Friendly Foal (7 page)

A picture jumped to my mind: Mason staring at the foal, the foal staring back, their eyes white with fear and distrust. Great. My photographic memory had snapped a picture of that.

Then, as if a slide show had kicked in, my mind shot me more photos, all of them of Gracie. Friendly was her baby. I owed it to that mare to give her foal a good life. Gracie had died with her head in my lap, just like this.

Catman peered over at me, his sharp, blue eyes cutting through the tiny, round lenses of his glasses. “It's cool, Winnie.” That's all he said, but it was enough.

“We'll start with her head,” I explained. It helped me to talk it through. And I knew it was a good idea to get the foal used to human voices.

I stroked the blaze on her forehead. Then I touched her jaw and under her chin. When I got near her muzzle, she tossed her head to keep me away from her nose and mouth.

“When she fusses, I have to keep repeating the same strokes,” I explained. “A hundred times or more. She needs to know I'll never give up on her.”

When Friendly finally stopped fussing, her eyelids drooped.

“She digs it!” Catman whispered. He scooped up Nelson as the black-and-white kitty headed my way. The flat-faced Churchill, orange tabby Moggie, and Rice were already on his lap.

When I was sure the foal wasn't resisting my touch on her head, I moved to her ears. I started with the left ear, rubbing it, then massaging it. “This will make it easier to bridle her when it's time.”

I stuck my finger inside her ear and wiggled it. She shook her head like it tickled, but I kept at it. “Once she gets used to people messing with her ears, she won't mind if somebody clips her ears later on. She'll remember. It's all a matter of trust, Catman.”

It didn't take long for her to get used to having her ears scratched. But I kept it up long after she stopped ear-flicking.

I moved on to the nostrils. Then the lips.

She definitely didn't like me messing with her mouth. Her lips twitched. She squirmed and lifted her head.

Amigo suddenly let out a mournful whinny.

Nickers answered it.

Annie Goat joined in.

I started in again, only I couldn't remember what I was supposed to do after the lips. There's a right order for imprinting. What if I got it wrong? I probably
was
doing it wrong. The filly was squirming more than ever.

We'd been at it a half hour, maybe way over. I'd promised to help Catman. Then I had to get to Pat's. Who knew how many e-mails had piled up for me on the Pet Help Line? Then I'd have to rush back to the barn before 11. I didn't want to miss Sal in case she came early. And Amigo. Sal and I would have to put in a couple of hours with Amigo.

“Chill, Winnie,” Catman said, using both hands to hold down the filly.

Friendly twisted her neck, trying to see Nickers. The filly was picking up my nerves.

I couldn't do this. “You can let her up now, Catman. I think we need a break.” But I knew it wasn't good to stop now, to give up on her.

The second Catman took his hand from her shoulder, the filly bounced up and trotted straight to Nickers to be rescued.

Nickers the Horse Gentler.

Catman and I speed-walked through the pasture and across the field, kicking through ankle-deep snow. I was glad Catman had opted out of his usual sandals in favor of moccasins. His striped bell-bottom jeans had snow-covered fringe on the sides that swung as he walked. Turquoise beads peeked through his army jacket.

“Did you get the beads for Christmas?” I asked.

He shook his head.

“So what
did
you get?”

“Beatles,” he answered. “Eight-tracks.”

I'd listened to the Coolidges' eight-tracks before. They're weird, box-shaped things that people used before CDs got invented.

Cats swarmed between us, more of them falling in as we got nearer to Coolidge Castle. That's how I'd come to think of Catman's home. The first time I saw it, though, I thought it was a haunted house.

Rice, the big white cat, leaped into Catman's arms. He stuck the cat inside his jacket.

Long gray clouds widened in the sky, as if they were being inflated.

“Hey, Catman,” I said, remembering the stars earlier. “Guess what. This morning that star of yours, the North Star, Polaris, was in the exact same spot as last night.”

“Always is. Always will be.”

I didn't know much about astronomy. But I did know that every time I tried to find the Big Dipper or Orion, they were in different places. “I thought stars moved around.”

“Not this one.”

Who knew?

Winter was definitely the best season for Coolidge Castle. The two boarded-up windows were covered with ice, and the gabled roof wore a white coating that took some of the spookiness out of the three-story rambling house.

I always check the front lawn before going inside. Mr. Coolidge is big on lawn ornaments, and you never know what will turn up. He'd outdone himself for Christmas, filling the whole front yard with Santas—Santa mice, Santa bears, Santa dwarfs (left over from Snow White's crew).

But something new had been added. The biggest Santa Claus had been transformed into an old man, dressed in rags and holding a scythe. Next to him, one of the elves wore nothing but a diaper.

“Let me guess,” I said. “Old Year, New Year?”

Catman just grinned.

We found Catman's parents at the dining-room table—a long, heavy piece of furniture with big claw feet. You could barely see the tabletop under the stacks of paper.

Coolidge Castle makes me feel like I've stepped inside a time machine and shot backward 100 years. Thick red-velvet curtains shut out the world. A giant spiral staircase leads to more rooms than I can count. You walk on Persian rugs and thick red carpet and stare up at sky-high ceilings.

“Calvin!” cried his mother. “Is that you?”

We couldn't see her over the paper piles, but nobody except Claire Coolidge would call Catman “Calvin.”

She kept talking. “Do you know what will happen if we fail to fill out all of these expiring contest entries? What will
not
happen, I should say. We may miss winning a brand-new, precision-made tricycle! Or a year's supply of dog food. Or a two-year supply of Crispy Rice Flakes!”

I knew nobody in the house rode a tricycle. A couple dozen cats were creeping from every room, but no dogs. And I didn't know where they'd put one more box of cereal. Their cupboards were full of cereal boxes, each one with a rectangle cut out from the back for last month's cereal contest.

“Where do we start?” I asked.

Chair legs scraped the floor. Then the head and shoulders of Mrs. Claire Coolidge popped up over the paper pile. Her head was covered with giant juice cans that had been transformed into hair curlers. She wore a fuzzy green bathrobe that matched the green netting over her juice-can curlers.

“Is that Winnie?” She brushed aside enough entry forms to see better. “It's
really
you!” She got up and charged around the table toward me. “Winnie, Winnie,
Winnie!”

Maybe one of the reasons I like coming to Coolidge Castle so much is that Catman's mother always acts like she hasn't seen me for years and is really thrilled I came over.

She hugged me hard. Then she reached up and whisked off my stocking cap. “There! Let's have a look at that gorgeous hair!”

Claire Coolidge is the only one, to my knowledge, who thinks
I
have gorgeous hair. Gorgeous hair is Lizzy's department. Mine is wild as a Mustang and ornery as a Shetland.

“For a minute, I thought you'd cut this lovely hair.” She tried to run her fingers through it but didn't get far. Too many tangles.

It was funny because I
had
been thinking about chopping off my hair.

As if she were reading my mind she said, “Winifred Willis, if you ever cut your hair, I will sell my salon and follow you around, scolding, until every inch of hair grows back.”

Note to self: Don't cut your hair.

I glanced down at her fuzzy green slippers, topped on each toe by a stuffed Tweety Bird head. No doubt a gift from her husband.

“Sa-a-ay!
How are you, young Winnie?” Bart Coolidge gave me his best firm, used-car-salesman handshake. Even though it was only six in the morning, he was wearing a gray-striped suit, with his Tweety Bird necktie loosened around the neck of his canary-yellow shirt.

“I'm fine, Mr. Coolidge. I'm the one who made Catman late. But I'm going to help him make up for lost time.”

“That's fine then!” he boomed.
“Sa-a-ay!”

I felt a joke coming on. Even though Mr. Coolidge is a natural used-car salesman, he must have dreamed of being a comedian. He has more jokes than a Pinto has spots.

“Knock-knock!”

I was already starting to laugh. His jokes are so corny that I can't help it. “Who's there?” I knew my part by now.

“Wire!” he shouted.

“Wire who?”

“Why're
you here and not out at Smart Bart's Used Cars taking advantage of our great, end-of-year bargains?”

We both laughed until our eyes watered.

Mrs. Coolidge brought out tomatoes, the Coolidge family's favorite snack. We each took one and started in on it.

Catman and I dug into the pile of entry blanks. Mrs. Coolidge insisted that I put in my own name, and whatever I won, I got to keep.

I filled out contest forms to win a toaster oven, a case of Spaghetti
W
s, a month's supply of Alphabet Rice, the world's largest garden hose, a year's worth of free movies for cable TV, which we don't have. But Catman handed me one entry I would have loved to win. A week at a dude ranch in Colorado. The fine print said the odds were 1,300,000 to 1.

“Maybe you'll follow in your father's lucky footsteps,” Mrs. Coolidge said, passing her husband another stack of envelopes. “Didn't he win an invention contest?”

“With the back bike,” I said.

“I have to get one of those bikes!” Mrs. Coolidge declared.

“You know,” I said, reading the entries more closely, “these just have to be
postmarked
by January 1. We don't really
have
to finish them today.” I was starting to worry about the time. I knew I hadn't put in my fair share yet, but I was anxious to get to the help line.

“But we're leaving at noon!” Mr. Coolidge announced.

“Where are you going?” I asked.

“Didn't Calvin tell you?” Mrs. Coolidge frowned at her son, who kept filling out entries at record speed.

“I can't believe you didn't tell your little friend about our prize!” Mrs. Coolidge scolded.

“What did you win?” I asked.

Mrs. Coolidge smiled so wide that I saw silver fillings on her back teeth. “Bart and I won an all-expenses-paid vacation to 15 international cities!”

“Wow! That's so great! What a trip!” I couldn't even imagine visiting
one
foreign city. I turned to Catman. “Catman, do you get to go?” I thought that for a trip like that, the principal wouldn't even count him absent.

Catman shook his head. “Barkers'.”

Mrs. Coolidge explained. “I'm afraid we only won
two
vacations. Calvin will stay with Eddy Barker.”

“It's a
romantic
, all-expenses-paid vacation, don't forget!” Mr. Coolidge chimed in. He leaned over and kissed his wife on top of her head, but it ended up being a kiss on a big green curler.

“So where are you going?” I asked, thinking I'd choose somewhere in Italy or Spain.

Mrs. Coolidge counted on her fingers as she spoke. I noticed that she wore eight rings, skipping only the pinkie and thumb of her left hand.

“1. Paris

2. Vienna

3. Warsaw

4. Nineveh

5. Bethlehem

6. Calcutta