Show Barn Blues Read online

  “No, and neither have you, because it’s past closing time.”

  She grinned. “It’s worth it, sister. Stay out late some night and watch some fireworks from horseback. You’ll be glad you did.”

  “Well, not tonight.” I dropped my boots from the stirrups and stretched my stiff ankles. “I’m knackered. And cold, besides.”

  Kennedy leaned forward and wrapped her arms around Sailor’s neck. The horse stood quietly, his ears flopped back to listen to her. “I try not to think I’m like my father,” she said after a moment. “Picking the easy life over the worthwhile life. But I just got so damn tired. Is it okay to just say you’re too tired to go on, when you’re not even thirty?”

  Nope. I didn’t say that, though. It wasn’t my life, and everyone’s battles were different. “If you’re tired, you’re tired,” I said instead. “It’s not for everybody, this life.”

  “It’s for you though.”

  I nodded. “It’s for me.” The only thing for me. Tired be damned. “But you know how I keep it from getting too tiring, how I keep going day after day?”

  Kennedy sat up. “How?” She seemed to hope I had some secret that could bring her back into the fold, back into the world of horses day in and day out, the world that must have seemed so magical to her once, before she burned herself out.

  “You won’t like it,” I warned her, picking up my stirrups and my reins. Hope walked forward and this time, Sailor started walking right alongside him. They had settled into companionship, creatures at ease with each other, with the night and the shadows. A horse could get used to just about anything, with someone to trust and a minimum of boogeymen jumping out of the bushes to startle them.

  “Tell me.”

  “Rules,” I said simply. “Rules, and one clear-cut goal. You can’t do everything. You have to pick something, and do it very very well. Take me — I decided to concentrate on A-circuit adult amateurs. I have students, and they do A-circuit shows. That’s it. I don’t have some eventing students, and some dressage students, and some students who are just dabbling. I train everyone the same — for big horse shows. Jumpers. Now — can you keep a secret?”

  Kennedy nodded eagerly.

  “Now I’m thinking of breaking my rule, but only with my business. It’s getting expensive here. I’m thinking of adding kids to the mix, but again, only A-circuit stuff. And I’m thinking of adding guided trail rides, but only from the higher-end hotels. But someone else has to teach the kids, and someone else has to guide the trail rides. Because I’m sticking to my rules. I take Monday off. I turn out the lights no later than eight. I teach adult amateurs. Rules give you time off, Kennedy, and rules give you boundaries. If you’re trying to please everyone all the time, and if you never stop working, then you’ll burn out. Every single time.”

  By the time I’d finished my lecture, we were back at the head of the arena, the barn entrance beckoning to the horses. Hope pulled at the bit, and I reined back and jumped out of the saddle. “It’s past seven,” I said, glancing at the stable clock above the door. I loved that clock — it was an antique I thought added a special stately something to the barn. “Let’s head in for the night, okay?”

  Kennedy nodded and jumped down from Sailor, following us into the barn. When both horses were in the cross-ties, she turned to me again, face serious. “Do you think I could have done things differently?”

  I shrugged. “I don’t know, Kennedy. I wasn’t there.”

  Kennedy took off her helmet, pushed mahogany curls behind her ears. She looked young, not yet thirty — probably because she’d quit riding, got out of the sun, and settled down to life under office lights. “I did everything you said was wrong. I worked all hours. I had hunter students, I had Western Pleasure students, I had pleasure students who just wanted to learn to ride. I was always teaching or riding or mucking or trying to get more business, and I swear I did all those things at once. Maybe if I’d done things like you, I’d still be a trainer.”

  “You’re happy with Sailor as you are,” I said gently. “Why would you want to change that?”

  Kennedy bit her lip. “I don’t know.”

  “Then don’t,” I advised her. “Now let’s put these horses up and say good-night.”

  “Do you want to come out and get a beer?” Kennedy asked suddenly, almost desperately. “I’d love to talk more.”

  I shook my head apologetically. “Not tonight. But thank you.”

  She nodded her head and smiled. “Another time.”

  I promised.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  Ah, glorious Sunday night! I had total freedom for thirty-six hours. I could put horses and developers out of my mind completely, relax, sleep late, and generally act like a normal person who hadn’t devoted her life to needy four-legged animals and their just-as-needy two-legged owners. I could pop the cork from a cheap but not-too-cheap bottle of wine, open a historical romance novel which involved lords and ladies who never had to clean their own stalls when one of the grooms called in sick, and slip into a hot bath, letting all the worries of the stable waft away in the steam.

  I really did plan to do all of those things, which was why I sent Kennedy on her way into the night alone. It would have been nice of me to go and have a drink with her, sure. We could have gone to the Applebee’s down the road, which was about as upscale a place as we could manage in our riding clothes, and had a few glasses of overpriced white wine while she detailed her regrets about giving up the horse business and I listed all the reasons I could figure for why she had done the right thing.

  As a trainer, soothing the concerns and swaying the opinions of my clients was something that I did quite frequently. Would-be buyers had to be finessed into buying the horse I had chosen for them; nervous riders had to be coached into agreeing to go to their first horse show or step up in the divisions. Occasionally, over-eager students had to be gently put down, lest their dreams of greatness take them further than their skills could safely see them through.

  I did those things because I had to do them, not because I wanted to do them. After all, if I’d wanted to be a therapist, I could’ve gone to school for psychology, and gone on to make a lot more money than I made now. No, I listened to people’s fears, and assuaged them, because that was part of making my living as a trainer and coach. If they didn’t buy the horse I’d chosen for them, if they didn’t make the jump up in levels and continue to show and progress as a rider, if they pushed too far too fast and got hurt or had their confidence shaken, I was losing money just as surely as they were. Keeping my riders happy and confident was a cornerstone of my business plan.

  Kennedy wasn’t one of my riders, and fixing Kennedy’s life wasn’t my responsibility. She’d been a pain since day one. I wasn’t going to reward her for all the turmoil she’d brought to the barn by listening to her worries and telling her everything was going to be all right. I certainly wouldn’t get anything out of it.

  Whereas, I thought with satisfaction, pulling down my bottle of cheap-but-not-too-cheap wine, I was getting plenty out of a night alone in my own little house.

  Kennedy was interesting, though. I rummaged around in the silverware drawer, finding my corkscrew where it had been buried since last Sunday night. She was more interesting than I had thought. A rancher grandfather who bred Quarter Horses, the black sheep of the family for riding English, who’d have expected that! Then there was the little matter of how she’d stolen her old trainer’s students — she’d glossed over that, hadn’t she? The trainer had a broken ankle, Kennedy rolled in to help out, and boom, she suddenly had a barn of her own, full of clients! “Little minx,” I muttered, twisting the corkscrew into the soft wood of the wine-cork. “There’s something to watch out for.”

  Still, I had to admit, in all my dealings with Kennedy I had never thought she seemed shifty or shady. She really seemed without guile — another reason she probably should stay away from the training business.

  I threw a bag of frozen past
a into a saucepan, looked at the empty spot on the floor next to me, and thought again about getting a dog. I could have talked to a dog about this whole Kennedy thing. About why her story was bothering me. Then the dog could yawn and lick himself in an inappropriate place, letting me know just how pointless the whole thing was. Thanks, imaginary dog.

  Usually, I wasn’t much interested in anybody’s problems. I had problems of my own. I didn’t need to borrow anyone’s worries. And of course Kennedy was better off with her white-collar job and her big paychecks and her freedom to do nothing but have fun with her horse. Hadn’t she said, time and time again, that was all she wanted? Hadn’t she been trying to convince everyone in the barn that all they ought to be doing was playing with their horses, not showing them?

  I frowned into my wine-glass. Did our dear Kennedy protest too much?

  “And what about the rumor that she was a princess at the dinner show?” I asked the imaginary dog, which I had decided was a Jack Russell, for old time’s sake — I’d had a Jack Russell terrier when I’d first moved here, ages ago. “Has she been moonlighting as a professional rider even after she claimed to give it up?”

  That was the problem, I thought, pushing up from the couch to stir the sizzling pasta on the stove. Now I was interested. “She’s reeled me in,” I told the imaginary Jack Russell, who had followed me into the kitchen and was watching me, adoringly, little stump tail wagging against the linoleum, pushing hairballs into wispy dust bunnies that would hide under the kitchen cabinets until I got overwhelmed with dirt one day and did a mad cleaning rampage. Maybe I’d get a puppy who hadn’t had its tail cut yet, I thought. I liked those whippy tails, whacking against your calf with enough force to leave bruises. That was true puppy love. “She’s got me hooked.”

  The pasta was plumping up and the shrimp was nearly done, curling into tight pink balls, the steam rising up to the ancient hood above the old stove. Another person might have replaced the peeling linoleum floor, put in a nice stainless steel appliances, or at least some modern conveniences that didn’t look like dangerously aging antiques, but another person didn’t have an entire equestrian center just a few steps away, taking up every penny and moment of thought.

  “Kennedy has clearly forgotten what it’s like to run a barn,” I told the Jack Russell. “Maybe she needs a reminder. Maybe if I give her a few little things to do around here, she’ll remember why she quit, and she won’t be fixated on it anymore. Or maybe she’ll fall in love all over again, and I’ll have a new trainer and trail guide.” And I ate a piece of shrimp, scalding hot out of the pan, and thought that at least I didn’t have to sacrifice one of these scarce little delicacies for the dog. Not yet, anyway.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Colleen brought out her daughter on Tuesday evening. Maddy, fresh-faced and pig-tailed and already kitted out in jodhpurs, garters, and carefully laced paddock boots, went racing from stall to stall, patting noses that were shoved through the stall bars, standing on tip-toe to see into stalls where less-eager horses were lurking within, watching her with wary eyes. “Why doesn’t this one want to talk to me?” she shouted, and I whipped my head around to see her leaping up and down in front of Ivor’s stall door.

  “Don’t touch that one!” I shouted, and went sprinting down the aisle to drag the kid away from Ivor’s box. Ivor glared at me from the depths of his stall, where he had retreated to avoid the offensively loud small thing that had shoved a hand through his stall bars. “Thanks,” I told him, deeply appreciative he hadn’t played the stallion and removed a finger or two.

  The girl writhed in my grasp. I took hold of her polo shirt collar and spun her around. “You listen to me,” I said sternly. “There’s no running, there’s no shouting, there’s no jumping, and there’s no touching horses that don’t belong to you.”

  Maddy’s thick brows crashed together as she regarded me with an alarmingly adult frown. “You can’t tell me what to do.”

  “Around here I can,” I informed her, fixing her with a frown of my own. “This is my barn, miss.”

  “Maddy, honey, you need to listen to Miss Grace,” Colleen said, coming up behind us. To me, she said gently, “I’m sure you can let her go now.”

  I released my death grip on the girl’s polo shirt and she took a step back, watching me rebelliously. Oh, I thought. Oh, this is just going to be way more fun than I had bargained for.

  Maybe having children at the barn wasn’t such a great idea.

  I remembered empty stalls and a waning supply of students and show fees and fixed a smile on my face. We all have to evolve with the times, after all, or we’d be still be cavemen hunting eohippus. “Are you ready to learn to ride, Maddy?” I asked in a voice I equated with kindergarten teachers. “We have a special horse all saddled up for you.”

  Maddy’s face was dark with suspicion. “Is it a pony?” She pronounced pony as one might pronounce worm.

  “It’s not actually. I don’t have any ponies yet. It’s a horse, but he’s a nice quiet horse. Very nice for new riders.” Douglas was the most bomb-proof of all horses, possibly because he was twenty-six years old. He belonged to one of the boarders, who kept him on out of sentiment after she had bought a racy young Oldenburg a few years ago. Douglas was of uncertain lineage, uncertain soundness, and uncertain history. The only thing we knew for sure about him was he was quiet as a sheep. “Do you want to go and meet him?”

  She nodded and put out her hand. I glanced at Colleen, who nodded.

  I took the little girl’s hand, which was unnervingly soft and delicate, in my own calloused one, and we went to the cross-ties to visit with Douglas.

  I went right up to him, waking him from a nap — Douglas spent most of his time napping — and gave him a rub on the face, between his eyes, where you could only touch a horse if he trusted you. “This is Douglas, but you can call him Dougie if you like,” I told Maddy, who was suddenly hanging back. “Come on, come and tell him hello.”

  Maddy shook her head.

  I looked at Colleen, who brushed glamorous hair behind her ears and looked right back at me with a challenging tilt of her chin. I wasn’t going to get any help from her, I could see.

  I scratched Douglas between the ears and considered my situation. I didn’t have much experience teaching children — nothing recent, anyway. Back in my younger, hungrier days I had done it, of course. I’d mostly bossed them around, I remembered, but I’d also been a lot younger, closer to them in age. When a young instructor bossed a kid around, it was like having an impatient older sister. When an older instructor bossed a kid around, it was more like they were just mean old people, and kids hated mean old people. That much I knew for sure.

  “Maddy,” I cooed. “Wouldn’t you like to come and pet Dougie? He’s the nicest horse in the whole wide world.”

  Maddy let dark hair hang over her face and shook her head very hard. Not so brave without stall bars between her and the horse, apparently.

  A new voice piped up. “Oh, Maddy, you’ll make Dougie so sad.”

  I looked down the aisle. Kennedy was heading our way, a camp-counselor smile on her face and a coaxing tone in her voice. “Poor Dougie,” she went on. “He’s so old and he’s afraid no one likes him anymore. All these flashy young horses and no one to love Dougie. It’s so sad.” She sidled up next to me and gave me a bob of the head. I took the hint and ducked away to watch from the sidelines. Kennedy gave Dougie a rub under his throat, and the old horse stretched out his head to enjoy it. His upper lip twitched with pleasure, and Maddy giggled. “Oh, he loves this, Maddy. It’s his favorite thing. Want to come and make sure Dougie knows we still love him?”

  Maddy nodded and came forward cautiously. When she was a few steps away, Kennedy caught up her hand and guided it to the itchy spot beneath the ridges of Douglas’s jaw-bones. She moved it back and forth energetically, and Douglas practically swooned with contentment, his eyes closing and his upper lip stretching to elephantine proportions.

  “T
here you go,” Kennedy said approvingly. “Look how happy you’re making Dougie.”

  He looked like the happiest horse on earth. Maddy was smiling from ear to ear, as if she could do this all day long, or at least until her arm got tired.

  Kennedy turned to look at me. “Grace,” she whispered. “Can I have this one?”

  I held up a finger and ducked under the cross-ties. “Hey Colleen,” I whispered, and Maddy’s mother turned.

  “This is nice,” she said, nodding back at the Douglas Appreciation Society. “Kennedy seems to have a way with kids.”

  Unlike me. “What do you think of having Kennedy teach this one?” I asked quickly. “She has a lot of experience teaching children.” So she says. “And they’ll only be on the lunge line in the covered ring, so you can watch and see what you think of her teaching.”

  I didn’t think she’d go for it, not after she’d practically blackmailed me into promising to kick Kennedy out at the next opportunity. But if there’s one thing that will always surprise me, it’s people. People aren’t like horses. You can never really predict what they’ll do next. It’s one more reason I prefer horses.

  “Sure,” Colleen said, and smiled. “We’ll keep an eye on her. You thinking of hiring her to teach the kids?”

  “Well, she has a job already.”

  We watched her show Maddy the parts of the horse, the bits to touch and the bits to avoid. Shoulders good, flanks bad. Maddy followed her lead with frowning concentration.

  “Looks like she might want a new one,” Colleen observed.

  “She say anything to you?” Maybe there’d been a tack room confidential.

  Colleen shrugged. “The same things we all say to one another. That we wish we’d never quit riding. That we could have been pros if we’d stuck with it instead of going to college, or getting married, or whatever. But she’s not married, she doesn’t have kids, she doesn’t have anything tying her down or keeping her on course or reminding her that she’s happy with all those choices. Maybe she really means it.”