For The Love of Horses (Pegasus Equestrian Center) Read online

  Eventually River shifted from staring at nothing and pulled out a textbook. It didn’t surprise her that he pretended to read for the remainder of the session.

  *****

  “That’s a wrap,” Mr. Schultz said, minutes before the final bell; the same thing he said at the end of every lecture. “Homework, if you refer to your syllabus, is to answer questions one through ten for this section – due tomorrow.”

  Sierra Landsing flexed the fingers of her cramped hand from note-taking, in full sympathy with the collective groan of the class. Mr. Schultz, the instructor for Comparative Government and Politics, an advanced placement class, was certainly living up to his reputation of lecturing and giving homework at a college level. Sierra looked over at her best friend Allison Ferguise, sitting in the desk next to her, and moaned, “My aching fingers!”

  Allison rolled her eyes and breathed out in a whoosh, expressing her relief that class had ended. She opened her mouth, about to comment when her jaw dropped and her eyes widened in alarm as something caught her attention in the aisle over Sierra’s shoulder. “Watch out!” she cried in warning.

  Sierra turned, just as a full water bottle that had been filled with some sticky, bright orange colored liquid, tumbled from the side of the backpack of the person walking by her desk. The lid of the bottle fell off, and Sierra emitted a small shriek as the liquid splashed onto her pages of notes and onto the lap of her jeans.

  “Oops, I’m so sorry,” Gloria, the owner of the bottle said in an exaggerated tone of apology. But she was apparently not sorry enough to offer any help, for she quickly moved on to join a group of giggling girls waiting at the classroom door.

  “Crystal!” Allison stated in disgust, glaring at the girl in the center of the group, surrounded by her followers.

  Sierra had pulled a tissue from her backpack and was blotting her page of notes, trying to salvage all the work of the past fifty minutes. The liquid on the page was thicker and stickier even than orange juice; maybe apricot nectar, Sierra surmised as she blotted away in dismay, noting the blurred ink and deep orange stain that obliterated the top page of her hard written words. “I just don’t understand why she can’t leave me alone,” she said out loud.

  “Because you are too sweet to understand the need for revenge,” Allison replied angrily. “Idiot pig!” she added.

  “I’ll grab you some wet paper towels,” said Ryan Fanning, the boy who had been sitting behind Allison. He rushed from the classroom, eager to be of assistance.

  Another boy with a crush on Allison, Sierra thought, trying to find a little humor in the situation. She had always thought her best friend, with her mixed-race heritage of white, black, and Asian, was the most beautiful girl in the school. “I think Ryan likes you.”

  “He’s very nice,” Allison said matter-of-factly, then added as she took the two pages beneath the damaged top sheet to lay them out to dry, “and smart, too.”

  “Crystal timed this ‘accident’ perfectly,” Sierra mumbled, as she stood up and surveyed her wet and stained jeans. “Second period, so I get to go around most of the day looking like a klutz. Are the bottom sheets readable?”

  “I think we can salvage them,” Allison said thoughtfully. “Don’t worry about the top page; I think I got down everything Mr. Schultz said. I’ll make you a copy when we go to the library.”

  “Thanks.”

  Ryan returned loaded with handfuls of wet paper towels and began to help the girls wipe up the spill on Sierra’s desk and the puddle beneath.

  “Do you mind finishing this so I can run to the restroom and use the sink?” Sierra asked.

  “Sure, go ahead,” Allison agreed. “I’ll catch up with you there.”

  Sierra hurried to the nearest girls’ restroom and after pulling out handfuls of paper towels, stood at one of the sinks. Soaking the paper towels and using some of the liquid soap, Sierra dabbed at the stain on her jeans, somewhat relieved as the orange color faded. I can hold my backpack in front of me to my next class, and hopefully the jeans will be dried before I have to get up again, she planned to herself.

  “I just cannot believe Crystal Douglas,” Allison exclaimed as she burst into the restroom several minutes later.

  Sierra looked up and asked in a forlorn tone, “What pleasure does it give her to plague me?”

  “She’s still carrying a grudge against you, Sierra. She’s just pathetic. Let me see,” Allison ordered, turning Sierra so she could study the damage.

  “I think I have most of it out…I just don’t understand her. She tried to kill my horse last summer. Isn’t that revenge enough?”

  “Apparently not.” Allison emitted a short, sardonic laugh. “Did you see how Crystal pulled Gloria into the center of her little group of fans? Seems like Gloria’s little ‘accident’ is helping her to regain her status as Crystal’s best friend. She is even more pathetic.”

  “Hmmph,” Sierra muttered. “You got that right… Okay, I think that’s good enough; let’s go.” She tossed her last handful of paper towels into the trash, and as they both headed out the door, changed the subject. “That was nice of Ryan to help.”

  “Um…he asked me out this weekend,” Allison spoke hesitantly.

  “Another heart broken,” Sierra said with a wry laugh.

  “Actually, I said yes.”

  “You what?” Sierra stopped walking to gawk at her friend. “What about Peter?”

  “I was going to tell you at lunch today. I broke up with him last night.”

  “Allison, oh my God!”

  “He told me he loved me…for the second time.”

  “And..?”

  “The first time I just sort of laughed and kissed him. That was a week ago. Maybe he thought me kissing him was my way of saying I loved him back, but I was just trying to not say anything. Well, last night he said it again and then wanted to know how I felt about him.”

  “You don’t love him?”

  “I like Peter a lot, you know that. After all, we’ve been going out for a year. But I’m not in love with him. I told him we were friends, but that’s all.”

  “Poor Peter.”

  “I feel bad, but it’s better to tell the truth. If he could have just kept things simple…”

  “Oh, Allison,” Sierra commiserated. She gave her friend a quick hug and they both laughed as Allison quickly pulled away from Sierra’s wet jeans.

  “Come on, we better get going or we’ll be late.”

  The two girls hurried on to their next class, Sierra cradling her backpack in front of her.

  *****

  “Are you going to let me drive?” Sierra asked as she stepped out her front door, dressed in her riding clothes. Just sixteen, she had recently acquired her learner’s permit.

  River looked up from retrieving a stick from Charlie, Sierra’s Border Collie, while he waited for Sierra to change out of her school clothes.

  “Maybe to the road,” he answered with a sly smile.

  “Please, River,” she pleaded and stepped up close to him, peering up into his face with her brown eyes shining with hope.

  “What will you give me?” he asked as he pulled her into his arms.

  Sierra took his face in her hands to pull his mouth closer, and gave him a kiss. Not much of a price to pay.

  River held her a few moments after the kiss ended, burying his face into the part that divided her soft braids, inhaling in her scent as he murmured, “You know I’m not old enough to drive with you on the roads.”

  “Nobody cares on the back roads; even my mother doesn’t care if I drive with you just to the stable,” she insisted with her own face pressed into his shirt.

  “Okay,” he relented, smiling to himself. As if she had any doubt I would let her drive.

  Sierra climbed into the driver’s seat of the old truck, and River got into the passenger side handing Sierra the keys. When she turned the key to the ignition and the truck bucked and stalled, she cried out, “Oh, I forgot.” She had started dr
iver’s education this quarter, but those cars were all automatics. Sierra wanted to learn to drive a standard transmission, and it hadn’t taken too much persuasion to get River to teach her in his dad’s old pick-up truck.

  River groaned, and cried out, “Clutch in!”

  “Right.” Sierra pressed in the clutch, turned the ignition key again while she fed the truck a little gas, and then shifted into reverse. The truck jerked once as she eased out the clutch and fed gas to back up, and then only bucked slightly as she shifted into first and then second, to head out the driveway.

  As Sierra drove the short distance to Pegasus, River watched her; enjoying the look of concentration on her face with her hands gripping the wheel, sitting up with straight, alert posture (like on a horse), and how she held her bottom lip in her teeth every time she shifted gears. When they arrived at the stable she eased the truck into a parking space, shifted into first, shut off the engine, and set the parking brake before she released her foot on the clutch and brake.

  “Well?” she asked with a triumphant grin.

  River leaned over to kiss her once more. “Not bad.”

  “Not bad?” Sierra said in mock hurt as she handed over his keys. “I thought I did pretty good once I got on the road.”

  “Yeah, you didn’t hit anything,” he replied, teasing.

  She rolled her eyes and laughed as they exited the truck. Sierra headed off to the stable and River sprinted toward the lounge where he had a room on the second floor. Storm, his own dog, trotted up from where she had been lazing in a patch of sun, waiting for him to come home.

  “Hey, Storm,” he greeted as she looked up at him with a dog grin, her back end wagging along with her tail. He reached down to pat her head and then entered the lounge with Storm following close behind. He took the stairs two at a time, pulling off his school clothes as he entered his room.

  A twinge pulled at his back as he bent over to retrieve his riding breeches where he had tossed them on the floor last night. He reached back to press against the scar from the bullet hole where his father had shot him. So many months later, he still felt his back muscles spasm if he moved suddenly or worked extra hard so that he became very tired. He wondered if he would have to deal with these spasms for the rest of his life and a surge of anger filled him as he thought about what his father had done to him in a drunken rage.

  At least he’s in prison now. Don’t let him leave scars on my mind as well as my body, he told himself, following advice given him over and over from Laila, a close friend.

  It wasn’t that hard anymore to shrug off all the abuse he had received from his father. In fact, River couldn’t remember when he had ever been happier; certainly not since before his mother, a professional jockey, had been killed in a horse race. At the age of eight, River found himself living with an aunt who hated him, and two cousins. His younger cousin barely tolerated him, and took immense pleasure in tormenting River, especially since his mother would never intervene. River’s father, a race horse trainer, showed up occasionally in between race tracks and during the off season. Sometimes he treated River with a certain amount of fatherly affection, but more often, knocked him around in his frequent drunken rages. When his father discovered his son’s talent for working with horses, he had sent him to work at Pegasus, only nine years old, in exchange for a place to board his colts in the off-season. Last spring, his father had decided to take River out of school to work with him at the race track, and when River refused, had threatened him with a gun. His father claimed he had only meant to scare him and shoot over his head, but somehow had lost his balance and accidentally shot River in the back, puncturing a lung.

  River figured he would never know the truth, and really didn’t care as long as his father stayed out of his life. How wonderful it felt, not to be afraid to go home!

  Now, at age seventeen, he was an emancipated minor living on his own. He owned a wonderful horse, Corazón, a black gelding he had rescued from imminent slaughter. Cory had surprised everyone with his ability to compete in combined training events once he had put on weight and conditioning. He was so proud of Cory, and also Sierra, who had won the championship on his horse.

  Sierra, mi angelita. Just the thought of her stretched his mouth into a smile. As he finished changing into work clothes he thought back to when he had first met the petite, eager-faced little girl when she showed up one morning to help him feed the horses and clean stalls. He had never met anyone with such determination and desire to learn everything she could about horses. He couldn’t say exactly when his feelings for Sierra had developed beyond just friendship…it didn’t matter. All that mattered was that miraculously, Sierra felt the same way about him.

  My life is good! He allowed two moments of irritation to dampen his mood as he thought of having to waste forty-five minutes every week with a stupid counselor. He didn’t need that…certainly not now with everything going well for him. He bounded back down the stairs and outside to the stable, mentally planning the work sessions on the two horses he would ride between now and when the horses were brought in to their stalls for the night.

  A girl leading an appaloosa mare toward the stable stopped just before the entrance as she saw River coming from the lounge.

  “Hi, Katrina,” he greeted as he came up to her.

  “Hi,” she answered, ducking her head. A beautiful girl, she let her long, rich brown hair fall forward to hide the flush of her face. “Um…” she began hesitantly. “River, I’m sorry about…well, you know, coming on to you.”

  “There’s nothing for you to be sorry about,” he said softly, but also feeling very uncomfortable. Katrina had avoided him ever since she had made a pass at him last summer. He felt bad that he had hurt her feelings, and that it had destroyed their friendship.

  “Okay, I’m over you,” she stated, looking up with a determined expression. “Can we be friends?”

  “Of course,” he answered giving her a smile. “I wanted us to still be friends.”

  “Um…what about riding lessons?”

  “Sure. Are you okay taking them with Sierra again?”

  “Yes, sure…thank you!” Her face lit up and she spontaneously hugged him, just as Sierra stepped out of the stable, leading her assigned horse.

  “What’s going on?” Sierra asked, stopping short and gaping at Katrina with her arms around River, and yes, he’s hugging her back!

  They broke apart and while River ducked his head in embarrassment, Katrina stepped over to Sierra, smiling. “Sierra, I’m sorry.” Noting the deep frown on Sierra’s face, Katrina laughed and then hugged her. “You’ve got nothing to worry about,” she said when she broke away. “I’m just apologizing. Forgive me?”

  Relief flooded through Sierra and she smiled and returned Katrina’s hug. “There’s nothing to forgive,” she said. “I’ve missed you.”

  *****

  Chapter 2 Shoulder-in, Travers, and Renvers

  The half-halt is almost synonymous to dressage riding, for classical riding is without the force of hands. The half-halt, let us never forget, is a rebalancing aid that is “handless” when properly done. Pulling, jerking, or sawing with the hands is not a half-halt but its antithesis! – Charles de Kunffy

  *****

  “Come on, girls, quit arguing with your horses,” River called out from the middle of the arena where he was coaching Sierra on Fiel, her Lusitano gelding, and Katrina on Calliope, her appaloosa mare.

  “Just what do you mean by that?” Katrina asked, sounding as frustrated as she felt. She brought her mare abruptly down from trot to a halt, and turned her to face River. Calliope sucked in with her head, stiffening her neck and back, and Katrina knew it was not a balanced halt.

  “Both of you; ride into the center here for a minute.” River noted stiffness in both riders, and consequently, their horses moved as if with unyielding muscles. Even Sierra seemed to struggle with Fiel today; gripping too much on the reins and her back stiff. What is going on with the girls? Maybe
both were a little on the tense side, since this was the first lesson together since the misunderstanding with Katrina. Maybe…or something else? He knew Sierra had jumped Fiel yesterday in the back field over a few small cross country obstacles. Is Fiel a little sore today?

  “I’m sorry, River,” Sierra said, her face registering her own frustration. “I feel like I’m fighting with him today; he doesn’t want to bend away from my inside leg.”

  “Maybe both of your horses are not at their best today. I think Fiel might be a little stiff in his right shoulder.”

  “Do you think it was too much to jump him yesterday?” Sierra asked, her frustrated expression changing to anxiousness at the thought she might have harmed her horse.

  “I don’t think so; if anything, he was full of himself yesterday and if he strained a muscle it’s because he wanted to go too fast.” He thought for a minute and then said, “Let’s try this. Go back out on the rail and drop your reins. Do some loosening up stretches and stay off their mouths.”

  The girls nodded in agreement, and turned their horses back to the rail. Both horses, no longer feeling a tight, restrictive hold on their mouths, dropped their heads and stretched their necks while the girls performed a series of stretches: rolling shoulders, swinging legs, turning from the waist; loosening up their muscles and relieving tension.

  “Good,” River said. “Now at a trot…no, don’t touch the reins yet.” He watched the girls repeat the stretches now at the trot and in both directions of the arena. “Okay, you can pick up your reins now, but stay light…good. Time to get your horses moving up underneath you; I want to see them working off their hind ends.” He directed them through a series of twenty-meter circles, figure-eights, and then spiraling their horses in on a circle and back out again and then transitions in the trot, from a more collected trot to a lengthened trot. When he asked the girls to allow their horses to take the reins on a trotting circle, it pleased him when Fiel and Calliope stretched their necks and snorted, indicating they were relaxed. Now he believed the horses were ready to work.