Team Challenge

by Janet Rising

  “Oh, James,” I yelled, “you’ve only got ten minutes to warm up!”

  Tightening his girth, James leaped into Moth’s saddle and headed for the show jumping ring at a fast trot. Katy volunteered to stay with the ponies, so the rest of us, together with James’s mom, followed him over. As we walked across the grass, James’s mom fell in step with me.

  “James thinks very highly of you, Pia. He says you’ve helped him a lot with Moth,” she said, smiling.

  “Oh, well, I hope so,” I muttered. I could feel myself going red. How wonderful that James thought highly of me. I felt like I was walking on air.

  India Hammond was in the collecting ring on the Dweeb and talking to a girl with glasses on a piebald pony. Bean and Dee-Dee went to help adjust poles for James and Moth to practice over, and as James’s mom and I stood anxiously waiting for James to jump, I could hear the Dweeb and the piebald pony talking.

  “How’s it goin’?” the piebald asked in a drawl. I remembered that I had promised myself to do some research into whether ponies had regional accents—and this seemed to confirm it.

  “Well, I find this all a bit—forgive me—provincial,” said the Dweeb. She sounded really upper-crust and a bit conceited.

  “Whaddya mean?” said the piebald, not posh at all.

  “Oh, you know, it’s not quite what I’m used to. I mean, when one has jumped at the National Show Jumping Championship, coming in and competing against these ponies doesn’t seem fair—for them, I mean.”

  “Oh, a bit beneath you, is it?”

  “Quite! If I don’t get a clear here, I might as well retire! Of course, the championship was in my younger days, and I’m not sure India even knows how good I really am. I changed homes so many times—as talented ponies do, you know. My name was Platinum Bell then. Ahh, wonderful times.” She sighed.

  “That must be a pretty big burden for ya,” the piebald said sarcastically.

  You know when you hear a snippet of information you know to be important, but you can’t really unravel its significance at the time? I got that feeling when I heard the Dweeb, so I filed it away for future reference. I couldn’t do much else right then because James and Moth galloped into the ring, grabbing all my attention.

  “Oh, come on, James,” breathed his mom, crossing her fingers on both hands. Bean and Dee-Dee scooted up behind us, and we all held our collective breaths. Moth looked fired up and ready for action. The pair of them flew around like they were late for an appointment—which is how Moth always tackles jumps—and only one flimsy pole dropped on a nasty upright, giving her a ten-second penalty. We all leaped in the air and screamed, “Well done, James!”

  We grinned at one another. The ponies were being so great this time!

  We followed James and a puffing Moth back to the tree and gave Katy the great news.

  “Fantastic!” she cried. Then her face dropped. “Oh, I hope I’m not going to spoil it all.”

  “Don’t be silly,” I told her. “Bluey is our anchor pony!” It really did seem that we were invincible this time. We could easily drop Bean’s score and still do well at this rate. I couldn’t wait to see Catriona’s face when she found out how improved we were.

  We had at least half an hour before Bluey was scheduled to go cross-country, and it was when I was munching on yet another of James’s mom’s sausage rolls that my thoughts returned to what I’d overheard the Dweeb tell the piebald. Because I thought I remembered reading in the rules that this competition was restricted to ponies who were not at the national level. It was strictly not allowed to have any team members who had jumped under USEF rules. If the Dweeb had indeed been to the championship, then she wasn’t eligible to compete in the Sublime Equine Challenge. My mind rambled on and reached an inevitable conclusion: the Dweeb’s experience meant that Cat and Leanne’s team was breaking the rules.

  Cheating.

  But then, just as that nasty word popped into my head, another worse thought followed it—was I cheating, too? Because there was no doubt about it, Epona had allowed me to listen to the ponies on my team, and it had dramatically improved our performance. If I hadn’t heard them, would we still be struggling?

  My head hurt.

  I had to share this.

  As Katy rode off on Bluey (with Bluey getting excited at the prospect of doing his favorite thing), I grabbed James and Bean.

  “I’ve got something to tell you both,” I told them. “I need your opinions.”

  “OK, let’s have it,” said James, between bites of an éclair. Cream oozed out and dripped onto his blue tie. I ignored it.

  “You know the Dweeb?” I said.

  “India’s pony,” said Bean, on the ball for once.

  “Well, according to the rules, I think she’s overqualified to be in this event.”

  James gave a low whistle. More cream spluttered out.

  “Oh, puh-leeese!” wailed Bean, flicking bits of secondhand cream off her jacket.

  “I overheard her saying she’d jumped at the national championship,” I continued.

  “So?” said Bean. I knew it wouldn’t last.

  “This competition is for ponies that have never competed under rules.”

  “The cheats!” Bean exclaimed, looking around wildly for the secretary’s tent. “Let’s tell on them, get them disqualified.”

  “Hold on…” I said, grabbing her arm. “I’m worried they might have something on us, too.”

  “Like what?” James said indignantly. “We’re not cheating.”

  “No?”

  “Get to the point, Pia!” Bean cried.

  “Well, what about my little talk with the ponies? How can we explain our remarkable improvement? Cat and Leanne know about my Pony Whisperer status, they could complain about that, too!”

  “Mmmm, tricky,” said James, stroking his chin. Why do boys do that? “But they don’t know about your chat with the ponies.”

  “They’re cheating!” wailed Bean. “It’s not fair!”

  “I’m not sure they even know they’re breaking the rules,” I said.

  “You’re kidding!” exploded James. “How can they not know?”

  “The Dweeb was called something else then. It was a long time ago. I don’t think India is even aware of her history.”

  “Well, we still have to say something. We still have to get them eliminated,” Bean said.

  “They’ll want to know how we know,” murmured James.

  “Exactly!” I said, thankful someone else appreciated the problem.

  “Oh!” said Bean. Her forehead wrinkled as she worked it all out in her mind. Then, once she had, she shrugged her shoulders and sighed. “So we’re stuck with it?”

  “It looks that way,” I said, thinking that things would have been simpler if I hadn’t overheard the Dweeb’s conversation. Epona wasn’t always a blessing.

  The loudspeaker announced the departure of Katy and Bluey as they galloped toward the first fence on the crosscountry, and we watched as Bluey’s black and gray speckled backside disappeared into the distance.

  “God, wouldn’t it be awful if Bluey made a mess of it,” said Bean, chewing her nails.

  “Shhh, don’t say that!” I said.

  Bluey didn’t. He romped home after a fabulous round, and we all jumped up and down, hugging one another.

  The Great Eight finished third behind the professional team of chestnuts and a team of three boys and a girl who looked like they’d been doing this all their lives. We were sooo excited—and a bit stunned!

  “We’ll have to get your mom to come along next time,” said Bean. “She’s our good-luck charm.”

  “And if she brings some more food, that’ll be awesome!” I agreed.

  “Yes, you greedy pigs,” interrupted Katy. “I never did get any of that. Any left?”

  “No chance!” James laughed.

  We made a huge fuss over the ponies.

  “Well, we kept our word,” said Drummer.

  “You were wo
nderful!” I told him, keeping ours. I hugged his neck, planting a huge kiss on his cheek.

  “Awww, get off!” he mumbled.

  “But do you realize the best part?” James said.

  “What?” said Katy, rummaging around the cooler for crumbs.

  “Team SLIC had a disastrous day—poor Warrior got bitten by a horsefly as he was doing his cross-country round and went ballistic, which meant Scott had to retire. That means we’ve each got one qualifier under our belts, and both teams need to finish in the first three next time to qualify. With any luck, if the next qualifier turns out like this one, we won’t have to worry about the Dweeb’s secret, after all!”

  “What secret?” asked Katy.

  “Oh, we’ll fill you in on the way home,” Bean said as we got ready to go to get our ribbons. As we rode over to the main ring I looked over to the horse trailer line. Leanne and Cat were staring at us, and they looked anything but happy. I pushed any negative thoughts to the back of my mind. I wanted to enjoy the feeling of success for a while longer, and we reveled in euphoria as we rode home. Even the ponies picked up the mood and were in high spirits. For me, it lasted until I got home.

  Chapter 9

  You see, it was like this: Mom’s nightmare friend Carol had dropped by and they were chatting up a storm. OK, so Mom asked me about how the challenge had gone. She made all the right “Oh, I’m delighted for you, Pia,” noises for, like, five minutes, and then she swooped in with Greg updates and took it from there. Because she’d been out for the day with Greg.

  They’d started at a coffee shop watching the street performers. Then they’d walked around the park and fed the squirrels. Then they’d had lunch somewhere really fancy, with wine and everything—even though my mom gets a bit sloppy when she’s had a drink. Then Greg insisted they go to a museum to look at the weird art, only Mom said she couldn’t get her head around it and Greg had lectured a lot. Mom giggled as she told us she’d spent five minutes nodding sagely at an exhibit before realizing it was a radiator (Carol screamed with laughter at this point). And then they’d caught the train home where, apparently, there was kissing. I so didn’t want to go there—gross squared!

  “I can’t wait to meet him,” said Carol, helping herself to a cookie. I couldn’t wait for her to meet him either. I didn’t think Carol would take to him at all. She liked them a little wilder than cotton-ball-hair Greg.

  “He’s so nice,” raved Mom. “He complimented me on the dress I wore today—”

  “Oooo, that’s good. This one?” Carol interrupted, peering at Mom’s dress.

  “Yes, he said it was a nice change to see a woman wearing something feminine,” Mom continued. “Greg said that he likes to see a woman in a dress.”

  Oh, did he? I thought.

  “And he said it made a nice change to be seen with someone who takes pride in her appearance,” said Mom, a bit smugly.

  “Oh, not so good. It sounds like he’s training you,” said Carol, helping herself to another cookie. “That’s typical talk for someone who wants to dissuade you from wearing pants.”

  I thought so, too. Greg sounded pretty creepy.

  “Oh, Carol, you’re reading too much into it!” Mom laughed.

  “Did he say anything else?”

  “Well, he wouldn’t let me go halves with the lunch bill. And he said he liked my hair up, and that I should always wear it like that.”

  “See!” exploded Carol. “He is training you!”

  “It was just a compliment!” Mom laughed.

  “Just watch him,” Carol said darkly, brushing crumbs off her ample chest. “He sounds manipulative to me.”

  And me, I thought, without saying anything. That was a first, Carol and me agreeing on something. Usually, she’s the one egging Mom on and throwing caution to the wind. It seemed she had her doubts about Greg, and so did I. But then, I wondered, would I always have doubts about Mom’s boyfriends, simply because they weren’t my dad? I imagined the future with Greg and Mom as an item. Not attractive. I went to bed, leaving Mom and Carol giggling over a bottle of wine. Honestly!

  The next day at the yard, James rounded up the human members of the Great Eight for a meeting in the tack room.

  “What are we meeting about?” asked Bean, yawning.

  “I just thought we ought to formulate our action plan for the next qualifier,” James explained.

  “Aren’t we just trying our best to win?” said Bean. “Or is that too obvious?”

  “OK, no need to be like that,” said James.

  “Sorry, but the farrier’s due any minute, and I haven’t got Tiff in from the field yet. You know what Dave’s like if he has to wait around.”

  “Yeah, but he doesn’t mind if he’s late,” said Katy. “I waited over two hours for him once, and he didn’t even apologize when he finally turned up, and he spent another half an hour on his cell phone, booking in other people.”

  “Is he any good? Drummer’s farrier keeps complaining about having to drive too far to shoe him. I might ask Dave to do him,” I said.

  “Can we concentrate on our action plan?” James interrupted. We all looked at him and remembered why we were there.

  “Well, what do you suggest?” said Katy.

  “How about we all watch one another as we practice and offer any advice? I mean, eyes on the ground are valuable, and we could really improve with some constructive criticism.”

  “I wouldn’t like to comment on Bluey,” I said, shaking my head. “As I see it, he and Katy are stars and don’t need any help.”

  “I agree,” said Bean, looking at her watch.

  “Well, I could do with some help,” said James.

  “OK, we’ll all watch you,” said Bean, getting up to go. “Oh, no!” she exclaimed.

  “What?” we all swiveled around to see.

  “Twiddles-scissor-paws is sitting on my tack box. I can’t get my halter.”

  “Are you going to let a fluffy little kitty cat stop you?” James grinned.

  Twiddles is one of Mrs. Collins’s cats. A fat tabby and a great mouser, he’s all purry and nice-as-pie with Mrs. C, but morphs instantly into Demon Cat with everyone else. He scratches, he hisses, he doubles in sizes and fluffs up like a puffball cat if you so much as speak to him. Everyone’s terrified of him, and if Twiddles chooses to sit on anything of yours, well, unlucky you is all I can say. Bean wasn’t overreacting at seeing Twiddles all curled up and comfortable on her tack box.

  “You chance it!” said Bean. “Katy, can I borrow your halter?”

  “Yeah, of course,” Katy agreed. “Come on, James, Pia and I will watch you jump Moth and make suggestions.”

  So Tiffany spent the next hour tied up in Bluey’s purple halter having a pedicure, and Katy and I watched James take Moth around the jumps in the outdoor school. She thundered around, her hooves drumming on the sand surface, snorting through her nose in her usual dragon fashion. Only we didn’t do much watching, as we were too busy jumping jumps and wings around, altering the height of poles and rearranging the course to James’s liking. Moth was still taking the odd pole off with her hind legs—worryingly.

  “You know what, Pia?” Katy puffed, struggling to push a jump cup through a hole in the wing. “We have so been set up.”

  “How?” I asked, hauling a pole around.

  “Hey, James!” Katy shouted. “You just wanted us to alter the course for you, didn’t you?”

  James grinned. “No, I need your advice. Honest!” he yelled, aiming Moth for the double and leaning forward as Moth launched herself into the air. She really was an exuberant jumper.

  “Oh, that’s a dirty trick!” I yelled, dropping the pole in disgust.

  “You’re still helping. I can practice much more if I don’t have to keep getting off to move stuff around. It’s for the team!” James said cunningly.

  “You ride with awfully long stirrups, James,” observed Katy.

  “Yeah, what of it?” James said, pulling up Moth for a br
eather.

  “Well, I always shorten my stirrups at least two holes when I go cross-country,” Katy said thoughtfully. “Perhaps your stirrup length is making Moth drop her hind legs too early. You’re not able to stay off her back.”

  I looked at Katy, then at James. His stirrups were very long. Everyone knows you need shorter stirrups for jumping, but somehow this information had passed James by.

  “I’ll give it a try,” said James, adjusting his stirrups there and then.

  “Wow!” I exclaimed, as James and Moth cleared all the jumps in fine style. “It’s like magic!”

  “Yeah, well, we could use some magic to help us,” said Katy. James caught my eye—little did Katy know that any success we’d had so far had relied heavily on some magic from a certain two-thousand-year-old stone artifact.

  Epona!

  Chapter 10

  I’ve got it!” cried Dee, handing out Popsicles. She’d stopped off at the convenience store on her way to the yard and bought one for everyone. Soon, all that could be heard in the tack room was the sound of slurping. It was a great idea because it was really, really hot. The tack room, however, was really, really cool, which made it the location of choice on a hot day.

  “Got what?” said Bean, lifting her Popsicle up and out of reach of Mrs. Collins’s greyhound, Squish, who had suddenly become everyone’s friend.

  “An idea on how we can make sure we qualify for Brookdale,” Dee said.

  “Well, don’t keep it to yourself.” I slurped.

  “My granddad. He can help us.”

  Katy, Bean, and I looked at her blankly. James hadn’t arrived yet, but he was due any moment as he had another jumping practice planned.

  “Is he one of the dressage judges?” Bean asked hopefully, twirling her long blond hair up on top of her head to keep cool.

  “No, he’s dead.”

  We all stopped mid-slurp. We hadn’t seen that one coming.

  “Er, sorry, I’m missing something,” said Katy. “Get lost, Squish, I don’t hang around when you’re eating your Kibbles ’n Bits!”

  “We can call up his dear departed spirit.”