The Silver Pony

by Holly Webb

  Daisy was eyeing the newsagent’s window, wondering whether they could convince Mum they needed ice cream for a second breakfast, when Chloe squeaked and pointed ahead.

  Mum started to laugh. “Oh, look. They want a cut and blow dry.”

  On the other side of the road, standing on the pavement and apparently very interested in the posters in the hairdresser’s window, were three ponies. A chestnut, a young chestnut with a pale mane, and a white pony with a messy fringe and dark grey ears. The three of them turned round curiously to look at Chloe squealing and jumping up and down.

  It was her pony!

  “I saw them when I took Betsy out on Saturday,” she told Mum, a bubble of happiness rising inside her. “The same three. Perhaps they’re going to stay around.”

  “They’re very sweet,” Mum said. “Especially that little chestnut one with the blond mane.”

  “He’s mine,” Chloe said, pointing. “My pony. Oscar can have the big brown one and the white one’s for Daisy.”

  Daisy stared at her sister, blinking silently. Chloe said silly stuff all the time, nonsense words and little songs she’d made up but she sounded so serious now that it felt real. Of course the white pony wasn’t really Daisy’s and Chloe would have forgotten about them by the time she got to nursery.

  But the happy bubble inside Daisy was growing, faster and faster, as if it was filling up a hole.

  After that, it was as if the pony knew that Daisy was looking for her. Some days she was there when Daisy went out exploring the woods over the next few weeks, and some days she wasn’t, but Daisy saw her often enough that she began to feel like a friend. Too much of a friend just to be called ‘the white pony’. Daisy was sure that the pony recognized her now. She would turn and watch her, and sometimes she wandered a few steps towards Daisy and Betsy, giving them a friendly, interested sort of look. Daisy wanted so much to stroke her but she never did.

  “I could call you Mara,” Daisy said, leaning against the trunk of a tree and watching the white pony graze. “Your fringe still reminds me of her, you know. You make me think of her. You make me think of Mara, how she used to be,” she added in a whisper.

  The white pony went on placidly munching grass. The weather had broken at the start of the summer holidays, which Daisy’s mum said was typical. Today was a showery sort of day, and Betsy had got three steps out of the front door and gone on a sit-down strike. She didn’t like rain – it splashed up on her tummy, and she got soaked and cold so quickly. She’d scuttled back inside and Daisy had gone out pony-watching on her own, in a waterproof and wellies. The ponies looked pretty wet too, but they didn’t seem to mind, and at least the grass was a bit greener and nicer now.

  “I called her again yesterday,” she told the pony. “But Mara’s mum answered her phone. She said Mara wasn’t feeling great and she was asleep. And it was the same last time. I haven’t talked to her properly for a whole week and that time she had to go after a couple of minutes because there was a doctor who needed to see her.” She kicked at the grass with her boot. “I still haven’t sent her any photos of you. I did tell her we saw three ponies by the hairdresser’s, though, like they were going for a haircut, and she thought that was funny. She said some ponies get their manes plaited for shows. And you have to French plait the fringe bit.” She squinted at the white pony’s forelock. “I don’t see how, to be honest, but Mara said it’s the best way to make a pony neat and tidy. I think you’d look weird.”

  The pony turned to look at her, chewing thoughtfully, and Daisy shook her head. “No, it would be strange if you were called Mara too. I’d mix you up. I suppose you have a name already. Whoever it is you belong to must have given you a name, even if they don’t see you all that often.” Daisy hesitated, biting her bottom lip. “It doesn’t matter. I can have my own name for you. Maybe Lily? Bella?”

  Daisy gazed at the pony, hoping she might make some sort of sign, but she just wandered off to the other side of the tree to nibble at a clump of longer grass. “The thing is, I suppose I’ve already sort of been calling you Mara in my head and now the other names don’t feel right. Something else beginning with ‘m’ perhaps. Milly?”

  The pony peered back round the tree, looking a bit ditzy, and Daisy laughed. “Muppet! No, that’s mean. M… M…”

  The pony’s grey ears pricked forward and Daisy nodded. “You like that? I could call you that. Em. Like short for Emily.”

  The pony stepped delicately round the tree, closer to Daisy, and Daisy held her breath. Her greyish-white nose looked so soft, spiked with short little whiskers, and Daisy ached to stroke her. She’d never come so near, not in all the times Daisy had watched her. It felt like a sign.

  “Hi, Em,” she whispered.

  That night, Daisy just couldn’t seem to get to sleep. She glanced across the room at her little sister, who was asleep on her back and making funny little whistling noises, then dangled over the side of her bed, feeling around for her torch. She was sure it was under there somewhere. It was! She turned it on, cautiously watching Chloe – but she didn’t stir.

  Daisy pulled her drawing pad over from her desk, and some coloured pencils, and started to draw. She wasn’t very good at drawing ponies – the legs were really hard to do – but what she wanted to draw was Em’s face when she’d been looking round that tree. She’d come so close, she’d almost looked like she wanted to bump noses. She’d gazed at Daisy for a moment more, and then turned and wandered away into the wood. Daisy was sure she could remember how her eyes had looked, the way she’d peered through that messy fall of white hair. She’d seemed so curious, so friendly.

  Daisy looked down at her drawing and sighed. It wasn’t quite right. Em didn’t look as intelligent as she did for real, or as special. But it was close.

  It had been true, what Daisy had said to Em earlier on. The pony did make her think of Mara, with her funny fringe and dark eyes. Talking to Em almost felt more like talking to Mara than talking to the real Mara did – at the moment.

  That wasn’t fair.

  Slowly, Daisy wrote across the bottom of the page.

  “Hey…” Daisy answered her phone a little doubtfully, unsure what to expect. Usually it was her ringing Mara, not the other way around. Mara had still been so quiet and sleepy the last time they’d spoken, and then over the last few days her mum had kept answering her phone for her.

  “I love her! She’s so pretty! Where did you see her?”

  “Oh! You got my picture? I only put it through your door yesterday – I wasn’t sure when you’d see it.”

  “Mum brought it in to show me earlier. I didn’t know you could draw horses like that, Daisy!”

  Daisy felt her ears turn pink and she grinned into the phone. It was so good to hear Mara sounding awake and bouncy again. “Thanks. I can’t do the legs, though,” she admitted. “I keep seeing that pony along the paths near our house. She’s usually with a chestnut, and another chestnut who’s got a cream-coloured mane and tail – the same ones I told you about that were by the hairdresser’s. I called her Em, like ‘m’ for Mara, because she reminded me of you—”

  Suddenly remembering that she didn’t want to remind Mara about losing her hair, she added quickly, “You know, loving ponies so much.”

  “I really miss riding.” Mara sighed. “Have you got any photos of her? Will you send them to me, Daisy, pleeeaaase? I’ve got a board I can stick pictures up on. Mum can print them out for me.”

  “Sure.” Daisy was silent for a moment, not sure whether she ought to say anything. But she had to. “It’s so nice talking to you,” she mumbled. “I miss you.”

  “I miss you.” Mara sniffed. “The doctors told me I should be able to have visitors soon. Maybe in a couple of days. Will you come?”

  “Definitely!”

  “OK. Cool. I have to go now but please send me the photos?”

  “I will, I promise. And I’ll come and visit you. Bye!” Daisy sat holding her phone, staring at it and smiling.
That had felt like talking to Mara, the old Mara. And it was all because of Em. She opened up the photos on her phone, flicking through her pictures of the white pony. Em was keeping her and Mara together.

  “Can you see her?” Daisy murmured to Betsy, looking out for a flash of white coat as they wandered along the path. “Oh, I think I can see the chestnut ones.” Mara had emailed her straight back when she’d sent the photos of the ponies, saying the chestnut with the pale mane was called a flaxen chestnut. And that Em was beautiful. Daisy was hoping to get a good close-up of Em to send her.

  The chestnut pony was out on the heath, and Daisy was pretty sure she could see Em and the flaxen chestnut a little bit beyond, knee-deep in pink heather. She was about to make her way over to them, when she caught a flash of yellow. Someone else was already there – right up close to the ponies.

  No one was supposed to get that close to them! All the signs said, Look but don’t touch. Daisy hesitated at the edge of the trees, wondering what to do. Should she go and tell them? But they might not listen to a ten-year-old…

  “Shh, it’s OK,” she murmured to Betsy, who was tugging on the lead, clearly not sure why they’d stopped. “Just wait a minute.” Betsy sighed loudly and sat down on the grass, idly scratching at one of her ears. “Hey… Is that…?” Daisy stepped back, almost tripping on Betsy’s lead. “Sorry, sorry… Are you OK?” She crouched down to fuss over the indignant little dog, but she was still peering through the trees at the boy in the yellow T-shirt.

  A boy that she knew.

  “What’s he doing here? Why’s he with Em?” Daisy said angrily. “He shouldn’t be messing around with her like that!”

  The boy in the yellow T-shirt was Jack Wilson from her class. Daisy couldn’t stand him. He still picked on her almost every day. He made faces whenever she had to talk in class and he rubbished everything she said. Even when she was just answering the register, he managed to make her sound like an idiot. Daisy had no idea why. He just seemed to like making fun of her. It was yet another reason she missed Mara being around. Mara had always stuck up for her – although she did tell Daisy off afterwards.

  “You let him get to you!” she said. “If you didn’t show him you minded, he wouldn’t bother doing it.”

  It was all very well saying that but how was Daisy supposed to pretend that she didn’t care, when she did? When the whole class was sniggering at her and even Miss Fondu looked as though she was trying not to laugh?

  Jack was funny, everybody thought so. Without Mara there, Daisy just stared at the tabletop and tried to imagine she was somewhere else.

  And now Jack Wilson – mean, cruel, horrible Jack Wilson – was standing right next to Em. Petting her nose! Touching her, when everyone said you were never, ever supposed to touch the ponies.

  On one of the last days that Mara had been in school – when she’d been off sick a day here and a day there, and her mum thought she had some sort of nasty virus that wouldn’t go away – she’d had a massive row with Jack about Daisy. They’d been skipping in the playground with a long rope that Skye had brought in. Almost all the girls in the class were playing, running in and out, doing a figure of eight and then chanting Bluebells, cockleshells, eevy, ivy, over. They hadn’t skipped for a while and everyone kept tripping. Lots of the girls did – so when Daisy got tangled in the rope, Jack didn’t need to start laughing and pointing and whispering to his friends.

  “Shut up and leave her alone!” Mara had snarled, hauling Daisy out of the way of the others. “Are you OK? I said shut up!” she added, rounding on Jack again. “Go and jump off a cliff!”

  “Awww. Can’t Daisy talk for herself? Why does she always need you to stick up for her?” Jack was smirking, looking over his shoulder at his mates, checking that his audience was there.

  Mara had nudged Daisy in the ribs – a go on, say something sign. But all Daisy could manage was, “Leave me alone,” in a weak sort of mumble.

  “Leave me alooooone!” Jack parroted. “Awww, she wants us to leave her alone.”

  “Get lost!” Mara had yelled. She was seething and the worst thing was, Daisy had been pretty sure that Mara was almost as cross with her as she was with Jack. Daisy had slunk away and sat on one of the benches pretending she’d hurt her knee when she tripped and didn’t want to skip any more. She did. She just didn’t want to do it with Jack and his gang watching.

  What she should have done was said something like, Go on, you do it then, let’s see how good you are. Except Jack would probably be brilliant at skipping. He was always playing football, and Mara had told her he went to the same riding school that she did, and he won prizes and things. So she’d just have looked even more useless.

  The unfairness of it surged up inside her again now and she marched out on to the heath, with a surprised Betsy stumbling after her.

  “Hey! You leave her alone! You aren’t supposed to touch the ponies!”

  She wasn’t quite as loud as she’d meant to be but Jack turned round. “What?” he called back, and then, “Oh, it’s you.”

  There was something about the way he said the word you that made Daisy furious. He sounded exactly like he did when he spoke to her at school, as though she was nothing.

  “Get away from her!” she screamed, startling Betsy. The little dog cowered down against the grass with a tiny whimper. She wasn’t used to hearing Daisy shout like that, not ever. The ponies were shocked too. Em whinnied and laid back her ears, and Daisy felt a hot rush of shame running over her. She’d scared the ponies and her own Betsy. But it wasn’t her fault. It was Jack’s – he’d started it.

  “Get away!” she yelled again, louder and higher, and this time the ponies startled and trotted away, leaving Jack standing by himself in the heather.

  “What did you do that for?” he said, stomping towards her. “You scared them! You don’t scream like that around ponies! You could’ve got yourself kicked! Or me!”

  “Like you know so much about ponies,” Daisy muttered. A tiny little bit of her deep inside was thinking, I’m arguing back! I’m shouting at him! What would Mara say? She’d just never been angry enough before. “You’re not supposed to touch them – there’s a sign literally over there that says so!” She waved at it and Jack stared at her.

  “That’s for the tourists,” he said, shaking his head as if she was stupid. “It doesn’t mean me!”

  “Because you’re so special?” Daisy was so cross now that she was practically shaking. Betsy was whining, and looking between her and Jack with the whites of her eyes showing.

  “Sorry, sorry, it’s OK,” Daisy whispered, picking her up. “It’s OK.” She forced herself to breathe in slowly, the way Miss Fondu had told her to do once, when she was upset at school. It had helped her stop crying and she guessed it might help make her less angry too.

  “I never said I was special,” Jack said, rolling his eyes. “But I’m definitely allowed to touch her since SHE BELONGS TO MY DAD!”

  Daisy felt the bottom drop out of her stomach. All of her went cold, all at once.

  Jack folded his arms and smirked – the same way he did when he was teasing her at school. For a moment Daisy thought she was going to cry and run away like she usually did but she could hear Mara in her head, going, Why don’t you say something back? Don’t just cry!

  “Why didn’t you say so then?” she snapped, and she had the satisfaction of seeing him look surprised.

  “I just did! What am I supposed to do, carry around a sign that says, this is my pony? I was checking on her!”

  “Why?” Daisy demanded.

  “Because we have to. We have to make sure they’re OK. If they get sick or they’re hurt we have to take them in off the forest. To the paddock by our house. Me or Dad, we check on them every couple of days. Don’t you know anything?”

  Daisy wanted to answer him back but she couldn’t. She didn’t know anything. “I hate you,” she hissed. It was all she could think of to say and it was true.

  �
��I’m so scared.” Jack leaned down and picked up a green plastic bucket that had been by his feet – Daisy hadn’t even noticed it. “Mind if I go and feed the foal now? Is that allowed?” He shook his head disgustedly and marched off after the ponies, leaving Daisy standing shaking in the heather.

  It took a good five minutes of slow breathing, and letting Betsy lick her cheek and scrabble at her with tiny paws, before Daisy could turn and walk back to the ride.

  I haven’t even got any more photos for Mara, Daisy thought miserably as she headed back home. And then all at once her knees gave way and she slumped down on the grass. She hadn’t cried at all while she was fighting with Jack but she couldn’t hold back her tears any longer. Em was her special link to Mara. She was named for Mara! Except she wasn’t, because she must have some other awful wrong name that Jack’s family had given her. She wasn’t Em at all.

  “Sorry,” she whispered to Betsy, who was frantically squirming in her lap, jumping up and whining and licking away her tears. “It wasn’t much of a walk, was it? We’ll get up in a minute, OK?” She gave a huge sniff. “I’m not telling Mara that Em belongs to Jack Wilson. I’m not going to spoil it for her…”

  Em wasn’t really the thing that had made Mara so much better – well enough that she could have visitors soon. Daisy did know that. But it felt as if the white pony had drawn her and Mara together, after they’d grown apart. Daisy couldn’t bear to lose her old, funny, happy Mara when she’d only just got her back again. Jack Wilson wasn’t going to ruin that. She couldn’t let him.

  “Em doesn’t belong to Jack’s family,” Daisy muttered, clutching Betsy so tight she squirmed. “She just doesn’t. I suppose there’s a piece of paper that says she does but I don’t care. She’s ours, mine and Mara’s.”