her workout, for some reason she turned right and headed back the way to the old house. Amy’s mother had picked her up, so they couldn’t even ride together.

  The grass had been mowed at their house. And a new coat of paint brightened the outside. She put her key in the lock and opened the door.

  The house smelled empty. She crossed the family room and looked out at the backyard. The gardeners had been there, too. A row of red tulips nodded in the twilight.

  She turned and headed up the stairs to her old room. Halfway up she stopped and backed down to look where Gran’s wing chair used to sit. She could close her eyes and feel herself sitting on the floor at Gran’s knee. Gran would stroke her hair and share a Bible verse with her.

  DJ sucked in a deep breath. Now Gran lived with Joe. Would she give up Joe to go back?

  “No way!” She shook her head and continued up to her old room. It was so small. Well, not really, but compared to her new one it was. She sat down on the floor, back against the wall where her desk used to sit. Arms on her knees, she waited. For what, she wasn’t sure.

  But it remained an empty room. Not her old room, but an empty room in an empty house.

  Something she’d heard once, “You can’t go back,” now made sense.

  It wasn’t the same. The house wasn’t it at all. It was just a house now, not her home. It would be a good home for her cousin Shawna. She’d like this room.

  DJ stood and jogged back down the stairs. She locked the door behind her and pedaled back up the hill and down past the Academy, around the bend, and into the driveway. Putting her bike away in the garage, she hummed a tune under her breath as she entered the back door.

  “Where’ve you been?” Lindy looked up from breaking lettuce into a bowl for salad.

  “To our old house.” DJ snagged a carrot from the plastic sack on the counter.

  Lindy kept her eyes on her daughter and her hands busy with the salad.

  DJ waved the carrot in the air. “You know what?”

  “What?”

  “You can’t go back.”

  “So?”

  “So it isn’t the house.”

  “I don’t understand. What isn’t the house?”

  “Well, it isn’t the house that makes a home. We’ve moved on up to a bigger house, and while I thought it didn’t feel like home, it does. I’ve moved up to bigger shows, and they’ll feel like home eventually. I’ve moved up in my art, too.”

  She dug her midterm report out of her back pocket and tossed it on the counter.

  Lindy wiped her hands on her apron and, still watching DJ, pulled the card from the envelope.

  DJ kept her face as blank as she could, watching her mother. After all, a girl who went from a D minus to a B minus in algebra in one quarter could do about anything she set her mind to. She could keep on moving up, as far as she wanted to go.

  “You did it! I knew you could.” Lindy threw her arms around her daughter and danced her around the kitchen.

  “Me too—now.”

  Acknowledgments

  Thanks to Joanie Jagoda, who brainstorms, coaches, and critiques not only my horse information, where she is a master, but throughout my books.

  Thanks, Tim Mitchell, for your help in the field of algebra, where I, like DJ, struggle or don’t as the case may be. No telling who you might sit next to on an airplane.

  Thanks to Rochelle and Natasha for helping keep my timelines straight and all the other things that editors do to help books become the best they can be.

  To Pat Rushford,

  friend and encourager

  Thanks

  Chapter • 1

  “Reverse, please, and trot.”

  Darla Jean Randall
signaled her horse, Major, into the trot and began posting. She kept her shoulders and back straight, her eyes forward, and her total focus on her horse and the ring. Keeping herself from admiring her competition took real discipline.

  You know they are lots prettier than Major. DJ, as she made sure everyone called her, tried to ignore the sarcastic little voice, too—the voice saying nanar, nanar, nanar, like kids teasing each other.

  She wanted to pat Major’s shoulder, but she knew better. They were in the show-ring, after all, a big rated show-ring, with expensive horses and riders looking to the big time.

  Like her, except she lacked the expensive, flashy horse that would catch the judge’s eye.

  “Walk, please.”

  Major snorted when DJ sat down and tightened his reins. He’d rather canter. He’d rather jump. But they were doing flat classes because Bridget Sommersby, DJ’s coach, said that’s what they must do.

  DJ could feel sweat trickling down her back and alongside her right eye. May in California could be hot, and today proved that point. Her mouth felt as though cotton balls had taken up residence.

  “Line up, please.”

  Major did everything she asked to his very best. That’s the kind of horse he was—all heart, but as Joe had said, “No class. An old police horse like Major doesn’t need class.” Major’s heart, though, had taken them over a lot of jumps. Joe Crowder, or GJ as DJ had dubbed him, was her fairly new grandfather and had become one of her very best friends and champions.

  Ears pricked forward, Major stood still as the judge gave him barely a moment of her time before she went on to the next horse and walked around him to view the animal from all sides.

  DJ could feel her jaw tighten. How rude. To almost ignore them just because her horse wasn’t a warmblood or hotshot something. Always sensitive to DJ’s moods, Major shifted his weight from one foot to another.

  The judge walked toward the announcer and handed him her paper. DJ knew for absolute certain that their number and name weren’t on that piece of paper. Their third class of the day, this no-ribbon thing was getting to be a habit. A not-very-comfortable, hope-it-goes-away habit.