Team Challenge

by Janet Rising

  Katy and I were doing the supportive thing for Bean, who was practicing her dressage schooling in the outdoor school, when James walked over to join us, his lips grimly pressed together.

  “What’s up?” I asked him.

  “Oooh, is it gossip?” Katy cried eagerly, jumping down from the fence.

  “Where am I supposed to canter?!” yelled Bean.

  “Oh, let’s see…” I looked at the dressage test sheet in my hand. “Canter a fifty-foot circle…at…A.”

  “What are you doing?” asked James.

  “Bean’s learning her final dressage test,” Katy told him.

  “But she’s not supposed to practice the actual test.” James sighed, like we had pony poop for brains. “If the judge thinks the pony’s anticipating the next movement, she’ll lose marks.”

  “Shhh!” I hissed, shaking his sleeve. “You know that, and we know that, but Bean’s in such a state about remembering the test, she has to do it this way.”

  “Don’t you say anything, James,” warned Katy, putting on her menacing face. “Just let Bean do what’s right for her. We’ll probably have to drop her score, anyway, so what does it matter? Get on with what you came to tell us.”

  James took a deep breath. “Has anyone given any thought as to how we are going to get to the final at Brookdale?” he asked.

  “But we’ve qualified,” Katy said in a voice that suggested James was being dim. “We’re G-O-I-N-G!” She did a jig on the spot in glee.

  “Yes, but how? How, physically, are we G-O-I-N-G? Ride all the way?”

  “Oh,” I said again, feeling as though someone had let the air out of my lungs. Obviously we did have pony poop for brains, otherwise we’d have thought of that. Brookdale wasn’t a rideable distance.

  “Mmmm, bit of an oversight, wouldn’t you say?” agreed James, running a hand through his slightly-too-long blond hair. It has a peculiar effect on me, him doing that, but I couldn’t dwell on that now.

  “What’s going on?” said Bean, pulling up next to us. Tiffany snorted dramatically at a snake in the sand before it turned back into a stick. We explained the crisis.

  “Well, Katy’s got a trailer. Two of us can go in that,” said Bean, being a bit free and easy with Katy’s trailer. But Katy nodded in agreement.

  “But what about Moth and Drummer?” asked James. “Katy’s dad can’t make two trips, and Brookdale is miles and miles and miles away!”

  I felt my spirits dribbling out of my boots and sinking into the grass.

  “We’ll just have to hire a horse trailer,” said Bean matter-of-factly.

  “But that will cost a lot,” I said, chewing my lip. Mom and I weren’t even going on vacation this year, so I knew we didn’t have any spare cash for a horse trailer rental. The entry fees for the Sublime Equine Challenge had been difficult enough to scrape together, and I hadn’t any pocket money left after forking out for Drummer’s ear protectors and bells. James’s family was obviously loaded, and I could only imagine how he was going to feel when I had to let him down. But James surprised me.

  “I don’t think my parents will pay for me to go,” he whined. “They’re helping my sister buy an apartment. They’ve made it clear that I have to fund any shows and events I want to do with Moth this year from my allowance.”

  We all stood around in gloomy silence. Tiffany rubbed her nose on the fence. Katy screwed up her face, deep in thought. I could almost feel the wind whistling through my head—empty of any ideas, as usual.

  “I’m going for a ride,” Bean announced in a wobbly voice, obviously totally let down. She rode off through the yard, her blond braid bobbing up and down, riding out a wobble halfway along the drive as Tiffany spotted a couple of monster rabbits. I couldn’t be sure Bean wasn’t actually crying, but I knew how she felt. It seemed so unfair that after everyone’s hard work we weren’t going to be able to get ourselves to the final. James, Katy, and I flung ourselves down on the grass in gloom.

  “We should so have thought of this,” James said.

  “I can’t believe we’ve been so stupid!” I agreed, angrily wrenching the head off a daisy.

  We sat wallowing in misery, trying to think up ways to get around it and failing. When Dee arrived, declaring that she had some bad news of her own, we were less than sympathetic.

  “I bet it’s not as bad as ours,” mumbled Katy.

  “You’re always complaining,” said James, disappointment making him unkind.

  “Yes, well, it’s all right for you,” wailed Dee. “You can do what you like up here. You should have your mom around all the time, telling you what to do with Moth, see how you like it.”

  “OK, Dee, what’s your bad news?” said Katy, soothingly, anxious to avoid a scene.

  “It’s about Brookdale…”

  “Yeah, ditto!” I said.

  “I can’t groom for the team at the finals—”

  “No problem, actually,” interrupted Katy, testily, “because the team can’t go.”

  “What?! ”

  “It’s true.” I sighed. “Half of us can’t get there because—”

  “The transportation’s too expensive,” finished James, stealing the punch line. “Only two of us can go in Katy’s trailer, so it’s all been for nothing. So you see,” he went on, “it’s actually all right for you, for once.”

  You’ll never guess what Dee did. You won’t, so I’ll have to tell you.

  She laughed!

  We all stared at her. I thought Katy was going to burst. James looked ready to do murder.

  Dee stopped laughing and rolled her eyes skyward. “The other two can come with us,” she said, like we were stupid not to have thought of it.

  I felt my jaw dropping.

  “Say again?” Katy said slowly.

  “Yeah, we’re going. That’s why I can’t groom for you. Mom’s entered me and Dolly for a showing class there— it’s a HOYS qualifier—and it’s on the same day as the challenge. Our horse trailer takes four horses, and we’re only taking Dolly, so there will be plenty of room. I’ll ask Mom now, if you like.” She poked her tongue out at James. James just looked flabbergasted. I’d never seen him lost for words.

  I looked over to Sophie’s huge and expensive horse trailer parked next to the barn. Could we really, possibly, ever in a million years, travel to Brookdale in that? We’d not just get there, we’d get there in style!

  Dee’s mom, Sophie, was completely supportive.

  “Of course you must come with us,” she gushed. “You’ve all done so well to qualify, and we’re going anyway,” she said in her usual, bossy tone. Which everyone forgave because she was being so generous.

  So it was settled, and when Bean returned, after much whooping and jumping about, we all had a powwow, and Bean and I biked to the village shop to get a box of chocolates for Sophie and a couple of bags of Whoppers and Marshmallows for us to celebrate. We all sat and had a major, delirious scarf-fest until Bean actually turned a bit green, jumped to her feet, ran across the yard, and disappeared. We just thought she was being strange as usual, but when she wobbled back she confessed to having thrown up a load of brown and pink goo on the muck heap— which we put down to the emotional roller coaster of the day. James felt the need to point out that it was a terrible waste of good Whoppers and Marshmallows. But then, I thought, that was far, far better than not being able to go to Brookdale, and we all (except Bean, who shook her head and rolled her eyes at the thought) sucked another Marshmallow each to that!

  Chapter 15

  I can’t believe we’re really here!” murmured Katy, looking around the famous Brookdale showground. The rest of the Great Eight nodded in agreement. It was totally awe-inspiring, competing at the same show as some of the most famous riders in the world. I could feel butterflies doing the rumba around my stomach.

  We’d hit the road at six o’clock that morning. Bluey and Tiffany cocooned in Katy’s trailer—Bluey swathed in purple from poll guard to boots, Tiffany in a more so
phisticated two-tone blue ensemble. Drummer and Moth had been draped in their green (it’s so Drum’s color!) and black blankets respectively, and ready to go in Sophie’s luxury horse trailer. Boy was it nice! With a ramp at the side and another at the back, four stalls, and living accommodations, Drummer had never traveled in such four-star luxury, and neither had I. I was almost as excited about traveling in that as I was about our destination.

  Dolly had gone up the ramp first, and it immediately became clear why Dee hated going to shows with her mom.

  “Tie her up a bit shorter,” Sophie had barked from the bottom of the ramp. “Oh, come on, Dee, you’ve done it enough times!”

  “Last time, you said I tied her too short!” Dee had protested.

  “Sometimes, I think you do it deliberately, just to annoy me!” her mom had retorted, shaking her head.

  “Why doesn’t she do it herself?” I’d whispered to Dee when she came back down the ramp.

  “Then she wouldn’t have anything to complain about,” Dee had whispered back. “She’s always worse on show days—nerves.”

  With trepidation, and hoping I wouldn’t get yelled at, I’d led Drummer up the ramp and tied him next to Dolly. Dolly had been made up.

  “Oooh, hello, handsome. How lovely we get some quality time together at last!” she’d cooed as Drummer had sighed. Dolly’s attentions embarrass him. I keep asking him why he doesn’t just roll over and go for the glam Dolly, who clearly adores him, instead of rough old Bambi, but he says that love’s like that. He must like a challenge.

  “Can’t Moth go here?” Drum had whispered out of the corner of his mouth. I’d grinned and patted his neck.

  “Sorry! We don’t get to choose. Sophie’s in charge.”

  “Oh, I guess that’s it then.” Drummer knows an immovable force when he sees it.

  With Moth safely loaded, and after a couple of minutes of Sophie berating Dee about loading tack and not forgetting this, and remembering that, and answering her cell phone a couple of times (she always seems to have her ear jammed to the phone, which is the only respite Dee gets), Dee and Sophie got in the cab and James and I climbed into the living part behind them, and we’d set off down the drive after Katy’s trailer.

  To Brookdale. Did I mention that? I could so not sit still!

  Twenty teams had qualified for the Sublime Equine Challenge—which meant that the showground was teeming with ponies, riders, and their supporters—and there were lots of the usual Brookdale showing and jumping classes going on at the same time. Having caught up with Katy’s trailer on the way, Sophie parked her horse trailer next to it, so we were all together. I’d never seen so many fancy horse trailers in one place, and all that obvious wealth made me feel like a pauper. Katy’s dad, who’s all smiley and laid-back, settled down to read the paper, and Katy and James went off to find the secretary and get the lowdown on where everything was situated and the times we were due in which ring, leaving me and Bean to gaze all google-eyed at the exciting scene around us. It was a sunny day with a faint breeze, and the smell of hot dogs and doughnuts mingled satisfyingly with the smell of horses.

  “I hope we see Ellen Whitaker,” said Bean, her head on a swivel, trawling for horsey celebrities.

  “Oh, look there’s…em, who exactly is that?” I said as a man in show jumping gear whizzed past us on a bicycle.

  “Dunno,” said Bean, “but he must be someone famous. I thought I’d brought my autograph book…” she muttered, clutching her jacket pockets. The only thing I had in my pocket was a two-thousand-year-old goddess. Epona was safety pinned in to make sure she didn’t go missing. What a disaster that would be!

  “I wonder when my mom will get here?” I said, looking at the huge crowds. “Are your parents coming?”

  Bean did a Tiffany-type snort. “You must be joking—they’d rather pull off their own heads. Let’s go and look at the derby bank,” she said, changing the subject and breaking into a run. I realized I’d never seen either of Bean’s parents at the yard. What was the story there, I wondered. I realized that both my parents at least tried to take an interest in my interests. When I’d eventually told Mom about qualifying for the final, she’d been thrilled and totally excited.

  The enormous derby bank looked like a huge, grassy, Egyptian pyramid.

  “I can just imagine me and Tiff sliding down that,” mumbled Bean, her mouth open in awe. Yeah, right, I thought. Tiffany would freak out half a mile away from it.

  The main ring was vast, and all the jumps looked newly painted and familiar—the Devil’s Dyke, the triple bar, the water jumps. I was in heaven knowing I wasn’t just a spectator, but a competitor, just like my fave horsey celebs. My stomach did a sort of dance at the thought.

  We wandered through the trade stands—we didn’t have time to stop—and found our way back to the horses. We unloaded the ponies, stripping off rugs and travel boots and checking that they were OK. Moth had rubbed out one of her braids, so Bean fixed it before James and Katy returned.

  “Here, I’ve got our numbers. Katy’s got the times, and we walked the cross-country course together, so that’s all done,” said James, handing out the numbers.

  “They’ve built the course especially for this event,” said Katy, “and it’s gorgeous. Bluey’s going to love it!”

  We looked at the note James held with our times written on it. James and Moth were up first, then me and Drum, followed by our secret weapon, Katy and Bluey (only they weren’t much of a secret), with Bean and Tiffany going last. Seeing my name in the program prompted an excited tingle and a stab of fear. I wasn’t the only one with worries.

  “Oh, God, I’m last, and I just know I’m going to forget the test and let you all down,” wailed Bean.

  “You won’t forget it this time,” I said, crossing my fingers behind me against the probability of telling a big, fat lie. “You’ve practiced it so often at home, you’ll remember it today.” I didn’t mean it. Secretly, I wished Katy was going last.

  James wasn’t so diplomatic. “We can drop your score, like we always do.”

  “Thanks for the vote of confidence!” yelled Bean.

  “Oh, enough of the negativity!” snapped Katy, sticking her fingers in her ears. “No more what-ifs, puh-leeese! Unless it’s to say, What if we all do fantastically well? What if we all perform like champions? What if we win? If you believe you’ll do badly, you will. If you believe you’ll do well, then guess what? You might just do that, instead!”

  “Wow, that’s telling us!” I said.

  “OK, Katy, keep your hair on,” mumbled James.

  “If you say so,” said Bean, unconvinced.

  “OK, now give me five!” Katy said, sticking her arm in the air.

  We did. Katy can be really scary at times.

  Our supporters began to arrive. First were James’s parents, and they’d brought Katy’s mom with them. They all chatted with Katy’s dad, said all the right encouraging things to us, then disappeared to have something to eat and go around the trade stands, promising they’d be watching all of us. There was no sign of my mom yet—or Greg, who was coming, too. I wondered whether he’d make me do detention if I didn’t win. Or he might make my mom do it instead.

  My dad and Skinny Lynny turned up though. But you’ll never guess what Skinny was wearing. Jodhpurs! I could have died of embarrassment. Who wears riding clothes at a show when they’re not competing? She can’t even ride!!! I could see the others staring as Skinny stomped about in her leather boots and skintight jodhpurs and I could have died. Right there. Dead. At Brookdale. I imagined my teammates and Drummer shaking their heads as they gathered around me prostrate on the grass, saying, “It’s sad, but going at Brookdale, well, it’s what Pia would have wanted, after all.”

  “Hi, Pumpkin!” said Dad, kissing me out of my morbid thoughts and making me even angrier—with myself this time. When was I going to have a word with him about that?

  “When are you on?” asked Skinny, making an attempt t
o pat Drummer, then backing off as he flattened his ears back and swished his tail at her.

  “Not until this afternoon. Why are you wearing jodhpurs?” I had to ask.

  “Oh, I thought I’d blend in,” Skinny replied airily, flicking back her hair.

  “Don’t they suit her?!” said Dad, giving her a dorky smile.

  As one of my parents took his trophy girlfriend shopping at the trade stands, my other parent arrived with her boyfriend—the one with the glued-on hair.

  “Hello, sweetie,” said Mom, kissing my cheek. She was wearing a plain shirt and a pair of jeans over some flat boots, not very Greg-like at all. This merited investigation. As Greg admired Sophie’s sensational horse trailer, I whispered to Mom.

  “I thought you’d be wearing something unsuitable for a horse show, something Greg likes a woman to be seen in. What’s going on?”

  My mom turned a bit pink and faced me squarely. “I thought about what you said—about me doing what Greg wanted all the time. You were right. Greg was being manipulative. But I was to blame, too, for letting him influence me.”

  I was a bit stunned. “Oh,” I said. Not the greatest of responses.

  “So I decided that instead of running away from the problem and simply finishing with him, I’d talk to him about it, put my point across.”

  “Oh,” I said again. This was getting repetitive.

  “He was actually really sympathetic to my feelings and what I told him. I was surprised,” said Mom.

  She wasn’t the only one—I almost fell over. At least I didn’t say “oh” again. I was starting to get on my own nerves.

  “So we’ll see how we go. At least I didn’t cut and run. We’re working through it instead of just running away from the problem.”

  My mom had stood up for herself. That was great.

  It meant Greg was still ongoing. That was bad.

  “That’s fantastic, Mom,” I heard myself saying. “I want you to be happy.”

  “Where’s Drummer?” said Mom, as Greg came over.

  I took them to where Drummer was tied to the trailer, munching on some hay. He was thrilled to see Mom. “Here’s a woman who knows about the important things in life!” he said, frisking her for sweets.