by Taya DeVere
“You’ve been…” Iris’s voice cracks. She clears her throat to continue. “You’ve been sick.”
Tina’s laughter is dry and brief. “You keep telling yourself that. And hey…” she moves to the aisle, holding the door open as she turns to give Iris a nasty grin. “I hope you’re not delusional enough to think that what you did is just a one-time thing.”
Tina lets the door swing shut. As she follows Tim’s footsteps out of the barn building, her yell echoes in the empty barn. “Have fun with that, Eskimo!”
***
Cracked and misshapen, the remains of Iris’s phone reflect moonlight on the windowsill. One hand resting on her cheek, Iris stares at the phone, not wondering where in the world her mother might be right now, or how she’s going to come up with this month’s rent, but trying to get Tina’s words out of her head.
She doesn’t care about Tina’s name-calling. She doesn’t even care about the bitch-slap. All she worries about is that Timothy hasn’t yet told Tina it would be Iris riding the stallion in the World Cup. Why hasn’t he? What is he waiting for?
Iris closes her eyes, reliving the one ride she had with Alfred. The authentic connection she feels with the majestic animal was even stronger while she was riding him. She squeezes her eyes shut tighter and focuses on the memory of each movement they performed. Every turn she asks Alfred to take, every transition or tempi-change, all she needs is to breathe. Alfred moves under her seat, strong and majestic, never missing a step. Like an iceberg providing shelter to Iris—and Iris alone—while the rest of the world drowns in its overflowing hate and greed. Gently, Iris closes her ring finger on the right rein and activates her core. The stallion holds back for half a second, then moves forward with circling, powerful energy, making Iris and him one. The tempo of his canter is steady, almost too slow, but he compensates for the lack of speed with the bounce and ease of his rhythm. Left stride, left stride, her mind’s eye moves from Alfred’s left ear to his right—all she needs for the stallion to switch the canter and perform a perfect lead change. Right stride, right stride—he does it again. Iris lowers her left hand for a quick scratch on the stallion’s withers. He snorts, stretching his majestic neck an inch longer. At the corner of the arena, Iris sits heavier in the saddle and closes her left calf just behind the girth. The horse bends, shortening his swinging gait…
The knock on the door startles Iris into sitting up. Holding her breath, she reaches for the blanket and covers her body with it. For a moment, there’s no sound at all. Iris gasps for air and loosens her grip on the blanket.
What are you, five? Go open the fucking door. The new Iris doesn’t act this way.
Another knock on the door. Iris stares at the lock, wondering how much force it would really take for someone to just barge in through the raggedy door—locked or not.
“Iris? You in there?” Timothy’s words slur while he raps his knuckles on the door for the third time. “We have some unfinished business.”
Iris looks around the room, unsure what she’s looking for or why. Without thinking about it, she strides over to the windowsill. She grabs the damaged phone, shoving it into her pajama pocket.
“Open up. I can hear you moving in there.” The sound of stumbling and then Timothy cursing under his breath reaches Iris’s ears. She forces herself to breathe, no matter how shallow the inhales. The room has started to spin slowly, and a strange buzzing sound starts somewhere at the back of her mind.
A fourth knock. “I want to talk about the Cup.”
The buzz fades away. The room stops spinning. Iris takes a hasty step toward the door, every inch of her body spiked with excitement. She takes another step, then stops to hesitate. “What about the Cup?” she asks, her voice shaking more than she’d like.
“What do you think?” Timothy says and grunts. “You want to ride the damn stallion or not?”
Her feet act before she can think about it. With the memory of Alfred’s canter swing filling Iris’s body, she takes a few light steps toward the door and turns the lock. When she opens the door, the smell of alcohol slaps hard against her face—harder than Tina’s palm ever did.
He’s wasted. Drunker than Iris remembers ever seeing him. Leaning against Iris’s bedroom door, the man looks at her for three seconds then pushes past her, almost knocking her off her feet. She backs up against the wall, still clutching the door handle. Timothy looks around the room, grunting and chuckling to himself like he’s enjoying some sort of an inside joke that Iris is not invited to be a part of.
“No pictures of mommy dearest?” he asks, plunging down on Iris’s bed. He’s not a heavy man, but the bed struggles under the impact. The corner of the bedsheet comes undone, now hanging loose by Timothy’s leg.
“What good are pictures?” Iris breathes. Oh, come on, her inner voice snaps at her nervous tone of voice. We can do this. She remains by the door, still holding onto the handle. “I remember what she looks like just fine.”
“Looks like you?” he asks and gives a brief laugh. “She small and feisty, too?”
A throbbing, alarming sensation fills Iris’s stomach. In the corner of her eye, she estimates the steps she’d need to take to reach the staircase leading down to the barn aisle—and outside. She calculates the meters between herself and the drunken man. Estimates Tim’s intoxicated state and how much it would slow his mobility.
She could make it.
“I get it,” Timothy sighs and waves Iris off. “I don’t like to talk about my parents either. I mean, who does, right? They bring us into this world against our will. Then fuck us up while waiting for us to move the fuck out and make our own money. Just so we can buy them a spot in some shitty retirement home where they’ll lie in their own shit while complaining about how their ungrateful children never visit their sorry asses.”
Iris swallows, takes another breath. Should she run? Should she stay?
So he finally talks to you again, her inner voice says. Offering you a spot in the sun. Just like you always wanted. And what does dainty little Iris do? She wants to run away like some useless coward. Just because he’s drunk and venting about his parents doesn’t mean that he’s not telling you the truth about Alfred and the Cup.
“Have you told Tina?” she asks, finally able to move, even if it’s just to shift her weight from one foot to another.
“Told her about…” he stops to think, then snorts and laughs for a while before continuing. “Ahh, I see. We’re back talking shop. You really don’t want to waste any time, do you? Not a fan of small talk?”
Iris shakes her head, the blue and white locks dancing around her face.
“Well, get your pretty little ass over here then,” he pats the spot next to him on the bed, “Let’s talk. And no more mumbo-jumbo sentimental bullshit, you’re right. I’m sick of it. Less talk, more action. Am I right?”
Just inhale. Hold it. Exhale. The restless, throbbing sensation travels up to her midriff area. It travels all the way to her forehead, makes a U-turn, then swarms down her body, all the way to her toes. A sliver of air enters her lungs, just enough to keep her from passing out.
Breathe. Just fucking breathe. Don’t you dare run off. Stand. Your. Ground.
“Um, hello?” Timothy says, his eyes suddenly sharper than before. Looking soberer, he waves his hand in the air to catch Iris’s attention. “Where the fuck did you just go?”
“I’m here,” Iris breathes, wondering whether it’s Timothy or herself she’s trying to convince. “I’m just…”
“A bit slow?” he says, all lightness and amusement vanished from his voice. He gets up from the bed, his gait less wobbly as he walks over to Iris. He places one hand against the wall next to Iris’s head, and the other hand on her other side, pinning her against the wall. “You know,” he says, his breath hot and smothering against Iris’ face. “I always thought you were as dumb as a bucket. Mm, from the day I met you. But then again…” he brings his body closer to Iris, his hip now pressed against hers,
“Buckets don’t need to be Einstein to serve their purpose…”
The room spins around her, a full one-eighty. Iris escapes, not using her feet but her mind, entering her mental vessel, leaving her body. When Timothy turns her around, his rancid breath now huffing against the back of her neck, Iris is somewhere else entirely. Flying through the air, wind on her face. She closes her eyes, ignoring the harsh fingers digging into her waist. The sound of a dozen galloping hooves thumping against the ground fills her mind. Ignoring the groans against her ear, the slamming weight against her buttocks, she’s safe in her mental vessel—her happy place.
Slowly gaining more and more distance from her body, still pushed against the wall, Iris steers the vessel to travel back in time. She floats over a small red barn with a herd of Icelandic horses and Shetland ponies running across a wintery lava field. She sees herself—a tinier, younger Iris—grabbing onto one of the ponies. Her short legs wrapped around the pony’s plump frame, she closes her little fists on the rough mane.
A jingling sound fills her ears—laughter. Her own. Tears of happiness—or maybe it’s the wind—fill her eyes as the pony gallops through the lava field. Powdered snow rises from the ground around them as the herd continues full speed ahead. She’s not afraid of falling. She’s only afraid that this moment will at some point end. That she’ll be forced back home where her stepfather lies amid oxygen tanks in the living room, Iris’s mother weeping hopelessly next to him. Iris laughs louder, squeezes her legs around the pony, telling her to gallop forward even faster than before. In this moment, nobody can catch her. Nobody can tell her she’s supposed to cry because her father is dying—that of course she loves the man. He’s her father, after all, his devotion and undivided admiration thicker than blood. Shaking her head, Iris laughs again, howling into the wind. The bad man would soon be gone. The bad man would never knock on her bedroom door again. Telling her she wouldn’t be allowed to go to the barn ever again if she ever told her mother about these secret meetings in the night. The bad man would be gone—and little Iris would be safe again.
CHAPTER 5 — THE SAFETY BELT
She wakes up from the cold floor, bundled into herself. Downstairs the horses are banging their empty feeders, demanding their morning grain and hay. Someone whinnies. Someone kicks the back of their stall, hard.
“Shit, shit, shit…”
Iris leaps up from the floor and winces as pain travels through her, the consequence of her too-sudden movement. She looks down toward her ankles where her pajama bottoms are bundled around the broken phone—the weapon she had picked up to defend herself but then never used.
Oh, like that would have solved it. You, smashing his skull in with a piece of plastic? It would hardly have killed him, just pissed him off more. It’s over now. What’s done is done. You opened the door, didn’t murder your trainer, and guess what? Now you get to ride in the World Cup and win yourself a big fat paycheck that’ll give you the freedom to do whatever the fuck you want.
Unconvinced, she steps out of the pajama pants, careful not to step on the phone’s sharp edges. After pulling on clean clothes, Iris shakes her head and refocuses her thoughts on the day ahead. The chores. The schedule. That’s what she needs to do. It’s the only thing left to do. On autopilot, she would perform the same tasks in the exact same way as she does every single day. Just like always, she’ll keep her mind too busy and her body too exhausted to focus on anything other than keeping the horses well-fed and shiny.
Another loud bang sends her toward the bedroom door. One of the mares is kicking the back wall of the stall, most likely causing the wood to splinter. Every day she’s downstairs at five o’clock sharp to feed them. Every day—except today.
Ignoring the strangeness of her bedroom door being unlocked, she kicks her shoes on, then hurries toward the stairs and down to the grain room. One stack of buckets at a time, she loads the wheelbarrow and starts pushing it toward the back end of the aisle. A quick glance at the digital clock up on the wall tells her the harsh truth; she’s an hour late. This has never happened before. The daily routine is ruined; the schedule is completely messed up. She should be tacking up Alfred for training, or at least getting him ready for another lunge line session in case Timothy skips the training again. Now, Alfred wouldn’t have time to eat before exercising. This would get Timothy foaming at the mouth—pissing him off beyond belief.
Two sets of boot steps arrive at the barn. Light chattering reaches Iris’s ears, making her move faster, dumping the buckets into the feeders as quickly as she can.
He hasn’t told Tina about the Cup yet, she thinks. No way would she be in such a chatty mood if he had.
Timothy disappears into the viewing room. While Iris collects the empty buckets off the floor, Tina walks over to her, a small smirk on her face. Her shiny black boots stop at the wheelbarrow. “What’s this, Mo?” she says, her voice filled with mockery. “An hour late for feeding?”
“Mind your own fucking business,” Iris mumbles.
She places the two bucket towers into the wheelbarrow and rolls it back into the grain room. Ignoring Tina, who follows her in and then leans against the swinging door, Iris pops open the grain cans’ steel lids and looks for the plastic scoop. It’s nowhere to be seen.
“What’s gotten into you, Mo? Someone piss on your popsicle?”
Iris looks up from the grain cans to frown at Tina. “Is that an insult? Because that doesn’t even make any sense.” She turns and looks around the counter space, then under the sink.
“You off your meds or something?” Tina says in her chirpy voice.
Iris slams the cupboard door shut. “Where the fuck is that scoop…” she murmurs.
Tina takes a few steps, her shiny boots moving to the first grain can. She leans in, then lets the missing scoop swing side to side as it hangs from her fingers. “Looking for this?”
Iris takes a fast step forward, reaching for the scoop, but Tina hides it behind her back. Eyes filled with satisfaction, she lifts her chin and fails to suppress her smile. “Why are you an hour late on the schedule?”
Iris narrows her eyes at Tina, then takes a step back. She reaches for an empty grain bucket from the wheelbarrow and leans over the tin barrow with it. Using her hand as a scoop, she starts tossing in the granola pellets.
“Polar bear got your tongue?”
Iris lets the small bucket fall into the can. She leans against the metal edge and hangs her head. Then she lifts her gaze to stare at Tina. Her rage doesn’t go unnoted; Tina jerks her head back in surprise.
“I said…” Iris says, gritting her teeth. “Mind your fucking business.”
It takes Tina a few seconds to snap out of her surprise, but soon, the usual smirk returns to her face. She tosses her long brown hair back and walks to the swinging door. “But you see, my dearest Mo. I am minding my business.” She grins, showing her perfect row of white teeth. “Because you’re supposed to be tacking up Alfred for me. Tacking, not preparing grain.”
It’s Iris’s turn to be surprised. No, she thinks to herself. No, she’s making it up.
“What?” is all Iris can say.
“Al-fred,” Tina pronounces the word slowly. “The stallion I’m riding in the World Cup. Tack. Him. Up.”
Swallowing painfully, Iris parts her lips to ask the question burning in her mind. But the words get stuck in her throat.
“Seriously, Mo. You look like a fucking blow up doll.”
“Did you talk to Tim?” Iris finally breathes out. “About Alfred?”
Tina frowns at her, then scoffs and heads to leave. “Yeah. He said the stallion just needed a few days to recover from the training. Something about an algorithm telling him so, or whatever. I can’t really bother with that geek stuff.”
“No…” Iris says, suddenly out of breath. “Did you talk to Tim about you riding in the Cup?”
Tina raises her brows. “Um… yes? I mean, that’s all we ever talk about.”
Iris closes her ey
es, then clenches her fists. Without opening her eyes, she asks, “When’s the last time you spoke about it?”
“What, the Cup? Just now, while walking over from the main house. We were going over the tempis, and decided to start with threes and go from there. Then leave the changes be for a while and focus on the canter pirouettes. I told Tim that’s my strong point, and he said—and I agree—that we should still… um, hello?”
Iris marches past Tina, a loud sound ringing sound in her ears. Her whole face burns. Her blood seems to be surging around in her veins with not enough space to move. Her whole body is about to burst.
“Hey, I’m still talking to you!”
But she can hardly hear Tina’s complaint. She stomps over to the viewing room, slams the door open, and walks right in front of Timothy, who’s taking careful sips of coffee at the table, staring into numbers on Iris’s laptop.
“You need to tell her,” Iris says between her teeth. “You need to tell her right now.”
Timothy stares at Iris with a disinterested look on his face. Without looking away, he brings the coffee cup to his lips and blows in it. After another careful sip, he looks back at the laptop and places the cup next to the computer. “Tell her what, exactly?” he murmurs without looking at Iris.
“That I’m riding Alfred in the Cup.”
“Um… Excuse me?!” Tina’s squeal hurts Iris’s ears. She’s followed Iris to the viewing room, but Iris doesn’t turn around to look at her.
Tim leans closer to the screen, then tilts his head as he reads Iris’s notes on Van Dijk’s latest algorithm calculations. “Huh,” he says happily, then leans back and reaches for the coffee cup again.
Iris rushes over and slams the laptop lid shut. Timothy blinks a few times, then sits back and looks up at Iris, this time with annoyance in his reddish eyes. They stare at one another for a moment, Iris’s heart bouncing against her chest.
