Chapter 1 Vanessa #2
“Maybe you just have Jack hold your hand tonight or something. Casual. Easy. Like it’s no big deal.”
I shudder.
“Is he that gross?” Natalie’s smiling. “Because I feel like you might almost enjoy holding his hand.”
I swat her shoulder. “Shut up. Or if you insist on yapping, you can tell me why you haven’t been out with Cillian yet.”
“Well, let’s walk and talk, if you want to know. I promised Sam I’d come check out the new footing she got.”
“Did she finally get that sand she wanted?”
“Sam always gets what she wants, but it was hard. Apparently everyone here has moved to bits of rubber and trash.”
“Don’t try to change the subject.” I wiggle my eyebrows. “Cillian update. Spill.”
Natalie sighs. “Well, there’s not really an update to give.
It’s been three weeks, and I haven’t even told him that Samantha’s fine with it.
It seems. . .lame. Like, do I text and say, ‘turns out, Samantha likes the other guy I was flirting with, so after I made a big old deal about it, it turns out we’re both okay with sort of swapping guys.
’ Like shoot, after one bite, I’ve changed my mind.
” She snorts. “You take this blueberry muffin, and I’ll take your banana nut. ”
“Literally no one picks banana nut over blueberry,” I say.
“I do,” Natalie says.
“Liar.” I sigh. “But that’s bad, Natalie. He told you he liked you, and you just. . .never got back to him. So he thinks you aren’t into it.”
She nods her head slowly, glum.
“Girl.” I snap my fingers under her nose. “Stop being stupid. He made his play, now you have to do something.”
“But how?” She wails. “I wasn’t supposed to be doing this stupid dating stuff anymore. I’m too old and too rusty.”
“Okay, but before he told you he liked you, when did you talk to him then? Maybe you can just sneak it in during a normal conversation.”
“That’s the thing. I didn’t really talk to him.” Natalie shrugs. “He was just sort of around whenever I had a problem, and now he’s not anymore.”
“Plus, you’ve had no problems lately.”
“Yeah, no barns burning down or insurance companies crapping out.” Natalie shakes her head. “I mean it’s great that the barn rebuild’s going alright with the contractor he found for us, and thanks to his lawyers, the insurance company’s actually paying.”
“Girl, just message him then and tell him thanks for all the help he’s provided. Easy.”
We’ve reached the front of the almost-done barn, and Samantha’s waiting for us.
“I hope we’re talking about Cillian.” She shimmies at me with a huge grin on her face.
“I think he deserves a big old thank you basket and some effusive gratitude for his help with the insurance company.” She wiggles her eyebrows.
“You should take that basket over yourself.”
“Speaking of horses, I wanted to tell you something.” Natalie looks like she’s had to reroute Samantha’s enthusiasm frequently.
“Were we speaking about horses?” Sam quirks an eyebrow. “I wasn’t.”
“You’re always talking about horses,” Natalie says. “And I wanted to mention before I forgot that Hannah said she wants to show again, and I was talking to her about what horse she might be able to show on, and then guess what?”
Samantha lifts both eyebrows.
“Clara said she’d like to show too.” Natalie’s smiling. “Can you believe it? Clara, of the angry guitar music and the headphones-so-she-never-has-to-talk-to-any-of-us—that Clara—wants to show horses again.”
“That’s great news,” Sam says. “I’d be happy to be their trainer, if that’s what you’re asking.”
“Oh.” Natalie laughs. “I just assumed that. I wanted to give you plenty of time to think over what horses might be suitable.”
“It is important that a horse be suitable.” Sam smiles. “Just like with humans, you need to try and find a man who suits you.” She clears her throat. “You haven’t found any men like that lately, have you?” Her lip’s twitching. “Maybe you could text or call him if you have.”
“Shut up, already.” Natalie shoves past Samantha and drags us all inside the barn.
The walls are up, the ceilings are all in place, and the lighting’s also finished.
The frames for the stalls are done, but they don’t have all the interior walls finished yet, and the mats aren’t in on the floors.
“Hey, this is really coming along. That’s exciting, isn’t it?
” Now my lip’s the one twitching. “Once it’s done, I guess we’ll have to bring our horses back from.
. .who’s been kind enough to take care of our lame horses while we didn’t have a barn? ”
Samantha feels us coming for her, and she switches into business mode.
I actually enjoy the tour, watching my friends focus on the things they’re great at, designing horse facilities and talking about how functional and beautiful they will be.
“Not to sound dramatic, but winter’s coming, and we need to get this finished before the horses need shelter in any real way. ”
“I like this big, run-in stall,” I say. I spin around, trying to get a ballpark for how much space there really is, and how many horses could fit.
Traditionally, horses are kept in small, enclosed spaces during periods of inclement weather, or whenever you need to have good control of them because they’re sick, injured, or rehabbing.
But lately, people have been going back to the way farmers and ranchers used to keep horses in shelters a long time ago—a larger, community space.
It’s more like the spaces herds would have found in the wild too, just some kind of shelter from the storm, and it lets horses stay in closer proximity with other horses, which is usually better for them mentally and emotionally.
Plus, they have space to move around more, so it’s good for the circulation in their legs as well.
“It’s actually called a loafing shed,” Samantha says. “We made it big enough to hold eight to ten horses.”
“Some places call it a group housing pen,” Natalie says. “I think the more social ponies who really struggle when we stick them in stalls will love it.”
“If you put Foxy in, we’ll have to padlock it,” I say. “Goofball.”
“Aware,” Sam says. “That sneaky horse let two others out and went for a walkabout yesterday.” She’s shaking her head. “I swear, I thought about taking her to the horse fair and getting rid of her.”
“Stop,” I say. “You can’t do that.”
“Because she’s the only horse my equally goofy friend will ride.” Sam rolls her eyes. “We need to get you past that.”
“Just because she’s the only horse I want to ride, doesn’t mean she’s the only one I will ride.” I frown.
“Great,” Natalie says. “Then let’s go out right now. I think you’ll love Conor.”
I hold up my hand. “Listen.”
Natalie folds her arms. “I’m listening. Now, you tell me how you’d can’t ride Conor, or why you can’t ride right now, or make up some other excuse, but it can’t be the pumpkin patch, because I know that’s not until eleven. We could get a quick little arena ride in.”
I splutter.
“Still waiting for it,” Sam says.
“She’s trying to think of something.” Natalie arches one irritating eyebrow.
“Fine.” I huff. “Fine,” I say too loudly. “So I still get nervous about riding another horse, but not her. What’s wrong with that?”
Sam smiles. “At least you’re admitting it.”
“If we aren’t riding, we could help you move those grain bags you were saying had to go to the north end.” Natalie tosses her head at the big old pile. “Want a hand?”
An hour later, I’m regretting that I went for a jog this morning, but mostly I’m regretting that I already showered.
“When Foxy comes home, we’re all going for a trail ride.” Natalie wipes her forehead on her sleeve. “You have to ride a lot so you remember why these stupid beasts are worth all this hard work.”
“You know, I do like Foxy,” Sam says, “for the record. If you have to like just one horse, she’s a cute one, but she’s an absolute misery to manage. Did you know I had her tested after we got a positive to insulin resistance on Drew?”
I frown. “What does that mean?”
Sam walks out of the almost-finished barn and toward the new arena that’s also close to done.
“It means she’s also insulin resistant.” Sam shakes her head.
“Two horses that live in Ireland where it rains all year round, so there’s green, lush grass ten months a year, and they both need to very carefully consume almost no sugar. ”
“What happens if she doesn’t get ‘managed’?” I blink. “I mean, presumably she’s been fine this whole time without us knowing, right? How old is she? Eight?”
“Ten, according to the vet,” Sam says. “We don’t have papers on her, so that’s a guess.
But what happens if they have consistently high insulin, and hers was close to two hundred, is that at first, they get hoof sore.
Not a big deal, but limiting. Then if it goes untreated, their feet start to fall apart. Laminitis, and eventually founder.”
Founder’s the worst f-word—by a mile—to horse people.
Laminitis comes first, the loosening and inflammation of the connective tissue between the hoof wall and the inside of the hoof, but if it continues, the coffin bone, a bone that literally floats inside a horse’s hoof, can rotate.
If it gets bad enough, the bone can even punch through the sole of the hoof.
That cripples your horse, as you can imagine.
You wouldn’t be able to walk around with a bone sticking through the bottom of your foot.
Basically, if your horse founders, you’re in big trouble. They usually have to be put down.
“So what do we do?”
“I ordered some special grain Becky recommended for both her and Drew. Buckeye something. And I already set the date for them to come back. Middle of next week.” She casually drops that in, like she’d mention that the trash pickup’s coming a day early, or we need to grab more horse feed the next time we go into town.