Safe Landing (10 page)

“You’re such a snob, Brazil. His wife used to compete in Grand Prix championships. She doesn’t ride anymore, but the horses still need to be worked.”

“Maybe.” This was sounding better and better. “It would be nice to ride again.”

“And it’s for pay.”

“I’ll do it.”

Mom folded the grocery bag and put it in the laundry room. “I wrote down the address. You can go see him tomorrow if you’re up to a walk along the beach. But you’ll have to take the boys along.” She walked over and put her arm around my shoulder. “I think riding horses again will do you a world of good.”

The poor woman still thought I was imagining ghosts. If she only knew the truth.

****

Tyler stumbled into the kitchen rubbing his eyes. There was a terrible frown on his face as he yanked out a chair and plopped down hard.

“What’s your problem?” I asked.

“Raymond is an idiot,” he grumbled. It was unusual to hear him speak that way about his other half. They both seemed to have eased into their new school without a hitch. If fact, we were already receiving a rash of phone calls with feminine giggles before the hang up.

Raymond came in next. His face was equally grumpy.

“Great. So now you’re both in a bad mood.” I poured some batter on the griddle.

“What? Do you think you’re the only person in this house that gets to be in a bad mood?” Raymond asked. I swung around. Tyler was trying to suppress a smile.

“Pretty much,” I answered. “So knock it off. Mom left a note and you guys are supposed to weed the yard. Then you’re walking with me to the stables so I can see about a job.”

They moaned simultaneously. I flipped the first pancake. It was slightly black. “That one is for Raymond,” Tyler called. Raymond elbowed him hard.

“Enough. In a minute I’m going to let you make your own damn pancakes.”

I decided to join the boys in weeding since between them throwing dirt clods at each other and having a contest to see who could jump the furthest from a running start off the porch, I saw little actual weed removal. Plus the sunshine outside seemed more inviting than the brooding spirits inside, even though, my particular brooding spirit had not materialized all morning. I guess when you have eternity in front of you, sulking for several days straight isn’t that big of a stretch.

On the Mount Stables
was more rundown than I’d expected. The word
rustic
would be the nice way to describe it. It looked nothing like the pristine, prefabricated tan and forest green barns at Oak Hill. The pathways to the barn back in Boston were neatly groomed decomposed granite with symmetrically placed boxwood edges running along either side. This place was an uneven pattern of redwood stalls and pipe corrals. Giant shade trees surrounded the entire place, completely blocking the view of the road behind it. Some of the horses had a great ocean view. These horses looked happier than the animals stuck in the sterile environment at Oak Hill.

The twins stopped at a round pen where a huge, sorrel gelding was turned out. I joined them. The horse came to me immediately and brought with him the warm familiar scent of pine shavings and grass, a smell I’d always treasured. The animal made it immediately obvious that he would stand perfectly still all day for a hearty neck scratching.

“That’s Legend,” a man’s voice said from behind me.

I turned. It was an older man with shaggy gray hair that reached his collar. He was wearing a floppy brown felt hat that might have looked silly on someone else, but it was perfect on him. The soft wrinkles of his face showed a man who had smiled a lot in his life, a man who had seen good days and bad and had weathered them all with an easy going shrug.

Legend nudged my hand with his nuzzle reminding me that his scratching session had not ended. I reached up and stood on tiptoes to rub his forehead. “He must be seventeen hands.”

“Seventeen-one. Use to jump five feet from a standstill. Bowed a tendon once and was never the same.” The man walked closer and put out his hand. I shook it. His fingers were callused from work. “I’m Moses,” he said with a kind smile.

“I guess that explains the name of the barn,” I said. “This is Tyler and Raymond. I’m Brazil. And please don’t ask me why.”

“Tell you what, you don’t ask me to recite the Ten Commandments, and I won’t ask you about South America.”

I nodded. “Deal.”  I looked around. “How many horses do you have boarding here?”

“At the moment, twenty four. Two are my own. Legend here and the Warmblood over there is my wife’s horse, Dusty. He has some long, ridiculous show name that I can never remember, so I just call him Dusty on account that he kicks up a helluva lot of it when he’s in the arena.”

In a nicely kept stall across from the riding arena stood a chestnut Warmblood who looked like he’d seen some titles in his day. “He was my wife’s favorite horse. You could light a firecracker under his butt and nothing would spook him. Steady as rain in the rainforest.”

“That’s the best kind of horse,” I said.

“Been around horses long?”

“Since I was seven. My mom used to say they were in my blood.”

Moses nodded. He didn’t need to say a word. It was obvious they were in his blood too.

“You’re mom said you might be interested in a part time job. Most of the owners only come out on the weekend. They pay me to lunge and groom during the week.” He lifted his hands and I noticed, for the first time, his crooked fingers. “Arthritis is slowing me down these days. Hardly ever ride anymore. My wife neither. Our two horses need to be ridden. I’ll pay eight bucks an hour.”

I glanced around. Some of the horses were wandering out of their stalls waiting for dinner. Legend snorted and sprayed moisture on the back of my neck. I laughed. It was all so familiar and I felt more solid just being around horses again. I stuck out my hand. “I accept.”

By the time Mom got off work, the weeds in the yard still flourished, no see-through visitors had appeared, and Tyler and Raymond were speaking again. “How’d everything go?” Mom asked. “I was surprised no one called me even once.”

“I got the job at the stables.”

“Terrific. And how were the boys?”

“The brats were both in bad moods today. They were pissed at each other about something.”

“I’m not surprised,” Mom gave each of her four-legged fans a hug.

I put the last washed dish in the rack. “You knew they were mad at other?” I dried my hands and noticed Mom was giving me a look that bordered on an eye roll.

“Brazil, you may find this hard to believe, but your father’s leaving has been hard for all of us. Not only you.”

“What the hell did I do?” I asked incredulously. “You’re pissed at me because the boys were in a bad mood? You’re the one that let Dad leave.” It was another stupid blurting of words that I seemed to be highly skilled at.

Mom flopped onto a chair and restacked the napkins in the holder. Weariness washed the color from her face. “Is that what you think? You think I let him leave? I’ve got news for you, kid, your father wanted to leave. He walked out on his hysterical teenage daughter without looking back. Take him off of the fucking pedestal, Brazil. He’s not as wonderful as you imagine.” She was on the edge of screaming, but it didn’t make me feel better. My mom was the type of person who only screamed if something scared her. Like when Darcy ran after a turned out horse and nearly got his head kicked in. Or when Carrington spooked at a garbage bag and threw me over the arena fence. As I’d hit that point of no return when a rider knows she’s about to eat dirt, all I could think of was this was going to hurt and it’s going to scare the crap out of Mom. When I came too after the fall, Mom’s deathly white face was hanging over mine.

Now we faced each other in the kitchen, only it was sadness not fear that paled her skin. I’d thought that if she showed some anger it would make me feel better. But this was real anger and it didn’t help. My throat tightened and tears were clinging to my bottom lashes. My usual sharp tongue had retreated.

Mom swept around once with her arm. “You don’t actually think that I love being in this decrepit, old house. I gave up friends too, Brazil.” Her voice softened. A flaring of my mom’s temper was just that, a momentary warning flash. “I’m sorry I spoke so harshly about your father. I never want to harm your opinion of him. I only need you to realize that this was not all my fault.”

I stared at the ground. All I could think was that she didn’t seem to try hard enough to turn things back around. As their once good marriage started to disintegrate before our eyes, it didn’t seem like Mom put in any effort to save it.

“I’m taking Darcy for a walk before I make dinner. Want to come with me?” she asked as she reached for the leash on the hook by the door. Darcy pounced on her, nearly knocking her out onto the back stoop.

“I think I’ll stay here.” Deep down I knew I should’ve gone. I knew Mom was lonely these days, and I hadn’t been much of a friend, the opposite in fact. I was still too busy trying to sort the whole divorce thing out, and I especially didn’t know how to talk to her about it.

I absently began rinsing clean cups in the sink as Mom walked to the laundry room to put on her beach shoes. I snuck a peek at her while she was tying her laces, and it was there. What Sebastian had told me was there. Her face stretched thin and long, and her mouth tightened in a grim line as if it were pressed together to hold back some incredible pain, the pain of a broken heart. Why had I not seen it before? My own cloud of distress had been too thick to see through. I was too busy with my own heartache from losing dad. But I had not really lost him. He was still my dad even if I rarely saw him. It was different for Mom. She had really lost him.

Chapter 10

I trudged up to my room not sure whether I was feeling extra sad for Mom or feeling like a self-centered boob. My computer beckoned me and I slouched in front of it staring at my vague reflection in the sleeping, black screen. As I reached for the mouse, I noticed a glimmer of light floating above my head in the wavy image on the glass. It faded instantly. My head twisted around. “Sebastian?” No answer. He was probably sick of me too.

I wiggled the mouse and my desktop emerged from the black screen.

Brandy was online. I typed.

I typed the phrase and then stared at it. It was weird coming from my fingers.

Jenny’s screen popped up.

I typed back.

Her message popped back.

We were talking like old friends. I guess time was all I needed to get over it. Especially since I had no feelings for Blake.

Jen wrote again.

I typed in return. That ought to freak her out a bit.

I smiled. What the heck. It’s not like she’d believe me anyhow.

she wrote back.

“What is this, LOL?” Sebastian’s voice drifted over my shoulder, and it hardly fazed me. I was getting used to him popping in.

“LOL means laugh out loud.”

“So you’re friend, pinka—pinkalicious laughed out loud at your message?”

I signed off. “She probably didn’t physically laugh. It just means she thought my message was funny.” I peered up over my shoulder but he was across the room sitting on my dresser. His voice had sounded so close, and somehow he had read my message.  He must have been leaning over me. His light speed movements were unsettling.

“That’s absurd. And sexy is a good thing, right?”

Heat rose in my cheeks. “That was a typo. I’d meant to write a nosy ghost.”

“I’m not nosy. I have better things to do than read the nonsense messages you send your childish friends.”

“Better things to do? What could you possibly have to do?” I laughed. “Do you write yourself a checklist of things to do each morning? Six o’clock float through wall, seven o’clock drift around room, eight o’clock vanish into—”

“Enough. As you can see I’m not lol-ing at what you perceive as charm.” He glanced down at the pile of folded laundry on the top of my dresser. I knew I should’ve put it away. My lacy green bra floated up. “This is interesting.”

I stomped over and snatched it out of mid air. As my hand went through his, a rush of cold air flowed straight through the palm of my hand, cooling the blood and bones beneath. But it was not painful like when your hand has made too many snowballs with soaked gloves. It was more like the soothing feeling of sucking on a wintergreen mint. I stomped back to my chair.

Mom’s voice floated up to my window. I wondered whom she could be talking to, a neighbor or, more likely, her pet crew.  

“I saw it today,” I said still facing my computer away from Sebastian. “She was tying her shoes, and she looked incredibly sad. Not sure why I hadn’t seen it before.”