by Maggie Dana
In my wheelchair.
I haven’t fallen out of it in months—well, not counting the time last week when those dumb steps at school tripped me up. My fault. I was in too much of a hurry to make a detour and use the wheelchair ramp that’s a bazillion miles away. My friends had raced off, and I wanted to catch up.
The story of my life—catching up.
Being in a wheelchair changes all the rules. One minute you’re a seventh-grade track star; the next you’re stuck in the bleachers with a blanket over your lap, surrounded by kids and parents who try very hard not to stare at your legs.
The docs don’t know why I can’t walk.
They say I’ve got “hysterical paralysis,” which means it’s my dumb brain that’s stopping my even dumber legs from doing what they’re supposed to be doing.
Okay, hysterical. Wikipedia says:
Hysteria, in its colloquial use, describes unmanageable emotional excesses. The fear can be centered on a body part or, most commonly, on an imagined problem with that body part.
I am not imagining this. My legs don’t work, even though nothing is broken or twisted or whatever. They haven’t worked since the car accident two years ago when my father and I were driving to the feed store, and—
I can’t go there. It hurts too much. But I’ll get it out, anyway, and I won’t talk about it again. Dad died. I didn’t. And now I’m paralyzed from the waist down.
Hysterical paralysis.
I hate that label. It makes me sound like the helpless heroine in a Victorian novel, always fainting and being revived with smelling salts … or a hot, smoldering hero.
My cell phone rings. I check caller ID and don’t recognize the number. It’s probably another job applicant. Mom put my number in the newspaper ad because I’m more likely to answer the phone than she is … as in, way more likely.
For me, it’s a lifeline.
For Mom, it’s a nuisance. She’s usually giving lessons, dealing with difficult parents, or yelling at truck drivers who don’t follow directions when delivering hay. If you call her cell, you get voice mail, mostly because she can never remember to turn on her phone or she leaves it somewhere and it’s up to me to track it down.
“Hello?” I say.
The woman sounds old—older than Mom—and I know I’m imagining things, but I can almost smell her cigarette breath down the phone. We make an appointment. Dorothy Johnson will be here tomorrow at three o’clock.
Dorothy?
Like in The Wizard of Oz?
I adore old movies, so I feel good about Dorothy … until I meet her. Mom and I look at one another. Bad enough that Dorothy obviously smokes, given the smell and her gravely voice, but she also has tattoos and a nose ring.
The next call is more promising.
It’s a guy in graduate school who’s working on a thesis about dolphins and sonar.
Wow … this is great.
Dolphins are totally awesome. Mom says I swim like one, too. But that’s because swimming is the only exercise that works for me. We have a pool in the backyard, and I’m in it all the time. So much time, in fact, that my skin gets wrinkled, like prunes.
But the grad student doesn’t work out either … too many classes and not enough hours to help me out. Okay, so back to square one. In the meantime, I have a pool party to plan and a horse to hug.
* * *
Magician whickers as Sue Piretti pushes me into the barn. She’s been riding my horse ever since I got laid up, and sometimes I worry that he loves her more than he loves me.
“No way,” Sue says, laughing.
She puts Magician on the crossties so I don’t have to force my wheelchair through the bedding in his stall to groom him. I can only reach halfway up, to his legs and the lower half of his belly. But that’s fine with my horse, and I know all his tickly spots, too.
Our ribbons hang above his stall.
I got Magician when I was ten. Mom said I’d outgrown the barn’s ponies and needed a horse. I hated giving up Plug—all twelve hands of him—but Mom was right. Within six months, Magician and I were beating kids two years older than I was.
We started in hunters then switched to three-day events, except at the junior level they were held on a single day—dressage, cross-country, and jumping—all at once. It was pretty grueling, but Magician loved it, and so did I. By the time I was twelve, I’d joined Pony Club and was competing in rallies. I would go far with this horse, they said.
Then came the accident, and—
Sue puts on Magician’s saddle and helps me do up his girth—I can’t quite manage the top billet holes. Then Magician—my incredibly wonderful horse—lowers his gorgeous black head so I can put on his bridle.
Not many horses will do that.
It’s as if Magician knows I need help.
He never even spooked at my wheelchair the first time I dared to enter the barn, unable to walk and totally bummed out. For more months than I’m willing to admit, I vented my frustrations on Magician.
He didn’t complain. He just listened.
Magician is pretty sure he’s the best thing that ever happened to the world, and I agree. I never feel like he’s my horse; it’s more like I’m his girl.
I wheel myself out of the way while Sue leads Magician outside. They’re having a group lesson with Mom and the other riding team members. There’s a big show coming up, and I know Mom’s sweating it. If the Timber Ridge team doesn’t perform well, her contract to run the barn might not be renewed.
It’s Angela Dean’s fault.
She’s the barn’s princess, and her mother is its queen. Mrs. Dean runs everything around here—the ski area, the tennis courts, the golf course, and the barn.
Whenever she says, “Jump,” people ask, “How high?” She knows nothing about horses, except what Angela chooses to tell her, and it’s always skewed in favor of Angela.
I hate this.
Hate it. Capital letters. HATE.
But Mom is stuck. She needs this job—and it comes with a house that has a pool, and I need the pool for my stupid exercises.
So, let’s add GUILT to my list of sins.
* * *
I know I shouldn’t rag on Angela, but I’ve known her since kindergarten. She always whined and complained if she didn’t get gold stars, so the teachers gave them to her, just to shut her up.
And she hasn’t changed a bit.
Angela still makes a fuss when she doesn’t win blue ribbons. Mom does her best to be fair, but Mrs. Dean overrules her. She’s here now, standing at the rail, watching Angela like a hawk. If I had a mother like that, I’d probably be as bratty as Angela.
Her bay gelding, Skywalker, cost a bazillion dollars. Well, maybe not that much, but he was way more expensive than the rest of our horses. He’s also push-button, and as long as Angela pushes the right ones, he’s fine. If not, then—
Oops … looks like a wrong button got pushed.
Skywalker trashes the in-and-out, then demolishes the hogsback. Mrs. Dean is not happy. She strides toward Mom, tripping over clumps of dirt in her high-heeled shoes.
They talk.
Mom listens, like she always does, and Mrs. Dean waves her skinny arms around. Dressed all in black, she reminds me of a witch. Any minute now, she’ll take off on her designer broomstick.
I can’t wait.
Vroom … and she’s gone.
Next to jump is Angela’s best friend, Denise, with her bad-tempered mare, Luna. The last time I went anywhere near Luna, she tried to take a bite out of my leg.
Not that I’d have felt it if she had.
Ears pinned, Luna swishes her tail and stops dead at the parallel bars. Denise lands halfway up her horse’s neck. Patiently, Mom tells Denise to try again, but this time it’s worse.
I can barely watch.
Then it’s Robin with Chantilly, who’s the prettiest gray horse I think I’ve ever seen, except when she’s got grass stains up her legs and poor Robin has to spend all day scrubbing
them out. At least my horse doesn’t show the dirt.
Well, most of the time.
Sue goes last. As she canters toward the first vertical I can almost feel my legs wrapped around Magician. I want to ride him so badly that I can actually taste it. But it’s just my mind playing tricks again.
Maybe I shouldn’t come to the barn.
Maybe I should just stay home and swim my brains out and feel good about being able to do something really well … like planning my pool party. It was Mom’s idea.
My birthday’s in November—not a good month for pool parties in Vermont. So Mom and I celebrate my real birthday shortly before Thanksgiving, and I get to have a half-birthday blast with my friends on Memorial Day weekend at the end of May.
Our pool is open by then—even if it’s cold—but nobody cares. Half of my friends don’t swim, anyway. They just like to hang out in their bikinis hoping the guys will notice.
Um, guys.
None of them rides, at least not around here. I would kill to have a boy in our barn who loves horses as much as I do. He would be swamped with girls. They’d fawn all over him, even if he was a total dweeb. I don’t know why boys don’t get this.
I mean, c’mon.
If they want to attract girls, where better than a horse barn?
After I help Sue brush Magician and feed him a ton of carrots, I wheel myself home and concentrate on my guest list. I didn’t want to invite Angela and Denise, but Mom insisted.
“They’re team members.”
“So?”
I wasn’t on the riding team any more and didn’t see why I had to include them.
“Because,” Mom said.
And I had to laugh. It’s what I always say when I can’t think of a better answer. So onto my list they go, even though I’m not happy about it. Angela has a reputation for ruining parties. I will kill her if she ruins mine.
Mom doesn’t cook—she doesn’t have the time or the talent—so we’ll have pizza from Alfie’s in the village, ice cream from The Sugar Shack, and an amazing carrot cake with cream cheese frosting that Robin’s mother always makes for barn parties. The horses love it. So do us kids.
I send an e-vite to Becca.
She responds right away. “Can’t wait to meet you. It will be totally awesome.”
We’re Facebook friends, and Becca doesn’t know one end of a horse from the other. She lives in New Hampshire, about an hour from here.
“You can spend the night if you want,” I message back.
I haven’t had a sleepover since before the accident. I haven’t made any new friends either, except for Becca. She doesn’t know I’m in a wheelchair because I haven’t told her, or maybe she’s guessed. It’s not like I’ve hidden it on purpose; I just didn’t mention it. Will that be a problem?
I have no clue.
We’re friends. Isn’t that what’s important?
Her mother has talked to mine. They’ve swapped phone numbers and e-mail addresses. Everything is cool … as far as I know.
* * *
I obsess over the weather. One day the weather guy on TV says it’s going to be cloudy with intermittent showers; the next, he’s predicting thunderstorms. But my half-birthday dawns bright and clear, and it looks as if it will stay that way.
Phew … big relief.
Mom mows the lawn and vacuums the pool, then sets out chairs and umbrellas. She hasn’t scheduled any lessons for today so she can spend it with me. I blow up a few balloons. We organize paper plates and napkins and make sure we’ve got enough cups and glasses. At one point, we look at one another, and I know we’re both thinking about Dad.
“He’d have loved this,” Mom says.
I gulp. “Yeah, I know.”
It’s hard—no, make that impossible—for us to talk about him. So we fumble along, quietly getting in each other’s way and wait for the first guests to show up.
Robin Shapiro and her mother arrive bearing my carrot cake, along with Sue. She and Robin are best friends—like seriously—and there are times when I feel totally left out.
But it can’t be helped. I can’t do all the stuff they do. Not any more.
Then comes Angela, followed by Denise, and a bunch of kids from school. No guys, though.
Mom asked if I wanted a boy girl party this year.
I thought long and hard about it. What fun, to have boys at my house. But I don’t know any boys well enough to invite them. So I didn’t.
Mom was cool with that.
But not Angela. She’s now strutting around our pool in her neon pink bikini and looking as if she can’t wait for the first boy to show up.
Sorry, Angela. Not gonna happen.
Another car pulls into our driveway, but I can’t see it over the stockade fence. I wheel myself into the house and yank open the front door. At first, it doesn’t register, but this has to be Becca. Her mom’s car has New Hampshire plates.
“Hi,” I say, feeling suddenly awkward.
I’ve been dying for this moment since last November when Becca and I first became friends on Facebook. I reach up for a hug, but she doesn’t respond.
It’s almost like she doesn’t see me.
Okay, I’m used to this. People in wheelchairs are invisible unless we run over someone, and then it’s a headline or a video on YouTube. But this is Becca. We’ve been the best of best friends for six months.
And then it hits.
We’ve both been hiding stuff. Becca looks nothing like the glamorous photos she’s posted on Facebook, and I don’t either because I never included my wheelchair. But who cares?
It’s Becca and me.
It’s what’s inside us that matters.
* * *
The pizza arrives and Becca helps herself to three slices—all at once. Tomato sauce dribbles down her double chin. I grit my teeth and hope Angela doesn’t make a snotty remark. So far, she’s been off in the corner, gossiping with Denise. I don’t think they realize that Becca’s my best friend.
At least, I think she is.
Maybe she’s mad at me for not telling her about my wheelchair. I keep waiting for her to say something, but she doesn’t. Not about that, anyway.
“What’s for dessert?” she says. “Do you have cake? I love chocolate, with lots of frosting. And ice cream. Buttercrunch is my favorite.”
“Mine, too,” I reply. “I adore it.”
“Let me see your room,” she says.
“Right now?”
“Yeah, sure,” she says and waddles up the ramp and into our kitchen. My cake is on the table, and I can see her trying very hard not to stick her finger in it. Poor Becca.
I feel desperately sorry for her.
She’s got a big problem, and I don’t think her mother is helping. She’s twice the size of mine. Moments ago, I saw them at the food table. Mom was nibbling on a celery stick; Becca’s mom was inhaling corn chips and pizza so fast that it made me feel sick.
I guess my room has the same effect on Becca.
“Wow,” she says. “This is so—babyish.”
Okay, I’ll give her that.
My room is wall-to-wall horses. Breyer models poke their noses over tiny stall doors, stuffed ponies snooze on my bed, and a herd of wild mustangs gallops across the ceiling. Mom put them up after the accident while I was flat on my back and couldn’t move and needed something to look at.
Becca straddles my old rocking horse.
Rusting springs complain; the horse’s belly scrapes the floor. It’ll probably break, but I daren’t tell Becca that. It wasn’t designed to support two hundred pounds.
This morning I helped Mom change the sheets on my spare bed. We put fresh towels in the bathroom and scrubbed the shower until it squeaked. I wanted everything to be wonderful for Becca.
She says, “Your bathroom’s really small. Is there another one?”
“You could use my Mom’s.”
Becca sniffs. “Whatever.”
How could we have gone so wrong? I mean, we
got along so well online with Facebook and private messages. Phone calls, too. But now?
I am freaked out over this.
Maybe Becca’s shy. Yes, that’s probably it. She’s feeling awkward because she doesn’t know anybody except me.
Mom calls. “Holly? Time for cake.”
“Good,” Becca says. “I’m starving.”
* * *
Everyone sings “Happy Birthday” even though it’s not my birthday. I cut into the cake and hand out slices. Becca takes two, plus a huge dollop of ice cream that almost slips off her plate.
Mom cranks up the sound system. I’m amazed she knows how to do this. That’s my job. Mom’s expertise with electronics fizzled out when CDs arrived—like way before I was born.
We dance around the pool to One Direction, and Mom says we can’t go into the water for another half hour. So we dance some more.
Well, everyone else does.
I can’t dance. I just bop my head and clap my hands and wish I could jiggle my stupid feet. I totally love these guys and their music. Harry Styles is hot, hot, hot.
Becca sheds her tank top and baggy shorts. Underneath, she’s wearing a pink bikini almost the same color as Angela’s—except it doesn’t look quite the same on Becca as it does on Angela, who’s skinnier than a stick insect and about as cuddly.
Angela snorts and dances past Becca. “You’re too fat to wear a bikini,” she says, nudging Denise. “Try a tent, instead. Or an umbrella.”
Becca’s face crumbles.
I rush to her side and try to put my arm around her, but she pushes me away. On purpose, I tumble out of my wheelchair and into the pool. I pretend I’m in trouble.
“Help me out,” I cry.
Angela’s the closest one—which is what I intended—and she reaches out a hand. I grab it and drag her into the pool with me. She surfaces, spluttering. Her fancy hairdo is a wreck, her mascara clearly isn’t waterproof.
“I’ll get you for this,” she snarls.
And I’m sure she will. But right now, I don’t care.
* * *
Becca says she can’t stay. The party has wound down, and she’s the only one left. Her mom and mine are outside, clearing up the mess.