Wild Thing (12 page)

“Night, Wild Thing,” I said. I did my best impersonation of a nicker, then wrapped the blanket around me and fell asleep.

I woke to a whinny that seemed part of my dream. The blanket was beaded with dew, and I shivered at the cool morning air. The only light came from the moon, but dawn was waiting behind the clouds.

“Morning, girl!” I called.

The mare tossed her head, sending her long mane waving like ocean crests. I tried to imagine a good-morning nicker from her.

“Breakfast?” I asked, remembering Lizzy’s treats.

That’s when I noticed that the chunk of granola bar I’d set next to the blanket was gone. I lifted the blanket and searched in the grass for the missing granola chunks, following the trail of treats. Nothing. They were all gone.

I narrowed my eyes at the Arabian, who widened her eyes at me. “You already had breakfast, didn’t you, girl? Want some more?”

My heart quivered as I dug into Lizzy’s bag for another bar. I held it in my open hand and walked toward Wild Thing. She nodded and pawed the ground. Her ears rotated up, back, up. Then she stretched her neck until her muzzle barely reached my hand. She lipped the treat until she had it, then crunched happily. I had her eating out of my hand!

“I love you, girl,” I whispered. “Please believe me.”

For an hour Wild Thing grazed, and I stroked her all over. Finally, she let me lead her to within a few feet of the barn. When I sensed her fear returning, we stopped.

“Let’s play!” I said, facing her.

Mom had taught me that playing is the best way to gentle a horse. I looked around for a toy, but all I came up with was a black plastic bucket. “This will have to do,” I said, rolling it out of the barn.

Wild Thing shook her head as she watched the bucket roll noisily in the dirt. I ran after it, laughing at the mare’s puzzled expression.

“Your turn,” I said, toeing the bucket until it rested in front of her.

She pranced up to it, sniffed and snorted. Her muzzle bumped the bucket, and it rolled. Wild Thing let out a squeal. Then she nudged it again.

“Want this?” Catman stood like a ghost in the dancing barn dust. He held out a large rubber ball. “Cats will share.”

“Perfect!” I said. “Besides, playing with a bucket could be teaching her a bad habit if she ever has to drink out of one.”

If she ever . . .
I wished I hadn’t gone there. When I worked with Wild Thing, it was easy to forget that I was doing all of this just so we could sell her. I shoved the thought away.

Catman tossed the bright red ball at us. Wild Thing sidestepped playfully.

“Race you!” I shouted, running for the ball. She didn’t race, so I got there first. “Here it comes!” I called, rolling the ball to her.

She stopped it with her nose and gave it a shove, sending the ball right to Catman’s feet.

“Guess she wants you to play too,” I called.

Catman joined us in an awkward game of three-way catch. Wild Thing played along, rolling the ball and making us run for it. But I sensed her caution, her distrust. We had a long way to go.

The whole Barker family came by to drive Lizzy to church for some kind of youth concert. Lizzy introduced me to the other five Barker boys: Matthew, Mark, Luke, Johnny, and William. Mrs. Barker drove her family in a bright yellow van big enough to pass for a small school bus. Her husband sat in the very back seat between Johnny and William.

As they drove off, waving back at us, I could see why Lizzy liked the family so much. I felt bad not going with them—guilty because Mom had always seen to it that we all went to church. But that wasn’t all of it. I could remember when church had felt like a part of home and loving God had come as natural as riding bareback. Now somehow the pipeline that used to run from God to my heart was all clogged up.

I wondered if that was how Wild Thing felt—blocked off from everybody, all alone where love couldn’t reach her. I had to break through that. I had to make her feel my love, and I had less than a week to do it.

Tuesday a northerly breeze blew in, bringing with it a bunch of new fears for Wild Thing. She bolted when a branch cracked, shied at a candy wrapper, bucked at the breeze.

“She looks wild again,” Lizzy said, safe on the other side of the fence.

Lizzy was right. The mare’s wide-eyed stare was back.

I was grateful Wild Thing’s fears didn’t include me. But she didn’t trust me enough to believe I’d keep her safe either.

I asked Lizzy to bring me the empty feed sack, which I folded into a square the size of my hand. Beginning on her neck, I rubbed her all over with the gunnysack. I felt her sway when I got to her favorite spots—her withers, jowl, low on her neck.

When I finished, I opened the sack a fold and did it all over again, repeating the process until I was stroking her with the open bag.

“Next week, Lizzy,” I said, “we’ll soak the sack in water and do this again. Then if there’s ever a barn fire, she’ll let herself be saved with a wet blindfold.”

I rested the sack on her back like a saddle blanket. “She doesn’t mind pressure on her back. I’m sure she’s been ridden before.” I hadn’t ridden since the accident, since we’d sold all our horses. Everything within me ached to ride Wild Thing. “I don’t want to rush it, but by next week I bet I can ride her bareback.”

Lizzy cleared her throat. “Next week, Winnie?”

I frowned over at her. “Dad hasn’t said anything to you about signing up for Spidells’ fall sale, has he?”

Lizzy shook her head, but looked like she wanted to say something.

“I know what you’re thinking. And I’m not getting my hopes up,” I said. But maybe I
was,
just a little. “I’m just saying that if he doesn’t register for Saturday’s sale, we have to wait for the spring sale.” I took off Wild Thing’s gunnysack. She shied as a gust of wind blew a dust eddy at us. “By then, anything could happen.”

Pat Haven stopped by twice a day to see how Wild Thing and I were getting along. She found two saddles and four bridles in the barn and said I was welcome to them. And in the loft we discovered a nylon lunge line good as new—30 feet long with a solid hook clasp.

The lunge line proved to be exactly what I needed. Wild Thing learned fast how to move to my voice commands. I stood in the center of an imaginary circle and held one end of the lunge line, while at the other end of the rope Wild Thing circled at a walk, a trot, or a canter, as I called out the commands.

Thursday afternoon Catman and Barker came over with Pat just as Dad’s truck pulled in. “Jack!” Pat called to him. “Come see what your daughter can do with this horse!”

I hoped my nerves wouldn’t travel down the lunge line to Wild Thing as my audience gathered. But the mare ran through her paces perfectly on the lunge, circling our well-worn path.

“Well, I’ll be,” Dad said. “Good job, Winnie. I’ve gotta run, but I’d like to see you and Wild Thing work out tomorrow again.”

Good job, Winnie.
Before I could say anything, Dad headed back to the truck.

The truck backfired as he drove off. Wild Thing bolted, jerking my arm so hard it hurt. The line whipped through my palm with blistering heat.

“Great finish,” I said as Pat and Lizzy checked my hand. “Good thing Dad didn’t stick around for it.” I pretended to laugh.

“Your daddy’s coming back for a real show tomorrow though, sugar!” Pat said. “I’d like to see that myself. Wouldn’t you, boys?”

Catman shrugged, and Barker said he wouldn’t miss it. Lizzy said she’d pop popcorn.

The rest of the day Wild Thing and I took turns working and playing. By nature, Arabians like humans more than most horses do. They were bred for desert nomads who needed steady mounts and good friends. We were becoming friends. But still she held back from accepting all the love I wanted to give her.

I slept in the barn Thursday night with Catman’s black-and-white kitty, Nelson, snuggled next to me. Wild Thing never came in, but she didn’t wander far away.

For no reason I could figure out, Friday morning Wild Thing decided to forget everything she’d learned.

“I said
trot,
not
balk!”
I shouted from the center of our makeshift arena. “Please, girl! We have to get this right.”

She stood her ground as if her hooves were glued to it.

“Okay,” I said. “Don’t trot. Walk on!”

She switched her tail and craned her neck to look at me. She pawed the ground and jerked against the lunge line.

I tried everything—jogging with her, starting over with commands, reversing directions. Nothing got through.

My stomach ached, and my head throbbed. Finally I walked up to her. “You may think this is fun, but I don’t!”

Fun? Did I say
fun?

Wild Thing wasn’t the only one who had forgotten! I’d forgotten the first rule of horse gentling—have fun.

I unhooked the lunge line and let it drop. Then, dangling one of Lizzy’s treats behind me, I raced out into the pasture. “Come on, girl!” I called over my shoulder.

She hesitated. Could be a trick. Then she tossed her head and galloped up behind me. She soared past, came back, circled, bucking for the fun of it.
Fun!