Horse Love

by Bonnie Bryant

  “BOY, I’M READY for a good long nap now and I bet you are, too,” said Tec, holding Lisa’s hand outside her cabin door.

  “I am,” she said, smiling back at him.

  “I’ll come knock on your door for dinner at eight tonight, okay?”

  “It’s a date,” she said.

  “And you get all the rest you can before then, because there’s going to be dancing in the disco tonight and I want to be sure you’re up to it.”

  “I will be,” she promised.

  He leaned over and gave her a quick kiss. “Sleep tight,” he said.

  Lisa was sure she would. It was only the middle of the afternoon, but she’d already had a trail ride, a swim in the pool, and a snorkeling picnic on the beach with Tec. Rest was something she could definitely use—especially after being up so late the night before!

  She unlocked her door and went in, aware that Tec was walking away, toward his own room.

  As she stepped in, she noticed a piece of paper on the floor. She leaned over to pick it up. It was a note from Jane.

  “Rehearsal 3–5 in theater,” it read.

  Lisa had forgotten all about the talent show and the rehearsal schedule that Jane had promised to provide. She hadn’t really thought it possible that the first rehearsal would be that afternoon, but since the show was going to be on Saturday and this was Monday, there wasn’t a lot of time to spare.

  The problem was that although she’d mentioned the show to Tec, she’d never told him that Jane had promised a rehearsal schedule, and since she hadn’t known herself what the schedule would be, there was no way he would know to be in the theater at three.

  It was already two-thirty, so there was no time to waste. She had to tell him right away.

  She put her key card back in her pocket, slipped her sandals back on her feet, and hurried out the door.

  First she thought Tec might be in sight. It had only been a matter of seconds since he’d kissed her good-bye, but there was no sign of him. His room was in another area of the resort, and she knew the number because he’d had to give it for identification when they’d returned the snorkeling equipment.

  She hurried over to his section, still hoping to spot him on his way. It took a few minutes to locate his cabin. She was uncomfortable knocking at his door, but she had no choice. Time was passing, and she had to get to the rehearsal, but she’d need to shower and change first.

  She listened at the door. There was no sound. Perhaps he was asleep already. That wouldn’t surprise her. She raised her hand and knocked.

  There was no answer. She waited a few seconds and then knocked again. He was a pretty sound sleeper, as she knew from watching him at the pool. She almost wished she had a water polo ball to wake him with. She knocked a third time. There was still no answer.

  Either he was totally zonked, in which case he’d be too tired for the rehearsal, or he was in the shower. If that was the case, then all she had to do was to let him know what was happening. She took the paper Jane had left for her, folded it, and slid it under Tec’s door. He might get there late, but he’d get there.

  Satisfied, she returned to her own room for a very quick shower and changed into clean, dry clothes.

  By a few minutes to three, she was racing through the open-air lounge area to the theater.

  The lounge area abutted the swimming pools where she’d met up with Tec that morning. She glanced over at the seats, wondering who was occupying them now and if they were enjoying being there as much as she and Tec had.

  The seats were empty, though each had a towel draped on it. Lisa turned her attention to the theater, but something caught her eye. At first she thought it was Tec, but it was hard to tell because there was a big splash fight going on.

  She looked again. It wasn’t Tec. It couldn’t be. For one thing, Tec was taking a shower or a nap. For another, that boy was with another girl—a skinny thing, wearing a string bikini, and they were splashing one another in the pool. Tec wouldn’t be with another girl, and he’d told her that he didn’t like to swim in freshwater pools. It was funny to think that there would be two boys at the same resort who had similar looks—what good news for the girls who hadn’t been lucky enough to meet Tec first!

  Then she turned her attention to the theater and, following the clear signs, went right on in.

  The rehearsal had already started. Jane waved Lisa in and straight onto the stage.

  “Okay, now, chorus line, let’s see how you can kick!”

  Lisa put her arm around the waist of the woman next to her and, without missing a beat, joined in on the kick line. She’d certainly had enough ballet and tap lessons over the years to be able to manage that.

  “Nice work, Lisa!” Jane said.

  The PA was blasting a poor rendition of “There’s No Business Like Show Business,” leading Lisa to assume, correctly as it turned out, that they were working on the grand finale. That was one of the things she loved about putting a show together. Sometimes there appeared to be little or no logic to the order.

  However, as Lisa looked around, she knew exactly what the logic was. There were almost no men present. Since a kick line was all women, it made complete sense to begin with that.

  Jane had them go over the steps four or five times until it was roughly passable.

  “We don’t need this to be too professional,” Jane said. “Enthusiasm is much more important than precision!”

  Lisa smiled to herself. That was typically the case with amateur shows. The fact was that precision was impossible, so enthusiasm was essential.

  Once they had the finale down, Jane checked her clipboard for other acts to rehearse.

  She shook her head. “We need men,” she said.

  “I’ve got one coming,” Lisa promised.

  “Where is he now?”

  “Taking a nap,” Lisa said. “But he’s got talent and I can fill him in on stuff so he’ll be up to speed tomorrow. I mean, I don’t think he can do the kick line.…”

  “I don’t expect that—just that he can hold a tune and is willing to sing with the chorus.”

  “You can count on that,” Lisa promised.

  “Okay, leave a space for him,” said Jane, indicating where the group should make room for one more.

  Jane had worked up a number of funny skits for the performers to put together. One of them was about a honeymooning couple who didn’t notice anything else going on around them. It was very funny, and Lisa could easily imagine herself and Tec playing the parts—for real—but Jane wouldn’t cast anyone who wasn’t there.

  There was a skit making fun of the activity director, and another that involved a barnyard and required several people to share costumes for horses and cows. Lisa’s favorite skit was about snorkeling. Almost all of the skits required a chorus of some sort, and in each case Lisa made a space for Tec. None of this was hard. All of the music for the chorus parts was recorded, so the chorus had to do little more than be there and lip-sync. Tec could do that, for sure.

  Lisa had had the foresight to stick a notepad in her pocket. As Jane described the blocking for each skit, she made notes for herself and for Tec. Since there would only be three rehearsals before the dress rehearsal, Tec would have to work hard to catch up. He could do it, though, she was sure.

  “Okay,” Jane said, inviting them all to sit down on stools on the stage. “Those are the general skits, and since we do variations of them with every group of guests at the resort, I can assure you the audiences love them—especially the all-male Swan Lake takeoff. The other part of the show will be individual performances by guests. If there are people who would like to perform, sing, dance, juggle, twirl batons, whatever, they should see me. I’ll be holding auditions tonight at six and tomorrow at four. Thanks for all your good work, and I’ll see everybody tomorrow afternoon, same time, same place.”

  Individual performances. Maybe that included duets. Could she and Tec do something? There were a lot of wonderful Broadway show duets they
could sing, like “Anything You Can Do” from Annie Get Your Gun. Or maybe something like “Let’s Call the Whole Thing Off.” Either one of those would be great. They’d be showstoppers. They’d be wonderful! She knew it would be unbelievably fun to work with Tec on a silly song like that, but she also knew, and was less eager to admit, that it would be a way of showing him her talent. She didn’t like to think of herself as a show-off or think that she had anything to prove, but it would be nice to show Tec that she wasn’t exaggerating. She talk with him about it tonight and they could practice together tomorrow. It might not be exactly like a picnic on an almost-deserted beach, but it would mean being together and working together. She got excited just thinking about it.

  “Okay, that’s it. Rehearsal’s over. See you next time!” Jane said. “And Lisa, I guess I’ll see you tomorrow morning on the trail ride, right?”

  “Of course,” Lisa said. “I wouldn’t miss it.”

  She wouldn’t—and she had no intention of letting Tec miss it, either.

  Lisa hopped down off the stage and headed back out into the bright tropical sunlight. It was just after five o’clock, and the afternoon seemed even hotter than it had before. She became aware of her overall exhaustion, recalling the nap she’d promised herself for the afternoon, now mostly gone. She was expecting to see Tec at eight. That gave her two and a half hours to rest and a half hour to freshen up and change before he came to pick her up for dinner. She glanced at the pool as she walked past it, wondering if she would see the guy who reminded her of Tec, but there was no sign of him or the skinny girl in the skimpy bikini.

  “She probably got a terrible sunburn,” Lisa told herself, and then realized she was being unnecessarily mean. She needed a nap.

  “I THINK THERE’S a way to do this on the computer, but I don’t know what it is,” said Carole, glaring at a sheet of paper. What she held in her hand was a list of names. It seemed like everyone in the stable wanted to help with the painting, and that was good news. It also seemed like they all had different schedules.

  “Why don’t we just tell everybody to come whenever they can?” Stevie asked.

  “Because then we’d end up with fourteen people in a room that can hold only four. Anyway, we only have six paintbrushes.”

  “And two cans of paint.”

  “That, too,” Carole agreed. “So you had this bright idea to ask everybody when they had time. Some of them wrote times they were available; others just said when they were busy. I think if we look at this carefully, we can figure out Dr. Faisal’s entire schedule for the week.”

  Dr. Faisal seemed to be everybody’s orthodontist, and apparently every single rider at Pine Hollow was getting his or her braces tightened during school vacation.

  “Well, his office is between school and the stable,” Stevie reminded her.

  “I know. It’s just funny to see it on this paper. Now, how do we organize?” Carole asked.

  “We think what Lisa would do,” said Stevie.

  “Ah, yes,” said Carole.

  Stevie perched on the desk next to where Carole had placed the sheet of paper. The two of them studied it for a while.

  “Okay, first we have to reorganize this list,” said Carole.

  “Just what I was going to say.”

  Stevie pulled a fresh sheet of paper out of the desk drawer, turned it sideways, and made six columns. The first one was NAMES and the rest were the days of the week, Tuesday to Saturday. Then she broke the days into thirds and called those MORNING, MIDDAY, and AFTERNOON. This was for them to work out who was available at which times. Once they knew that, they could then begin to assign times on a second sheet of paper.

  “This is just what Lisa would do,” Carole said, beaming.

  “Sure,” Stevie agreed. “But she’d know how to do it on the computer.”

  Carole shook her head. “I don’t think so,” she said. “Lisa’s not all that hot with the computer. It’s Phil who could figure out how to do it on a computer.”

  Stevie looked at the handmade chart and smiled. “Computers? Who needs ’em? Not me!”

  LISA’S EYES FLUTTERED open. She was aware of little more than the total darkness of her room. At first, she wasn’t even aware of what room it was, but then the soft breeze coming through the light cotton curtain reminded her she was on vacation, at a resort on San Felipe, and that she was falling in love with the most amazing boy she’d ever met.

  Then she looked at the clock on her bedside table. It was almost nine! She only had a few minutes to get to the dining room before they stopped serving dinner. She leaped out of bed, brushed her teeth, ran a comb through her hair, and pulled on a white cotton dress. She grabbed her key card, slipped into some sandals, and was out the door and onto the path to the dining room before she remembered that Tec had promised to pick her up for dinner at eight. Had she been sleeping so soundly that she’d missed him? How embarrassing!

  She still felt the vague disorientation of a sound sleep when she arrived at the dining room. The line was dwindling and they were clearly getting ready to stop seating people, but she was in time … to have dinner with whom?

  She stood on her tiptoes and looked around the place for Tec. She spotted him quickly. He was at a table full of other kids around their age. He waved to her cheerfully.

  She slid past the hostess and went over to the table but was disappointed to find that there weren’t any empty seats. It might not matter anyway, because it was clear they were almost finished eating.

  “I guess I must have been sound asleep when you knocked,” she said.

  Tec looked slightly confused and then embarrassed. “Oh, no, I’m sorry,” he said. “I didn’t wake up until after eight, and I figured you’d already be here by then, so I came straight over.”

  That made sense. “Oh, good, because I was so sound asleep—well, you can’t imagine,” she said. “Look, I’ve got a lot to tell you,” she began.

  “Then let’s get together after dinner, okay?” he asked.

  “Okay,” she said.

  He turned to the other people at the table. “Hey, guys, this is Lisa Altman—”

  “Atwood,” she corrected automatically.

  “Sorry. Atwood. Anyway, she’ll meet us in the lounge after she’s eaten, okay?”

  “Great,” said one guy. “I’m Will.”

  Lisa nodded as the others introduced themselves, too, a sea of names she was sure to forget until she got to know the owners of those names better—Kiki, Sophie, Grant, Brian, Meredith, and Alex.

  “We’ll see you over there, okay?” Tec said. He smiled warmly at her, once again showing those dimples that melted her knees.

  “I won’t be long,” she promised.

  “Take your time,” said Kiki. “We wouldn’t want you to get indigestion!”

  A couple of the kids laughed and so did Lisa, though she didn’t really think that Kiki had said anything particularly funny.

  Lisa returned to where the hostess was taking care of the last diners, but before she was relegated to the tail of the line, she spotted her parents. They were sitting together at a table that was almost empty. Her father saw her and waved her over to them.

  It seemed like days since she’d seen them. She remembered that they’d been on an official snorkeling picnic, unlike the impromptu one that she and Tec had devised. Perhaps they could compare notes.

  Lisa picked up a plate and walked through the buffet, selecting a light meal—sure to save her from indigestion—and then sat down next to her father.

  Over the last few months, she’d gotten very good at taking a barometric reading of her parents’ moods, and she could sense right away that the mood was good. It seemed that the vacation was having exactly the effect her parents had hoped for.

  “How’s it going, sweetie?” her father asked. “It looks like you’ve made some friends.”

  “I guess,” Lisa said. She wasn’t thrilled with the idea of talking with her parents about Tec at this point. “We
ll, there are a lot of kids around my age here now. I guess it’s because it’s spring vacation for a lot of schools. Say, how was that snorkeling thing you did today?”

  It was a good question to ask at a time when she didn’t want to answer questions herself. It turned out her parents had had a great time.

  “The colors on those fish!” her mother said.

  “And you wouldn’t believe the coral,” added her father. “It’s made entirely of very tiny animals who’ve colonized over many centuries. These creatures work together …”

  Lisa was amused in spite of herself. Her mother, a natural stylist, whether it was decorating a room or planning a wardrobe, had tuned right in to the colors of the fish. Her father, an engineer, was all keen to study the construction of a coral reef. Actually, it was quite wonderful that they’d found something that had interesting aspects for each of them, no matter how different those aspects were.

  Before Lisa knew it, her mother had switched subjects to talking about how good the fresh seafood salad had been at their picnic, while her father talked about watching the way the schools of fish (no matter what color) worked so that each member of the school was a lookout for one part, thus protecting the entire group from predators.

  “And this afternoon, after the picnic, we went into the town. It’s so charming!” her mother said.

  “But your mother didn’t buy a thing!” Mr. Atwood said.

  “I did, too, Richard,” she said.

  “I don’t consider that little wooden salad bowl a serious purchase by your standards, Eleanor,” he teased. Instead of cringing when her father talked about her spending habits, Lisa’s mother laughed. She didn’t mind being teased the way she minded being nagged.

  “Well, your father ignored three phone calls from the office!” Mrs. Atwood said, smiling proudly at her husband.

  “I didn’t exactly ignore them,” said Mr. Atwood. “I just called back and told them to solve the problem themselves.”

  “Which means you didn’t climb on a plane to go take care of it personally,” said Mrs. Atwood.

  “No, dear. I’m on vacation.”