Horse Games

by Bonnie Bryant

  Carole gave up. Since all the other riders were just standing still watching the Carole and Marie Show, it was easy for Carole to tag Adam. He accepted the tag with good grace, but informed Carole immediately that he was smarter than she was because he wasn’t going to try to go after Marie, who was obviously better at this game than any of them. He was going to go after …

  “Lisa! You’re It!” he announced.

  A few minutes later, with Lisa still It, the game ended. Max called them to order and told them to pair up for the final exercise.

  “You mean class is almost over?” Marie asked.

  “Yes, it’s been an hour,” Max told her.

  It was clear Marie couldn’t believe it. Lisa was really happy to know she’d had so much fun that the time had flown for her, as it always did for The Saddle Club.

  Max lined them up and had them parade around the ring, once again going through their gait changes, this time keeping pace with their partners. Finally, it was time for somebody to pick the soda whip—Max’s way of designating one rider to bring a drink to all of the others—and the horses drew to the side of the ring for dismounting. Class was done.

  From the edge of the ring, Stevie announced that polocrosse practice would begin in fifteen minutes for all members of the Horse Wise polocrosse team. Those who weren’t participating were invited to watch.

  Of course, she meant Marie.

  Max and the therapist were helping Marie get down from Patch’s saddle. “I’m okay, I’m okay. I can do it myself,” she said with a trace of irritation.

  Her mother remained concerned. Her therapist just watched proudly. Obviously, she was happy with what was happening to Marie’s legs.

  “Very good!” a familiar male voice said, admiring Marie’s dismount. It was Colonel Hanson. He’d arrived early, just as The Saddle Club had planned. That was Carole’s cue, but she was in the stable. Lisa had to get her so she could tell her father she’d forgotten about polocrosse and ask if he would mind waiting.

  Lisa shooed Pepper into his stall, tracked down Carole and Starlight, and reminded her about her part in the subterfuge. Stevie’s assigned job was to get Marie to stay to watch polocrosse practice.

  Lisa followed Carole back out to the ring. They were both pleased to see that they had to interrupt a conversation between Colonel Hanson and Mrs. Dana.

  “Oh, Dad, I’m so sorry!” Carole said. “I forgot all about polocrosse practice when I asked you to pick me up today. Would you mind sticking around? It’ll only be a half hour or so.”

  “Wait? Here?” he said. “Well, Marie just told her mother she wants to watch the practice. Why don’t Olivia and I take a walk. We’ll meet you girls at TD’s after practice, okay?”

  It was better than they could have imagined. TD’s was an ice cream parlor at the nearby shopping center.

  “Fine, Dad,” Carole said. Then, she touched her own forehead lightly. “You know, Dad, I think I might have a slight fever. Do you want to check it for me?”

  Colonel Hanson put the back of his hand on her forehead. “You seem fine to me,” he said. Then he offered Mrs. Dana his arm and the two of them walked off to the ice cream parlor together.

  “Distraction,” Carole said to Lisa. “I told you, it’s the best route every time!”

  The two of them burst into giggles and ran to find Stevie. They couldn’t wait to tell her!

  POLOCROSSE PRACTICE, COACHED by Stevie Lake, was unlike any experience the riders had had with polocrosse before. Stevie was a changed person. She was all business, with no yelling, no screaming, no putting down.

  She had designed a number of exercises to develop polocrosse skills.

  “The game is primarily won with good pickups, passes, and catches. We all already know how to ride a horse. What we need to learn is to handle the racquets and balls. When we can do those things, we can defend, attack, and score. Now, first, pickups.”

  Stevie had been studying hard and she shared her knowledge well. Still sitting at the edge of the ring, because she couldn’t even be on horseback with her sore ankle, she showed how to sweep the racquet just along the surface of the ground to pick up the ball.

  “See, if you swat down at it, all you’re going to get for your trouble is a racquetful of dirt—if not worse.” There were laughs. All the riders practiced leaning forward and sweeping the ground with their racquets. Then Stevie had each of them pick up the ball, first standing still, then walking, then trotting.

  “Hey, it gets better!” Lisa declared, proudly showing off the trophy in her racquet’s net.

  “Not it—you,” Stevie corrected her. “When you practice, you get better. Next, throwing.”

  She led them through her program of exercises. With throwing, that included underarm tosses, sidearm tosses, and overhead heaves. Then it was time to practice catching. The riders faced each other on horseback and threw the balls back and forth. At first, catching was a disaster. Polocrosse balls were flying everywhere except into partners’ racquets. But then, it changed. By the fourth or fifth attempts, the riders learned how to control their racquets both as throwing and catching instruments. They were a long way from being good, but they were learning and that was something they hadn’t done much of in their first week as polocrosse players.

  When the half hour was up, all of the riders thought they had done a lot of work and that it had been good work. Everybody wanted to thank Stevie for her coaching. She had run a really good practice.

  The riders untacked and groomed their horses, fed them and gave them water, and then changed into street clothes and shoes. Within a very short time, there were only four girls left at Pine Hollow—The Saddle Club and Marie.

  “Where’s my mother?” Marie asked, suddenly realizing she hadn’t seen her since the end of class.

  Lisa, Carole, and Stevie looked at one another mischievously.

  “I think she got distracted by something,” Stevie said, putting a lot of emphasis on the word distracted.

  “By someone,” Lisa corrected her friend.

  “What are you talking about?” Marie asked.

  All eyes turned to Carole. “If you can believe it, my father invited your mother to go with him to the ice cream parlor.”

  A grin crossed Marie’s face. “You know what?” she asked. “That’s the first time in almost four months that I haven’t known exactly where my mother was. I mean, she didn’t even leave an emergency phone number!”

  TWO DAYS LATER, Carole was tightening Patch’s girth for Marie. She handed the reins to Marie. “Let me just bring Starlight to the doorway and then I’ll help you into the saddle,” she said.

  Marie’s eyes were twinkling with excitement. She was obviously eager to get going.

  Carole had arranged to take Marie on a trail ride. All she had had to do was promise Max that she would watch her every second and pledge to Mrs. Dana that she wouldn’t let Marie’s horse go faster than a walk.

  Within a few minutes, all the work was done and they were ready to go. Carole led the way to the stable’s entrance. They each brushed the good-luck horseshoe and they were off.

  The two girls rode through the fields behind Pine Hollow side-by-side. Soon, they were talking easily, as if they had been riding through fields together all their lives.

  “This really is wonderful,” Marie said. “I spent so many months indoors that I had almost forgotten how nice fresh air is, how wonderful the fields smell in the spring, how beautiful the sky is when it’s filled with fluffy clouds, how—oh, I guess I must sound foolish. Is that what you were thinking?” she asked, blushing suddenly.

  “Not at all,” Carole said. “I was thinking how much you’ve changed.”

  “I have?” Marie asked.

  “You don’t know?” Carole was surprised.

  Marie shook her head.

  “Well, when I first met you a few weeks ago, you didn’t want to talk, much less admit that anything was wrong, or even ask for help. Now, you’re having fun, aren’t
you?”

  “Yeah, I am,” she said. “And I want to have more fun, too. Can we trot?”

  “No way,” Carole said. “I promised Max and your mother on a stack of Bibles that this would be the safest trail ride anybody ever took. So, there is nothing you can say to convince me that we ought to go any faster than a very sedate walk”—she paused for effect—“at least as long as we are within sight of Pine Hollow. Come on, follow me.”

  With that Carole led the way around a small hill and obscured the stable from their view. “Ready?” she asked. Marie nodded. Carole gave Starlight a little nudge. It didn’t take much encouragement. He began trotting right away. As soon as Marie gave Patch the signal, he broke into a trot, too.

  Carole let Patch come up beside Starlight so she could watch Marie carefully. As she had seen when the girl was in class, Marie knew what she was doing. She posted with the two-beat gait of Patch’s trot, rising slightly and sitting, still keeping her back straight and her hands still.

  “Nice,” Carole said, genuinely admiring Marie’s position. “You do know what you’re doing.”

  Marie just smiled. It wasn’t clear to Carole whether that was because she was pleased by Carole’s compliment or simply happy to be trotting. It didn’t matter. A smile from Marie was a very welcome thing.

  Carole drew Starlight back down to a walk. She patted his neck reflexively. It was a way she could always tell him how much she loved riding him. Marie did the same with Patch.

  “You’re right,” Marie said, walking side-by-side with Carole. “I have changed. I’m happy now and I’m beginning to think it’s all right to be happy.”

  “I know. All of a sudden, there comes a time when you realize you don’t have to feel guilty about being happy and having fun. That’s when you can really start living your life again.”

  Marie looked at her strangely. “How did you know?”

  Carole remembered then that she’d been keeping a secret from Marie. She’d never told her new friend about her own mother’s death. At first, it had seemed as if it would be sort of phony to tell her—as if Carole were trying to prove something, or as if she expected Marie to feel sorry for her, too. That wasn’t how Carole felt, but she’d been afraid it would be how Marie would react. Now, however, the fact that she hadn’t told her made her feel dishonest, as if she’d been withholding something. Carole had to come clean and she wasn’t quite sure what to say.

  “Well, my mother—”

  “Your parents are divorced, aren’t they?” Marie asked.

  Carole shook her head. “No,” she said. There was a long silence. Then she said the words. “My mother died.”

  “A long time ago?” Marie asked.

  “Just two years. Seems like yesterday.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  Why? It sounded so strange even to her that Carole couldn’t explain it. Why not?

  “I don’t know,” she began.

  “You were holding out on me,” Marie said accusingly. “Did you think it was some kind of dirty secret?”

  “No,” Carole told her. “I guess it seems that way. It’s just that—well, I didn’t know how to tell you.”

  Carole pulled Starlight to a complete stop. Marie stopped Patch next to her. The two girls stared at each other, looking for clues and answers. Carole wished that she had told Marie when she’d first met her, wished she hadn’t kept the secret, which wasn’t a secret at all and certainly wasn’t a dirty secret. She just hadn’t wanted to talk about it and now she had to, but she didn’t know what to say.

  “It’s not fair, you know,” Marie said. “Having my father die is bad enough without people trying to lie to me about things. For a long time when I was in the hospital, they lied to me about him. ‘He’s still sick,’ they said. ‘He’ll come visit you when he can.’ Once a nurse even told me he’d been there but that I’d been asleep and they hadn’t wanted to wake me up. I knew it was a lie. That was when I knew he was dead.”

  “I hate lies, you know. I hated it when the doctors told me things wouldn’t hurt—and they did. I hated it when they told me I’d be up and walking in no time, and I wasn’t. I hated it when they said physical therapy would be easy and fun, but it wasn’t either. I hate lies, Carole, and you told me a lie!”

  The lines in Marie’s face hardened with anger. Carole wanted to speak, wanted to reach out with her heart, but there were no words. Before she could say anything at all, Marie gave Patch a big kick and the two of them bolted off—not at a leisurely walk, but at a trot that rapidly turned into a canter.

  When it came to words, Carole could often be tongue-tied, but when the subject was horses, she just about always knew what to do. Marie was a pretty good rider. That was clear to anybody who’d seen her on horseback, but she was also a girl who was still recovering from some serious injuries and she had no business galloping off through the fields. No matter how angry Marie was at Carole, Carole had a responsibility to Marie, to Marie’s mother, and to Max. She couldn’t let Marie do something recklessly dangerous!

  Carole turned Starlight around and bounded after her. Patch was a fine and gentle horse, but he was also a fast horse and once he got an idea about running free, it was sometimes pretty hard to convince him to stop. By the time Carole and Starlight were aimed in Marie’s direction, Patch was two hillocks away, and still going strong.

  “Go, boy! Go!” Carole said, touching Starlight gently with her riding crop. He got the idea. He instinctively understood what Carole needed. Carole was grateful then for the fact that horses are naturally competitive. They love races and Starlight was no exception. As far as he was concerned, Patch’s head start was just all the more reason to go fast.

  Carole gripped tightly with her legs and they flew after Marie and Patch. As they got closer, she was afraid that Marie was struggling with Patch. Riding a horse under control wasn’t always easy, even with strong legs. Riding a horse out of control was hard, even for an experienced rider, and nearly impossible for somebody with weak legs. “Help!” Marie shrieked. She was doing the best she could but it was just too much for her. Her arms flailed over her head and the reins flew out of her hands.

  “Grab his mane!” Carole yelled.

  Marie’s fingers clutched at Patch’s mane.

  Carole focused every bit of her concentration on reaching Patch and grabbing the loose reins. Every time her concentration slipped the least bit, her mind filled with a terrible image of Marie falling on the ground and hurting herself. If Marie had to go back to the hospital now, Carole didn’t know how she’d ever forgive herself—and she was sure Marie would never forgive her.

  “Hold with your legs! I’m almost there,” Carole called out. She tried to mask the fear in her voice. She was sure it wouldn’t do Marie any good to think that she was scared, too.

  Then, a funny thing happened. Starlight pulled up to Patch and the two of them ran neck and neck together. Carole tried to reach over to grab Patch’s reins. Before she could get them, however, Patch slowed down and drew to a halt. As far as he was concerned, the race was over. He probably even thought he’d won. Carole didn’t care what his motive was. She was just glad he’d stopped. Carole drew in Starlight’s reins and rode over to Marie.

  Marie didn’t have the reins, and her feet were out of Patch’s stirrups, but she was still in the saddle. She was leaning forward against Patch’s neck, clutching it. Tears streaked her face. She gasped with the sobs that racked her body.

  Carole dismounted. She took Patch’s reins and Starlight’s and walked the horses to a fence post nearby. She secured the reins around the pole.

  “Come on,” she said gently, helping Marie out of the saddle. “Let’s get you down from there for a breather, okay?”

  Without answering, Marie allowed Carole to help her down. Carole fished in the pocket of her breeches and found a rumpled handkerchief. She offered it to Marie. Marie wiped at her tears, but they kept coming. Carole led her to a small rock on the edge of the field,
where they could sit and talk in peace. But first, Marie needed to cry.

  Carole knew Marie wasn’t just crying about the fright she’d had with Patch. Nor was she crying about Carole’s deception. She was crying about everything awful that had happened to her in the last few months, but mostly about her father’s death. Carole put her arm around her to comfort her.

  “It’s okay,” Carole said. “I know. I really do. About the only thing I can tell you is that it will get better. That’s not much comfort right now. Maybe that’s one of the reasons I didn’t tell you about my mother before. I knew it wouldn’t help.”

  “How does it get better? It doesn’t change,” Marie said. “Nothing can change the fact that he’s dead.”

  “I know,” Carole said.

  Marie’s tears finally subsided. She blew her nose a final time. “Thank you,” she said.

  “For what?” Carole asked.

  “For knowing how I feel. A lot of people kept telling me not to cry. You knew better. A lot of people told me that things would change. You knew better. A lot of people kept telling me how to feel. You didn’t. You just let me feel what I felt. You knew you couldn’t change that. You should have told me about your mother, but I guess I understand and, anyway, you didn’t really lie.”

  “Sort of,” Carole admitted.

  “And mostly thank you for saving me when I let Patch run wild. That was scary!”

  “You can say that again!”

  Marie shivered with the memory and the girls laughed. It helped to release a lot of the fear they’d both had when Patch was on the run. They felt better when they were done laughing.

  “Phew,” Marie said. “Now what do we do?”

  “Next, we get you back in the saddle and walk slowly and carefully back through the fields to Pine Hollow. And as we walk, I’ll tell you more about how I felt when my mother died, if you want to hear it. I’ll tell you how much I love horseback riding and what a comfort it was to me when I was saddest. It’s still a comfort to me. Then I’ll tell you I think you can get as much out of it as I do. And, finally, I’m going to try to talk you into joining our polocrosse team.”