The Mare

Velvet

She did not hit the horses hard, but still you could feel how big that whip was. You could feel something else too, something big and oily in the air around her when she used it. I realized then what she’d meant when she talked about controlling them from inside. When I was on Joker, I could feel something psychological happen inside him, like he was mixed-up and didn’t know which way to go. It wasn’t the whip. He understood the whip. It was the something else, and I had to use my legs not just to stay on but to tell him, It’s okay, you’re okay. It made me feel like I was riding against Beverly, even if she was the one teaching me to ride.

Then one day we went on the trail into the green that I used to be scared of a long time ago. The bushes and plants were fat back there and thick, like beautiful songs are so thick in your brain sometimes you can’t think. We walked until we came to a river. I thought we were going to turn around, but Beverly didn’t stop, we went up to the river and I made a scared noise, and Joker slowed up, nervously. Beverly said, “Steady! They know how to swim!” And I felt Joker telling me to relax, and then we went into it — we went into the water. My heart hammered; the water went almost up the horses’ backs, and our legs went under the water too. All the girls were screaming about the cold, but I wasn’t. Not even when it got deep and I could feel Joker’s legs running in the water under me, his body moving incredible, like a snake. I just closed my eyes and felt: cold water. Hot sun. Thick green. Shawn. His hands on me, his mouth, his voice in my ears. The snake-moving feelings of the world. You so beautiful, I wanna kiss you all over, touch your breast, feel your legs holding me real tight. But where was the one I wanted? We reached the other side and I held Joker with my legs as he climbed out onto shore, rocking back and forth, horse-strong and heavy under me again. Shawn’s lumpy dick like a crocodile in his pants, his grandma knocking on the door — but where is the one I want?

—

It was later that day that I asked Pat why she said I should not hit Joker when she thought it was good that Beverly hit him. She said, “Because you don’t have the authority. Not then you didn’t. Beverly does have the authority and also that time he got loose was a particular situation.” We were grooming Joker together; she’d just been out working him, and he was all wet and peaceful. He was on cross-ties almost right in front of the mare, and she was right up against her door, watching us. Not kicking, quiet, almost like she was listening. “You hit only as a last resort,” Pat said. “Or at least I do. Some people do it different.”

“Beverly told me that hitting doesn’t really hurt them. She said it’s more psychological.”

“That’s kinda true. You can make a horse crazy hitting him, especially if he can’t figure out what you’re hitting him for. But he did know in that case. It made sense.”

“So if hitting is okay sometimes, what is abuse?”

“You know Little Tina, right? She used to have this issue with cleaning her hooves. I’d pick up her hooves to clean ’em and sometimes she’d go like to kick me. That’s dangerous. So I’d hit her with the crop. Once, maybe twice the next time she did it. Abuse is when you don’t just hit once, but over and over. I’ve seen people do things like beat a yearling to the ground ’cause it reared up ’cause it was young.”

We took Joker off the cross-ties, and I led him back to the stall. As soon as he was in, my mare went to the side of her stall then and put her nose up where Joker was. He came to her; I noticed they were talking more this summer.

“You think anybody ever beat Fiery Girl that bad?”

“I don’t know, but I doubt it. The thing about mares? They will always draw a line in the sand. Stallions, geldings, they can be tough. But while a mare’ll take a lot of shit, eventually she will draw a line in the sand, and when she does that — cross it and she is going to take you down, even if she has to die doing it. Just like a woman. It’s why some people don’t like mares.”

I smiled and Pat said, “You think I’m joking? People say you can tell a gelding, discuss it with a stallion, ask a mare. I say beg a mare is more like it. Unless she likes you. And sometimes even then.”