CHAPTER 14
August was a whirlwind of activity, and it felt like Victor never got a breather.
If he wasn’t at a show on the weekend, he was at a clinic or travelling to someone else’s barn for a training session with a horse that wouldn’t get on a trailer or turned aggressive during feeding time.
Taylor went with him to several shows, either to serve as interim groom or to participate in the show itself.
By now she was mostly riding Midnight during her lessons, and the horse was really coming around as a solid mount.
Victor decided he’d be the one to show her first, which turned into a good decision when Midnight became a bundle of nerves and acted out several times during an equitation class.
She spooked at someone’s umbrella and bolted halfway across the ring before Victor got her back under control.
By then, her confidence was shattered, and she popped a few small rears before Victor excused himself from the ring.
Sometimes when a horse said no, you had to listen to them.
After giving her twenty minutes to decompress and eat hay by the trailer, Victor tacked her up again and took her down to the practice ring, which she handled much better.
By the time they finished, she was relaxed and responsive, and it gave Victor hope that during her next show, she’d act more civilized.
Victor had put Taylor on Saturn for her youth reining class.
Both Johnny and Kayla came out to watch, and she ended up placing first, which had everyone beaming and in a good mood.
Taylor pinned the blue ribbon to her shirt and wore it the rest of the day.
Every conversation from that point forward was about the class and all the things Taylor wanted to do in the future.
It gave Victor some hope that her success in the ring could buoy her above any turmoil in her personal life.
Several of his other students placed well, and Jade won Division Champion on her personal horse.
It reminded Victor of his days when he showed competitively, when every weekend was spent travelling to NRHA shows so he could win the purses and belt buckles and write-ups in reining-related blogs.
But he was much happier doing this—taking his students to more local shows and watching them compete instead.
All the trophies in the world didn’t make him feel a fraction of the satisfaction he got from watching a relaxed, happy horse perform well in a ring for a rider who had trained years to get it there.
Before Victor knew it, September arrived, though the summer weather remained.
Victor contacted Ramona’s friend about the LGBTQ rodeo event, and the organizer was happy to invite Victor to participate.
He asked if Victor might have any interest in being the flag bearer at the start of the event, which Victor agreed to.
Victor had invited Jade to join him, but Jade had a wedding to attend that weekend, so Victor planned on going alone.
He spent an abnormal amount of time dressing himself that afternoon, even though he knew that if he did calf roping anything nice he put on would end up covered in dirt and cow hair.
Still, knowing that this would be his first exposure to a group of queer people in years made him anxious and twitchy, and he kept wondering if he looked too gay or not gay enough.
He didn’t really own many things that couldn’t get ripped up, so he couldn’t peacock to the degree he would have liked.
The best he could do was a plaid shirt in the trans flag colors, though he was so used to trying to fly under the radar that only the most tuned-in queers might comment on it.
The rodeo was held at a small venue back a long dirt road, and everyone had to park in a large grass field near the arena.
Victor unloaded Saturn and tied her to the trailer, then headed toward the crowds in hopes of finding the ticket booth to sign in.
His heart bounced into his throat when he saw two men standing by the bleachers, arms around each other’s waists.
He was really here. God, how he’d fucking missed this scene.
Part of him wanted to run up and hug these strangers and thank them for being there, for existing.
He didn’t, obviously, but he still wanted to.
He did find the right place to sign in, but it wasn’t a booth, just some older ladies at a table by the arena entrance.
One of them was probably in her seventies, and she wore a tie-dye T-shirt that said, “I LOVE MY LESBIAN GRANDDAUGHTER”.
Victor wanted to hug her, too. Oklahoma was a scary place to be gay, and Victor was so happy that her granddaughter got to have this woman be so supportive of her.
There was a tall man with a waxed handlebar mustache standing beside the table, thumbs hooked through his belt loops as he observed the crowds under the shade of his cowboy hat. He wore a large nametag that read RICK.
“Rick Tanner?” Victor asked him, then held out his hand. “Victor Ortiz-Bennett. We spoke over email. You’re Ramona’s friend?”
The man’s previously serious face broke out in a grin, and he grabbed Victor’s hand with such enthusiasm that Victor’s palm stung when he pulled away.
“Nice to meet you, young man! We’re happy to have you here.
You’re our flag bearer, yeah? Lemme go track it down and I’ll hand it over.
You want the American flag or the gay pride flag? ”
“Definitely the pride flag,” Victor replied.
Once tacked up and mounted, Victor headed back to the arena gate, sidling up next to a guy on a palomino carrying the American flag.
He wore a heavy turquoise bolo necklace, rhinestone earrings, and a denim jacket with tasseled sleeves, the back decorated with a few hand sewn patches.
One was rainbow-colored and read Queer Pride.
Another was yellow, labeled Seal of the Osage Nation.
“A mustang, huh?” the man asked Victor with a friendly smile.
Victor reflexively ran a hand down the center of Saturn’s neck. “Oh yeah. Trained her myself.”
“Been thinking about getting one,” the man said. “No better horse breeder than nature, right?”
The sound system crackled, and a drag queen stepped out into the center of the ring to welcome everyone to the event and thank them for coming.
After a few dry jokes, she asked for attendees to stand for the national anthem, which was Victor and his fellow flag bearer’s cue.
Side by side, they cantered out into the ring, flags snapping in the wind behind them.
Victor was no patriot, but he had to admit that seeing the rainbow flag flowing behind him filled his chest with pride.
He was so happy to see all the smiling faces in the bleachers, thrilled to hear the wolf whistles and clapping when the drag queen finished singing.
When they pulled to a stop behind her, Victor cued Saturn to bow, which she did to the delight of the onlookers.
The rodeo began with barrel racing. In a standard rodeo, it was women who ran barrels, but tonight it was open to everyone, though a few had decided to try their hand at drag.
Some were good at it, others were not. One person rode a donkey out, to the delight of all.
The races were timed, but there was no money or prizes to be won—everything was for fun and camaraderie.
Once calf roping started, Victor waited at the gate with the several other participants, one of whom was Ramona.
She waved at Victor with a grin before her number was called, then whipped her horse around and urged him through the roping box and the breakaway barrier.
The chute opened, through which galloped a calf headed for the opposite side of the arena.
Ramona spurred her horse into a gallop, then spun her lariat over her head before letting it fly.
Sadly it didn’t connect with the calf, and her round was over.
People still cheered anyway, and she gave Victor a “good luck!” as she passed him on the way out.
Victor’s number was called next, so he readied Saturn by the roping box. He placed the tie down in his mouth, then adjusted the lariat in his hand. When the buzzer rang and the calf jumped from the chute, Victor squeezed Saturn into a gallop.
Everything happened in a split second once he tossed the lariat.
First he triumphantly realized that it had slipped around the calf’s neck.
Then he swung his legs forward and his shoulders back, bringing Saturn to a skidding halt, yanking the calf to a stop with her.
Victor launched himself out of the saddle and sprinted toward the calf.
He hadn’t flanked a calf like this in a while, but his muscle memory was still reliable, so he was able to hoist the steer up and get it down before tying off three of its legs.
It helped that the calf was quite young and seemed resigned to its fate.
After finishing, he threw his hands in the air to stop the timer.
Afterward, he returned to Saturn and mounted, waiting six seconds to ensure the calf didn’t break free from his knots.
The time on the board was nineteen seconds—not awful, considering neither he nor Saturn had done this in a while. The pros could do it in nine.