Searching for Normal

by C. J. Darlington

  “Thanks, guys,” I said, finishing off my bagel and trying not to feel guilty for allowing them to treat me. First it was the food, now this. I didn’t know why, but it was really hard for me to receive, yet it also felt awesome when someone cared.

  I got quiet for the rest of the drive to the fairgrounds and just listened to my friends’ banter. Amelia and Izzy played the “Name that Musical” game Izzy and her dad had made up, and even Tessa guessed a few right. They knew better than to ask me to participate.

  There were more vehicles than I anticipated, at least half being pickup trucks, but Claire found us a spot close enough that we wouldn’t have to hoof it too far in the chilly November air. It looked like rain was coming too, and I noticed my friends hadn’t really dressed for spending any time outside. It was a good thing the event would be held inside the main arena.

  “Gee whiz, this is like a rock concert,” Izzy said. “Reminds me of when I saw For King & Country perform here.”

  I turned to my friend. “You’ve been here before?”

  “Beginning of summer. It was awesome.”

  I hoped this experience would be just as amazing.

  Claire parked and handed Tessa the keys to her truck “just in case” and hopped into the car of her friend, who arrived a minute later to pick her up for some robotics club thing. They’d decided to carpool so Claire could save on gas. She’d be back to drive us home when the clinic was over. We waved her off.

  As we walked toward the doors, I tried to laugh and joke with my friends, but I could feel tension working through my stomach like a snake.

  Tessa gently bumped me with her shoulder. “It’s going to be all right.”

  I smiled.

  “Just relax and try to enjoy yourself.” She returned my grin. “We’re here to support you no matter what.”

  I glanced around at my friends. My friends. How could that be? I came here to Riverbend with nothing but a suitcase and a heart full of grief. It had even felt like God had abandoned me. Yet here I was, surrounded by three girls I met in drama class who really seemed to care about me, even though I couldn’t act to save my life and had barely spoken more than a few sentences for the first weeks of our friendship.

  And today I was going to meet my father.

  Chapter 29

  THE SECOND I ENTERED THE BUILDING, I was on high alert for any signs of Mason. His picture was everywhere—snazzy promo posters with some of the photos I had saved on my phone, black T-shirts with his logo embroidered on the pocket, Mason King–endorsed horse treats, and even dog coats that looked like horse blankets.

  I felt like a spotlight was on me.

  Or crosshairs.

  I froze, staring at all the . . . stuff.

  “What’s wrong?” Amelia said. Izzy had already walked beyond us, wide-eyed and hoping to pet some horses, though I was pretty sure they were in a different part of the building. She’d actually been in 4-H as a kid back in Williamsport, where she lived before coming to Riverbend, and had been the most excited when I told her about visiting the barn near her house.

  Tessa and Amelia looked around the lobby bustling with people wearing cowboy hats, Carhartt vests, boots, and jeans. There was a roping cow dummy several kids were intently trying to snag with their lassos. Someone walked a border collie on a leash and harness, though it looked more like the dog was walking them by the way he pulled the leash taut. The chatter of voices droned like a lazy swarm of bees, and still I couldn’t move.

  “Do you think . . . ?”

  It’s stupid, really. There is no way anyone will notice.

  “What if I really look like him and people come up to me?”

  Amelia rubbed her hands together. “Then you just thank them and say, ‘Yes, I actually am his daughter.’”

  She was only half joking. I think.

  Amelia and Tessa took me by an arm. “Come on. You’re going to be fine,” Tessa said.

  Izzy came bouncing over, holding up a stuffed horse the size of a cat. It wore a little felt hat, also emblazoned with Mason’s logo, and a red bandanna. “Isn’t he cute? I wish my brother Bash wasn’t too old for it.”

  “Sebastian may be too old, but you’re apparently not,” I said.

  Amelia reached for the stuffed animal. “Oh my gosh, I need one too.”

  I laughed. Of all the things to buy, why doesn’t it surprise me that my friends are drawn to a plush horse? I had to admit, even though I told myself I was way too old for stuffed toys, part of me wouldn’t have minded getting one for my bed. Stanley would’ve loved it. I could picture him running around the apartment with it hanging from his mouth.

  “Okay, where to?” Tessa said, getting us back on track.

  “We better find our seats,” I said, still searching for any sign of Mason.

  Izzy and Amelia went to buy their toys, and I waited with Tessa. Once we were together as a group again, I led the way. People were already inside, but we managed to find seating in the front row nearest the round pen set up inside the huge arena.

  I sat down and took it all in.

  “Did you text your aunt?” Izzy asked.

  Oh, man, I’d forgotten. I whipped out my phone and zapped a text letting her know we were safe and waiting for the event to start. Within a minute she texted back.

  Thanks. Have fun!

  “Snacks?” Izzy pulled a bag of Peanut M&M’s from her coat pocket.

  “We just ate breakfast!”

  Amelia poured herself a handful. “Hey, never turn down M&M’s.”

  The bagel and tea had gone down easily, but now that I was finally here, my stomach gurgled from the anticipation. No matter how much I tried to calm myself, my insides had other ideas. I didn’t want my friends to see how nervous I was, but they likely already knew.

  The arena was only half full, but the attendance probably still totaled a few hundred people, most of them women, I noticed. I hadn’t seen a horse yet.

  Finally, right on time, the event started. Rock music with lots of drums blared from the loudspeakers hanging from the ceiling far above us. Then Mason King made his entrance.

  He rode a jet-black horse at a gallop across the arena, and then just when it looked like he was going to run the animal all the way to the other side, the horse did a fast, sliding stop that sent a plume of arena dust into the air.

  The crowd broke into applause, and I started clapping too. My friends joined in. Izzy mouthed wow to me, and it made me feel good that she appreciated the show of skill. That was my father out there. That was my father! It hit me with the intensity of those drums in the music. What if someday I could join him out there and learn all his amazing techniques? What if I could get so good, I’d have my own clinics and help troubled horses like I’d dreamed of doing since I was a kid?

  A part of me wanted to jump to my feet, point at Mason, and yell, “Hey, world! I’m his daughter! We share the same blood!” Thankfully, the urge quickly left me, but my pulse was still pounding in my ears as he did another lap around the arena at full speed.

  “Greetings, Riverbend!” he shouted into his headset microphone. “Are you ready to learn how to truly experience a relationship with your horse?”

  The crowd responded with a resounding yes!

  I focused on Mason’s face and tried to decide if the photos on his website were an accurate depiction. He looked a little older, but his features were hard to see from a distance. I also watched his horse. The big gelding was well-muscled with a long, wavy mane that had to take hours to untangle. He was big enough that he could’ve had some Friesian bloodlines mixed with quarter horse.

  Mason spent a few more minutes taking the animal through a reining pattern including spins and more sliding stops. Like I usually did, I watched the horse as much as the trainer. I didn’t know why, but the gelding pinned his ears every time Mason asked for a transition into a faster gait.

  Hmm . . . interesting. Horses don’t lie. They wore their emotions in their bodies, and unlike humans, d
id not try to suppress them. If a horse was unhappy, he’d let you know. Sometimes the signs were as subtle as a flick of the tail or a slight raise of the head. But they were there for anyone who took the time to pay attention.

  I rested my arms on the ledge separating our seats from the arena, focusing on every word Mason King said. He made a lap around the very outside of the arena. As he approached our seats, my whole body tensed, and Izzy and Tessa both elbowed me, which didn’t exactly help me feel relaxed.

  “Horses are prey animals,” Mason explained. “Humans are predators. Our goal is to teach our horses they don’t need to fear us, but they do need to respect us. Without your horse’s respect, you have no relationship.”

  Mason slowed his horse to a trot only a few feet from us, and I got a good view of him and his mount. Sweat soaked the horse’s chest and flank, glistening under the lights. His ribcage heaved in and out. A walk break seemed like a good idea, and at first, I thought Mason was going to rest the horse.

  But right after he passed us, so close I could see a scratch in the leather pommel of his saddle, Mason cued the horse forward with his spurs. There was nothing wrong with correctly using humane spurs. They were a way to communicate subtly with the horse, but I clearly saw the metal attached to the back of Mason’s boot jab harshly into the gelding’s side. That’s when the horse’s ears pinned again.

  “Notice how he just disrespected me there when I asked him to move forward?” Mason said through his microphone. “We’ve gotta nip that kind of behavior in the bud if we’re going to have a good partnership. He must move his feet when I say move his feet.”

  Mason immediately pushed the horse into a fast lope, taking another lap around the entire arena. When they passed us again, he slowed to a trot for a few strides before cuing the gelding with his spurs. This time the gelding jumped into the lope, but his tail swooshed.

  “See? That’s much better,” Mason said, and he was met with a round of applause.

  Izzy leaned toward me. “The horse seems really tired.”

  I swallowed. “Yeah.”

  “Respect is the number one ingredient in a good partnership,” Mason said. “Without it, you’ve got nothing.”

  I tried to listen as he continued to explain his horsemanship philosophies, things I’d heard many times before in his YouTube videos. But there was something about that horse. On his final lap around the arena, Mason let the gelding walk with loose reins. As they came close to our seats, I looked right into the gelding’s eyes and saw nothing but exhaustion and a dullness no video could ever capture. Pinning his ears hardly seemed disrespectful considering how hard he’d worked already for his master.

  Mason left the arena, and the applause was so loud I almost wanted to cover my ears. We were given a thirty-minute break to check out the merchandise tables and use the bathroom. My friends stood up to go.

  “I’ll stay with the seats,” I said.

  “Are you sure?” Tessa asked.

  I nodded.

  When I was alone, I tried to understand what I was feeling. Mason talked about respect, and that sounded great on the surface. So why did his presentation bother me? A well-trained horse needed to listen to the “asks” of its handler or rider. It was important the horse responded to those cues for everyone’s safety. But something rubbed me wrong about it all. I’d looked up to this man well before I knew he was my father. Was this the way he always was with horses? Even I could see that gelding was uncomfortable and unhappy. Had I missed something in the videos?

  It took me five minutes to figure out what nagged me, but as my friends took their seats beside me again, I realized what it was. Respect had to go both ways. Where’s Mason’s respect for his horse?

  Chapter 30

  “HAVING FUN?” Tessa cradled a cup of vanilla-flavored coffee she’d bought in the lobby.

  “Mm-hmm,” I said.

  Izzy and Amelia were animatedly trying to figure out what band played Mason’s entry song, leaving Tessa and me to have our own conversation.

  “That hardly sounds convincing.”

  “I’m fine.”

  Tessa took a slurping sip, and I knew she wasn’t buying it.

  “It’s . . . he seems different from his videos.”

  Was it just me? Had anyone else in this place noticed a thing? Maybe I was imagining something that wasn’t there or putting a crazy amount of pressure on the man to live up to my expectations.

  Before we could talk more, a truck and three-horse trailer from one of his sponsors drove into the arena to another pounding rock song. The next segment was supposed to be a trailer-loading demonstration.

  Mason entered the arena on foot this time, followed by a woman in a fringe vest leading a petite, dark-gray horse. The crowd’s applause spooked the horse, and it jumped away, slamming right into the woman and nearly knocking her off balance. Mason rushed over and took the horse’s lead rope.

  “Looks like we’ll be working on more than trailer loading today,” he said with a chuckle that the crowd echoed. “Go ahead and make some noise!”

  As I watched him run the horse around in a circle on the line, my insides twisted every time the horse reacted to the crowd. I would never say I was an experienced horsewoman, but even I knew the animal was terrified.

  After twenty minutes of the pre-trailer-loading work, Mason finally brought the horse, a mare, over to the fancy trailer. Just like with the gelding, the mare was out of breath and sweating. The crowd no longer freaked her out, but I wondered if it was because she didn’t have the energy to spook.

  “This horse refuses to load,” Mason said. “Took her owner what? Three hours to load her so they could even get here?”

  The lady nodded, said something, and Mason proceeded to point to the trailer with his finger and swing the end of his rope toward the mare’s hindquarters to encourage her forward. It didn’t surprise me when she balked and actually started backing up instead.

  “When they refuse, you gotta make the outside of the trailer uncomfortable,” Mason said. “Make the wrong thing difficult, the right thing easy.”

  I’d heard that phrase used in horse training many times before, but somehow the way Mason was using it didn’t seem fair. That mare had just been through an entire training session already. Now they are going to push her to load as well?

  “So, do horses normally just walk on?” Izzy asked.

  “If they’re trained to and they feel safe,” I said.

  “Guess she doesn’t,” Izzy muttered.

  We sat through another hour of Mason working with the mare, but she still wouldn’t load. I noticed a few people get up and leave. A man with a beard farther down on our row was dipping his chin to his chest, fighting to stay awake.

  Mason had stopped talking and kept pushing the mare, but I think the horse had made her decision—and that was a big “Nope.” I almost smiled at her resolve. She definitely had spirit.

  “Well, folks,” Mason said. “At least she knows who’s in charge. We’re going to have to call this one and break for lunch.”

  “Finally!” Izzy said, jumping up.

  We bought hot dogs and French fries at the concession stand and took them to a corner of the lobby to eat. Izzy passed around her delicious brownies, and soon our stomachs were full. I unscrewed the lid of my bottled water and took a long swig.

  “I really think you should tell him,” Amelia said. “There’s an autograph line at the end, right? That would be perfect.”

  “No, it wouldn’t,” I said.

  Amelia cocked her head in that same Labradoodle way that had made me bust out laughing in drama class. Today it just annoyed me. Does she actually expect me to just get in line and lay it on him when I reach the front? I’d been sitting on the floor but stood up. “You really think this is a simple, easy decision?”

  Amelia stared up at me. Tessa and Izzy looked at each other.

  “I mean, seriously?” I waved toward the merch booths plastered with Mason King’s smi
ling face. “This isn’t a Disney movie. It’s not gonna all end up perfect and happy with a group hug and Mason welcoming me into his family.” I crumpled up my hotdog container and stuffed it into the plastic bag Izzy had used for the brownies. “It just isn’t.”

  “I wasn’t saying it was,” Amelia said.

  “But you keep pushing me to talk to him.”

  “Because I think you should!”

  “It’s my decision.”

  Amelia clambered to her feet and faced me. “We’re all completely aware of that, Shay.”

  “Then stop pushing me.”

  “We’re just trying to help you!”

  “Guys.” Izzy got in between us, holding each of our arms.

  I yanked mine away. “Stop it, Izzy. I need some space.”

  Stomping over to the nearest trash can, I stuffed the plastic bag inside as much as I was trying to stuff whatever it was I was feeling. All I knew was that if I kept going, I was going to explode on my friends even more than I already had, and tears were already filling my eyes.

  I walked past the booths loaded with overpriced horse tack and just kept walking. Mason was proving who he really was at this clinic, and here I was doing the same.

  My phone vibrated in my pocket, but I didn’t pull it out. It was probably my friends trying to get me to come back. I wanted to. I really did. But they didn’t seem to understand how much pressure I felt.

  I wandered past all the hype until I made it outside where the horse trailers were parked. Mason King’s tour bus sat nearby too, and I wondered if he rested inside. Is there anything keeping me from knocking on the door? Is that weird? I glanced around for security but didn’t see any.

  The wind swirled around me, and the sky was filling with dark clouds. I stared at the bus, wishing I’d worn my jacket. I’d set myself up for this. Aunt Laura had tried to warn me, but I’d insisted I had to know.

  Where does that leave me now?