Best Friends

Carole, Lisa, and Stevie finished up the last of their chores and then escaped to the hayloft for a quick Saddle Club meeting. The hayloft was one of their favorite places. It was filled with the sounds and smells of the stable but was above the hubbub of activities.

“The show’s going to be so much fun,” said Lisa.

“Yeah, it’ll be great watching Veronica get beaten in every class,” Stevie said. “We’re going to have to leave early.” Getting up in the morning was not her favorite thing.

“And get here early,” said Carole, thinking about the long drive into town at dawn to get on the road just two days after Christmas.

“I’ve got an idea,” said Lisa. “Why don’t we stay here the night before? That way we’ll know Stevie will get up on time, we can make sure the horses are properly prepared for the trip,
and
we’ll have more fun together.”

“Count me in,” Stevie said.

“Me too!” Carole agreed.

“It’s beginning to feel a lot like Christ-mas!” Stevie sang, off-key.

“I
F
I
SEE
one more flake of snow this winter, I’m going to scream!” Stevie Lake declared, practically screaming even as she said it.

“Oh, come on, Stevie,” Carole Hanson, one of her two best friends, responded. “That’s not reasonable. It’s only the middle of December. And remember, we want to have snow for the Starlight Ride on Christmas Eve.”

“That’s the point,” Stevie said, fiddling with the napkin dispenser on the table. “We’ve already had three snowstorms. This is just going to be one of those winters, and I don’t like it. Everything gets cold and mucky. We never get enough snow to play in or to close school, just enough to make a mess.”

“Hear! Hear!” their friend Lisa Atwood chimed in. “It’s been pretty awful. We’ve been confined to riding in the indoor ring since the beginning of November.”

And that, of course, was what really mattered.

Although the three girls were very different from one another, their common love of horses drew them together. Once they’d discovered the possibilities of a friendship based on that love, they’d formed The Saddle Club. It was a simple organization with only two rules: Members had to be horse-crazy (easy), and they had to help each other out, no matter what (not always so easy).

Carole was the horse-craziest of the three. It seemed to her friends that her whole world centered on horses, and Carole would never have disagreed. Her room was covered with pictures of horses; her bookshelves were filled with books about them; her magazine collection was all about them. Carole wasn’t sure what she wanted to be when she grew up—a competitive rider, a trainer, a breeder, a veterinarian, an instructor, or just an owner. Most of the time, she thought she ought to be all of these things.

Carole could be forgetful about many things. Sometimes her socks didn’t match, sometimes she left her book bag or her lunch at home. But she never forgot to bring her riding clothes on days she had lessons, and she never forgot to
bring a treat for her horse, Starlight. Her father, a colonel in the Marines, had bought Starlight for her one Christmas with the money her mother had left for her when she’d died.

Lisa was as organized about everything as Carole was about horses. Her clothes were always neatly pressed, her hair always combed smooth. Her assignments were never late and the only grade she ever seemed to get was an A. Her parents had just separated, and she lived with her mother. Her father was living in an apartment nearby, and she saw him every other weekend. Everything seemed different, and different didn’t feel very good. It was especially hard now that they were about to have their first Christmas as a split family.

If Lisa was organized about everything, Stevie was organized about nothing. Her clothes were often wrinkled, rescued from the laundry pile that she called her closet floor. She was often late, she sometimes forgot assignments, and she was frequently distracted by her compulsion to play practical jokes, especially retaliatory ones, on any one or all of her three brothers. Stevie spent a good deal of time in hot water with one authority figure (parent) or another (school administrator). She sometimes had difficulty seeing what she’d done wrong, but she was awfully grateful to her
friends, whose devotion and skills helped her get out of trouble almost as often as she got into it.

The waitress arrived at their table. Tastee Delight, or TD’s for short, was one of their favorite places, and the girls were treating themselves to some ice cream before their afternoon ride.

“Oh, it’s you,” their waitress said, looking warily at Stevie. Stevie was famous—perhaps even infamous—at TD’s for her odd ice cream combinations. The waitress was not always enthusiastic about her choices.

“Strawberry,” Stevie said. “In a dish.”

“And?” the woman asked expectantly, obviously waiting for Stevie to order licorice bits, caramel sauce, or pistachio ice cream to go with it.

Stevie fumbled in her pocket and pulled out the handful of change she had to work with. “Just strawberry,” she said. The waitress sighed gratefully.

Carole and Lisa placed their orders and the waitress disappeared.

“Well, it’s almost Christmas,” Stevie said. “I’ve got to save up, even though I was tempted by the bubble gum syrup.”

Lisa and Carole exchanged glances. “I think we can consider this our Christmas present,” said Carole. “I mean, not having to watch you eat a crazy concoction.”

“You could be right,” Stevie said. “But I don’t even have time to worry about money now. There’s so much to do!”

“You bet there is,” said Lisa. “All that Christmas stuff, especially the Starlight Ride, and then the horse show.”

“Right,” said Carole. “The Carolina Invitational. Did you ever think we’d be asked to go?”

They hadn’t thought it would be possible. The Carolina Invitational was a very exclusive show that allowed only a limited number of riders to apply. Max Regnery, their riding instructor, had been invited to send four junior competitors. Much to their delight, he’d chosen all three of them. Less pleasing was that he’d also chosen Veronica diAngelo.

Veronica was their least favorite rider at Pine Hollow: She was about as annoying as anyone could be. For one thing, she never let anyone forget that her parents were very wealthy. If she couldn’t earn something, she could always buy it—or at least she thought she could. Also, she considered Red O’Malley, Pine Hollow’s chief stable hand, to be her personal servant. And perhaps the most annoying thing of all—and even The Saddle Club couldn’t deny it—was that she was a pretty good rider. She wasn’t as good as she thought she was, but she was good, and that rankled them no end.

“Well, there’s lot to be done for just the show on its own,” Lisa said. “Like filling out the application.”

“You haven’t sent it in yet?” Carole asked. That surprised her, since Lisa was usually so organized.

“Not yet, but the deadline isn’t for a while. At least I’ve got it.”

“Me too,” Stevie said. “I wrote away for it the day I heard we could go, and I sent it in yesterday.”

“I sent mine last week,” said Carole.

One of the things the girls had learned early was that every show had its own rules and regulations. For the Carolina Invitational, which they were now referring to as the CI, the only deadline was for requesting the application. The riders could submit it up until a week before the show. They wouldn’t have to pay the entrance fee until they registered at the show.

“I applied to be in a couple of jump classes,” Carole said. That didn’t surprise her friends. Carole was great at jumping, and Starlight seemed to have been born for the sport.

“Well, you’ll do great, especially now that you’ve got that awesome new bridle for Starlight. He’s going to love it and jump like a pro—as if he didn’t always jump like a pro. It’s dressage for me,” said Stevie. “The CI is famous for its dressage tests.”

Although all aspects of riding in competitions required discipline, dressage was the one that required the most. The rider and horse were required to proceed through a predetermined
course of movements, turns, gait changes, reverses, and patterns, and it all had to look completely effortless. Many riders thought of dressage as the most demanding of events. Stevie, whose strong suit was rarely discipline in any form, took to dressage as if it were the most natural form of riding.

“Well, I’m applying for an intermediate jump class and dressage, but I also want to do a pleasure riding class,” Lisa chimed in.

“Sounds good to me,” said Carole. “You’ll learn a lot from all of them. The best thing about shows, really, is learning. Some people think the purpose is to gather blue ribbons, but the only person worthy to compete with is yourself, as you know—”