by Kate Lattey
Anneke rolls her eyes. “Tell me about it. I think she did break it, because it started stopping and dumping her, so they told everyone it was useless and got rid of it.”
“What a waste,” Noah mutters. “It was a nice pony, and man could it jump!”
“I hear the Carmichaels have it now,” Anneke tells him. “Eleanor told everyone it was only fit for the glue factory, but they reckon it’ll make Grand Prix easy. I hope it does, and beats Carly into the ground.”
“I’ll drink to that,” Alec mutters, watching Carly as she trots past us, her hands jerking back and forward as she goes.
“How did she even make the team?” I ask. “She looks like she’ll fall off over a cross-rail.”
Anneke looks surprised. “She’s Eleanor’s niece. Can’t you see the resemblance?”
Now that she mentions it, I realise that she’s right. “I knew she looked kind of familiar.”
“She can’t ride to save herself, but her ponies are always amazing and get her out of trouble,” Anneke says. “At least this one’s well up to her weight.”
“And then some,” Alec adds. “Looks a bit fat to me.”
“Reckon,” Noah says. “I think it’s all the pies she eats. Oh, were you talking about the pony?”
Alec’s laugh breaks off abruptly as Eleanor strides into the arena.
“What are you all standing around for? Get out there and start warming your ponies up!”
She turns and watches Carly as we disperse. Her niece’s lower leg is sticking way out in front of her, her hands are fixed in front of the saddle and her pony looks utterly fed up already.
“Looking good Carly, just a little more leg,” she says encouragingly, clearly blind to her niece’s multiple faults. I sigh as I walk Finn forward. I can already tell we’re in for a long afternoon.
“At least tomorrow we’ll get to jump,” I point out to Anneke as we move into our accommodation and start setting up our beds.
“We’d better,” Anneke mutters. “If I have to listen to that woman telling me that Danny is on his forehand one more time I’ll shoot myself. She wouldn’t know a properly schooled pony if it bit her in the bum.”
I smile fleetingly, distracted by the seemingly impossible task of putting my camp stretcher together. I’d
completely overlooked the need to bring bedding until the last minute, and in desperation, I borrowed this one from Alec. I should’ve made Dad drive me into town and buy a new one, but I didn’t have time, and now I’m stuck with the most uncomfortable bed the world has ever known.
I slot one end of the stretcher leg into the metal pole and look disbelievingly at the opposite hole that I’m supposed to somehow force it into.
“This is impossible. Am I even doing this right?”
Anneke casts an eye over it and grins. “You’ve just got to put your back into it. Here, I’ll hold this side steady, and you pull.”
We work together, sweat beading on our brows in the hot sun as I finally jam the prong into its hole.
“Is that in?”
“I think so. Do the next one.”
The next one doesn’t go in all the way, but we can’t get it any further, so we carry on. Outside our room I can hear the other riders chatting, mingled with the sound of airbeds being blown up and sleeping bags shaken out. The other girls are all sleeping in the main part of the hayloft, but the boys have been banished off somewhere else, apparently to protect our virtue – or theirs. The smell of hay and horses filters up through the floorboards, and I smile as I jam the last stubborn prong into its hole and flip the camp stretcher over triumphantly. Anneke holds her hand up for a high-five and I’m slapping it firmly when Tegan charges up to the doorway of our tiny room and glares at me, hands on her hips.
“I cannot believe you abandoned me.”
I glance up at her as I shake out my sleeping bag. “Sorry.”
“It’s my fault,” Anneke says quickly, seeking to keep the peace. “I asked Jay to share with me. I didn’t know you were coming.”
“Yeah, well she knew,” Tegan scowls down at me, but before I can explain that I didn’t know there’d be no room for her, she’s distracted by the sight of my rickety camp stretcher. “Hah. That looks comfy.”
I throw my pillow at her head. “Shut up.”
Tegan catches it and lunges towards me, preparing to retaliate. Anneke pulls her legs out of the way as I sidestep, and Tegan trips over her airbed and lands awkwardly, half on top of my camp stretcher. There’s a loud popping noise, the stretcher collapses and so does Tegan, smacking her head against the wall.
“Nice one.”
She sticks her tongue out at me as I look despondently at my broken bed, then she turns to Anneke.
“So what are you doing here?” she asks rudely. “I mean, your team’s already been selected, right? You didn’t actually have to come on camp to get picked.”
Anneke’s eyes narrow slightly as she sits cross-legged on her inflated bed. “Not technically.”
“I knew it. Your team picks itself anyway. You and Noah are both totally pro, and your ponies will jump round Cambridge with their eyes shut. It’s a bit unfair on the rest of us, don’t you think, riding Grand Prix ponies in a Pony Club competition?”
Anneke says nothing, and I cringe inwardly as Tegan keeps going.
“Whatever. At least you’re stuck with useless Carly as a reserve, so maybe one of your ponies will conk out and we’ll have a chance to beat you. Speaking of Carlotta, why doesn’t she have to sleep in the barn with the rest of us?”
Anneke meets her eyes coolly. “Carly lives here,” she says, and I grab my chance to interject.
“Really? Wow.” Once again, I’m overcome with jealousy as I try to imagine living with every equestrian luxury at my fingertips. “Lucky her.”
Tegan pulls a face, but Anneke shrugs. “I wouldn’t trade. The place is flash, but who’d want to live with Eleanor telling you what to do all the time, and screaming at you whenever you do anything wrong? They put on a good front when they’re out at shows, but believe me, behind closed doors it’s a nightmare.” She shudders. “I don’t know how their horses put up with it. Nonny’d have a nervous breakdown.”
Tegan drags herself to her feet and leaves the room as abruptly as she came in, and Anneke rummages through her bag, avoiding eye contact with me. I wonder awkwardly how offended she was by Tegan’s comments. I hadn’t realised that Danny was a Grand Prix jumper, and part of me can’t help agreeing with Tegan that it’s not really fair to bring a pony of that calibre into this level of competition. Anneke could easily have ridden Nonny instead, but I don’t know how to bring it up without sounding jealous or catty.
“I like your bay pony,” is what I settle for eventually, and she glances up. “He’s gorgeous.”
“Thanks.” She pulls a bag of sweets out of her bag and tears it open, then offers it to me. “I was going to bring Nonny, but then we heard that Steph was going to be here and Mum said I had to ride Danny. We bought him from Steph,” she explains as I take a couple of sweets and hand them back. “She bred and produced him, and she’s always really helpful at giving me some insight into how to get him going better.”
“Wow. Lucky you, too.”
It’s a good thing that jealousy doesn’t actually turn you green, or I’d be the colour of grass right now. It’s starting to seem like everyone I’m competing against has strings of highly-trained ponies bought for them by their devoted parents, and get to live on properties with proper facilities and be driven to shows every weekend in huge shiny trucks, and have masses of lessons and own all the flash gear and rake in the ribbons without even trying. And then there’s me, struggling to train my pony over rusted-out barrels and old tyres, occasionally making it to a show in a rickety old horse truck that you can hear coming from ten miles off, with a completely disinterested father who’ll only come to shows if his girlfriend drags him along. It’s not fair. I know I shouldn’t feel this way, that I should be
grateful for what I have, and the opportunities I’ve been given. I should look back and remember how far off all of this was when I lived in England, but I just keep getting dragged under by everyone else’s perfect lives.
“Your friend’s probably right about our team already being picked though,” Anneke admits as she shoves three sweets into her mouth at once. “Sorry, I’m a pig, but I don’t get to eat many lollies at home because of my sister, so I have to make the most of it whenever I’m away.”
I shoot her a curious look, and she elaborates. “She’s diabetic. And she’s only nine, so she’s not very good at staying on top of it. Plus she was born with a sweet tooth, and literally the only way to stop her from eating herself into a sugar coma is to not have any temptation lying around. We’ve learned that the hard way a few times.”
So much for perfect lives. “That must be tough.”
She shrugs. “Gets a bit depressing at Easter,” she says. “But Dad’s a doctor so he stays pretty well on top of things. Lucky for me, because it stresses Mum out enough as it is being away from her every other weekend, but Dad insists that she takes me out to shows to get away from it all. Meike can be pretty high maintenance at the best of times.”
“How come she doesn’t ride?” I ask, and Anneke looks horrified.
“Because the universe took pity on me?” she suggests, then changes the subject. “So who’s going to make your team, d’you reckon?”
“Sarah and Amy,” I mutter. “Probably. Eleanor doesn’t like Alec, and their ponies are way more consistent than mine and Tegan’s.” I’m about to say there should be a limit on the ability of the ponies allowed to compete at lower levels, but stop myself in time.
“Eleanor doesn’t pick your team,” Anneke reminds me. “And Amy’s pony is lame behind. If I didn’t know better, I’d be shocked that Eleanor didn’t pick up on it during our lesson, but I guarantee you that Steph will when she sees him tomorrow.”
* * *
Anneke is right. As soon as Amy starts trotting Spud around the arena the next morning, Steph tells her to stop.
“Girl on the dark bay. Your pony’s lame.”
There is no sympathy in our coach’s voice, just statement of fact. I glance over at Steph, standing in the middle of the arena with her tanned arms folded across her chest. Her straight blonde hair hangs in a long ponytail down her back, and she looks intimidatingly self-assured as she watches us trot around the outside track. Amy pulls up, looking disappointed, and her mother comes rushing to Steph’s side like a worried hen.
“Spud’s just a bit stiff at the moment,” she tells Steph. “He works out of it and our vet said he’s sound enough to be in full work.”
Steph gives her a withering look. “He’s lame. Left hind. Looks like it’s in the hock.” She looks at Amy. “You can feel it, can’t you?”
Amy swallows, hesitating. “He got kicked, ages ago. He feels a bit funny sometimes, but he’s jumping really well. He won the metre-ten at Taupo last weekend.”
Steph seems unimpressed. “HK Sputnik, isn’t it?” she asks, looking at Spud again, and Amy nods. “Winning a metre-ten isn’t much of an achievement on a Grand Prix pony. Take the poor thing home and don’t ride it again until it’s sound. I’m not teaching you on a lame pony. Sorry,” she adds, almost as an afterthought, before turning towards the rest of us. “Okay you lot, canter on.”
Amy leads Spud out of the ring in tears as I squeeze Finn into a canter, sitting up tall and trying to do everything perfectly under Steph’s eagle eye. The harder I try, the stiffer and more awkward I feel, and Finn isn’t helping as she spooks at every jump we pass, acting as though she’s never seen a painted pole in her life. When she swerves violently at the sight of the Liverpool and I lose a stirrup, Steph finally speaks.
“Slow her down Jay,” Steph says. “And relax. She’s working herself up, and you’re so tense that you’re making it worse.”
I take a deep breath, trying to soften, but Finn is still full of beans and barely listening to me at all, and I can only hope that she will settle down once we start to jump.
Of course, I should know better than to expect any such thing. When Steph sets a low cross-rail and tells us to trot over it, Finn decides that’s the stupidest idea anyone ever had, and rushes at the jump with her head in the air, fighting my contact on the reins.
“Slow her down!” Steph tells me as Finn takes a big dramatic leap over the low jump and rushes off even more quickly on the other side. I pull on the reins and bring her back to a raking trot as Sarah’s pony trots quietly in and jumps the fence in copybook style.
“Come again Jay, and trot it this time,” Steph tells me, as if I wasn’t trying to before.
I work harder at it, but time and again Finn insists on cantering. In the end, Steph makes me walk up to the jump, before slowly trotting a couple of strides out and halting on the other side. Finn fights me furiously, but I manage to get her to stop after about ten strides.
“Better. Do that ten more times,” Steph tells me. “The rest of you, over here.”
She takes Tegan, Alec and Sarah over to another vertical and starts building it up, while I’m stuck trying to trot over the stupid cross-rail. I seethe quietly to myself, hating Finn for being such a fruitcake, mad at Eleanor for making me put her in a yard full of lush grass all night when she’s not used to it, despising Sarah and her pushbutton pony as she jumps the vertical perfectly, and most of all, hating myself for being unable to do something so simple.
“Come on Finn,” I mutter to her, my arms aching already. “It’s not that hard. Just trot.”
It takes more than ten attempts, but eventually Finn realises that the jump isn’t getting any bigger or more exciting, so she agrees to trot over it, and halt three strides later. It’s not pretty or particularly calm, but she did it, and I pat her encouragingly as we re-join the others, who are cantering over a tall vertical with placing poles on either side.
It’s Tegan’s turn, and she’s looking determined as she rides Nugget down to the vertical, spurring him on enthusiastically. Steph calls to her to slow down, but her warning comes too late. Nugget is going too fast, and he stumbles slightly over the placing pole in front of the fence. Tegan smacks him on the shoulder with her whip, warning him not to dare refuse, so he jumps. But he can’t get his forelegs up quickly enough, and he catches the rail with his knees. I hear myself gasp as I watch Nugget’s hind end come up as his head and neck plummet straight down towards the ground. There’s a moment when time seems to stand still, a fleeting recognition within my subconscious mind that this moment could be about to change everything, because at the angle that Tegan and her pony are about to hit the ground, this might spell the end for either – or both – of them. They both land headfirst, Nugget’s neck bent so far that his head disappears beneath him, Tegan flying over his shoulder and ploughing into the arena surface.
Steph swears under her breath as she approaches them, and parents on the sidelines come flying into the arena with loud cries. My heart is pounding as I stand in Finn’s stirrups and try to see over their heads while they crowd around my friend, hoping desperately that she’s okay. Nugget is struggling to his feet and Steph takes hold of his reins and runs her hand down his neck as I finally hear Tegan’s voice, loud and clear.
“Get off me Mum, I’m fine. Where’s Nug, is he okay?”
Her mother tries to keep her sitting down, but Tegan pushes her way to her feet and walks dazedly towards her pony, her eyes only on him.
“Is he alright?”
“I think so,” Steph says, leading the pony forward. He walks tentatively, and she frowns as she looks him over again, running a hand carefully down each leg in turn. Her frown deepens as she returns to a foreleg and checks it again. “Crap.”
“What?” Tegan’s voice is getting more desperate as she hovers over Steph’s shoulder, shrugging off her mother’s attempts to comfort her.
“Swelling. Could be the tendon. Best to get it scanned,
just to be sure. And he’ll need some time off and some good bodywork to make sure he hasn’t done any major damage to his neck either.” Steph strokes Nugget’s dark ears, and he lowers his head submissively, looking pathetic and nothing like his usual turbulent self. “Do you have transport here? Can you take him home today?”
Tegan nods, her eyes filling with tears as she takes Nugget’s thick leather reins and leads her limping pony away, her mother fluttering at her side. Steph stands and watches her go, twisting her long blonde ponytail over her shoulder for a moment before turning back to the rest of us with a resigned shrug.
“I did tell her to slow down.”
And just like that, we’re down to three.
“How’d the rest of your lesson go?” Anneke asks as we sit down to share a plate of sandwiches at lunch.
I shrug. “Quite good, all things considered. Steph eased off a bit and just had us do ground poles after that.”
“Lost her nerve,” Alec mutters, biting into an egg sandwich. “So much for getting to do some jumping today. I think we got over three fences before it all went to custard.”
“As long as Nugget’s okay,” I remind him.
“Tegan too,” Anneke says, and I nod quickly.
“Mmm. She seemed fine, but I’m sure her mum will be dragging her off to the emergency room as soon as she can. How was your ride?” I ask.
“Super. Bruce is amazing, Danny was a megastar and Carly got bucked off, so all in all I consider it a total success.”
“I can’t wait for our lesson with him this afternoon,” I reply. Alec snorts and Anneke looks cagey.
“I hate to say it, but I don’t think you’re having one. Oh, you’re having a lesson,” she assures me, “but not with Bruce. Because he’s taking the Seniors. At least that’s what I heard.” Anneke looks awkward as I look from her to Alec and back again.
“Then who’s coaching us?”
