Golden Filly Collection Two (24 page)

Trish felt like tearing the page out and ripping it to shreds to let the wind blow it away. Peace, there was no peace. She ground her teeth together. Fury, red hot and snapping sparks, blurred her vision. Her father said God lived up to His promises. Then why, even here at the beach today, was there was no peace? No song. No nothing.

The seagull dipped low and screeched at her.

“Shut up, you—you stupid bird.” She threw a handful of sand at him, and with one last keening cry he tipped his wings and drifted off.

Never had she felt so alone. She looked up and down the beach. Totally empty. “Father, Dad, Daddy, help me!” The scream tore from her raw throat.

She dropped her head on the leather-covered journal and waited for the burning tears to flood her eyes. But they didn’t. The burn continued.

Dry-eyed, she traced the embossed design of the cross on the front of the journal. “Please, please,” she whispered, “please help me.”

The sun disappeared behind the two-toned gray band of clouds swelling on the horizon. The wind, cold now, tugged and pulled at the figure sprawled on the square of red plaid spread on the shifting sand.

Trish sat up. She picked up her journal and stuck the pen in the pages, then placed it and her father’s journal back in her blue pack. The song hadn’t come. She stood, shook out the blanket, and folded it up. If peace came, what would it feel like? What did Jesus mean by “His peace”? She dug the journal out of the bag again and opened it, searching for the right page.

There.
“Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you.”
The words hadn’t changed. She read them again. And then her father’s words that followed:

Father, God, I need your peace so desperately. Sometimes I am so afraid, and then I am comforted by your words. Peace means to me, right now, that you are in control and you will never let me go. Your love, your grace, are eternal, forever, and that means right now. Thank you, my Lord and my God.

Trish shivered in the wind. Her dad had been afraid too. She closed the book, keeping one finger in the place. “Thank you.”

The tune floated in on the wind and curled around her bleeding heart.

When she reached the top of the cliff, she turned and looked over the white frosted breakers that crashed on the sand. One last ray of sun beamed up and painted the underside of the cloud in molten fire.

Trish hummed the song under her breath as she placed her bag and blanket in the trunk and removed her purse and schoolbag. She’d have time to grab a hamburger in Half Moon Bay before driving the curving road back up to the school.

“You look like something the cat wouldn’t even drag in,” Richard, her tutor, said when she dropped into the chair beside him.

“Thanks a lot. I needed to hear that.” Trish smoothed the windblown hair back from her face. “Driving a convertible messes my hair. So what!”

“Nah, not just that. Your eyes are all red; you look like you’ve been crying for a week. What happened, your boyfriend dump you?”

Trish stared at him. “Since when do you care? All you’ve ever talked about is chemistry.”

“Trish, that’s what you pay me for.”

“Well, you’re not doing a very good job.” Trish leaned back against the seat and crossed her ankles.

“Hey, your grades aren’t my fault. You just aren’t concentrating. I’ve watched you, your mind is off someplace far away. I think I’m just wasting my time.”

“Fine. Quit then.” Trish bit the inside of her cheek.

“No, we need to get to the bottom of this. You want to tell me what’s wrong?”

Trish stared at him, her mind at war behind her burning eyes. “Not really.”

Richard stared at her.

Trish stared back at him. One fat tear slipped from under her control and meandered down her cheek.

She clenched her fingers into fists until she could feel the nails biting into the palms of her hands. She would not back down.

Richard leaned forward and pulled a handkerchief from his back pocket. With a gentle touch, he wiped the tear away.

Trish’s lip quivered. Her nose ran, followed by the tears she’d tried so hard to hold back.

Richard handed her the handkerchief. “Here. While you wipe your face, I’m going out in the hall to get us a couple of sodas. You like Diet Coke, right?” Trish nodded. “And then we’ll talk, okay?” Trish nodded again.

The drink felt heavenly, both slipping down her throat and as the can pressed against her swollen eyes. “Thank you.” She swallowed several more times and put the can to her cheek.

“My dad died a couple months ago.” She took another drink. “Do you know much about Thoroughbred horse racing?”

Richard shook his head.

“Well, I’m a jockey and…” Once having begun, Trish told the entire story, about their dream of winning with Spitfire, and about all the races they’d won. “And now I can’t quit crying; I can’t think; I can’t do anything right anymore.”

“Man, that’s a bummer. No wonder you look sad, kinda spaced out all the time.” Richard tugged at an earlobe that held a tiny diamond post. “Bummer.”

“Yeah, you could call it that.” Trish blew her nose again. “Sorry, I messed up your handkerchief. I’ll take it home and wash it.”

“No problem.” Richard stared down at the chemistry books forgotten on the oak table in front of him. He looked up at her, seeming to stare through her eyes right into her brain. “I have something that can help you.”

Trish stared back. “You do? Really?”

“Really.” He dug in the pocket of his sweat shirt. “Here.” He dropped four white capsules into her hand. “Uppers. They’ll make you feel better. I promise.”

Chapter
05

D
on’t worry, you can’t get hooked on a couple of uppers.”

Trish’s fingers trembled. “I—I know that.”

“Well, I just thought they might help—like give you some energy and make you think better, maybe win a race or two. You know, even the doctors give these out.”

Trish nodded. “I know. He—the doctor offered me some right after my dad died. Said it would help make things easier.”

“Did you try it?”

Trish shook her head.

Richard looked at her and rolled his eyes. “Why not?”

“My dad always said we should depend on God for help, not pills and—stuff.”

“Didn’t he take the medicines the doctors told him to?”

Trish felt like her head was tied to a string. Nod yes, shake no. Her hands wouldn’t quit trembling.

“Well, think about it.” He checked the clock on the wall. “We better get on the chemistry. I gotta be somewhere else in a while.”

Trish shoved the pills in her pocket and opened her book. Maybe it was a good idea if those simple little white things could make her understand this stuff. But as Richard explained the formulas, her mind flitted off again. She fought to keep her eyes open. The warm room, full stomach, a droning voice—

“Trish, you’re not paying attention!” Richard slammed his book shut.

Trish started. Her eyes flew open and her heart pounded. “You scared me.”

He looked at her in disgust. “Take it from me, you
need
help.” He pushed himself to his feet and gathered up his books. “And there’s always more where those came from. All you have to do is ask.”

Trish watched as he strode out the room, his blond ponytail curling down past his shoulders. He was trying to help, he really was. If only she could stay awake.

All you have to do is ask,
kept ringing in her ears on the drive back to the condominium. That’s what her father always said too. He quoted the verse all the time, “Ask and you shall receive.” Just ask. She snorted. She was sure he didn’t mean ask for drugs.

But she
had
asked. She’d begged and pleaded for God to make her father well again. And He had—or the medicines had—for a time. But then her father died. The tears that always hovered just behind her eyelids pooled and blurred her vision. She wiped them away with the back of her hand.

And she’d prayed to win races. She had. And not just she and Spitfire. She’d won on plenty of other horses too. Her father always said she had a gift for understanding horses and getting the best out of them. So—had God taken the gift away?

She parked in the driveway at the hillside condo. Did God give gifts and take them away? Did He just answer prayers when He felt like it?

Wait a minute!
She thumped her fist on the steering wheel.
You said once you didn’t believe in God anymore—remember? You said He wasn’t real, but at the beach you were praying and begging again.

The battle waged in her mind. One side yelled there was no God, and the other insisted God was her Father and loved her dearly. Trish dug her fingers into both sides of her scalp and rubbed until it hurt.

But who else can I turn to? What else is left?
She pulled the pills from her pocket and stared at them in the light of the streetlamp. Would they
really
make her feel better? She stuffed them in her purse, grabbed her bags, and ran up the brick stairs.

She fell asleep after working only one chemistry problem. The thump of the book on the floor woke her so she could undress and crawl into bed. Another evening shot down. Would she never get this stuff?

The next morning, after working the horses that were healthy, Trish slumped into the chair in the office. She alternately sipped orange juice and munched a bagel. Adam and Carlos both favored coffee with their bagels, and Adam’s was smeared liberally with cream cheese.

“You got any mounts in the next week or so?” Adam asked around a mouthful.

Trish shook her head. “Should bug my agent, but—I don’t know—who’d want to hire me?”

Adam glared at her. “Well, there’re lots of other jockeys who make up the races without winning.”

“Yeah, right.” She looked up in time to find Carlos glaring at her too, sparks seeming to fly from his dark eyes.

“I think you should go home for a few days, then.” Adam set his coffee cup down and leaned forward. “If you leave today and come back Monday, you’ll only miss one class.”

“As if that makes any difference.”

“Trish!”

“Okay, okay. I’m going. You want me to leave right now?”

Adam leaned back again with a grin on his face. “Martha will drive you to the airport. No sense paying for long-term parking if you don’t have to.”

“You had this all worked out, didn’t you?” She stared from one smiling face to the other. “What about Firefly?”

“I think I can take care of her.” It was the first time Trish had heard Carlos resort to sarcasm.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean…”

“We know. Now get outta here.”

Trish felt hope leap within her. Home—she was going home. She stopped at the first phone booth and called Runnin’ On Farm. When the answering machine clicked on, she glanced at her watch.
Only eight-thirty.
She left a message. “I’m on my way home, first flight I can get. Call you as soon as I know. Oh, I hope you haven’t gone for the day.”

She called again from the house after making reservations. Same thing, just the answering machine.

A repeat at the airport.

“Don’t worry, I’ll keep trying,” Martha assured her as they called the final boarding for Trish’s flight. “You just have a good visit with your family. We’ll miss you.”