“You know what I think?” Rosie said to his father and stepmother. “I think you guys ought to just stay here. And I know what you ought to do with all the money you’ve got saved up too.”
“Oh, really?” Brad rolled his eyes at his wife, then looked back to his son. “Okay, lay it on us. I can’t wait to hear this. What do you have in mind for our hard-earned money?”
Rosie said, “I think you ought to get some more horses. So we can all go riding with Colt.”
There was a moment of total silence. Then everyone started talking at once.
Audrey to Brad: “You know, I really did enjoy riding Bonita.”
Brad to Audrey: “It’s a thought. It would be safer for Colt. Horses don’t get so nervous when they’re in a group.”
“It’s something we could all do together.”
“And less hassle for Mrs. Reynolds, not to have Colt pestering her to take him out on the trail.”
Colt to Rosie: “You really mean it? You’d get on a horse again? You sure you didn’t hit your head?”
Rosie to anybody who would listen: “I just mean, like, real safe gentle horses. With cowboy saddles. None of that stuff where they make you go over jumps and wear tight pants.”
Lauri, jumping up and down and clutching at the adults: “Oh, oh, oh, a horse of my own, I can’t believe it, oh, please, Daddy! Oh, please, Mom!”
And Brad and Audrey gave each other helpless looks and started to laugh. Which seemed to settle it.
“Tell you what,” Colt told Lauri, businesslike, “suppose I take you out to the stable sometime and start giving you some riding lessons.”
Colt told Mrs. Berry all about it the next time he saw her for physical therapy. “So as soon as Rosie is able to get around better, Mom and Brad are going to take a weekend and go out to Ohio to visit Mr. Ticknor and maybe buy some Paso Finos.”
“Colt, that’s wonderful.” Bending over the padded table, measuring Colt for longer braces because he had grown so much, Mrs. Berry shook her head happily. She was, Colt noticed, a rather pretty lady, little blond mustache and all. “I’m so thrilled things are going well for you. And you know, I feel like I ought to take some personal credit. I’m the one who dragged you to Horseback Riding for the Handicapped, remember?”
Colt remembered, but Mrs. Berry didn’t give him time to answer. She chattered eagerly on. “I can’t believe how much you’ve grown up since then. It’s hard to believe you’re the same boy. You used to be such a—well, so immature.”
Such a brat, she meant. Colt didn’t know whether to laugh or scream. “You noticed,” he finally managed to say.
“I certainly did notice! You were quite a nuisance. Half the time I wanted to strangle you.” Mrs. Berry playfully put her hands around Colt’s neck and gave a gentle squeeze.
He grinned at her. “I’m glad you didn’t.”
“So am I.” Mrs. Berry shifted her hands back to her tape measure. “Now that you’re feeling so much stronger and surer of yourself, you’ve turned into a beautiful human being.”
Ick. But that was all right. Now that he had Bonita, Colt found it a lot easier to like life and everyone in it. Mrs. Berry and all her handicapped kids—Anna Susanna, Jay Gee, Matt, cute little Julie.
Even boogerhead Neely, who was just coming in the therapy-room door for his own session.
“Okay, Colt.” Mrs. Berry helped him down off the table onto the floor. “Fifty push-ups. Neely, you too.”
“I can’t do that many!” Neely whined.
Colt said, “Sure you can, Neely!”
“Drop dead!”
Colt didn’t feel the least bit angry. Was that where Mrs. Berry got her patience, just from feeling good about herself? He said, “Hey, Neely, come on, you got to try. I didn’t used to think I could do it either.”
“Butt out!”
“Neely,” Mrs. Berry reproved, “Colt’s just trying to help. Push-ups, both of you. Start!”
Colt finished his fifty push-ups while Neely was still complaining his way through twenty. He wished he could make Neely see, make Neely understand.… He wished he could change Neely’s life the way horses had changed his, because he knew exactly how Neely felt.
At the very back of his mind he decided that maybe he would help handicapped kids somehow when he grew up.
But meanwhile there were other things to do.
On a green-and-golden, blue-skied day in June, a family went horseback riding.
Up the Deep Meadows Farm lane, then along the dirt road. Mrs. Reynolds, now well and strong again, stopped the tractor she was driving and hollered after them, “Beautiful day!”
“Yeah!” Colt yelled back with the others.
“Have a good ride!”
“Okay!”
Brad’s horse, the biggest one, was a sturdy chestnut gelding named Flame. He was not particularly handsome, but Audrey’s little Maria del Consuela was a beauty. A cremello, a pale buckskin, lighter than Audrey’s blond hair, with black legs and tail and a sunny streak in her long black mane—she was, Colt had to admit, almost as pretty as Bonita.
Lauri’s horse was a flashy pinto Paso named Luz, “the light.” Bonita liked Maria del Consuela, but did not get along as well with Luz. When Lauri let Luz get her nose too close to Bonita’s hindquarters, Bonita laid back her ears and lashed her tail, threatening. Colt sent her scooting forward before she could kick.
From Flame’s back Brad glanced over at him. “Everything all right, Son?”
“Sure, Dad. I can handle her.”
The adoption proceedings had begun. Colt would soon be officially a Flowers. When had he started calling his stepfather Dad? He couldn’t remember. It had all been so natural, he hadn’t noticed.
Into the state forest, onto the lakeside trail … Rosie rode up beside Colt, his long legs hanging well below his horse’s belly. Rosie’s horse? It was a big, homely, Roman-nosed, flop-eared Appaloosa with only the most pathetic excuses for mane and tail. Rosie rode Liverwurst, and loved him.
“Race ya,” Rosie teased.
“Give me a break, Fran.” Colt knew he would always be handicapped. He couldn’t get reckless on horseback. Ever.
“Turkey! You know this snorting horsey of mine could beat you.”
“Nothing can beat me,” said Colt.
About the Author
Nancy Springer has passed the fifty-book milestone with novels for adults, young adults, and children, in genres including mythic fantasy, contemporary fiction, magic realism, horror, and mystery—although she did not realize she wrote mystery until she won the Edgar Award from the Mystery Writers of America two years in succession. Born in Montclair, New Jersey, Springer moved with her family to Gettysburg, of Civil War fame, when she was thirteen. She spent the next forty-six years in Pennsylvania, raising two children (Jonathan and Nora), writing, horseback riding, fishing, and bird-watching. In 2007 she surprised her friends and herself by moving with her second husband to an isolated area of the Florida Panhandle where the bird-watching is spectacular, and where, when fishing, she occasionally catches an alligator.
All rights reserved, including without limitation the right to reproduce this ebook or any portion thereof in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 1991 by Nancy Springer
Cover design by Drew Padrutt
ISBN: 978-1-4976-8872-8
This edition published in 2014 by Open Road Integrated Media, Inc.
345 Hudson Street
New York, NY 10014
www.openroadmedia.com
EBOOKS BY NANCY SPRINGER
FROM OPEN ROAD MEDIA
A
vailable wherever ebooks are sold
Open Road Integrated Media is a digital publisher and multimedia content company. Open Road creates connections between authors and their audiences by marketing its ebooks through a new proprietary online platform, which uses premium video content and social media.
Videos, Archival Documents, and New Releases
Sign up for the Open Road Media newsletter and get news delivered straight to your inbox.
Sign up now at
www.openroadmedia.com/newsletters
FIND OUT MORE AT
WWW.OPENROADMEDIA.COM
FOLLOW US:
@openroadmedia and
Facebook.com/OpenRoadMedia
Colt Page 9
