Renaissance Man

by M. Garzon

  Cal had been to a few schooling shows, but nothing as large or impressive as this. He craned his neck in interest at all the new sights, and I walked him all over the grounds, getting him used to the atmosphere. Our biggest problem was that he was an unusually gregarious horse, and he thought every one of the hundreds of new horses on the grounds should be his friend. I had to constantly remind Cal that he was here to work with me, not play with other horses.

  After I’d put Cal away, damp but clean, I saddled Hades and headed back into the drizzle. Days like this made me question why I loved competing. At horse shows you were sometimes cold and sometimes broiling, and sometimes both on the same day. You ate bad food and didn’t get enough sleep, and spent lengthy periods of time waiting interspersed with periods of frantic activity. It was insanity, really. All for those brief, luminous moments when you and your horse understood each other completely, your bodies danced in flawless harmony, and you hopefully did the job better than anyone else that day.

  Hades hadn’t been himself since he’d returned from Rodney’s. He seemed physically healthy, and I had hoped that a simple return to his usual routine, diet, and friends would set things right, but he was unmistakably tense.

  I let him walk calmly around the grounds before heading for the schooling ring, mulling over his mood. I was sure that Hades hadn’t been started properly as a youngster. Fortunately, the days of thinking in terms of “breaking” a horse were long past for most people. Reputable trainers no longer used the violent methods of our predecessors, choosing instead to teach their young horses steadily from birth, forming a relationship of mutual trust. Naturally, some trainers were better at it than others. Hades might be dominant on the ground, but under saddle, I had come to realize that much of his behavior was defensive — he was protecting himself based on bad experiences he’d had as a youngster. Maybe his size and general pushiness had led his riders to be too rough with him, but whatever the case, it had taken well over a year for me to coax him into relaxing. He had offered me his trust bit by bit, and I had given mine in return, riding him as kindly as possible. The sense I got now was that his trust was shaken. Maybe someone had ridden him badly at Rodney’s, or maybe it was simply that I hadn’t been there when he’d needed me. In either case, I couldn’t hold it against him, but only hoped that time would convince him he was safe again.

  Horses are the most generous of creatures. I sometimes think they must find us deeply strange — we put cold metal bars in their mouths, we strap all kinds of bizarre equipment onto their bodies, and we ask them to leap over obstacles that any sensible creature would go around. Yet they humor us with good grace, giving us their all, and even love us despite our perplexing and often onerous demands.

  I discussed my worries with Karen over dinner. We were a big, noisy group: Karen’s three students — including the obnoxious Brittney — and her groom, plus the three students, two grooms and one boarder from our barn. We’d gone to a local family-style restaurant and sat at adjoining tables, frequently leaning over to talk to one another.

  “Hades isn’t himself,” I said as I started on my salad. A side effect of the increased competition I’d been doing was that I was making an effort to eat better.

  “You know him better than anyone,” Karen reminded me. “What do you think is wrong?”

  I hesitated, wondering whether she would dismiss my suspicion. She’s not Dec, I reminded myself. “I think he was scared by what happened at Pépinière.”

  Karen nodded thoughtfully. “If that’s all it is, he should get over it after a show or two.”

  After dinner, we organized the ride back to the motel. Emma’s parents took three girls with them and Melanie, a boarder, took the rest. I had my own car since Palgrave wasn’t far from home, but I didn’t take any passengers. I had decided to head back to the showgrounds, unable to shake the anxiety I’d been feeling. Maybe Hades’ tension was rubbing off on me. He had been microchipped days after his return, so his identity would never again be in question, but Rodney didn’t know that and I couldn’t help but worry that he might try again. I’d even discussed it with Jaden before the show, although he hadn’t been concerned.

  “It was a crime of opportunity, Téa, and he’s lost the element of surprise. I doubt that he’ll go near Hades.”

  Maybe he wouldn’t, but I was uneasy all the same. No wonder Hades was acting funny, I thought as I parked the car. At least it had stopped raining, but the air was so damp I felt like I was growing mold. I went to see Hades and said hi to him. He was chewing hay and barely acknowledged me, so I worked my way down the row of horses. I paused in front of Cameo’s stall. The pony had to raise her nose up high to reach over her stall door, and I smiled as I patted her grey cheek and fondled her silky ears. She was such a sweet thing.

  I was headed two rows over to check on Karen’s horses when a voice stopped me in my tracks. Rodney. He was walking outside the barn with another man, and he seemed to feel my gaze because he turned and saw me. He held my stare for a minute before swaggering up to me, leaving the other man behind.

  “Well, well,” he sneered. “Funny how you seem to have found that horse.”

  There’s nothing to be afraid of, I told myself fiercely, but my heart was rabbiting inside my chest. I tried to smile sweetly. “I guess you were right all along, Rodney — it was a case of mistaken identity. Our horse was safe at home.”

  His rodent-like face twisted with fury, but he spun and marched off, forcing his companion to hurry to keep up. I put a hand to my chest as though I could soothe the galloping beast inside. I was shaking, and I chided myself for overreacting. Nothing had happened beyond the exchange of a few words. I looked around. The showgrounds were fairly quiet at this hour. Darkness was approaching, and grooms would soon appear to do night checks. Security guards would be in place overnight, but there was no way I was leaving now.

  I went back to the car and dug an old sleeping bag out of my trunk, kept there for emergencies such as this. It was still too early to go to sleep, so I dumped it in the tackroom we were sharing with Karen’s barn and checked on her horses.

  “Hey,” Alex called from down the aisle. I wandered over as he fastened a stall door. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost,” he remarked.

  “Worse. I’ve seen a fiend.” I explained what had happened.

  He gave a low whistle. “It’s like you’re in a suspense novel.”

  “Yeah, only it’s a lot more fun when it’s fiction.” I relayed my plans to spend the night.

  “Why don’t you stay in the camper with us?”

  “It’s a nice offer, but it would defeat the purpose of me staying to guard Hades.” Not to mention that Jaden had not been overjoyed the last time I’d stayed with Alex.

  “Well, we have a cot you can use in the stall if you want.” Now that was an offer I couldn’t pass up. We squelched across the wet grass to the trailer, and Alex carried the cot back for me. After looking at how much space Hades took up in his stall, we decided to set it up in Cal’s stall instead.

  “Well, goodnight,” he said after I’d unrolled my sleeping bag. He seemed reluctant to leave me there.

  “Goodnight. I’ll call you if anything goes bump in the night.” As his footsteps faded I sat on the cot and pulled out my phone. I called the motel to let everyone know I wouldn’t be back, and then I called Jaden.

  “What?” he exclaimed when I’d covered the situation. “Téa, you can’t spend the night in a temp stall. It’s rainy and cold out.”

  “I’ll get a horse blanket if I need one.”

  “It’s not safe! Have you alerted the security guards yet?”

  “What can I say? If I tell them Rodney once stole my horse, it’ll raise the whole question of how I got Hades back. You’re the one who told me you can’t accuse someone without proof.”

  He made a frustrated sound. “I don’t like this. Maybe I should drive up there.”

  “And what, stay in here with me?” I sighed. “Jade
n, you have to work in the morning.”

  “I’m going to be up half the night worrying about you anyway.”

  “Don’t! Look, Jaden, you’re right — I’m cold, and I’m a bit nervous, but this is my life. Grooms sleep in tackrooms all the time. I’m staying right here.” I was getting angry and it showed in my tone. I’d called Jaden for comfort, but instead he was adding his fears to my own.

  He started to say something but apparently thought better of it. It was his turn to sigh. “Are you sure you’re safe?”

  “They’ve got security here, remember?”

  “Call me at the first hint of a suggestion of trouble. Even if you just get lonely.”

  I felt my face soften in the darkening stall. “Okay.” Then, because I wanted to hear his voice a bit longer, I went on. “Something’s up with Hades. He’s been upset all day and I don’t know why.” That was one of the best parts of my relationship with Jaden; we could discuss our horses for hours, and neither of us ever got tired of it.

  “Why don’t you try using your gift to find out what’s troubling him?”

  I squirmed uncomfortably, even though I was alone and no one could have overheard. Cal turned his head to look at me inquisitively. Jaden was the only one who called my oversensitivity a ‘gift’, but then, he was the only person who knew about it other than Seth, who laughingly called it my superpower.

  “It’s not like I can read his mind,” I almost whispered. “At most, I’ll be able to tell how he’s feeling right now, while he’s safe in his stall.”

  “Any insight is better than none,” Jaden said. “You can try tomorrow while you ride him as well. You don’t take full advantage of your ability, querida — it could give you an edge.”

  I smiled at his confidence and wished him goodnight. When I got up and unzipped my sleeping bag, Cal came over to investigate, poking his nose into the bag and trying to look under the cot until he almost tipped it over. I moved him out of the way and climbed in fully dressed, zipping the bag up all the way. Cal’s ears went on full alert and he gave a small snort at the sound of the zipper.

  “It’s just a zipper, silly.” I lay my head on my arm. A pillow would have been nice, and I toyed with the idea of going to find a sweater in my car. Too much trouble, I decided. Cal came closer, his shape indistinct in the now almost-full dark. He wiggled his upper lip in my hair, then moved his nose over my face and blew softly.

  I stroked his face, my hand gliding effortlessly over the super-fine hairs. “G’night, buddy.” I was glad I was sharing a space with him and not Hades. While Hades wouldn’t intentionally hurt me, he was not only larger but a lot less careful than Cal.

  My horse went back to his hay, and I closed my eyes, suddenly sleepy. Nighttime sounds washed over me; crickets and frogs sang melodies punctuated by the rustle of horses and occasional, quiet voices in the distance. As my body relaxed my mind began to wander. Remembering Jaden’s suggestion, I opened myself up to the feelings around me. The sensation was hard to describe — it was as though I was throwing the doors to my chest wide open. At the same time I tried to keep my mind as blank as possible, although my concern over Hades and fear of Rodney’s return did flare up intermittently.

  It was sometimes hard for me to tell whether an emotion was my own or not, because I felt it by experiencing it. Context was usually an important clue. Nervousness washed through me, and I began tensing up. Was this my fear for Hades, or his own fear? I breathed deeply, allowed my muscles to relax, and examined the emotion. As I sampled it again I realized it couldn’t be mine; it was too raw, too unfocused, too... young. It was like a child’s fear of the dark. And it wasn’t Hades. My eyes sprang open and I turned my head to peer at Cal in the gloom. His silhouette stood stock-still, head raised, ears swiveling and alert for danger. I heaved a frustrated breath. What did he have to worry about? Now I was no closer to deciphering Hades than before.

  “Go to sleep, Cal,” I murmured, and proceeded to take my own advice.

  Six

  It was a long night. Every kick, whinny and unidentified sound woke me up, and at one point I was shivering so hard that I got up and went to the tackroom for a wool cooler to layer over the sleeping bag. The horses woke up at dawn, so I followed suit, stretching and yawning until my jaw cracked.

  I checked on all the horses before visiting the Port-o-Potties. I needed coffee, stat, so I approached a girl who was braiding a horse a few doors down from Cameo and asked her to keep an eye on our horses. I drove to the nearest coffee shop, got a large coffee and settled at a table with a sigh. I called the motel and told my crew I’d feed so they wouldn’t have to hurry, but the grooms were already leaving to go braid their horses, so after texting Jaden — I survived — I went for a much-needed shower at the motel.

  If the night had seemed long, the day was even longer. I was stiff and tired from the night before, Hades was jumpy, and I was too busy. Emma had brought another little girl from our barn to help groom her pony, and I’d brought Erin, one of my students, but it wasn’t enough. Hades needed a full-time groom to himself because I had to spend time coaching, as well as riding other horses. On top of that, Melanie interrupted me with questions and requests for help at every turn.

  Karen shook her head. “She’s not good for your rep, that one. I have a requirement at my barn that anyone who comes to shows has to be in training with me.”

  That would probably be a good idea, I thought. We wanted to make showing accessible to all our riders, but Melanie only took the occasional lesson and her Thoroughbred mare, Asia, was a bit much for her to handle.

  The sun was trying to peek out when I rode Cal into his first class. It was a training class and the jumps were small: three-quarters of a meter, or about two foot six. Since Cal was only four, he had much to learn before we jumped courses of any size. There was an entire four-year-old jumper circuit that I didn’t participate in because I didn’t want to jump Cal that high yet. Four was barely adult for a horse, and Warmbloods like Cal tended to mature later than other breeds. If I didn’t overwork him now he could still be jumping when he was twenty, so I was determined to keep our progress slow and steady, despite the pressure to do otherwise.

  “Number 241, Renaissance Man,” the announcer called, and I felt a slight thrill at hearing Cal’s show name in public for the first time. I walked into the ring rather than trotting, in order to give Cal time to look around. There was so much for young jumpers to learn beyond the physical act of jumping: how to handle different types of footing, how to recognize particular kinds of fences and jump them appropriately, how to stretch out into a gallop one second and the next, compress their bodies tightly like an accordion, all while their lungs are pumping and their hearts are pounding and adrenaline is blurring everything into a haze of excitement.

  Since horses are prey animals, cooperation at speed is usually a difficult thing for them to master — to a horse, adrenaline and running mean “escape the predator!” Most of all, they had to learn to trust and work in tandem with their rider, no matter what mood they woke up in, even if they had a small undetected ache or pain, and regardless of what scary and distracting things were taking place just outside the ring. Those strenuous physical, mental, and emotional demands were the reason that horses rarely made it to the Olympics before their teens.

  And it all starts here, I thought as I asked Cal to canter. He sprang forward immediately; I couldn’t fault his obedience. As I lined up our first fence I strove to block out thoughts of what I’d felt from him the night before, but it began again, the buffeting of doubt and unease keeping rhythm with his strides, although this time it was interspersed with moments of excitement. I tuned it out as best I could and focused on the mental aspects of our ride — I calculated distances and carefully planned corners and rebalanced Cal in plenty of time for lead changes. He jumped a careful round, clean but slow, and we walked out while I tried to smother my frustration.

  I took a breath to calm myself and patted Cal’s flame
-colored shoulder. His body was smaller than Hades’, and his neck was slimmer, but his ears were quite far away from me and he was still growing. The most important difference between them wasn’t size, it was attitude. Even when Hades had had rider issues, his attitude toward the jumps was always, “Let me at’em.” I was beginning to wonder if Cal had what it took to be a jumper.

  * * *

  Hades’ big classes weren’t until the weekend, and the Donalds were coming to watch. I didn’t know what to tell them about their horse’s fretfulness, and I was apprehensive. The only wealthy horse owner I’d ever dealt with was Marty’s, and that hadn’t ended well. I decided not to say anything before Saturday’s class because I figured Hades might turn out to be fine, although my gut disagreed. Sure enough, he was distracted during our class and had two rails down, keeping us out of the ribbons.

  It was finally warm and sunny, and I walked around on Hades to cool him down before going to find his owners. I jumped off, feeling a slight jar in my ankles, and slowly pulled the reins over Hades’ head. I didn’t meet the Donald’s eyes until I had to.

  “What happened out there?” Neil asked. There was a frown on his face.

  I took a deep breath. “I think Hades is still upset about being stolen.”

  Neil looked skeptical. “You can’t tell me the horse remembers that,” he said.

  “Actually, horses have very good memories,” I told him. “And look at it from his point of view — he went to a show and tried really hard, he knew he did well, and next thing he knows he’s taken to a dark place he doesn’t like, with none of the comforts of home and no friends to turn to. Small wonder he’s nervous.”

  “Oh, poor Hades.” Monica’s hand flew to her mouth, but Neil seemed unconvinced. He was a medium-sized man with a deep tan and grey hair that was almost gone on top. He was also the only man I’d ever seen — other than rap singers — who wore a heavy gold chain. But he owned a very successful import business and I supposed he hadn’t made all that money by being dumb.