“It didn’t feel that way.”
His shoulders slumped, and suddenly he looked like an old man. “What’s worse than facing prison is knowing how much I hurt you and Mom. I’ll never recover from that.”
“Guilty.” I repeated his word again.
He was going to prison. Even after not seeing him for so long and wanting him to tell me the truth, the reality of his going to prison shocked me. And it hurt.
“Can I write you while I’m away,” he asked. “Will you read my letters?”
“You can write,” I said, trying hard not to let him hear my voice wobble. “Now I have to go.”
He took another step toward me. I put my hands up and shook my head.
“Not now,” I said. “I’m glad you told me but not now.”
He made a noise when I turned away, but I kept going, shoulders back, head up, determined strides to at least look powerful, at least give the appearance of being in control. I kept it up all the way until I turned into the yard where he couldn’t see me anymore. I dropped to my knees, covered my face with my hands, and let tears soak the mittens Mom had crocheted while sitting on the couch at Good Hope: A Home for Families in Transition.
Thirty
The day before the deadline Mike had given Joe to put Fire up for sale, I walked to the thrift store and collected the rest of what was owed to me, then went back to Good Hope to count it all out.
“One thousand and one, one thousand and two, one thousand and three dollars!” I said out loud. “Oh my god, I did it. I did it!”
I had the money for Fire. He was actually going to be mine! I rubber-banded the bills into cylinders and stuffed them in my backpack, then ran through the woods so fast my feet barely touched the ground. By the time I got to the top of the hill and barged through the door to Joe’s office, my lungs were on fire.
Joe leaped to his feet. “Lizzie, are you okay?”
I flopped into a chair and threw the backpack on his desk. “Oh, yeah, I am so okay. I’m great, Joe. Great!”
A lady standing off to the side stared at me with her mouth half open.
“Oh!” I sat up quickly. “Sorry. I didn’t know you had anyone in here.”
“Susannah,” Joe said. “This is Lizzie.”
“Oh, Lizzie,” she said, like she already knew who I was. “Then I should wait outside.”
She scooped a bunch of papers from the desk and put them into a folder. “Nice to meet you,” she said. “I’ll just be out here.”
Joe nodded and held the door for her. As soon as it was closed, I dumped the rolls of cash onto his desk.
“Look! I’ve got it all! Every penny plus three extra dollars!”
Two cylinders rolled onto the floor. Joe picked them up and laid them with the rest of the money.
“What is all this, Lizzie?”
“For Fire! I got all the money before the end of the month like Mike said, so I can buy him!”
I pushed each bundle to make a pile in the middle of the desk and cupped my hands around them.
“What?”
“I did it, Joe, I made the deadline!”
I sat in the chair, my hands covering the money, and watched his face change from unbearably sad, to firm and resolved, then back to the saddest of sad. Suddenly, it felt like a bag of rocks had crashed over me.
“Lizzie—” he said. He glanced at the closed door. “Susannah—”
Everything froze inside me again. “Who is that lady?”
Joe moved his mouth like he was trying to make words come out, but they wouldn’t.
“Tell me,” I pressed him.
“Lizzie, I’m sorry. She is Fire’s rightful owner. He isn’t going to be sold to anyone. He has to go back to her.”
“What?”
“Someone stole Fire from her and sold him at the sale. She wants him back. He has to go back.”
“Back where?”
“Massachusetts.”
“No, Joe. No.”
“I am so, so sorry.”
I stood up too quickly and my chair flew back against the wall.
“It’s impossible,” I said. “Look at all my money. We’ll give it to her!”
I turned to the door to let Susannah back in, but Joe grabbed me and shook his head. His voice was soft and sad, the same way it had been the day he saw Bryce’s bruise.
“We already tried. She’s bringing her trailer on Saturday to take him home.”
“No, this isn’t true.” Hot tears spilled down my cheeks and gathered into little puddles in the corners of my mouth. Joe’s face swayed in front of me. “It’s not fair!”
His eyes locked on mine. “It is true, Lizzie. It’s horrible, but it’s true.”
“She can’t just show up here and claim him and you just say okay. She has to have proof!”
“She has everything. Photos, his registration papers, and the police report. He belongs to her.”
“But I spent all this time working to save money to buy him, and I never made anyone help me, and now he’s supposed to be mine and you know it. You know it, Joe!”
I screamed that last sentence, then made a giant swath across the desk with my arm, spewing the rolls of money into the air. They hit the wall so hard, the rubber bands snapped. Green papers floated to the floor like feathers.
It had all been for nothing. I was losing him anyway. Joe tried to grab me, but I was too fast. I flung the door open, pushed Susannah aside, and was halfway to the woods by the time Joe got to the top of the hill. I raced past Fire’s old paddock, past the chestnut tree, and through the woods with great sobs bursting from my chest. My feet pounded the earth, my legs pushed harder, faster, until they ached, but I couldn’t stop until I got to Good Hope and barreled through the back door. When I got to our room, I threw myself face-first onto Mom’s bed, screaming into her pillow.
“No! No! No! No!”
It had all been for nothing. Every dream I’d had, every penny I had earned, every moment I’d spent daydreaming about how Fire would be mine—none of it mattered. Nothing mattered. Nothing at all. And no amount of crying was going to change the truth.
Kennedy came to Good Hope an hour later. By that time, I was up and pacing between the window and the bunks, my arms crossed tight in front of my chest, trying desperately to figure a way to keep Fire, and mourning that I hadn’t even gone to see him before I left.
“I heard,” Kennedy said when she came into the room. “I’m so sorry.”
“How can it be true?”
“I wish I had an answer. I’ve had this happen so many times. I can’t count how many horses I’ve loved that got sold out from under me. I know how you feel. I’m so sorry.”
I threw my arms up in the air. “Did you work a million hours to save money for a horse?”
She shook her head. “No, I didn’t have your courage. But I’ve loved at least a dozen the same way you love Fire. They were all taken from me, sold to someone else. It hurts just the same.”
“My father did something really bad, Kennedy. That’s why we ended up here. He stole money from his company. I didn’t steal anything. I earned every penny of that money myself! And in the end, it didn’t matter anyway. It’s so unfair!”
Whether because I was mad or because I’d already told Bryce, it was easier this time telling Kennedy about what my dad had done. But what I’d said was true—in the end, it didn’t matter. None of it mattered anymore.
Kennedy put her hand on my shoulder. “Everyone ends up here for one reason or another. I’m sorry about your father. You know my story, and if it weren’t for Jamie, I’d assume all fathers were bad. But you can’t let their stuff ruin you. You’re better than that. You have to rise each time they push you down. You have to rise each time you fall.”
I spent every minute I could over the next two days with Fire. Joe let me off work, and no one bothered me. Word spread quickly throughout the barn that I had tried to buy Fire, but he was leaving. On Saturday morning, I left Good Hope before s
unup, when only a spoonful of gray light hovered over the hill. It was too early for Miss May to be there, so I didn’t sign out. Mom knew where I’d be. Other than her, I didn’t care. I stopped to pour a packet of instant oatmeal into the bird feeder, then stepped down the path and took a right at the fork for the last time.
Lime-green shoots and purple crocus buds were trying hard to poke through lingering crusts of snow framing the edge of the trail. I crouched beside them and wiped the white crystals off so the sun could help them open. When I got as far as the chestnut tree, I leaned my forehead against the trunk, closed my eyes, and wished some of that tree’s stamina could peel off like bark and cover me with courage. Just for today. Then I moved quickly down the hill and up the lane to the barn. Fire and I had only a few hours left. Susannah was coming at nine.
At 8:35, I was sitting on the floor in the corner of Fire’s stall, his head lowered in front of me so I could scratch behind his ears, when Kennedy came in.
“Susannah’s here,” she said. “Early.”
“Couldn’t she at least have waited until nine like she said?”
“I don’t know, kiddo. Maybe she thought it best to get it over with.”
“I’m not ready.”
“You’ll never be ready. Give yourself a minute. I’ll distract them so they don’t come looking for you.”
I got up anyway and wrapped my arms around Fire’s neck. “There’s nothing that’s ever happened in my life that’s worse than giving you up,” I said into his ear. “Nothing.”
He pushed me with his muzzle when I clipped the lead rope to his halter and led him from the stall toward the other end of the barn. We walked slowly up the aisle, my eyes on the ground, my ears listening to the sounds of his hooves clomping on the concrete. One-two-three-four. One-two-three-four. The most beautiful music in the world.
Outside, the sun shined shamefully bright. Susannah stood by the back of the trailer with Mom, Joe, Kennedy, and Jamie. Her eyes were as blue as Mom’s, and the way she smiled at me, I knew that what was happening hurt her, too. It was completely different from what I was experiencing, but she understood. It was a comfort to know that if Fire had to leave Birchwood, at least he was going back to someone he already knew, to somewhere he’d already called home.
Mom rubbed the end of Fire’s nose. “Thank you,” she said. “Thank you for watching over my little girl.”
Jamie put his hand on my shoulder. “I’m sorry, Lizzie.”
I buried my face in Fire’s mane again and cried for the pony who had needed me at the exact same moment I needed him. “Never, ever forget,” I whispered.
Then I handed the lead rope over to Susannah and backed away to let her load him. He stepped into the trailer like he’d done it a hundred times before. When Susannah was tying his lead rope up front, Kennedy peered closely at Fire’s tail, glanced at me, and grinned. Inside my jacket pocket, my fingers clasped a roll of silky custard-colored hair I’d cut out of his tail that morning. It was all I had left.
“Good work,” Kennedy said quietly. “I’ve done the same thing myself.”
Susannah latched the trailer door so all I could see of Fire were the very tops of his hindquarters.
“Is there anything I can do for you, Lizzie?” Susannah asked.
Yes! Leave him here. Don’t take him away.
“Can you tell me his name? The one before Fire?” I asked.
“He’s called Quixote, after one of my favorite characters in literature.”
“Don Quixote?” Mom asked.
“Yes, the errant knight who made impossible dreams come true.”
My heart warmed, and even though I didn’t want to, I smiled. “He lived up to his name, then. Thank you.”
Susannah jingled her keys in her hand. “Well, then, I should go.”
I snuggled into Mom’s arms and watched the trailer move slowly up the driveway, waiting for the anguish I knew was going to flood me any second. The right blinker came on, and just as Susannah turned onto the road, Fire whinnied. He whinnied so long, and so loud, the earth vibrated under my feet. I bolted away and ran down the lane toward the woods, my hand wrapped in the silkiness of his tail, smiling through my tears, because I knew, once again, that he was calling for me.
Thirty-One
Kennedy came to see me again that night. We sat on Mom’s bed and looked at a scrapbook with pictures and mementos from all the horses Kennedy had loved. She talked a lot about losing her mother and about the fire that gave her Jamie.
“My life is like the mythical phoenix bird that rose from literal ashes,” she said. “Yours will be, too. You’re on the verge of that part. Don’t waste your time sitting in this room and feeling sorry for yourself. Come back to Birchwood soon. Your family is there.”
Before she left, she laid my backpack on the bed.
“The money is all here,” she said. “That’s crazy-hard work you did, kiddo. If nothing else, be proud.”
Mom stayed with me all day Sunday. I watched from my bunk as she rearranged the drawers three times—until finally everything was back the way it was before she started. At five o’clock she went to meet Mrs. Ivanov in the common room.
“Want me to come get you for dinner?”
“I’m not hungry,” I said.
“You have to eat. I’ll smuggle something in later.”
She was back in an hour, tapping on the door with her foot. I crawled down from my bed and opened it wide, but it wasn’t Mom. It was Leonard. He stood in the hallway holding a miniature peach rosebush and a yellow envelope.
“Oh! I thought you were my mom!”
His eyes searched my face for something, then he held out the plant.
“It’s what I could do,” he said.
“What?”
“About the horse and your friend who had to left. I am sad for you. I brought this from my job, the greenhouse. We planted all winter. I saved this one for you.”
A miniature peach rosebush. He was sad for me. He was kind. No words would come.
“A little money I save to help you buy the horse,” he said. “It’s in the card. Keep it. You’ll find different one someday.”
Then he turned and walked away.
When Mom came back with a paper plate of dinner, I was sitting by the window, staring out into the dark, the peach rosebush in my lap. The light shined behind me, casting my reflection on the glass.
“Hi, sweetie. How are you?”
I touched a fingertip to a peach rose blossom. “Look what Leonard brought.”
She leaned over and put her nose up to a bloom. “Mmmm, yummy. That was so thoughtful.”
“I didn’t know he worked in a greenhouse. I feel terrible. I always thought he hated me.”
“Don’t be too hard on yourself. Sometimes, when we don’t understand something, we make judgments about people that aren’t accurate. That’s why it’s always important to keep your eyes, ears, and mind open.”
“He always talked like he was angry at me or thought I was stupid.”
She massaged her fingers into my shoulders and smiled at me in the glass.
“Maybe you misjudged him because his accent is different. It can sound a little harsh, but that doesn’t mean he’s harsh. It’s just not what you’re used to.”
“Maybe.”
Mom came around and perched on the windowsill. “I think if you open your heart just a teensy bit and look around, you might see a lot of things differently.”
A ladybug crawled out of the rosebush and onto my fingernail. “We should make a wish.”
“A wish, yes. Let’s make a wish,” Mom said.
We both closed our eyes. For so long, I’d put everything I had into saving money for Fire, and now it took me a second even to come up with something else I wanted. Finally, I wished for Mom to be happy again. But when I opened my eyes, I saw that my wish had already come true. Mom was happy. I’d just never noticed. She was at peace.
“I need to tell you something, Mom. Angela
’s been paying me to babysit. I know you thought I was just being nice, but I wasn’t. She was paying me. I’m going to give her back all the money, then the rest of what I earned I’m giving to you to pay some bills.”
She leaned over and smoothed my hair back from my face. “Give the whole thing to Angela if you want. We’re going to be fine, and I’m afraid her back-on-her-feet is going to take a lot longer than ours.”
She smiled and kissed the top of my head, then went to get dressed for bed.
That night I put all the money into a gallon-sized plastic baggie I confiscated from the kitchen and taped it to the counter in the bathroom with a note.
Dear Angela,
Here is the money you paid me plus some more I earned over the winter. I want you to have it all. My mom says we’ll be leaving Good Hope when we are back on our feet, but we are worried your “back on your feet” is going to take longer, so I want you to have this money to make that happen sooner. Thank you for being my friend.
Lizzie
On Monday morning, I waited for the bus at the corner of Good Hope and Brook Drive, where I was supposed to be getting on and off all year. The driver almost drove right past, but I leaned into the road and flagged him down. The wheels and brakes squealed to a stop. I figured he would say something nasty about my doing that, so I kept my eyes down and took my place alone in the front-row seat.
“Hey,” he said.
“Yes?”
“All year I’ve been waiting for the kid who was supposed to get on here. Why’d you walk all the way down to that other stop?”
I looked at him without saying a word. The tiniest smile curved on his lips for the very first time.
“Got it,” he said. “But there’s no shame in needing a little help sometimes.”
He said that last part at the same time he pulled the squeaky door closed so no one else would hear.
After third period, I stopped at my locker to get my history book. Two plastic grocery bags were looped around the lock. A folded, handwritten note was taped on the front of one bag.
Lizzie,
We’re really sorry about Bryce leaving and about Fire. Really, really sorry. Rikki saw you come to her dad’s thrift store the day you sold your stuffed animals. We really liked them, so we each bought one. Yesterday we all decided that you should have them back, so here they are. Hope they help make you feel better.
Lizzie Flying Solo Page 18