by Jane Smiley
* * *
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The summer went by very fast, even though I hardly saw Ned. I did get to show at the stables, on Blue, for three days, and even though it was gloomy and windy, I won a third, a fourth, and a first. The reason I won the first was that one of the jumps faced the forest, and horses from down south kept spooking at it even though it was 2'3", which is nothing. But Blue sees the forest a lot, so he knows there is nothing bad there. He jumped it perfectly every time, even when the wind came up as we were approaching it. Blue is a perfect example of how horses learn things and remember what they’ve learned, because he used to be very spooky. When I lie in bed the night after my lesson and think of Ned, I think, “Talk to Blue!” I can see the ribbons glinting in the moonlight, over by my dresser. Gee Whiz won a class, too, and I saw him, because it was the same day as my class, only in the afternoon, and Dad decided to leave me there all day with some money for a hot dog and an ice cream sandwich, and after my class was over, Abby let me wander around because I know enough now to stay out of the way.
Watching Gee Whiz jump is like watching a giant white bird—say, a pelican—fly. He usually likes to be dirty, but Abby had him so clean that day you could practically see yourself in his side like in a mirror (yes, I am exaggerating, but exaggerating is fun). He was the only white horse in his class, so compared with him, all the other horses, even the two chestnuts, seemed to canter around in a cloud, and then here he came, he coiled himself into a ball when he and Abby cantered their circle, then stretched out as they headed for the first jump, and then he launched himself. The woman next to me in the stands gasped, and yes, he is very large and he does seem a little out of control, but he didn’t touch a single pole, and of the three horses in the jump-off, he was the only one to clear everything. And when I say “clear,” I mean that I could see the clouds in the distance between his chest and the top of the fence. Sophia and her jumpers, Pie in the Sky and Onyx, weren’t in the class, it was too low for them, but she was watching.
The other thing that happened over the summer was that my grandparents from Pennsylvania came for a visit, for two weeks, to see Joan Ariel for the first time. They also wanted to see everything else, so we went to all of the towns around here, to Abby’s ranch, to some old famous houses, to one beach after another (but not to Disneyland), to museums and art galleries. It all seemed fine until the middle of the second week, which was two weeks before school started again, when I was sitting in my bed after dinner reading a book about a boy who goes to live by himself in some mountains. My window was open because I love the smell of the flowers, and I heard my dad and his dad step out onto the back porch. They were already talking. My dad said, “She’ll never stand for that, and—”
Then his dad interrupted him and said, “You’re much more likely to find something worth doing back east.”
“I don’t believe that. Anyway, this is our home.”
“Really? Thirty years there, ten, twelve years here? Your mother misses you.”
Dad coughed.
Pop (that is what he likes to be called) said, “I do, too.”
Dad said, “I’ll think about it. I do think about it, believe me.”
Then they went in the house. But in the morning, I remembered what they had said, so of course I made my ears as big as I could and stopped, looked, and listened (this is something they have been telling us in school since kindergarten, especially about crossing the street). Mom was being very polite to Gran and Pop—big smiles that seemed stuck on her face for an extra moment or two—and giving them most of the scrambled eggs and all of the English muffins, then asking them four or five times what they wanted to do that day. Gran was smiling a lot, too, but also she would look over at Pop and wrinkle her eyebrows like she didn’t understand what was going on. Finally, Mom got up and went into the kitchen, and Pop looked at Gran and shrugged a little bit. After that, everyone played with Joan Ariel like there was nothing else to do in the world, so I went outside and walked down the street. Mary Murphy, who is fourteen, had Brian out in their side yard, pushing him on the swing set. He would say, “Higher! Higher!” and Mary would heave and ho and bend like she was pushing harder and harder, but the swing only went a little higher. After a few minutes, Brian and I were both laughing, and then Mary started to laugh, too. Everyone, including Jimmy Murphy, says that once Jimmy went all the way over the top of the swing set, but there’s a limb of a pine tree pretty close to the top, so I don’t believe it. Mary said hi and asked me if Joan Ariel was crawling yet, and I said no, she would rather sit in one place and hold things in her hands and look at them.
“Lucky you,” said Mary.
I said, “So does Brian start kindergarten this year?”
“No, his birthday is behind the line. He won’t be five till December.”
“What is he doing, then?”
“Arguing.”
That made me laugh, too, and right then, Brian said, “I’m walking to the beach.”
“You are not walking to the beach.”
“I am!”
“You are too young to walk to the beach.”
“I am not!” He raced toward me, to the gate, but I held it shut. When he got to it, he pushed against me twice, then stepped back, stuck his tongue out just a little, and sauntered over to the sandbox and sat down. “Saunter” is a word I just learned. It means to walk like you don’t care about things. It was in a book I was reading and I looked it up in the dictionary. I love the dictionary.
Mary said, “Thursday’s child has far to go.”
I said, “Is Brian a Thursday’s child?”
“No, I am.” She sighed.
I said, “I am, too. I always thought that meant that I was going to see the world.”
Mary smiled and said, “Well, let’s hope so.”
“What is Brian?”
“Sunday. Bonny and blithe and good and gay.”
Another word to look up, “blithe.”
Then she added, “We’ll see.”
I heard my name and turned around. Mom waved me back to the house.
When I got there, I said, “Why is everyone standing around?”
“Well,” said Gran, “we haven’t quite made up our minds what to do today.”
“I could go have an extra riding lesson. Everyone could watch me.”
Why they all laughed at this I will never understand. I went up the stairs. When I got to my room, I looked out the window. The garden was empty of people but full of flowers. I thought they should go out there. I also thought that maybe Gran and Pop had stayed a little too long. Dad needed to go sell some vacuum cleaners, and Grandma and Grandpa needed to come help Mom with Joan Ariel. Now that Gran and Pop were visiting, there were just too many people in the house, which was probably why Grandma was making herself scarce, as she would say.
I sat on my bed and picked up my book, but then I closed my eyes and let my head fall back, and I made up a story about Ned and me. I was sitting on him bareback, the way I had in the spring, in the round corral, when Abby was inside and no one was looking, and I didn’t have a bridle, either, but we were walking along (sauntering along), going here and there, looking at things. The whole time, we were talking. I would say, “What’s that?” and Ned would say, “That’s an eagle. That’s a crow. That’s a porcupine.” And then I would see those animals in my mind, like pictures in a book. The road we walked along was a path, nice and flat and beige. It went up a hill, and then into some birch woods and then out of the woods into a green valley and then up the side of a mountain. In the valley, we stopped, and I sat on Ned while he grazed the green green grass, always saying, “Oh, so delicious! The best grass I ever ate!” and then he wandered to the edge of some woods, and I did something I did once with Abby—I picked blackberries off some branches and ate them. And then, of course, because I am an exaggerator, I also picked raspber
ries, apples, pears, and even strawberries, because the bushes, I imagined, were on a little cliff beside the path. After we were full, we walked back into the valley, and I said to Ned, “Canter!” and he went up into the most perfect canter in the history of the world, and all I had to do was take one deep breath after another and sit easy on his back.
“Ellen! Are you sleeping?”
My eyes popped open. It was Dad. I said the easiest thing, which was, “Yes.”
“I bet you stayed up late last night.” He smiled.
I didn’t answer. He said, “That’s okay. Some people are just night owls. But we’re going down the coast. Do you want to come? Mom and Joan Ariel are staying home.”
I have never seen a single horse down the coast. It is all boats and cliffs and sometimes a whale. I said, “I’ll stay home.” And I did.
One more thing happened before Gran and Pop left three days later, and that was that Grandma said she’d come down with something—she didn’t have any idea what it was, but it came on quick and so was probably very contagious—and didn’t dare give them dinner, the way she had planned. So Gran and Pop didn’t get a chance to say good-bye to Grandma and Grandpa, and instead we went to a famous restaurant out near the stables where Blue is, and we all, including Joan Ariel and including me, behaved ourselves. The next day, after a cab came to take Gran and Pop to the airport, everyone relaxed.
The next Saturday was the thirtieth of September, which made me happy because October would begin the very next day. October is my favorite month, and it is not because my birthday is in October (my birthday is in July), it is because where we live, October has the best weather. The days may be a little short, but the sky is clear, there are boats drifting across the bay, the water in the bay seems extra blue, and there are a lot of flowers that decide to bloom one last time before winter settles in. It’s the best time of the year for going to the stables, because the horse shows are over and the golf and the tennis and everything else. It is very quiet.
Which was a good thing, because Abby had a plan, and it was something I’d never done before, and I am not talking about jumping four and a half feet. When I got there—right on time—the late-morning sunlight was sparkling in the trees and my saddle was hanging on the fence of the arena. Blue was in the arena, but wearing Melinda’s saddle. Melinda is a little older than I am, but much more nervous. She was standing on the mounting block. She waved to me. Then Sophia came out of the barn leading Onyx, and then Abby leading Gee Whiz, and then Jane leading two horses, Hot Potato and a chestnut, already tacked up. I knew who I was supposed to ride, of course, and I went over to him, pretending to be happy because he is a nice pony and I didn’t want him to know what I was thinking. I took the reins from Jane and petted him several times. He didn’t seem to notice.
Jane pointed to the saddle, and I led Hot Potato to the railing. Jane said, “I feel like I’m back at summer camp!”
Melinda said, “Are we going to have s’mores when we come back?”
Jane said, “Oh, that’s an idea!”
Sophia, who was now sitting on Onyx, who was looking very fondly at the jumps, said, “What are some mores?”
I said, “Roasted marshmallows and chocolate crushed between two graham crackers. Yuck.”
Sophia nodded.
After I was mounted, I lined up behind Sophia, probably the safest, but also the most fun, place to be. Jane was in front, Abby on Gee Whiz just behind her, then Melinda, then Sophia, then me. I didn’t mind bringing up the rear, because I knew that the pony would want to keep up, and anyway, when you are bringing up the rear, you can watch everyone else.
We went along beside and then behind one of the arenas, and soon we were into the forest. This forest is not like the one I was imagining in the summer, the one I always imagine, with white birch trees and grass, fluttering pale green leaves and plenty of sky; this one is thick and dark—walking into this forest is a little like walking from day into night. The path was wide and sandy, and there was a strong piney odor that smelled like a cross between medicine and fresh air. Hot Potato walked along. I let my legs swing a bit and loosened the reins. Onyx has a beautiful, shiny black hind end. His tail, perfectly brushed, swung back and forth, almost to the ground. I could see a few white hairs in it that I’d never seen before. He is the kind of horse that you don’t notice at first, but then he just gets more and more beautiful. I could see Blue, too, though not as well. Melinda was sure to be bridging her reins and holding mane besides and looking here and there for bears and cougars, but Blue would take care of her. He knew his job. In front of him, I saw Gee Whiz. And Gee Whiz did say something—he said, “Let’s go!”
Even from all the way in the back, I could see that he was trying to get in front of Jane’s horse, and that Abby was tightening her reins and sitting deep. He tossed his head one time. Blue pretended not to notice. Onyx did not notice. Hot Potato might have noticed—I couldn’t tell, because he didn’t pay any attention. He was watching a blue-and-white bird on a branch that was staring at us, then he looked away. I glanced at Gee Whiz again. Jane’s horse walked along, smoothly stepping to the side and stopping Gee Whiz from passing him. Gee Whiz snorted one time, then settled down. The trail began to head downhill. I lowered my heels and leaned back just a little, like everyone else.
At Abby’s ranch, the trails lead up into open country. From most of those trails, you can see for a long way—one ridge behind another, blue-green in the spring and golden in the summer and fall. The clouds seem to float in all different, very light shapes, and the sunlight seems to pour down. Here, the sunlight seemed to come through the pine trees in little threads. I could see fine, and so could the horses, since they see better than people do in shadows, but nothing about this trail made me want to trot or canter. This trail seemed to be saying, “Go slow, go slow, go slower.” And Hot Potato was listening. I had to kick him a few times to make him keep up with Onyx. Finally, I said, “You have to make an effort.” His ears flicked.
Sophia turned and looked at me and said, “Who are you talking to?”
“Hot Potato. I want him to keep up with your horse.”
“Oh, I know that. I don’t mean that. I mean all that stuff about the trail and the trees and the sunshine.”
“Was I talking?”
“You were.”
“Sorry.”
“Don’t be. I was thinking those things, too.”
We kept walking and I ran the tip of my forefinger across my lips. That means, “Zip your lip.” Sometimes I obey myself.
We walked and walked. For a moment, I imagined doing this on Ned, let’s say bareback and without a bridle, and somehow there would be blackberries, but when I asked Ned, he said, “Never in a million years,” and I hoped that was just my imagination talking. There were more birds. There might have been a snake—I only saw it out of the corner of my eye as it was slithering away. I thought how nice it would be to have Rusty along with us, keeping watch. I usually do not think like this, but that is how spooky the forest was. I looked at my watch. Twenty-five minutes since we left the stables.
The trail branched, and then the light in front of us got brighter, and right after that, there we were at exactly the place I should have expected but did not—the ocean, endless and blue with white edges, making its constant noise, and between us and it, a slope through the dunes and the ice plants and the thistles. We moved in a long, careful row, winding between little sandy hills, and then stopped, looked both ways, and crossed the road. Here was the beach itself, pale and flat and dotted with footprints of birds. It was a small cove, not like the big beach near my house, but Jane led us down to the edge of the water.
I said, “Where are we?” And Jane said we were at the south end of the bay, where the bay meets the Pacific Ocean.
Hot Potato pricked his ears a little, maybe because of the breeze, but I could tel
l that this, like everything else, was just routine for him. I sat deep, just in case (and I saw Sophia do that, too, though Onyx didn’t show any worries). Blue looked around, but Blue always looks around. Then he sighed a couple of times.
It was Gee Whiz who seemed to be saying, as my grandma would, “Oh, heavens to Betsy! What in the world!” Abby was, of course, sitting deep. As soon as Gee Whiz saw (or heard) the waves, he settled back on his heels, pricked his long gray ears, and stared. If his eyes could have been plates, they would have been. Abby hardly even took a tighter grip on the reins (and certainly did not grab mane), though she did give him a little stroke on his shoulder. He had clearly never seen such a thing, not even in his years at the racetrack. We all sat quietly and waited. After three minutes (I checked my watch), he started stepping across the sand, and then Abby walked him along the harder, flatter part of the beach, above the waves. He walked nicely, but he stared, first down, then out, then down, then out again. I laughed, but only to myself. The rest of us walked along, too, but not close to him. Gee Whiz is bossy, and doesn’t listen to other horses. One time to the end of the beach, once back the other way to the end of the cove, then to the end of the beach again. Finally, on his own, because I did not see Abby kicking him or even urging him, Gee Whiz stepped toward the waves. When he got into them and they flowed around his hooves, he looked down and his tail lifted. To me, that was the scary bit, because he also snorted, but then he lowered his nose and touched the water, though I didn’t see him take a drink. Jane and Sophia now went into the water a little, too, but Melinda was obviously scared, and I preferred watching Gee Whiz. I’m glad I did, because Jane and Sophia did not see what I saw, something I think is the most interesting thing I’ve ever seen a horse do—he started prancing and playing, splashing, jumping a little bit, splashing again, going into the water up to his knees, then turning and prancing out of it. He stood where it was ankle-deep and did a kind of rhythmic dance, hitting it with the left hoof, then the right, then the left. He kept doing this until Abby was laughing, and then he turned and trotted along the beach, in the water, still prancing and splashing. Hot Potato and I walked behind him. Hot Potato got into the water, too, and was a good boy, but he was just doing a job, not having fun.