CHASING RIBBONS
BY
CLAIRE SVENDSEN
Copyright © 2015 Claire Svendsen
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This book is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, places or events is purely coincidental.
CHAPTER ONE
“Over the white oxer, roll back to the red vertical and then gallop to the water.”
Dad was giving Bluebird and me a lesson out in the jump field. The first show of the season was only a few weeks away and this wasn’t just any show, it was the first leg in the Talent Scout series. Each win would garner you and your horse points that would count towards a total at the end of the series. The winner would get a huge prize, possibly even sponsorship.
I had dreams of being sponsored by a big company, maybe even one that would pay to send me over to Europe to train. Everyone said that you came back a better rider than you left, something about the horses and the shows and the life over there. It was a pipe dream and I knew it but dreams were what my entire future was built on right now and besides, it didn’t cost any less to dream big.
“Come on boy,” I said, picking up my reins and nudging Bluebird into a trot.
He’d been on his game lately. I’d given him a month off from showing and he was fresh and ready to go. I knew that we’d be competing against a lot of really talented riders and horses but I also knew we were good too.
We cleared the oxer easily and as we were in the air I was already looking for the vertical so that we were turning as soon as his front hooves hit the ground. We rolled back neatly and Bluebird jumped the vertical like a cat and then I gave him his head and let him gallop on to the water. I felt him stretch across it. The water was a big flat expanse that was a challenge for a pony with shorter legs than his horse counterparts but Bluebird didn’t even drop a heel in it.
“Nice,” Dad said as we walked up to him. “Good job.”
“Thanks.” I grinned.
I dropped my stirrups and let my feet hang down. They stretched so much further than they used to. I was growing taller by the day. For a while I’d stopped growing and I thought that maybe I was done. I’d be one of those short riders who were able to show ponies forever and not look stupid. I’d be able to ride Bluebird forever. But the truth was that despite what my heart was telling me, I knew that wasn’t going to be the case. Eventually I’d look ridiculous on him. I already almost did. I kept my stirrups much shorter on him than I did when I rode the horses just so no one would notice. What would happen when the day came when I had to stop showing him altogether?
“Are you okay?” Dad said.
“Fine,” I said, grabbing a bottle of water from the fence post and gulping some down.
“Are you sure?” He pressed me.
“You don’t think I look stupid on Bluebird now, do you?” I said. “You know, now that I’m taller?”
“No stupider than you’ve always done,” he said with a grin.
“Hey,” I said. “I’m being serious.”
“He’s a pony Em,” Dad said. “You’ve always known that he’s not going to get any bigger but that you will.”
“But you don’t think maybe …” My words trailed off. It was too hard to even ask if it was time to stop riding my beloved pony.
“If it was don’t you think I’d have told you?” Dad said. “Now all I want you to focus on is the next show. Got it?”
“Got it.” I nodded.
I knew that Dad wasn’t as sentimental as I was and if he thought that I was really getting too big to ride Bluebird then he’d tell me. But it still lingered in the back of my mind, a thought that I just couldn’t shake. That someday I’d have to continue my dream without my pony. And that it would really suck.
“And don’t forget that the new horse is coming in at two and someone is coming to look at Four at three,” Dad called after me.
“Right,” I said, my heart sinking further.
The excitement of a new horse coming in was overshadowed by the fact that my father was pushing me to sell my new project horse already. I wasn’t ready to sell him yet and I wasn’t sure why my father wanted me to.
“Where is the new horse coming from again?” I asked.
“I told you,” Dad said with a wink. “It’s a surprise.”
But that didn’t exactly cheer me up either. Dad’s surprises often turned out to be horses that were rank or untrained or practically unbroken. I kept hoping that one day another Encore would fall into my lap, one that we wouldn’t have to sell but so far that hadn’t happened. Still, there was always next time. Maybe this would be the one that could take over for Bluebird one day. Maybe.
“Emily, wait.” Dad walked up to me looking slightly concerned. “There is something I need to tell you.”
My heart started to thump in my chest. I didn’t like it when people said that. It was normally bad news. I thought of Mom and how I hadn’t been able to reach her at all lately. Had he heard something? Something bad?
“I was doing some work over at the farm yesterday and I saw two girls out there riding in the fields next door.”
“Jess and Amber?” I said, knowing it could only be them.
“Looked like it,” Dad said. “I thought you ought to hear it from me. I didn’t want you running into them and being caught off guard.”
“It’s okay,” I said. “I’m over it. I’m a different person now. I’m not the same girl who let Jess walk all over her.”
“Good,” Dad said. “I’m glad.”
And I was pretty sure that whatever insults Jess threw my way, I’d be able to handle. At least I hoped that I would.
CHAPTER TWO
I hadn’t thought that I was particularly bothered by the fact that Jess was back in town. After all I hadn’t really thought much about her since she left. I was kind of hoping that maybe she was out of my life for good. She’d pretty much tortured me the whole time I’d been at Fox Run and even before that. Always putting me down and laughing about me behind my back.
When she posted the video online of me falling off and it had gone viral, I’d thought my life and career were over, especially when people I didn’t even know started laughing about me and posting horrible things. But something good had come out of it too. Random strangers had come to my defense and my father had kicked Jess out of Fox Run once and for all. It wasn’t like she needed to be there anyway. She had her own fancy farm with a barn and ring and her father had enough money to buy her all the horses and lessons with top trainers that she could ever want.
I sulked around the barn feeling a little out of sorts. Everything in my life had been going so well. Bluebird and I were ready for the first show in the Talent Scout series and I didn’t need someone like Jess coming in and messing with my head at the last minute, throwing me off my game. That would suck.
“How about if I take you for a ride to clear my head?” I asked Arion.
He was eating and picked his head up at the sound of my voice, nickering softly.
He hadn’t won his baby jumper class. In fact we didn’t even place but I couldn’t have been prouder of him. He didn’t go crazy and act completely stupid. He held it together enough to go in the ring and jump a solid round that would have been a clear if it hadn’t been for the little
kid with that yellow balloon. The very next day I’d bought a bunch of balloons, blown one up and hung it in his stall. Poor Arion thought his world was ending. He snorted and stood in the corner of his stall quivering like I’d just placed a tiger in with him instead of a small piece of rubber with air inside it but eventually his curiosity got the better of him. He took one small step after another until he was close enough to reach out his nose and touch it. As soon as his lip came into contact with the balloon, he jumped back so fast that he slammed into the wall.
“What is going on out there?” Dad had called out from the office at the noise.
“Nothing,” I replied.
“It didn’t sound like nothing,” he said, sticking his head out of the door.
“Balloon desensitization training.” I grinned, holding up the bag of balloons. “I’m not going to have another round ruined by these stupid things.”
“Good job.” Dad nodded and disappeared again.
It took about a day for Arion to accept that the balloon would not in fact kill him. Now he had a whole bunch of them strung up like there was some horse party happening in his stall. They bobbed and swayed as the air from the fan blew them about but Arion no longer cared. Of course there were a million and one other things that could potentially spook him at a show but I’d cross that bridge when I came to it, just like I’d have to do when I ran into Jess again because I knew it would just be a matter of time before I did. The horse world was small. We all went to the same shows. There was no way I’d be able to avoid her forever.
“How would you like to see the ocean?” I asked Arion as I slipped his halter on.
CHAPTER THREE
Arion was pretty excited about going out on the trail, just as he was with everything in life. He thought the world was one great big adventure and his enthusiasm was infectious.
“Okay, hold on,” I said as I hopped about, trying to get my foot in the stirrup.
Asking him to stand quietly was an impossible task and one I was supposed to be working on, at least according to my father. But there were lots of other things I was much more interested in teaching my over achiever of an ex-racehorse, like getting his flying changes and how to jump nicely down a row of gymnastics without trying to make the single fences oxers by jumping two at once.
“Where are you going?” Missy called.
She was out in the jump field with her kids group lesson. Faith was out there on Macaroni. I could see her now looking at me, her face falling when she realized that I was going out without her.
“On the trail,” I said as Arion pranced by.
“Well don’t forget that new horse is coming in and your father wants you here.”
“I know,” I said, looking at the time on my phone. “I’ll be back by then.”
“Can I come with you?” Faith asked.
She’d ridden her pony over to the fence and was looking eagerly up at me.
“Not this time,” I said.
“Please,” she begged.
“Is the lesson over?” Missy asked her, hands on her hips like she was not amused that Faith wanted to bail.
“No, I guess not,” Faith said.
“That’s right, it’s not,” Missy said. “Get back with the group please.”
“Alright.”
Faith turned Macaroni around and went back to where the other kids were sitting on their ponies in the middle of the field.
“Sorry,” I said over my shoulder.
Missy just waved me away. She knew it wasn’t exactly my fault that Faith had become obsessed with me. She was like my shadow, following me around and trying to copy me. She wanted to jump the same jumps as I did and ride in the same classes. I kept telling her that one day she would but that wasn’t good enough. She wanted to do it all now. She didn’t realize that we were only trying to keep her safe.
“Maybe I should just let her ride you,” I told Arion as he spooked at Meatball who was chasing a lizard across the parking lot and we ricocheted off a large bush. “That would change her mind about being so daring.”
But I wasn’t really about to ruin Faith’s fearlessness by putting her in danger. Part of me wished that I was still young and naive enough to believe that I’d never get hurt but I knew that wasn’t true. I’d seen people sprain things and break bones and even poor Mickey had ended up in a coma when she fell off. Riding wasn’t all leaping on the back of your horse and galloping off into the sunset, even though it sometimes felt like it should be because that would be awesome.
“You are worse than Four,” I told Arion as he tried to canter and I reined him back in to a ragged trot. “And you’ve been here longer.”
My summer project had settled in nicely and even though I still didn’t trust him not to rear when he was frustrated or upset, he had picked up all the flat work exercises I’d been teaching him really easily. We still hadn’t jumped him. Dad said it was too soon, which was why I thought he wasn’t ready to be sold and yet Dad had lined up a buyer already? I didn’t know what the deal was but I wasn’t ready to let my project horse go just yet, not when he hadn’t even realized his full potential.
“All right,” I said, giving Arion his head. “Gallop away but don’t blame me if you snag your foot in a gopher hole and take us both down.”
But that didn’t happen. I knew where all the best places to gallop were, where the land was flat and clear. Arion raced along with his head and neck down, his racing days not yet forgotten. As I crouched on his neck I couldn’t help wondering what it would be like to ride in a real race, jockeys and horses boxing you in as you let your horse loose and pushed them to go as fast as they could. I didn’t do that with Arion. I let him gallop but I knew it was never as fast as he could really go. I didn’t want to break him. I loved him too much for that.
After a while he started to slow and I let him walk to catch his breath because it was about ninety million degrees out. The sweat was running down my back in rivers. When we got to the ocean, I was going to jump straight in it.
We followed the same path that I’d taken the day I came out looking for Dakota. She’d taken Jordan’s horse for a joyride and I tracked them all the way to the beach. That was the way we went now, across the clearing and through the pine trees to the little pond where the clear water sparkled in the bright sun. Unlike that day when storm clouds had been rolling in, today it was hot with clear blue skies and only one white fluffy cloud rolling along.
Arion jumped and snorted as something splashed in the shallow water.
“I hope it’s not an alligator,” I said out loud but even though I scanned the water I didn’t see a beady eye looking up at me. “We’d better give it a wide berth just in case.”
We walked up the hill and through the trees where the air was thick and the sound of the waves crashing on the beach filtered through.
“Please don’t freak out,” I said, putting my hand on Arion’s neck. “I could have ridden out here with Mickey and Hampton, you know, used the buddy system but I didn’t because I trust you to not dump me off and run away. Okay?”
After all I’d told Missy that I was going out on the trail but had neglected to tell her that I was actually coming all the way out to the beach. Part of me had been afraid that she would try to stop me, that same regard for safety that I’d had for Faith rearing up in her as she tried to protect me. But I wasn’t ten years old. I could make my own decisions and right now this was what I wanted. Besides, Mickey couldn’t have come with me even if I wanted her to. School was out and her whole family had gone on vacation to Paris. I’d never seen Mickey so excited about anything before. She kept going on about the food and the Eiffel Tower and of course all the cute French guys she was bound to meet.
“Do you even speak French?” I’d asked her when she told me.
“No,” she’d replied. “But I have an app that does.” She held up her phone. “Besides, who needs words when you speak the language of love?”
“Gross.” I laughed as she ma
de a scrunched up kissing face. “I thought you were in love with Ethan?”
“Do you see Ethan around here?” she said.
I looked around the barn and shrugged. “I guess not.”
“Exactly. He’s at the beach with his surfing buddies and probably flirting with all those skinny, bikini clad cheerleaders so I don’t think he can exactly criticize if I have a fling with a cute French artist or something.”
I held my hands up. “Fling away. Just don’t go getting yourself in trouble.”
“I’m not the one who gets into trouble now,” she said with a smile. “You’ve taken over that role, remember?”
“I have not,” I said, feeling indignant.
But as Arion stepped up the hill and the vast blue ocean came into view, his body went stiff and I wondered if maybe I’d done exactly that because riding a green horse out to the beach alone did sort of seem like it was asking for trouble after all.
CHAPTER FOUR
Arion turned to stone. I’d never seen a horse go so rigid before. His sides felt like rock next to my legs and when I squeezed against him, nothing happened. His ears were pricked and his head high and although I couldn’t tell, I was sure that his eyes were bugging out of his head and it wasn’t exactly the ocean that was scaring him either. It was the tourists. Of course they’d be there. I don’t know why I’d thought that they wouldn’t be. Brightly colored towels were spread out on the sand and people lay on them laughing and talking and slathering each other with sunscreen. Kids were running and screaming and some teenagers were tossing a Frisbee back and forth.
My heart started to pound. What had I done? Mickey was right. I’d found trouble even though I had never even been looking for it. I never should have ridden Arion to the beach in the middle of summer. And I shouldn’t have come alone either.
“Come on boy, let’s go home,” I said but my voice was high and strained.
Chasing Ribbons (Show Jumping Dreams ~ Book 19) Page 1
