The Mare

Velvet

I thought Pat would talk about it in the car, but she just put the radio on. We drove over the bridge and took a road I didn’t know, like a dirty tongue going up a hill with no houses or even trees on the sides of it. The Iraq War was on the radio and people were being blown up. Pat said the war was a horrible mistake; she said it like she wanted to know what I thought. But I was thinking of when I showed Ginger’s picture to Shawn. I wanted him to see how nice she was, but he said, “You know why those people can act nice? Other people do the violence for them. That’s how they have that nice world.” I said, “Ginger doesn’t have anybody doin’ violence.” He just tossed her picture back at me and said, “She must think you some lil’ Orphan Annie.”

Pat changed the station to a song I didn’t know. Suddenly I thought, I don’t know her. And she is Beverly’s friend. Hard feelings banged together in me. You used to be able to beat a kid who acted bad.

“Where are we going?” I asked.

“My place,” she said. “Where did you think?”

We went up a bumpy driveway. I remembered a long time ago when I rode my bike with Ginger and she said, “Lumpety bumpety!” and we flew.

Pat said, “Just so you know, my place is primitive compared to Estella’s.”

“What’s ‘primitive’?”

“I mean there’s no toilet in the barn. When I don’t feel like walking to the house I use a bucket.”

We drove past a little house with tin patched on it and colored plastic flowers twirling in the yard. There was a vegetable garden with wire around it and a barn behind a bunch of pale trees. Two horses in a jelly-bean-shaped paddock came running at us, then away; they were both light brown, one with a blond mane and low, round, ripply shoulders. “Chloe’s the blondie,” said Pat. “The gelding’s Nut. See the difference in the way they’re built?” I looked. Nut looked stronger to me; he was tall and his back was very wide. “Chloe’s built what they call ‘uphill’—and her back is nice and short and she’s got a strong rear. See how long her shoulders are, that long neck? She’s a good jumper partly because of how she’s built — but the main reason is, she actually likes to jump.”

“Is Fiery Girl a good jumper?” I asked.

“I don’t know. I haven’t seen her jump. I don’t even know if she’s been jumped. She does have the build for it, though. Got a beautiful neck.”

I thought we were going to bring the horses in, but they didn’t want to come in, so we went to clean their feed and water buckets instead. We brought the buckets out of the barn and ran the hose. It was still hot; plant and vegetable smells spread in the air like invisible color with dark horse-smell underneath. I remembered Shawn in my mouth. I remembered Dominic in front of me with his legs open and soft heat coming from between them. I remembered his eyes when he was holding Brianna and looking at me over his shoulder, sharp like the arrow in the valentine, sharp in my heart, my real heart, like in the science chart of your body, the heart-muscle in the dark of my body. Soft/sharp. Love. We scrubbed while the horses played.

“Miss Pat, do you think Beverly would hurt Joker because of me?”

She didn’t look at me or answer right away. Then she said, “No. I can see why you would ask. But no.”

“Would she hurt my mare?”

“No. Beverly is crazy, but she knows horses. She knows the mare would kill her. Even if she had to bide her time. She’d kill her.”

What I thought was, Good. What I said was, “If you think Beverly is crazy, why are you friends with her?”

“We work together. It’s not my choice who Estella hires.” She dumped soapy water from a bucket. We rinsed the buckets and took the water buckets back to hang. We filled them up. While we were running the water, Pat said, “I’ve known Beverly a long time. We went to school together. She’s Estella’s half sister. Here.” She handed me the hose so I could fill Nut’s bucket.

“What’s a half sister?”

“Beverly’s mom married Estella’s dad when Beverly was like ten. Estella was born something like five years later. Beverly’s dad wasn’t in the picture anymore.”

I said, “Oh.” And I felt a little bit sorry for Beverly. Because it would be hard to have Estella for a sister, especially if you had to work for her.

“It was Estella’s dad who had horses. He used to own the place.”

I said, “Oh” again.

When we were done with the buckets, we got brooms and swept the floor and cleaned cobwebs. We got forks and cleaned the stalls. I wanted to ask if I could still see my mare sometimes, but I was afraid of the answer. So instead I said, “Miss Pat, what’s a competition?”

“There’s different ones. Hunter paces, eventing, hunter-jumper shows.”

“Estella said she wanted me to be in one.”

“Yes, she did. I did too. We were thinking you could do a hunter-jumper schooling show next spring.”

“What would happen if I won?”

“It’s complicated. You’d basically get a ribbon and points. Schooling shows are awarded in points; girls go to different shows and build points within the Equestrian Association. At the end of the year, if you have the most points, you get a big honkin’ ribbon.”

“Oh.”

“It means you’re recognized as the best in the county. And you can show bigger after that.”

“Do you ever get money?”

“There’s cash prizes for some shows, yeah.”

“Could I still do it?”

She stopped cleaning. “I don’t know, you tell me.”

I didn’t answer, or even look at her, but I stopped cleaning too.

“Can you stop putting yourself and other people in danger? Can you respect what I say to you and follow instructions?”

“Yes.”

“Can you? Because I went out on a limb for you and you made me look like an idiot. Truthfully? If I was your mother, I’d smack you.”

I wanted to say, That’s not what you looked like when you saw me on my mare. I felt mad and I put my head down so she wouldn’t see.

“You could never see the mare again, you know that?”

My head shot up, pain on it.

“Glad to see you still care about something.”

“I’m sorry. I told them I was sorry!”

“Then show it.”

“How?”

She didn’t answer me, she just went back to cleaning. The next thing she said was, “Come with me. Time to bring the horses in.”