* * *
—
After a ride, when she untacked him, his behavior was bad. He would grab for ropes or her hands with his mouth. He stained her light brown britches with bright green grassy slobber when he pulled at the fabric with his teeth (she had been pulling off his saddle and wasn’t quick enough to shoo him). There was something about that part of their rides he didn’t like. And when she backed him into the stall and slid the door shut, he ignored his hay and stood stock-still, staring at her, until she walked away.
Persimmon
“Dogs eat poop,” Sarah said.
“That’s disgusting. They do not,” Julie said.
“And hoof clippings,” Teagan said, reaching behind her and playing with the fringe of the sad old carpet on the common room floor. Some threads came off in her hand.
“My family’s always had dogs and they’ve never eaten poop,” Julie said.
“They love horse poop,” Sarah said.
“Especially if it’s fresh,” Teagan said.
“And they roll in it,” Sarah said.
“What kind of dumb-ass dogs do you have?” Julie made a face and hugged a pillow.
“Any dog,” Teagan said.
“Any dog in a barn. I don’t care if it’s the prissiest poodle; it’ll eat and roll in horse poop,” Sarah said, her long arms stretched out over some pages of notes. She twisted a pencil in her long fingers.
“And hoof clippings,” Teagan repeated.
“From where?” Julie said.
“When the blacksmith trims the hooves, the dogs steal the clippings and go chew on them,” Sarah explained.
“Right there. Right after they clip it?” Julie said.
“As soon as,” Sarah said.
They had been studying, mostly successfully, for midterms, but had come to a point of inertia. Julie tried to start them on their English study guides, but Teagan didn’t feel like she needed to study much for English and would do it later, and Sarah said that she was officially brain-dead. Julie wasn’t hungry yet, so they didn’t go to dinner. Sarah didn’t want to watch TV, and Teagan for once didn’t want to go for a walk, so they had slumped in their states of complete inactivity and were there twenty minutes later, talking about whatever. Teagan thought she could fall asleep, lying on her back on the rug, her feet propped up on the couch.
“Sarah,” Teagan said, then paused inordinately.
“Yes?”
“I can’t believe that you kept from us that you’re famous.”
Sarah gave a feeble laugh.
“Yeah, Sarah. Why don’t you have your hundreds of blue ribbons hanging in your room? You could wear one every day,” Julie said.
“I don’t want to brag,” Sarah said. She had finally confessed to them that she’d first applied to Hunting Hill for the riding program. She had been a National Champion of Tennessee Walking Horses and had gone as far as possible in the levels. Just before the start of school, she had admitted to her mother that she didn’t want to ride anymore. Her mother had tried to convince her to keep riding and competing, but Sarah was done with it. Her top-level horse had since been sold. When they’d asked her why she’d stopped riding, she said she’d been doing it for so many years already, and won everything she could, and wanted to do other kinds of stuff. Julie had said, “If I were a national champion of Tennessee Walking Horses, I wouldn’t just quit.” Teagan had called Julie the Champion of Annoying, and then Julie hadn’t spoken to her for an entire day, which was a punishment Teagan was learning to predict. “I’ve spent enough time in a barn,” Sarah added.
“With puppies eating poop,” Teagan said.
“Our dog did try to eat a bird once,” Julie said.
“I think dogs can eat anything they want,” Teagan said.
“And then he threw up,” Julie said.
Teagan and Sarah made the appropriate ew noises, which seemed to satisfy Julie.
“Horses can’t throw up,” Sarah said.
“And lightning bugs have glowing penises,” Julie said.
Teagan laughed. “Good one, Jules.”
“No seriously. They have no ability to throw up. Ever,” Sarah said. “There was this horse who gorged herself on persimmons, and the seeds wouldn’t pass out of her stomach, and they were stuck. She couldn’t throw them up.”
Teagan tilted her head, finding the energy to be somewhat interested. “Colic,” she said.
“Really bad colic,” Sarah said.
“Isn’t that what babies did in the seventeenth century?” Julie said.
Teagan pointed a finger at her. “Julie. No references. This is a study break.”
“It’s the same thing. Digestive-tract blockages. It’s dangerous in horses,” Sarah said.
Julie interrupted, holding up a hand. “Wait, I forgot to ask what a persimmon is.”
“A fruit,” Sarah said.
“Kind of orangish, purplish,” Teagan said.
“Kind of wrinkled, golf-ball-size,” Sarah said.
None of them knew enough to make jokes about testicles.
“Sounds gross,” Julie said.
“They are,” Teagan said.
“They get really sweet when they’re ripe,” Sarah said.
“Do you eat them?” Julie said.
“You could,” Teagan said. “Our dog does. Loves ’em. Eats them off of the ground.” She pictured Barker lying next to the gray, scabbed bark of the persimmon tree, happily chewing.
“So this horse at the farm where I kept my horse, she had persimmon trees in her field. None of the other horses went for them, but apparently she spent an entire day under the trees, just eating and eating. Persimmon seeds are big. About as big as an almond, and the seeds piled in her stomach.”
Sarah went on to explain how everyone at the barn took turns walking the horse continually to keep her from lying down, which would make her situation worse. When the vet finally came, Sarah stayed with some of the others to watch him stick a rubber tube down the mare’s nostril, into her stomach, and pump out some of the seeds.
“Well now I’m hungry,” Julie said.
“Horses are fragile,” Teagan said. “One thing goes wrong and they just go downhill from there.”
“Horses sound like a lot of trouble,” Julie said.
Sarah and Teagan agreed this was true.
“But worth it,” Teagan said. She didn’t see Julie look at Sarah. Sarah only smiled. Teagan thought about Ian, standing by himself in his stall day in and day out.
“Let’s go to dinner,” Sarah said. “You slackers aren’t worth anything right now.”
Teagan stretched and yawned. “Glowing penises,” she said.
Turn Out
Everyone was somewhere. At the dining hall for lunch; sitting on the stone wall in Miss Guinevere’s Garden, reading letters; in the library getting started on research papers; in the computer lab, finishing assignments before afternoon classes. The hallways of North Dorm were empty. Teagan sat in her room with the door shut. She should have eaten lunch, checked her mailbox, gone to the library or the computer lab; she had overdue homework. She didn’t do anything. She didn’t want to go anywhere. She felt like she would fall asleep. She wondered how much trouble she’d be in if she didn’t go to her afternoon classes but couldn’t think of any reason not to go. It was just that she felt tired, but feeling tired wasn’t the same as feeling sick, and she didn’t have the energy to fake an illness. She expected Julie or Sarah, or maybe Aleah or Sen, or even Ms. Ganski, to open the door and ask her why she was there. The door stayed shut. The clock told her she needed to start walking to class in fifteen minutes. Lying on her bed, she thought of Ian at the barn, and her thoughts turned to her father. She didn’t know his telephone number. She’d forgotten to ask. He was distant, and, like in her nightmares, it was as if the
people around her could move but she was frozen, unable to move or speak.
She thought about the word nightmare and separated it into night and mare, and thought of a night mare as a cold, ghostly horse who carried her through vivid and terrible dreams. On the night mare she was helpless; she couldn’t control the horse, not its pace or where it went.
Her father always told her what to do; he did not ask her for her opinion. Whatever he ordered, she either did or didn’t do it. Maybe now she wouldn’t do it. What it was she wouldn’t do, she wasn’t sure. Nothing. Anything. Maybe she would lie on her bed and do nothing, and not do anything. Maybe she would never sleep again, and then there could be no mare, no night, no loss of control.
She pictured the house at Blue View and what might be going on inside it. She wondered where her mother was, where Charlie might be. She thought of Grace. Teagan hadn’t talked to her in a couple of months. She wondered if Grace knew she had Ian with her. They’d see each other over the holidays. Maybe Teagan would teach her to ride Ian. She thought, I want him out of that goddamn cement box.
* * *
—
Shirley said he’d started kicking the door, knocking a front hoof against it, repeatedly, rattling it in its sliding track. When Teagan took him out for her riding lesson, his legs below the hock were stocked up, puffy and swollen from standing still. After the lesson, the heat in the legs went down some. She made herself late for class by staying to wrap the lower part of his leg, binding the long band of cloth around, wrapping from the front of the leg to the back, careful not to put too much pressure on the long tendon. Shirley said she’d take the wraps off after a few hours. Teagan couldn’t be late to class after every lesson. She didn’t want Ian to need the wraps. He’d never needed them before now.
* * *
—
Susanna would keep the horses in their stalls the night before a foxhunt. She’d pile the stalls with clean straw to keep the horses clean. In the cold, early morning, Teagan would help wrap the horses’ legs; it kept them clean and also kept them from getting scrapes and cuts from riding in the trailer. After the hunt, the horses were hosed off, cleaned up, and Susanna would turn them out into the field, where they could walk and wander and take a good roll in the dust.
* * *
—
In the stall, overnight, Ian might have anticipated what was coming in the morning; the squeak of bucket handles and heavy wooden doors at dawn; the shaky ride in the metal trailer; the smell of fifty horses and fifty hounds; the huntsman’s horn and the hounds’ song; and then the animals begin to run.
* * *
—
Teagan untacked her horse and led him into the wash stall. She sprayed his neck with the hose to let him get used to the cold water. When done, she squeegeed the excess water from his body and rubbed a towel over his back, digging in with her palm to massage the back that carried her. She rubbed the towel on his face to scrape off the sweat that stuck under his bridle. She fed him an apple and absentmindedly stroked his neck while he chewed. She did what she knew how to do for him.
“Maybe get him one of those big plastic apples,” Shirley suggested.
“What does he do with it?”
“Tie it inside the stall. Some of them will play with it.”
Teagan said she would get him one, but she knew he wasn’t going to play with it.
“If he starts anything else, weaving, you might want to think about turnout,” Shirley said.
“What’s weaving?”
“They sway. Side to side. Sometimes they’re bored.”
She felt sick at the thought of finding making the insane motion inside his stall.
“He needs turnout,” Teagan said.
“It’s extra,” Shirley said.
“He needs it,” Teagan said.
Shirley nodded.
* * *
—
Teagan looked at the clock by her bed. I’ll go to class, she thought, and I’ll get Ian out of that stall, or I’ll send him home. Maybe her dad would pay for Ian’s turnout. She thought better of it.
Manners
Miss Jessie was thin, with short, feathery gray hair, and had a pinched, thin face. Teagan hadn’t seen her on her hall before. While she tacked Ian for the lesson, Miss Jessie stood and talked with her. Teagan tried to pay attention to two things, responding to whatever her teacher was saying, and tacking up, trying to remember all the pieces, especially the martingale. Miss Jessie hadn’t acknowledged Ian in any way; in a barn full of horses he was another horse. Maybe he didn’t like being ignored, because he lunged at Miss Jessie’s arm. She didn’t waste a second and smacked him across the nose, yelling, “No.” Ian threw his head in the air, his eyes rolled back. Teagan had seen it before. She reached for his halter and stroked his long face, pulling his nose to her chest, Easy, now. She was shocked at herself and embarrassed, even while she coaxed the horse, because she was defying, as if Miss Jessie had done the wrong thing. She had done the wrong thing; the horse didn’t need the force of the blow, but her teacher didn’t know that. Teagan was surprised how fast and hard she’d struck. She didn’t really like Miss Jessie, but still fought a familiar urge to cry.
“I’ll see you in the arena,” her teacher said and walked away.
When Miss Jessie was gone, Teagan put her arms around Ian’s neck and hugged him tight. He tossed his head but otherwise didn’t fight her. As a horse, he thought horse thoughts, and maybe he tolerated being loved. She let go, and he lipped her arm with a soft mouth, leaving slobber on her skin.
Troll
Teagan cinched the girth. “Goin’ out today,” she told him.
He looked at her with one big eye. She led him outside to the mounting block. His ears were forward and his head high, but he stood nicely while she climbed on the block, stepped up on the stirrup, and sat lightly in the saddle. On Saturdays girls were supposed to ride in pairs. Teagan spotted a rider a ways off in the grass. The grass was a large oval area, fenced in. She was planning on using the ring, a fenced circle within the oval. Walking up the hill, Ian’s stride was long, forward. He liked outside. She felt him start to veer toward the yellow, scrubby field, a little farther off, and she pressed her leg against his side to steer him toward the ring. His energy seemed to subside, and then he halted. He did not want to go to the ring. She pushed him forward. Come on. She didn’t like the ring either, but their terrible performance during tryouts had stuck with her, and she felt she needed to ride like the other girls, and that meant controlling him in the ring. At least they were outside. They could, at least, have that.
She walked him into the loose sand of the ring. He was resisting her. She felt like he was making himself heavier, and she had to work hard to push him forward with her legs. With every fiber of muscle she had, she kept him going around the ring at a trot. She was feeling tired after just a few minutes of riding, as if she was doing all of the moving for him. When he faced the gate, out, he would speed up and she’d have to slow him down. Once they’d passed the gate, and he knew they weren’t going out, he would slow down and she’d have to work hard to speed him up. A couple circles at an even trot. It’s not much to ask for, she complained to herself, although part of her agreed with the horse; the ring was boring. Gimme this and we’ll go out to the grass, she bargained with him in her mind.
A pile of white painted poles lay on the ground just outside the ring, under some narrow trees that didn’t give much shade. After some circles, at an irregular tempo, at the trot, Teagan slacked off a little bit; she was getting tired, and just as they passed the pile of poles, Ian shied. He jumped sideways and broke into a canter. Teagan tipped forward over the saddle and hung for a moment with her bottom up in the air, struggled, couldn’t regain her balance, and fell. Ian stopped when she was off, staring at her on the ground as if he didn’t understand how she’d gotten there. She quickl
y dusted herself off and grabbed his reins and got back on. She was angry. Her horse wasn’t young, about seventeen years old, a seasoned animal, desensitized to the detritus of barns, of ropes and saddles and buckets and trailers and fences and jumps and parts of jumps. She had three thoughts: that maybe the combination of the poles under the trees bothered him, but he was too experienced to let that startle him, and her last, creeping feeling, which she knew was probably true, was that he had done it on purpose.
One chance to prove me wrong, she thought, and walked him over to where the poles lay inert on the ground. A young horse might have needed to see, and smell, and run away and come back, and see, and smell again, to understand. Ian just stood, his ears pricked up at the other horse over in the grass. Big faker, Teagan realized. She put him back on the circle, and in her inexperience didn’t know her mistake of giving him the distance of two-thirds of the ring to prepare to act up again. They reached the poles, he leapt away; she stayed in the saddle and put him back on the circle. He did it again, and she was able to hold him a little more and get him back on track faster, but after several circles, and she was close to tears, she couldn’t get him to move past the place without reacting. Finally, she toughened and rode smarter. Approaching the poles that lay to their right, she slipped her left leg out of the stirrup and held it against his flank, as far back as she could. She shortened up on the left rein and prepared to pull. The right rein she held steady against his neck. She felt him start to leap and pushed with her leg against his flank, keeping his back end in place, while she held his head to the left. With his head turned away from the poles, and shoving his hind end to the right, she forced his right shoulder toward the fence. He fought her, but she mustered her strength and held him, keeping his body moving straight ahead.
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