Golden Filly Collection Two (8 page)
Trish waved as she stepped up into the truck. Her blurry vision made her stub her toe on the step.
Red caught her and helped her into the cab. “You okay?”
Trish just nodded. She fought the tears, teeth clamped so hard her jaw ached. As they drove down the fence-lined drive, she stared at the clock on the dashboard. Hands tucked under her arms, she shivered once. Red laid his arm across the back of the seat and massaged her neck.
All Trish could see on the back of her eyelids was Spitfire galloping across his new paddock. She could hear his whinny, feel his last whiskery whuffle. A lone tear squeezed past her iron control gate and meandered down her cheek.
Red brushed it away with one gentle finger.
“I meant it, Trish, about coming to California and racing for me this summer,” Adam Finley said just before he boarded his plane in Lexington. “I know it’s going to be rough for you in the days ahead, and new scenery might make your summer easier.”
“I—I have to finish my finals, and then I promised my mom I’d take chemistry at Clark College. She’ll never let me out of that.”
“Well, just remember we have colleges in California too. I’m sure you could find a class in the evening.” He reached as if to hug her then drew back. “I know how hard you are fighting this, Trish. Martha and I would love to be able to help you, and you would be helping us too. Your dad’s passing has left a mighty big hole—in many lives.”
“Ahhh…” Trish nodded instead of trying to finish her thought. “Thanks for all you’ve done for us.” She looked up to see tears glistening in Adam’s eyes.
“Crying isn’t a sin, my dear.” Finley sniffed and blinked a couple of times. “No matter how hard you fight it, letting the tears come will help you get better.”
Trish shook her head. Her strangled “I can’t” carried from over her shoulder as she headed for the exit.
She had her armor back in place by the time she joined Red and Patrick at the cargo dock.
Loading Sarah’s Pride on the plane proved surprisingly easy. Patrick had come prepared with a tranquilizer shot, but the filly walked up the ramp with only a snort and a toss of her head. Once inside, she trembled and broke into a sweat while the men erected the stall around her, but she stood still. With Red doing the same on the other side of the horse, Trish rubbed the filly’s neck and ears. At the same time she whispered her soothing monologue, the song she’d learned from her father.
“I’ll call you soon.” Red ducked under the horse’s neck after she’d lipped a bit of hay from the sling. He put one arm around Trish and brushed a strand of hair off her cheek with his other hand.
“Okay.” One word was all Trish could manage.
“You’ll write or call? You can always get in touch with me through my mom and dad.”
Trish nodded. Red raised her chin and brushed her lips with his. She turned her head before he could kiss her again and shatter her control. Leaving hurt so bad. How much more could she stand?
Red squeezed her shoulder. “Take care.” He levered himself over the stall.
Trish heard him say good-bye to Patrick. If she started to cry now, she knew she’d never be able to stop.
Just get through.
The inner order worked again.
The filly swung her rear end from side to side as the plane revved for takeoff. Patrick joined Trish in the box to try to keep the horse calm. Together they kept her from slipping as the plane floor slanted. When the plane leveled off, the horse quieted down. She sighed and dropped her head, as if all the tension had worn her out.
Trish stretched and wrapped both arms around her shoulders to pull the kinks out. She dropped her chin on her chest, then shrugged her shoulders to her ears.
“Ye did a good job, lass.” Patrick walked around the filly, adjusting the travel sheet as he checked for any more sweating. He unbuckled the crimson blanket and pulled it off. “She needs a dry one after all that.”
Trish handed him the extra sheet and helped buckle it.
“It’ll get easier, lass, take my word for it.”
Trish just shook her head.
“You want to go sit down for a while? I’ll stay with the girl here.”
“No. You do that.” Trish dug a brush out of the tack bucket. “It helps me to keep busy.” She flipped back the sheet over one front quarter and started brushing.
The remainder of the trip passed without incident. Trish spent part of the time studying, but failed to turn many pages. Her eyelids kept drooping.
David had the six-horse trailer ready and waiting when they landed at Portland International Airport. Unloading and reloading went without a hitch, and they were crossing the I-205 bridge within a few minutes. The overcast skies seemed to match Trish’s overcast disposition.
She let Patrick tell about their trip to Kentucky and describe BlueMist Farms. She was back at the other end of the telescope, looking and listening from a great distance. It was easier that way.
David pointed out the sights to Patrick. Trish could feel her brother studying her between comments, but she shut her eyes and ignored him.
It wasn’t so easy to ignore her mother. Marge met them when they drove down to the barns at Runnin’ On Farm. She hugged her daughter once, then a second time before Trish could slip past.
Trish caught herself looking around for her father. Quickly she knelt to hug her dog, Caesar, and ruffle his pristine white ruff. The collie responded by quick-licking her cheek.
“I know, Tee.” Marge stood beside Trish with her hands in the back pockets of her jeans. “I keep looking for him too.”
A knife-sharp pain stabbed Trish. She felt as if her heart couldn’t take any more blows. She knew if she said anything or looked at the pain in her mother’s eyes, she’d crumble and lose the control she’d worked so hard to maintain.
Instead, she bit down on her lip and ducked her head as she followed David into the van to bring out Sarah’s Pride.
Spitfire should be coming home too.
Where was the celebration? Who could celebrate? She stomped her rampaging feelings down into a steel box somewhere in her middle and bolted the lid.
“Easy now.” David smoothed the filly’s neck as he jerked loose the tie rope. “Welcome to your new home.”
Welcome to nothing.
Trish caught the words before she spoke them aloud. She could hear her mother and Patrick talking outside the van. She untied the opposite lead and kept pace as David led their new arrival out the door.
Sarah’s Pride minced down the ramp and danced around in a circle, head up, surveying the area. She whinnied and pawed one front foot.
“Her stall is all ready,” David said. “I figured we should keep her separated from the others for a while.”
“You’re right, boy.” Patrick patted the horse’s right shoulder. “Why don’t you lead her around for a bit and let her work off some of her energy. We’ll give her a real work tomorrow and see if we can’t finish breaking some of her bad habits.” He tipped his fedora back on his head. “She sure is a determined one.”
“Well, stubborn fits right into this family,” Marge said. “She ran well the last time she was out, though, didn’t she?”
Trish felt her jaw drop in amazement. Since when had her mother cared anything about how a horse ran? She caught a grin that David tried to hide behind the filly’s neck. What was going on here? Her brother trotted off with the horse in tow.
“Patrick, I think Hal told you that we’d ordered a mobile home for you.” Marge leaned against the truck’s front fender. “The people installing the septic tank will be here tomorrow. The power and phone will be in by the end of the week, and the trailer should be here Friday too. In the meantime, you can have David’s room. He’ll take the couch.”
“No, no.” Patrick shook his head. “Ye needn’t be putting yourself out like that. I’ll just fix a cot down here and…”
“No, Patrick. This is the way Hal would want it. We had planned to have everything ready before you arrived, but…” She raised her hands in a helpless shrug. “We’ll make do until then. You’re a member of our family, and while the kids used to have slumber parties down in the barn, you’ll be much more comfortable up at the house.”
Trish could hardly believe her ears. Who
was
this person who’d taken over her mother’s body? And her mouth? Trish looked up in time to catch her mother wiping away a tear from the corner of her eye. Patrick looked misty-eyed too.
Trish dashed after David. “I’ll see if he needs help.” But David already had the filly loosed in her stall and was closing the lower half of the stall door.
“You know, I thought about bringing Dan’l up to keep her company, but Mom said to wait a couple of days. She’s right, of course.” David checked the latch and turned toward the house. “I’ve already done all the other chores.”
“All right, what’s going on here?” Trish kicked some gravel off to the side.
“What do you mean?”
“You know. Since when has Mom cared about what goes on down here?”
“Down here?” David picked up a stone and pegged it up the driveway.
“David!” Trish jerked on his arm.
“Okay, okay.” He raised his hands in surrender. “We had a long talk, Mom and I, and she said it was time she learned more about the horses and racing—since she doesn’t want to sell the farm.…”
Trish breathed a deep sigh of relief.
“You thought she might, didn’t you?”
“It crossed my mind.” Trish shoved her fingers into her pockets.
“Well, she isn’t. She said she and Dad had talked it all over. He told her to sell if she wanted to.”
Trish felt a boot-kick in her gut.
Her father had said that?
“But Mom says she wants to keep the farm; that with Patrick’s experience, and maybe hiring some more help when I leave for school…”
She felt the kick again. “But I—you—but…” David couldn’t leave too.
“I know.” David stopped and picked up another piece of crushed rock. He ran his finger over the rough edges. “But Mom said…”
Trish felt an arrow of anger again, the sharp one that caused her to clench her teeth. Since when did her mother know all about what was best for everybody? That was her dad’s job. She yanked her mind back to what David was saying.
“We had to pick up our lives and go on. My goal has always been to be a veterinarian, and now I want to specialize in equine medicine. You knew that.”
Trish nodded. She kicked another rock and watched it bounce off into the grass.
Sure, pick up our lives and go on. He makes it sound so easy. As if the world hasn’t totally fallen apart.
“I know this is hard for you, Tee.”
She shook her head. “Yeah.”
You don’t know the half of it, buddy-boy. What do you think you’re doing, just making plans like…like…
“Trish, Dad would want us to get on with our lives too—school, racing, all of it.”
Trish flung away his arm when he reached out to touch her. “Easy for you to say. You just go away and step back into a life that didn’t include us anyway. And Mom—she just acts like everything is fine. Well it’s not. It’ll never be fine again!” She felt like planting her fist in the middle of her brother’s nose.
Caesar whimpered at Trish’s harsh voice. He nudged her fist with his cold nose and whined again. When she ignored him, he tried a sharp bark.
Trish dropped to her knees and buried her face in the collie’s heavy ruff. When David laid a hand on Trish’s head, she shook it away. “Just leave me alone. Everyone, just leave me alone.”
And that’s what she felt like when she walked into the house. Alone. Her dad wasn’t sitting in his recliner. He’d never sit in his chair again.
T
rish, I’m so glad you’re here.” Rhonda threw her arms around her friend.
“Yeah, me too.” Trish stuffed her book bag into her locker. At least Prairie High hadn’t changed in the month or so she’d been gone. Kids still bumped into each other in the halls, yelled across the commons, and rushed off to class when the bell rang. She kept expecting everything to be different, just because she was.
“Can I help you somehow?” Rhonda clutched her books to her chest.
Trish shook her head. She seemed to be doing a lot of that lately. “David says just to pick up our lives and go on. That’s what Dad would want.” She felt like slamming her locker door and running screaming down the hall. “So my dad died. So what’s the big deal?” Trish lifted her chin in the air and glared at her friend.