Jinx was another story, of course. Carole knew that the only reason Max had agreed to take him was because of her, and she didn’t intend to let him down. She and Ben had sketched out a basic training schedule over the weekend, and Carole couldn’t wait to start putting it into action.
We’ll probably need to give him a few days to settle in before we get into anything too major, she thought, picking aimlessly at the peeling corner of her desk. But we can start working on some basic ground manners right away, like leading and grooming and stuff.
She blinked, distracted by a loud snort of laughter from nearby. For some reason her classmates seemed rowdier than usual that day. Carole supposed it had something to do with being the first day back after vacation. Doing her best to tune out the noise, she returned her thoughts to Pine Hollow. Thinking about the plans for Jinx made her think about Ben. She was starting to realize that he was part of the reason she was so excited about her new project. He was still being his new, friendly self, though no one except Carole seemed to have noticed.
It will be nice to work together on this, she thought. It’s nice that we’re finally becoming more like real friends. At least I think that’s what’s happening there.
Thinking about Ben—how she felt about him, what he might feel about her—always made her head hurt a little, so Carole did her best to put it out of her mind. She would have plenty of time to figure out what, if anything, was going on with them while they retrained Jinx.
She was glancing forward to see if the teacher had arrived yet when she noticed a couple of girls she barely knew staring at her intently. When they saw her look their way, both of them broke out in giggles and quickly turned away.
Carole frowned. What was that all about?
Before she could figure it out, Tanner Finnegan leaned over from his seat across the aisle. “So, Carole,” he said with a smirk, “I hear you had something going with Cam Nelson over the break.”
Carole gulped, a quick, surprising stab of pain shooting through her heart at the sound of Cam’s name. “What—um, what do you mean?” As far as she could recall, Tanner Finnegan had never said more than two words to her in the five months he’d been sitting across from her in homeroom. Why was he suddenly so interested in her love life?
“I heard all about it from the guys on the team.” Tanner wiggled his eyebrows suggestively and leaned closer. “They said you and Cam were hot and heavy. For a while, anyway.”
Carole felt her cheeks turning red. “It was no big deal,” she muttered, not sure what else to say. She certainly didn’t feel like discussing the way Cam had stomped on her heart with Tanner—or anyone, for that matter.
“Oh yeah? I hear Cam has quite the track record when it comes to lovin’ ’em and leavin’ ’em.” Tanner grinned evilly. “So did you at least get some lovin’ before you got left, Hanson?”
Blushing furiously, Carole turned away and pretended to search through her backpack for something, hoping Tanner would get the hint. If nothing else, she’d hoped the fact that Cam went to a different school would protect her from just this sort of thing. She’d forgotten that he knew plenty of people at Carole’s school through the sports teams he played on, which often competed against Willow Creek High.
The teacher came in a moment later, saving Carole from any further questioning. She sat back in her chair, ignoring the morning announcements. Doing her best to forget about Tanner and his obnoxious comments, she turned her thoughts back to Jinx.
As she headed for her first period class, she was still lost in thought. But halfway there, she started to notice that a lot of people seemed to be staring at her and giggling as she walked by. She glanced around, feeling strange. What’s going on? she wondered. Did Tanner and the other guys on the team tell the whole world that Cam and I broke up? Why would anyone even care?
She frowned and turned the corner toward her classroom. A tall guy she didn’t know stared at her with a goofy grin on his face, then turned to whisper something to a friend. Both of them burst out laughing.
Carole blushed, ducking her head to avoid any more curious looks. As she hurried into her biology classroom, she almost ran into Andrea Barry. Andrea was in Carole’s biology class, even though she was only a sophomore. She also boarded her horse, Country Doctor, at Pine Hollow.
“Oh!” Andrea said with an uncertain smile. “Um, hi, Carole.”
Carole grabbed her arm. She and Andrea had never been especially close, but Carole knew that the younger girl was a nice, honest person. “Andrea,” she whispered, dragging her into the room, “what’s the deal? I feel like everyone is staring at me.
Andrea looked uncomfortable. “Yeah,” she said, glancing over Carole’s head. “Um, I guess people are sort of talking about what happened. You know, with you and that cute basketball player from Arden.”
“Cam,” Carole said, the name feeling slightly bitter on her tongue. “Why would anyone care? People break up all the time.”
Andrea shrugged. “I guess some of the guys saw him the other night.” She shifted her weight from one foot to the other, looking as though she wished she were anywhere else. But she went on. “And he was with, you know, that new girl he started going out with right before Christmas. …”
Carole froze. New girlfriend? Right before Christmas? There had to be some mistake. “But Cam and I didn’t split up until New Year’s!” she blurted out.
“Yeah.” Andrea shot her a sympathetic look. “I know. I guess he was sort of bragging about that. Dating two girls at once. You know—guys can be total pigs sometimes.”
Carole barely heard Andrea as she excused herself and hurried to her seat. She walked to her own seat, feeling numb all over. Cam had been cheating on her? She couldn’t believe it. She wasn’t sure which was worse—that he’d done it or that he’d told the whole town all about it.
It’s worse that he did it, she decided quickly, anger flaring up and mixing with her humiliation. Much worse. But it was also really low of him to tell everyone about it. It’s like he wanted me to look like an idiot. No wonder everyone in school is laughing at me.
She shook her head, feeling like the world’s biggest fool. Why hadn’t she seen what Cam was really like? She had trusted him, and he had totally used her. And then he’d told everyone in town about it.
Only a real snake would kiss and tell like that, she thought, clenching her fists under her desk. Most guys wouldn’t do that, even if they broke up with someone. Alex wouldn’t do it to Lisa. And Ben—
She blinked, startled that Ben’s name had popped into her head. Still, it was true. As far as she knew, he had never told a soul about that kiss at the horse show back in the fall. He had more class than that. More than Cam.
It felt a little strange to be comparing Ben to Cam—and having Ben come out ahead. For a while, Cam had seemed a wonderful answer to her confusion about Ben. Everything had seemed so clear. He loved her, he wanted to be with her, and that was that.
Except it hadn’t worked out that way. And now it seemed that Ben had been the nice one all along. He hadn’t told her any lies, he hadn’t gone out of his way to hurt her. In fact, he’d been there ever since Cam had dumped her, like a true friend.
Or am I just kidding myself? Carole wondered, hardly noticing as the teacher came in and called for order. Am I just building Ben up in my mind because I’m so upset about Cam and I need someone else to distract me?
She wasn’t sure how to answer that. The only thing she knew for sure was that she’d better keep a low profile at school until the gossip blew over.
Lisa’s stomach was grumbling by the time lunch period came. She had skipped breakfast that morning, mostly because her mother had been in the kitchen hunched over a cup of coffee and Lisa hadn’t particularly felt like rehashing her breakup with Alex for the umpteenth time. Or, rather, listening to her mother urge her to rehash it so that she could experience “emotional healing.”
I swear, Mom is going to drive me nuts with this gripe ther
apy business, she thought as she entered the cafeteria and glanced around for an empty seat. If I come away from this with any emotional scars, it’s not going to be from the breakup itself. It’ll be from Mom’s constant nagging about honoring the grieving process and feeling my own pain.
“Lisa! Over here!”
Lisa saw Polly Giacomin waving at her from a nearby table, gesturing to the empty spot beside her. Lisa was a little surprised—last time she’d checked, she and Polly hadn’t been all that close. Even though they’d both ridden regularly at Pine Hollow for years and were in the same grade at school, they’d just never seemed to find much in common. Still, there was no sign of any of the friends Lisa usually sat with, so with a shrug, she headed for Polly’s table.
“Hi!” Polly said eagerly as she sat down. “So, Lisa, how are you doing?”
“Fine, I guess,” Lisa said, dumping her sandwich and apple out of her lunch bag. “I mean, you know, as well as could be expected. It’s kind of a bummer to be back here.” She rolled her eyes and glanced around the crowded cafeteria. Even after half a day back at school, the carefree days of winter vacation already seemed years in the past.
“I hear you,” Polly said with feeling, her brown eyes widening. She placed a hand on Lisa’s arm. “It must be especially hard for you—you know, since you won’t be able to spend that much time with, you know …”
Lisa glanced down at Polly’s hand in surprise. “Huh?” she said. “Oh!” The meaning of Polly’s comment suddenly became crystal clear.
Wow, gossip sure travels fast around here, she thought wryly. I guess this means the word is out about me and Scott.
She wasn’t quite sure how to feel about that. It was strange to know that people were talking about the two of them, especially when Lisa herself still didn’t know quite what to think of their new relationship. She and Scott had gone on a trail ride with Stevie and Phil the day before, and it had been really nice. But Lisa still wasn’t sure where she wanted things to go. She liked Scott, and she loved being with him. But did she really want to jump into a new romance so soon after Alex? Or would it be better to take a break, spend more time with her friends, get mentally prepared for college? The more she thought about it, the less certain she was about what she wanted to do.
“So Lisa.” Polly leaned forward eagerly. “I just have to say, Scott Forester is such a total hottie. So is he really as romantic as he looks like he would be?”
Lisa smiled politely, trying to figure out how to answer. Where was all this interest when I was going out with Alex? she wondered. It’s like now that I’m dating Scott, I suddenly popped up on everyone’s social radar or something. It’s amazing. He doesn’t even go to this school, but everyone knows him. I guess that’s what comes from being almost clinically social—not to mention having a dad who makes the evening news almost every night.
Spotting her friend Gary Korman ambling across the room, Lisa smiled apologetically. “Oops, I think Gary wants me. I’ll catch you later, okay, Polly?”
Gathering up her lunch, she made her escape. It was a relief to get away from Polly’s eager questions. Still, Lisa knew her reprieve was only temporary. If Polly was curious about Lisa’s new relationship with Scott, lots of other people would be, too. Scott and his family were probably the closest things Willow Creek had to celebrities, and that meant people paid attention to everything they did—and everything anyone connected with them did, too. Lisa supposed that was just something she was going to have to get used to if she wanted to be with Scott.
It wasn’t until Stevie walked into her American history class later that day that she realized George Wheeler was in the same class. Wow, she thought. Was he there all first semester? I guess I never really noticed him.
She smiled as George looked up from his books and spotted her. “Hey,” she called to him. “What’s up, George?”
“Hi,” he replied shyly as several nearby students shot them both curious looks.
Stevie guessed her classmates were surprised at her friendly greeting. It was common practice for most people to ignore George completely, except for a few obnoxious guys like Spike Anderson and Trent Lafferty, who delighted in teasing him and calling him names whenever they got bored. Stevie grimaced, feeling a twinge of guilt for looking the other way all the times she’d witnessed that kind of teasing in the past. If she’d known then what a nice, generous guy George really was, maybe she would have spoken up and put a stop to it.
Still, there wasn’t much she could do about that now. She took the seat in front of George, then twisted around to talk to him. “So I was thinking about maybe starting some jumping today after school,” she said. “Are you going to be around? I could use some eyes on the ground.”
“Sure,” George said immediately. “That sounds fine. Maybe we can set up some grids and stuff to start, kind of see how she reacts. Then we can figure out where to go from there.”
“Great idea.” Stevie smiled eagerly. “Like I said before, it’s been a while since Belle and I did any serious jumping. We need to get back in practice—both of us.”
“That reminds me,” George said. “I just heard about a jumper schooling show they’re holding over at Mendenhall Stables at the end of next month. I was thinking that could be a good goal for you and Belle to aim for. That way you’d be able to get back in practice jumping in competition, so it wouldn’t all be new when you’re ready to enter your first event in the spring.”
“That’s a great idea!” Stevie exclaimed. “Perfect, in fact. Thanks, George!”
“Sure.” George’s cheeks turned slightly pink, and he looked pleased. “Anyway, I need to go home after school and change clothes. But I can meet you at the stable around three-thirty if you want.”
“Sounds like a plan.” Stevie grinned at him, then turned around as the teacher entered. She was already looking forward to that afternoon’s session. It was nice to have someone helping her train. When she worked on dressage, she mostly did it alone, unless Phil was around or Denise had time to give her a lesson.
It’s amazing, she thought. I mean, all I really knew about George before this was from what Callie told me, which made me assume he was some kind of chronically annoying, needy mess. It’s kind of cool to see that there’s actually a sweet, interesting guy underneath that nerdy exterior. It’s just too bad he didn’t turn out to be the guy for Callie.
She couldn’t help feeling a little disloyal to Callie for her thoughts. But she also couldn’t help the way she felt, and she felt herself liking George a lot.
Pulling out her textbook as Mr. Carpenter started lecturing, Stevie shrugged off the moment of guilt. Callie will get over this sooner or later, and then everything will be fine, she thought as she flipped the book open to the correct chapter. But until that happens, I just hope being friends with her doesn’t mean I can’t be friends with George, too.
TEN
“Hey, handsome,” Callie greeted her horse breathlessly that afternoon. “How’s it going, Scoob?”
The friendly Appaloosa snuffled at her, then returned his attention to his grain bucket. Callie gave him a pat, then quickly picked up his feet and ran her hands over his body, checking for any problems that might need her attention. The horse seemed fine, so Callie gave him a quick scratch on the withers and then glanced at her watch. She was feeling rushed. For one thing, she was due at her doctor’s appointment in less than half an hour. Normally her regular checkups were something she dreaded, but that day she was almost looking forward to it. That was because of the second reason she was feeling rushed: She was trying to get in and out of the stable before she ran into George.
“Okay, Scooby Doo,” she murmured, letting herself out of the stall and then reaching over the half door to give the horse one last pat. “See you later. I’ll just go make sure they know to turn you out for a few hours this afternoon. Let you stretch those cute spotted legs of yours.”
She headed down the aisle, keeping an eye out for George. She was s
urprised he hadn’t turned up yet. All day at school, he had seemed to be in her face every time she turned around. That freaky incident outside the bathroom had been the first encounter, but it hadn’t ended there. She must have seen him two dozen times that day all over the school. In the halls between classes. In front of her on the stairs going down to the cafeteria. In the lunch line just a few people ahead of her. And, of course, there was chemistry class. Luckily the teacher had switched them around to new lab partners for the semester, so she didn’t have to sit next to George anymore. But she could have sworn she’d felt his eyes watching her through the entire class from his seat several rows behind her.
Was he always around that much and I just never really noticed it before? she wondered as she crossed the stable entryway. Or am I just going nuts—seeing him everywhere I turn, whether he’s there or not?
She wasn’t sure. Once upon a time she had prided herself on being one of the most rational and practical people she knew. The old Callie would have scoffed at the way the new Callie was behaving—like the bogeyman was waiting to jump out at her everywhere she turned. But lately the new Callie had been feeling pretty irrational most of the time, and she wasn’t sure how to deal with it. Maybe she really was going crazy. Maybe obsessing over George was just a symptom and she didn’t realize it because she was too far gone. If so, she hoped the men in the white coats would arrive soon. She wasn’t sure she could take many more days like that one.
When she reached the stable office, Max was there with his feet propped up on the desk, talking on the phone. Hearing him say something about foundations and load-bearing walls, Callie guessed that he was talking to the contractor who would be handling the expansion of the stable. But she didn’t think about it for long. Quickly scribbling a note about Scooby’s schedule, she gave Max a wave and then rushed out again.
As she reached the main doors she almost ran right into Stevie, who was hurrying into the stable with her arms wrapped around herself.
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