“Cool.” He inhaled the bottom bun, then started on the burger.
“No! Not cool! I’d make a fool of myself, Catman. Plus, I’d make the pro-life side look stupid!”
Catman squinted at my eye and handed me his napkin.
I dabbed at the makeup.
“Heard you ran into a door.” Catman didn’t look up from the peas he scooped onto his knife.
My lie sounded even lamer coming from Catman. I couldn’t think of anything to say.
Catman rejoined the food line for seconds.
All around kids shouted, making plans for after school. Silverware banged. Trays clattered.
I glanced at Summer and Grant’s table and thought about Hawk’s e-mail. Maybe Summer had made it up about finding a horse to replace Beauty. I wouldn’t have put it past her. A tray plunked down across from me.
“Catman—,” I started.
But it wasn’t Catman. I recognized the kid from my English class who sat in the back and hadn’t said one word since school started. His hair, pulled back in a ponytail, was longer than Catman’s, but black, like everything he wore every single day. Even in August, he’d shown up in black jeans and a black turtleneck.
I started to warn him he was in Catman’s spot, but thought better of it. Catman could take care of himself. Instead, I tried to smile. “Hi . . .” I didn’t even know his name.
He glanced at me, then went back to his burger.
“How’s it going?” I tried again.
This time he didn’t even look up.
Fine. I’d wait until Catman got back. Nobody takes the Catman’s seat.
Catman walked up and, without a pause, slid in next to the kid in black. They might have been in a french-fry race, matching each other as they ate fry for fry in silence. When Catman had finished every bite of his seconds, he said, “M, this is Winnie.”
So this was M! I’d heard M stories ever since we’d moved to Ashland. Kids joked about what the M stood for—Mystery, Moody, Maniac, Mute.
“We’re in Brumby’s class together,” I said. “So what’s the M stand for?”
M shot me a look as if I’d asked him why his mother wore army boots.
Catman shoved his tray away. “Done.” Compared to M, he was downright talkative.
At least I didn’t have to worry about M blabbing. “Catman, I’m riding Beauty as soon as I’m done with the Pet Help Line. I have to get her to take that high jump.”
He raised his eyebrows.
“Don’t say that!” I protested. “I can do this in my sleep.”
Catman locked his bright blues on me. “No doorknobs this time?”
“Look, I’m going to tell everybody the truth . . . eventually. I just need to make the jump first. Okay? I’m sure I can do it this time.”
Luckily Pat had a lot of customers at Pat’s Pets after school, so she didn’t get a chance to quiz me. Barker settled in a new litter of puppies while I watched Catman answer his last e-mail at lightning speed, using only his thumbs and pinkies.
Catman,
A pilot friend claims you solved his cat problem after three cat psychologists failed. We’re flight attendants and have a Siamese cat in our Chicago apartment. When we’re gone, Cuddles takes her revenge and scratches my favorite couch—never anything else. Any advice?
—Cat-loving Stewardesses
Catman didn’t even pause to think of his answer:
Peace, Stewardesses!
You can stop that scratching by chowing down an orange. Pin the orange peel to that couch. Cats hate the smell of oranges. Cuddles won’t hang there again. But hey, man! You should rap about getting another cat. Cuddles is lonely! Thanks for writing—gives me a chance to practice left-handed typing. Stewardesses is the longest English word you can type with the left hand. Fly high!
—Catman
Catman walked off to find Peter Lory, and I took over. Right away I spotted a message from Hawk and saved it until I’d finished the help-line e-mails. Sunday I’d lied to Hawk, too, and promised that Beauty and I were fine. Maybe this time, on e-mail, I could tell her the truth.
It didn’t take long to answer five horse e-mails. Then I scrolled down to Hawk’s:
Winnie!
Great news about Bold Beauty! I should have known Winnie the Horse Gentler wouldn’t fail when it came to horses!
Guess what I saw in the grasslands! My first golden plover! It had long legs, like the Ohio plover, the one Lizzy calls “killdeer.” When I got close to the nest, the bird spread out her wings and pretended to be hurt. She led me away from her babies and faked injury to protect them.
Mother is calling. No, I have not gotten the courage to tell her yet.
—Hawk
How could I tell Hawk about my problem when she had her own? I dashed off a quick pep talk to encourage her to talk to her parents. I ended with “You can do it! So just do it!”
At home, all three horses came into the barn to greet me. It felt great to be around horses after a day of dealing with humans. If there was any place in the world I had confidence, this was it. Nothing was stopping me from taking that high jump.
Except that the stalls needed cleaning. After mucking them, I grained the horses, measuring out the special oat mix I keep in plastic bins. Beauty finished her oats and came back for more. She snorted gently and nuzzled me. I slipped my arms around her neck and smelled the warmth. Chilly nights had brought on horse fuzz, the first stage of her winter coat.
“You deserve a good owner like Adrianna,” I murmured.
I was halfway to the tack box to get the jumping saddle when I changed my mind. No sense making Nickers jealous by jumping Beauty. I really should ride my own horse first.
Nickers stood still while I slipped on the hackamore, her bitless bridle, and swung up bareback. She quivered, ready to go. I hugged her neck, feeling safe.
We rode away from the barn, far away from the hedge that loomed in the pasture. I turned down an overgrown lane blanketed with brown leaves. A flock of birds took off in a fury of wings.
Can we just stay here forever, God?
The lane grew narrower, then disappeared into weeds. I let Nickers choose her own path and her own pace. She must have read my heart. Nickering softly, my Arabian moved through the field, surefooted and controlled. When we came to a fence, she turned around.
As we neared the barn, Nickers pranced. She may have been eager to see Towaco and Beauty. Or she might have sensed my anxiety.
I cooled Nickers down. Then instead of saddling Beauty, I hopped on Hawk’s good-natured Appaloosa. Towaco had worked his way out of every vice he’d picked up at Stable-Mart. Anybody could ride him now.
After a quick ride on the Appy, I trotted back to the paddock, where Lizzy and Catman were waiting.
“Why aren’t you riding the new horse?” Lizzy asked.
“I will.” I dismounted, careful not to look at Catman.
“Catman told me you’re on Barker’s don’t- have-abortions debate team! That so rocks, Winnie!” Lizzy hopped off the fence. “Can you hold off on riding the jumping horse until after dinner?”
“Sure!” I must have sounded too eager. Catman shook his head. Quickly I added, “I’ll work Beauty after dinner.”
But even as I said the words, pictures flooded my head—the hedge below me, Beauty’s neck as I fell, Catman’s shadowy face as I lay flat on my back.
We found Dad rocking in his chair like a crazy man. Sweat dripped off his forehead, although it was sweatshirt weather.
Catman pulled a rolled-up paper from his pocket and handed it to Dad.
Dad stopped rocking. He took the paper, then handed it back. “Catman, I told you I’m not ready. What if I won, not that I ever would? What would I do with Winnie and Lizzy while I’m at some Invention Convention?”
“You didn’t enter that Inventor’s Contest yet?” Lizzy squealed.
Catman handed back the paper. “Claire and Bart said our pad is your pad. You win, we’ll keep the girls.”
Lizzy and I exchanged looks of terror. Coolidge Castle? Talk about your nice place to visit . . . but you wouldn’t want to live there.
But Dad wasn’t biting anyway. For some reason, he didn’t seem to want to enter that contest.
Just as well.
Dad tossed the application down and revved up his rocker. “See? It’s just not working.” He rocked faster and pointed to the fan blades on top of the wind pole. “Stick your hands up there.”
We did. A trickle of wind came out. Nothing compared to Dad’s huffs and puffs.
He stopped. “Some invention.”
We ate a quick meal of corn fish—Lizzy’s variation on corn dogs, using fish sticks instead of hot dogs. Then Dad returned to his invention, and I headed back to the barn.
I decided to work Beauty on the lunge line, letting her jump riderless on the end of the long, nylon line.
I set out the five poles, or cavalletti, in a grid, spacing them along the ground so Beauty could canter over them without shifting her stride. Next I laid out a series of low jumps, raising the poles nine inches off the ground, adding in two medium fence jumps, and letting the hedge serve as the final high jump.
Beauty cantered easily at the end of the lunge, flying over the ground poles and low jumps as if they weren’t there. She loved to jump.
I kept her low-jumping on the lunge until dusk. Then I brought her in and cooled her off.
“How was your ride?” Dad asked when I walked up. He turned off the yard light.
“Great!” Half-truth. Beauty had done great. I hadn’t even ridden.
Dad opened the door. “Coming?”
“In a minute.” I gazed at the moon as Dad went inside. Clouded beams dabbed light around weird shadows in the yard.
I started for the door.
“Yuk!” Something sticky grabbed my arms. I brushed wildly, trying to get it off, knowing I’d walked smack-dab into a spiderweb. Imagining the spider pouncing on me and crawling all over my skin, I rubbed my arms and stamped my feet.
Lizzy’s spider? I knew it couldn’t have been Lizzy’s pet, but I walked back to her spider tree to make sure. Moonlight struck the spider’s fancy web, outlining silvery lace patterns and sparkling pearls.
In the corner of the web, Lizzy’s spider waited with his prizes—three lumps wrapped in silk, insects hopelessly trapped.
Hopelessly trapped.
That’s how I felt when I thought about jumping that hedge.
No! I can do it! I can. . . .
But it felt like a lie, a lie to myself.
My mind flashed to Beauty chasing Pat’s car. Pat had said something about giving Beauty a false confidence. Was that what I’d had myself—false confidence? Because somewhere inside me a voice screamed that I could no more jump that hedge than Beauty could chase a car.
I ran back to the house, still trying to get the sticky cobweb off. But it followed me every step. I couldn’t get unstuck. I couldn’t shake it off.
“Little Miss Muffet was a real girl, you know.” My sister’s voice floated in darkness above our beds as the night outside grew darker.
I wished I’d never told her about my run-in with the spiderweb. She hadn’t stopped chattering about the creatures.
“Thomas Muffet was a spider expert,” Lizzy continued. “He made his daughter eat mashed spiders when she got sick. People thought eating spiders would cure a cold.”
I pulled the covers over my head. “Night, Lizzy! Please?”
But I couldn’t sleep. Every time I dozed off, pictures of the hedge crept into my brain, and I’d jerk myself awake.
Tuesday in English, Ms. Brumby didn’t say a word about the debate. And she didn’t bring it up the next day or the next. Meanwhile, Pat Haven made a plea in her class every single day, so heartfelt I could have volunteered all over again.
But it was just as well I didn’t have to worry about the debate. I had enough on my mind. All week I practiced Beauty over the pole jumps and parallels—always riderless. I kept reassuring myself that I had plenty of time to ride Beauty. The Howards weren’t due back from their honeymoon until a week from Saturday.
But the more I told myself everything was fine, the more I doubted my own word. I knew better than anybody how many lies I’d handed out lately.
On Friday, I could tell by Pat’s face that nobody had come through at the last minute and volunteered for her debate team. She begged the class one last time, then gave up and made us open our books to the chapter on senses.
“What do you kids know about the way animals see?” Pat sounded like the spunk had drained out of her.
“My cat’s eyes glow in the dark,” Kristine offered. I’d never spoken to Kristine. She had short blonde hair, dark eyebrows, and dark eyes. All I knew about her was that she seemed smart and she ran with Summer’s crowd. “But it’s actually reflected light not absorbed by the retina.”
“Uh-huh.” Pat glanced around the room. “Anybody else?”
Barker raised his hand. “Most dogs see great, but they’re not big on colors.”
“Uh-huh.” Normally, Pat would have been bouncing around room, cheering for each answer, instead of slouching behind her desk.
Brian raised his hand. “Bats are blind as a bat—no offense!”
Half of the class laughed. I hated it. It felt like they were making fun of Pat. And she felt bad enough already.
I swallowed hard and raised my hand, something I don’t usually do in class unless I need to go to the bathroom.
Pat sighed. “Winnie?”
I cleared my throat. “Horses’ eyes are set on the sides so they can see almost all the way around, except for blind spots right in front and right behind.”
My mind flashed that picture of me on Beauty heading for the hedge. How could she jump something so tall when she couldn’t even see it in front of her? But that was silly. All horses have blind spots, not just Beauty. And if they have confidence in the rider, they’re okay not seeing everything in front of them.
Pat was asking me something. “. . . anything else?”
“Um . . . horses see independently out of each eye, but that gives them poor depth vision. They may not know if something is a foot away or three feet away.”
Did Beauty know how far she was from the hedge? Again, it wouldn’t have mattered, not if she could have gotten confidence from me. Maybe I was the one who couldn’t read how far we were from the hedge.
I didn’t hear much of what other kids said about their pets. I kept trying to picture that hedge the instant before we jumped.
Kids began to shuffle their papers and grab their backpacks, signaling class was almost over.
Pat took a deep breath and gave it one more try. “Well, this is it, kiddos. Last chance before we have to move to the next topic. Any takers on the abortion debate?”
Summer sighed so loud she sounded like Catman’s camel-moan tornado horn.
Nobody spoke up.
Barker silently begged, his colt eyes turned on each student.
“Then I guess,” Pat said, “since today’s the deadline, we’ll change the topic to—”
Somebody knocked at the door.
We all turned to see Catman Coolidge, nose pressed to the windowpane high in the door.
Pat opened the door. “Catman?”
Without a word, he handed her a note and left.
Pat walked back to her desk, unfolding the note. “Yippee! The debate is on!”
“What happened?” Barker asked, already out of his seat.
“Catman came through! He’s recruited a fourth member for the pro-life debate team.”
“Who’d he get?” Brian hollered.
Pat squinted at the wrinkled paper.
“Well?” Summer demanded. “Who is it?”
“I’m not rightly sure,” Pat said slowly. “I reckon this is just an initial. All it says is M.”
Kids were laughing hard as they poured out of Pat’s classroom into the crowded hall.
> I hung back with Barker. “Barker, what are we going to do? The debate is tomorrow. And M talks less than I do!”
Barker beamed as if we’d just been given our ace. “You never know, Winnie.”
Pat had Barker, Sal, M, and me meet after school for debate practice, which consisted of her trying to explain the rules. Each of us had to give a one-to-two-minute opening argument. Then we had to know enough to rebut the opposing team’s arguments.
Barker promised to compile a list of facts for us to use in the debate since we only had 24 hours to prepare. Sal painted her fingernails during the whole practice. I said three words, and M none. I felt like hurling.
I stopped by the pet shop and answered the Pet Help Line. Hawk’s name didn’t show in my in-box, and my disappointment surprised me. In school Hawk hung out with the popular kids, and she and I could go a whole day on a couple of hi’s. But on e-mail, one day without hearing from her seemed weird.
Just as I finished my last e-mail, advising “Frustrated” to slow down training his horse and focus on one skill at a time, Pat hurried by the computer.
She stopped, then backed up even with me. “How’s that hunter coming along?”
“Great, Pat!” I answered, choking on the lie, relieved when she walked away.
Catman followed me home. Our bikes made the cool breeze colder. By the time we reached home, I was glad I’d worn my flannel shirt.
Catman joined Dad at the rocker. I went straight to the pasture to lunge Bold Beauty. Riderless, she sailed over the pole jumps with no problem. I kept telling myself I’d get the debate over with. Then I could really focus on Beauty. I’d be over that high jump with no sweat.
I was leading Beauty back in when I heard a car pull up and two doors slam. Seconds later Richard and Summer walked out to the paddock. Summer still wore the long red sweater she’d worn at school. She looked as out of place as an American Saddle Horse at a Clydesdale convention.
“Can I help you?” I asked, as if they were customers.
“Good! We’re in time,” Richard announced.
“Time for what?” I led Beauty past them into the barn.
Bold Beauty Page 7
