24. Georgina #2
The crowd begins to applaud. I look up, startled by the sound, and see people standing along the rail. A woman has both hands over her mouth. Beside her, a man is clapping hard, his eyes still on Sovrano. They saw how close it came. They saw us get clear.
The steward opens the gate once we are still, and the groom reaches us first, her hands steady on Sovrano’s bridle.
I gather the loose length of rein out of the way and slide down from the saddle, my legs barely holding me when my boots hit the ground, and stand for a moment with my hand on his neck.
“Good boy.” My voice cracks. “Good boy. You listened. You brought me back.”
Max is there then, his face pale, his hand closing around my arm when my knees threaten to give. I lean against him while the steward calls for the vet, grateful that he holds me without trying to carry me away from my horse.
“Did you hit anything?” he asks. “Your back? Your hands?”
“No. I stayed on.” I look down at my gloves as though I need to check that they are still mine. “I nearly didn’t. After the fourth.”
“I saw.” His fingers tighten, then ease. “I saw you get your balance back.”
The vet comes through the gate, and I turn toward her before Max can ask anything else.
I tell her the left rein failed on the approach to the fourth fence, that Sovrano lost his rhythm and brushed the pole, that I brought him away from the next obstacle as soon as we landed.
Saying it in order takes effort. In my head, it keeps happening all at once.
“He came back to me,” I finish, my hand resting against his neck. “But please check his mouth. There was a moment when the contact went uneven, and I don’t know what he felt.”
She nods and begins her examination with the groom holding him. Max stays beside me while I watch, his hand warm at the small of my back. Sovrano stands on all four feet, turning an ear toward my voice, and I keep talking to him because it helps me breathe.
When the vet asks to see him walk, I step aside. The groom takes him forward and back, then follows the vet’s directions for a short trot. I watch each foot touch the ground, waiting for something to tell me that getting him to a halt wasn’t enough.
“I don’t see an injury on this initial examination,” the vet tells me when she returns. “Let him settle, and have your own vet check him again at home. If you notice anything worrying before then, call me back.”
I thank her, twice, and give her the details she asks for. At the steward’s request, we move just beyond the gate, into a quiet space clear of the path, so the ring can reopen. Only when the vet turns to speak to the groom do I begin to feel how badly my legs are shaking.
Max takes my helmet when I unfasten it and passes it to the groom. Then his arms come around me, and I press my face against his shoulder with a breath that catches halfway out.
“Elle.” His voice is rough against my hair. “God. Elle.”
I let myself lean on him. I don’t want to say anything brave, and he doesn’t seem to need me to. His heart is pounding beneath my cheek. The hand at the back of my neck isn’t entirely steady either, and that undoes me more than if he had stood there looking certain of everything.
“I’m here,” I tell him, drawing back enough to see his face.
His fingers tremble when he cups my cheek. I cover his hand with mine, holding it there until his eyes meet mine properly. For a moment we are both trying to reassure the other, and neither of us is very convincing.
“You looked so calm at the rail,” I say.
“Then I fooled someone.”
The answer pulls a small, unsteady laugh out of me. I rise on my toes and kiss him, wanting the familiar warmth of his mouth, wanting to feel him answer. He does, softly, with his hand still caught beneath mine. When we part, I stay close enough that my forehead rests against his cheek.
For a year, the worst part of any thought about riding has been what might happen afterward.
The ground coming up, the pain, the long wait to find out what I had lost. I know now that I can be frightened and still hear my horse, still make a choice in the moment when I need to.
I don’t feel fearless. I feel shaken and desperately grateful, with sand inside one boot and my husband’s arms around me.
I would have liked to finish the course. I can admit that without wishing I had asked Sovrano for anything more. There will be another course. He is standing a few feet away, breathing quietly while the groom speaks to him, and I want to be able to ride it with him.
“You were coming down to trot before I could get through the gate,” Max says. “I kept looking for somewhere to reach you. You’d already got him clear.”
“I wasn’t thinking about the gate. I just wanted him away from those fences.”
“I know.” His thumb moves slowly over my cheek. “You did that beautifully.”
I look toward Sovrano, letting the words reach me. I have spent so long missing what I used to be able to do that I almost don’t know how to accept being proud of something I did today. But I remember his stride shortening under me, the instant he began to listen again. I asked, and he came back.
Felicity reaches us as the vet finishes with the groom. Her face is pale, but she stops close enough to let me reach for her rather than pulling me away from Max.
“He’s been checked,” I tell her before she can ask. “He’ll need another look at home, but she hasn’t found an injury. And I didn’t fall.”
“I know you didn’t.” She takes both my hands. “I watched you stay with him.”