Chapter 9
“Anything worth doing well is worth doing poorly at first.” - Ray Congdon
Bryce
It was the 4th of July weekend, and I’d been here for a month. Apparently, this was one of the biggest weekends of the season for the track, and I’d been working over there for the past week, getting all the red, white, and blue banners hung; putting American flags around all the flower beds and along both sides of the horse track.
I’d gotten to observe Avery several times while I’d been working in the inside arena where she and her cousin, Hannah, gave lessons called dressage.
I hadn’t wanted to come across as ignorant about what exactly dressage was, I knew it was a certain brand of riding, but damn, once I saw the full extent of it, I realized it was much more than that.
I could tell that Avery was an expert. Hannah was pretty damn good too, but Avery seemed to handle her horse seamlessly every time.
I was over hanging flags on the bleachers in the arena when I got distracted by Avery giving a girl a private lesson. The girl looked to be about twelve or thirteen, and she wasn’t having much luck getting her horse to do the steps required in the routine. Avery had an inordinate amount of patience it seemed, as long as she wasn’t dealing with me.
“Rachel,” Avery said, “I’ve got an idea on how to help you with the problems you’ve been having in executing the half halt with Rebel. You know, it’s something my own mother showed me. I bet it’ll work with you.”
“Okay, Avery,” Rachel replied, her frustration evident, “I’ll try anything at this point. I need to get our routine down before the exhibition.”
“No worries,” Avery said, “Dismount for a moment.”
Rachel dismounted, and as soon as she did, Avery mounted the horse, and then reached her hand down, pulling the girl up behind her in the saddle.
“Now,” Avery said, “I think it might be easier if I show you how the half halt is properly executed. To the naked eye, it looks as if the rider applies all three aids at the same time. However, if we could freeze-frame it, you’d actually see that the aids are applied separately, in sequence. We’ll go through this a few times so you can feel what your body is supposed to do in conjunction with what the horse is doing, okay?”
“Sure,” Rachel said, nodding.
“So, I want you to rest each of your hands on the outside of each of my thighs, as close to the back of my knees as possible.”
The girl did as instructed.
“Now, remember what we talked about earlier? There is no ‘halt’ in the half halt. That’s a misnomer. Every half halt should contain what?” Avery asked.
“The surge?” Rachel replied.
“Correct,” Avery said. “It will contain the surge, the drive, and the energy from Rebel’s hind legs, just as if you were asking for a medium gait or a lengthening.”
“Got it,” she responded. “But we don’t want him breaking into the medium gait, until after the surge, correct?”
“Absolutely,” Avery agreed, “Because we know that we always ride the horse from back to front, which is what the surge guarantees.”
Avery started Rebel into the routine. The girl placed her hands on the outside of Avery’s thighs as instructed.
“Now, if we’re lucky, you’ll be able to feel my calves close first. It will be a steady squeeze for three seconds, just before the surge. Here we go.”
I stopped what I was doing to watch as Avery and her student went through the motions three times and, like clockwork, when Avery would close her calves with a steady squeeze, a few seconds later, the horse would flex and the hind legs would propel in a straight gait.
“Oh my gosh, yes I can feel it,” Rachel said loudly. “Let me try!”
Avery dismounted, handing the reins to Rachel who immediately got the horse into motion. The second time around, the girl had the horse doing the half halt or whatever the hell it was called. Avery high-fived the girl on her next time around the arena. It was then she caught me watching them.
Her face flushed as I gave her a thumbs up and nodded. “Nice job, Avery. You know your stuff no doubt. I’m impressed.”
Avery came up to where I was standing. “Do you ride?” she asked.
“I have a couple of times, but only for fun. Never knew how technical this shit was,” I admitted. “But you know what? I enjoy the work and diligence that goes into it. I’d never sell it short that’s for sure.”
“Thanks, Bryce.”
I smiled and got back to work. Avery went back down and mounted her horse to continue with her lesson.
And it dawned on me that she’d called me Bryce. Maybe for the first time; hopefully not the last. I kinda liked the way it sounded coming from her.
Thankfully, I didn’t have to work any of the 4th of July activities. Neither did Marvin. In fact, poor Marvin had gotten into it in a text fight with his girlfriend. He was pissed because she blew him off for the whole holiday weekend to hang with her girlfriends at some big party in Myrtle Beach.
So, we did what any normal, hot-blooded, unencumbered dudes would do: got drunk, got laid, and took no names or numbers.
Boom!
But to be honest, it wasn’t all that much fun. That same night, after we got back to Camp Horsey Horse, Marvin felt so damn guilty, he puked a couple of times, called his girlfriend, Heather, confessed all he’d done, and then went to his cottage to cry in his suds and pass out.
The following day was July 4th. I got up around noon and grabbed a bath. I wanted nothing more than to wash the smell of sex from my body. I made a note to grab another box of condoms the next time I made a trip to the general store.
My hair was still damp from my bath, and I’d pulled on a pair of jeans and nothing else as I decided I needed to get something into my stomach. I dropped a couple of Pop Tarts into the toaster, grabbed some orange juice from the fridge, and was drinking it straight from the carton, when a loud pounding at my front door stopped me mid-swallow.
Holy shit–what now?
I sauntered out to the living area and peeked through the blinds on the front window to see who the hell was beating down my door. It was Hannah Sinclair. Avery’s cousin.
Hopefully, she had the wrong cottage. Like I said, I didn’t do drama. And as I walked over to the front door, I couldn’t think of a damn thing I could’ve done to piss off Hannah. Unlike Avery, Hannah seemed soft and sweet. Not nearly as outspoken as her cousin.
I opened the door, “Hey Hannah—”
“Don’t you Hey Hannah me, you big jerk,” she snapped angrily, pushing her way past me.
“Yeah, come on in,” I deadpanned, shutting the door and turning to look over at her. She was definitely pissed, but I was clueless as to why so I waited for her to lay it on me.
“You’ve got one helluva lot of nerve, Bryce! Heather was blowing up my phone all night long, crying and beside herself because of you!”
“Wait. What? Who?” I asked, still clueless. “What the hell are you yapping about, girl?”
She placed one hand on her hip, the other one she waved around, her index finger jabbing at the air between us. “I’m talking about Marvin’s girlfriend, Heather? Yeah, she was totally gutted when Marvin called her and told her exactly what went down. You should be ashamed of yourself, Bryce!”
“Whoa, wait one minute there, what’s with the ‘I should be ashamed of myself’ bit? As far as I know, Marvin’s a big boy. I don’t tell him what to do. Dude’s got a mind of his own, don’t put that shit on me.”
“Oh come on! Everybody in town knows you as ‘Bristol’s Newest Party Boy.’ Your reputation precedes you. It’s nothing to be proud of, Bryce. It’s not impressive at all. Especially to the female gender. You can’t continue using people and not giving a shit about their feelings, without it eventually coming back on you. And you know damn well if it hadn’t been for your need to be a party boy, Marvin wouldn’t have been influenced by your reckless behavior!”
Now it was my turn to put her ass in its place.
“Hannah, this isn’t a conversation you should even be having with me. This is not your business. But for the record, if I’ve used anyone, it wasn’t without them wanting to be used. And just so you’re clear on it, I didn’t come to Podunk, Virginia to win some damn popularity contest. Do you actually think I had a choice in the matter? I had no choice. And I don’t give a flying fuck if you’re impressed or disgusted by what I do, cause like I said, it’s none of your damn business!”
It was silent for a few moments while she digested my words. She was calm, and a bit reflective from what I could tell. “You know, I give Avery a lot of credit. She sees a helluva lot more potential in you than I do, that’s for sure. But let me say this. Whatever issues brought you here are no excuse for treating people as if they don’t matter.”
She turned and left my cottage. And for once, the door wasn’t slammed with a female’s departure.