Heather sniffed and turned a teary-eyed look Reva’s way. “Fine, I guess, unless you consider the fact that I’m a bad, bad person. Charlie almost died because of me, and yet he seems to have forgiven me completely.”
“He has.” She didn’t say the old platitude about there being nothing to forgive. Because it was true that Heather could have done better. But she’d been consumed with her own guilt and pain along with the seemingly insurmountable task of taking care of her three children alone.
Reva reached through the bars of the stall’s closed door and petted Charlie’s neck. “But unless you can forgive yourself, you won’t be able to make his life better.” She kept her tone soft while counseling her friend. She wasn’t trying to lay blame. But she did want Heather to realize that until she could move past self-blame into a more open-hearted way of relating to Charlie, she wouldn’t be able to give him the care and connection he needed to become whole again. “Do you understand that?”
“I think so.” Heather took a shuddering breath. “But…” A sob escaped before she swallowed it back down. “I don’t know how to forgive myself. Not just for this”—she waved a hand at the now-clean barn—“but for so many things.”
Maybe because both women were touching Charlie at the same time, a window opened from Reva’s consciousness to Heather’s, showing Reva a glimpse of a memory that Charlie and Heather both shared, of Dale lying on the ground, unconscious. In the vision, Charlie stood near Dale’s prone form, still saddled and with reins trailing, feeling confused and contrite, trying to come close enough to find out what was wrong with Dale. Heather knelt beside Dale, consumed with panic, crying hysterically and swishing a riding crop at Charlie’s legs to make him back away.
Reva had never told Heather about the extent of her ability to communicate telepathically with animals, even though the two women had become good friends ever since their meeting at the grief support group.
But it was time to come clean. “Heather, I’m going to tell you something about myself that I don’t tell many people, and I hope you’ll keep an open mind and hear me out until I’m done explaining.”
Heather looked at Reva, her leaf-green eyes wide. “Okay.”
Reva took a breath for courage and let it out slowly. “When I was little girl, I had the ability to hear an animal’s thoughts, if they were inclined to share them with me. My parents convinced me that it was just my imagination, and they punished me for what they saw as telling lies to get attention. So I began to hide my abilities, even from myself, in order to fit in. But throughout my life, my abilities kept breaking through the wall I’d built around them, so when I became an adult, I started working on tearing down the wall by deliberately practicing my telepathic abilities.
“I was lucky enough to find a good teacher who helped me learn how to control and expand them. One of the rules she taught me was to only go where I’m invited, so I would normally not communicate with your animal companion without your permission. But sometimes, an animal reaches out to me, or their thoughts about needing help are so strong that I can’t help but overhear. When that happens, I believe that they are giving me the permission I need. So when Charlie had questions about what has been happening to him, I offered to answer them. May I share with you some of what he communicated to me?”
Heather nodded, an expression of shock on her face.
“Charlie feels responsible for Dale’s death. He believes that you blame him and that you’re punishing him.”
Heather drew in a breath. “No, I don’t. Of course I don’t blame him. It wasn’t his fault.”
“Well, he believes that it is.”
“But… but…” Heather shook her head. “Why would he think that?”
Reva closed her eyes, and with her hand on Charlie’s neck, she reached out with her mind and heart to connect to his. As the images started flowing into her mind, she narrated them to Heather. “He’s showing me images of Dale riding him along a wooded trail. Jasper is running alongside. Then something frightens them all—I’m not getting a clear image of what it is, but it seems to be all around them. Jasper yelps and runs back toward home. Dale is yelling and waving his arms above Charlie’s head…”
“It was a hornet’s nest,” Heather whispered. “I never told you that.”
Reva nodded but didn’t reply; she was still watching the images Charlie was sending. “Charlie is startled by the yelling and commotion, and he wheels around and bolts toward home. Dale falls off, and Charlie doesn’t realize it right away, but when he does, he stops. Dale climbs back on, and Charlie takes him home.
“When they get there, Dale falls off again. You run up to him. The kids run up too. There is a lot of loud noise—everyone yelling, screaming, crying. Charlie comes close to find out if Dale is okay. Then you… I’m sorry… You hit at him with Dale’s riding crop. You chase him away from Dale. You tell Erin to catch him and put him up in the barn, and he never sees Dale again after that.” Reva opened her eyes. “He thinks that you blame him for what happened. You need to let him know that’s not the case.”
Tears streamed down Heather’s face, and she wiped them away with her hands. “I was afraid he would step on Dale. I should have known better.” She reached through the bars of the stall and caressed Charlie’s face. “I’m so sorry.” She looked at Reva, her expression pleading. “Can you tell him I’m sorry? Can you tell him that I didn’t mean it? I was just so scared.”
Reva began to communicate what Heather had said to Charlie, but Heather interrupted. “I told Erin to put Charlie up and then run to the house and call 911, and I told the twins to run inside and get the EpiPen. It was my fault; I should have had Erin call 911 first, and I should have run for the EpiPen myself. It just never occurred to me that I could safely leave Charlie in the field with Dale lying there.”
Reva nodded. “I’ll tell him all that.”
“I was just so scared; I couldn’t think straight.”
“He knows. He was scared too. He didn’t mean to get in the way, and he wouldn’t have stepped on either of you.”
“I feel so terrible for what I did and then for everything I didn’t do. Please tell him I’ll make it up to him. I promise.”
Reva knew Heather was sincere in her intention, but having good intentions and having the wherewithal to follow through were two different things. “Heather, I know you mean well. But I can’t relay a promise to Charlie if I’m not sure you can keep it.”
“But I—”
“You would never have allowed Charlie—and his stall—to get in such a state if you’d known what was happening. I know that. But—”
“I won’t trust Erin to take care of Charlie by herself anymore,” Heather interrupted. “We’ll work together from now on—or take turns—and I’ll check behind her. From now on, I’ll make sure everything gets done.”
“I know you will. But that’s not enough. Charlie needs more interaction than that. He needs to be ridden. He needs to be worked with.”
Heather slumped. “And I don’t know how to do that.”
“So before I can relay your promise to Charlie, you and I need to come up with a plan that will work. Adrian has already agreed to come to the shelter twice a week to help tame that feral tomcat. I’m sure he’d be willing to stay a little longer to ride Charlie.”
Heather sent her a sideways smirk. “You think he would?”
“If not, I can twist his arm.” She winked. No need to let Heather know that she had already approached Adrian about it last night because even before chatting telepathically with Charlie, she’d had a sense that the horse was depressed and would need more attention than he was currently getting. And she knew that Mack had also spoken with Adrian earlier today. “He could come around here to ride Charlie while you’re working at the shelter. Would that be okay?”
“I’d hate to impose on Adrian, but…yes. Whatever Charlie needs,
I’ll make sure he gets it.”
“Good.” Reva completed the conversation with Charlie, ending the way she always did, by asking the animal if there was anything else they wanted to say. When he replied, she smiled and patted his neck before relaying the message to Heather. “He says that he will never harm you or the kids or any human, for that matter. You can trust that you are all safe around him.”
Heather blinked back tears. “Erin wanted to ride him, but I wouldn’t let her. Please tell Charlie that it wasn’t for fear of him… Well, actually, it was, a little. Please tell him that I trust him now, but I still don’t trust that Erin would know how to ride him safely. So I’m not ready to allow that yet, but it’s not because of him.”
Reva relayed the message, again ending with her query of whether Charlie had anything else to add. When he answered, she laughed. “He says he doesn’t trust that any of y’all are ready to ride him either. But he would be willing to let Adrian have a go, as soon as possible. Charlie is tired of being a brown blob of misery in the middle of the field.”
“Oh, my God,” Heather said softly, putting her fingers to her lips.
“What?”
“I’ve thought of him that way before—a brown blob of misery. Are you telling me that he’s been reading my mind?”
“Maybe sometimes, yes. It’s not like our animals stand around listening in on our every thought. But when our thoughts have a lot of emotion behind them, we can be pretty good at projecting them unintentionally.”
Heather gave a wide-eyed look at Charlie, then slowly turned that same incredulous stare to Reva. “So you…?”
Reva shook her head. Once people heard a communication from an animal that turned them into believers, their next question was almost always whether Reva could hear the thoughts of humans too. (In other words, their thoughts.) Reva chuckled. Though she was always honest in her responses, she didn’t feel obliged to give away all her secrets. “You can relax. Even if I wanted to know what the people around me were thinking, I ain’t got time for that shit.”
***
Heather poured a glass of wine and sat by herself at the kitchen table in her quiet house, soaking up the silence. The twins would be spending the night with Max at Sara’s. Erin would be home any minute to face the reckoning Heather dreaded but knew she had to deliver.
Heather’s friends, who’d been so incredibly wonderful, had all gone home, as had Adrian. They’d worked like field hands all afternoon, cleaning not only Charlie’s stall but the rest of the barn as well. When Quinn and Abby drove off with a flatbed trailer full of junk to take to the heavy trash facility on their way home, Reva had joked about bringing a few friends for Charlie over from Bayside Barn, now that his barn had three empty stalls.
“No, thanks,” Heather had said. She knew Charlie needed company, but she also knew better than to take on even more mouths to feed and stalls to clean. The company Charlie needed—and, she resolved, the company he would have—already lived right here in this house.
When headlights sent twin spears of light down the long driveway, Heather took her wineglass with her and walked outside through the open garage door. Erin hopped out of the back seat, all smiles. “Hey, Mama.”
Heather smiled too and waved at the parent who’d been kind enough to bring Erin home so Heather wouldn’t have to come and get her. “Thanks so much,” she yelled to the man who waved back but didn’t roll down the window.
“Don’t go in yet,” Heather said to Erin, who had started to head inside. “I want you to see something.”
“Okay,” Erin said, sounding perplexed but not arguing. They both stood and watched the car do a three-point turn and head back down the driveway. “What is it?”
“Follow me.” Heather led the way to the barn, walking quickly down the path illuminated by the security light on the side of the house. She still didn’t know how she was going to handle this; a lot of it depended on Erin’s attitude.
Would Erin be combative? If so, they’d probably be engaged in a screaming match before long, and Heather would have to watch her own temper. She had a long, slow-burning fuse, but once it was lit, an explosion was sure to follow.
Would Erin be contrite and remorseful? If so, Heather would have to guard against being too soft in return. She couldn’t afford to be as lax as she had been.
“What’s wrong?” Erin asked. “Is Charlie not okay?”
“He’s fine.” Heather flicked a switch, flooding the barn with light. Charlie nickered softly from his stall, confirming Heather’s words.
“Oh!” Erin glanced around the barn, her face lit with delight. “It looks great in here!” She went up to Charlie’s stall and petted him on the nose. “How’d this happen?”
Heather took a sip of wine; it tasted sour, and the small amount of alcohol wouldn’t help her through this. She set the glass on a nearby shelf. “Charlie’s stall was so filthy that we couldn’t put him back in it when we finally stopped walking him this morning at about 2:00 a.m. That’s why Adrian was still here when you woke up. He stayed to clean the stall before we could put the poor horse up for the night.”
“Oh.” Erin took a step back but still seemed confused. “I’m sorry. I put fresh shavings in there on…I don’t know…Thursday, I think?”
“And when was the last time you scooped the stall?”
“Um…” Erin’s cheeks flushed. “I don’t know.”
“And when was the last time you completely scraped out the shavings and started over with fresh bedding?”
“Last weekend.”
“Oh, yeah?” Heather walked through the barn to the huge pile of used shavings Adrian had dumped out there. “So where did all this come from?”
“Um…”
“And why were there more than a dozen unused bags of shavings stacked in the corner…with a magazine on top of them?” Heather paused to let her words sink in. “How many afternoons have you spent sitting in here reading a magazine instead of doing the work I’ve been paying you to do?”
“Um…”
“Pouring new food on top of old in the bins?”
Erin hung her head. “Those bags are heavy,” she mumbled.
“Sure they are,” Heather agreed. “And I was the one doing the work of refilling the bins each week until you offered to take on more responsibility. You offered!”
“I’m sorry, Mom,” Erin said, a hint of tears in her voice.
Heather stiffened her spine and held on to her righteous anger. “I was so proud of you for wanting to help out more. I was happy to increase your allowance, even though I had to watch every other penny to afford it.”
“Is it my fault Charlie got sick?” Erin’s tears spilled over, and she reached through the stall’s bars to rub Charlie’s neck. “Because I wasn’t taking good enough care of him?”
“I don’t know, but we threw away the food just in case. We also tossed out some stale hay because you weren’t using it fast enough.”
“I’m sorry, Mom. I didn’t know it could make him sick.”
“It might not have been your fault,” Heather admitted. “Charlie could have eaten a weed out in the field that made him sick. If so, that would be my fault for not having the field mowed often enough.”
Erin sniffed and wiped her face. “I could mow the field,” she offered. “You wouldn’t have to pay me either.”
Heather allowed a small smile but didn’t reach out to comfort her daughter. She needed to keep up the stern parent act a little longer. “I will take you up on that offer. As soon as the mower gets back from the repair shop. Quinn mowed the field with his tractor today, but the next time, it will be your turn. The job will probably take you all weekend, but since you’re going to be grounded for the next two months, you won’t be missing anything important while you’re out there sweating in the hot sun.”
Erin nodded. “Okay. I kn
ow I deserve to be punished.”
“Your punishment is for lying to me and for taking advantage of my generosity by accepting an allowance for work you weren’t doing.”
“I know. I’m sorry.”
“As to Charlie’s care, you absolutely should have done better.” This time, she let herself reach out and touch Erin’s shoulder. “But you and I both let Charlie down, and we are going to work together to make sure that never happens again.”
“I’ll take better care of him from now on,” Erin promised, turning to hug Heather. “You don’t have to worry about that. I’ve learned my lesson.”
Heather accepted the hug and even returned it, but she didn’t allow her voice to soften. “Unfortunately, my darling girl, you have lost my trust when it comes to taking care of Charlie.” She patted Erin’s back, then pulled away to make eye contact. “And trust, once lost, has to be earned all over again.”
“I understand. I’ll do the work, and you can check behind me.”
Heather shook her head. “You and I are going to care for Charlie together. We’ll come up with a schedule and a plan so we’ll each be coming out to the barn to care for Charlie on a daily basis.”
Erin looked down, her expression contrite. “Okay.”
“And in addition to mowing the field twice a month, you will also take over doing the laundry so I’ll have more time to come out here and spend time with Charlie.”
Erin’s eyes got big, her first look of dismay.
“And I’ll be withholding your allowance until you make up for what you got paid but didn’t earn all summer long. After that, you’ll go back to earning what you earned before I increased your allowance, even though you will continue to mow the field and do the laundry.”
To be honest, Heather wasn’t going to make Erin mow the field once she started getting a paycheck from her job at the shelter. She had looked into hiring someone to mow it with a tractor—a hefty amount of money, but one she’d be able to afford. Still, she wanted to impress Erin with the enormous potential punishment Heather had at her disposal should Erin decide to shirk her responsibilities again.
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