1n50mn14
11-12-2008, 10:44 AM
First off, I'd like to say 'Hi, Lit-Netters!' back from the comfort of my Canadian home and apologize for the potential shoddiness of my first posted work in the past 6 months. ;0
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The Summer Horse Remembers
It was a slap in the face to visit home (for Lottie, in the idealistically coloured childhood sense of the word) to see that the summer horse had been sold to the silent old man across the road.
'For the grand daughters,' Helen apologized, seeing the look of consternation on her daughter's face. Lottie shrugged hopelessly and stared blankly out of the passenger side window.
The horse had long been a bone of contention since she had thrown her hands up in defeat and walked out of her family's many intricacies on summer vacation two years ago. He had been a hard won prize after years of dreams of a horse in the barn, saved jars of pennies, riding lessons and poring over tack catalogues in the vain hope that maybe... Her abandonment of the horse was a marked symbol to her of how bad things must have been. Nothing had been said about it since, but when Helen silently slipped her $900(the price of the horse) during a visit, she understood.
The carefully tended and healing scab that the girl had nurtured over that chaffed, sore part of her heart was pried off at the sight of him grazing. For two days, she moped about the grandmother's house, avoiding the eastern window lest her heart escape her throat at the glimpse of gray mane, a flash of hooves, black, compassionate eyes.
She remembered the sting of loss worse than any slight from a boy, which had been few in her young years, anyway. The horses had always prevailed.
When the listlessness became too much to bear, the pattern of moping feet from bed to couch to freezer to table became too redundant, and she was about to scream as the composure she had practiced over the last years crumbled away, she quietly slipped on her tatty old barn boots (stored in the basement, by Helen, in some vain hope she might return home), and made sure the screen door didn't slam behind her in the early dawn breeze. The bending stalks of frosted hay felt familiar beneath her feet as she ran across the autumn stubble. The barbed wire fence seperating her from the one thing that had ever, truly touched her heart was no obstacle.
With the ease of a farm girl, but the impatience of a lover long seperated, she clambered over the fence, shaking her trousers loose where they snagged the barbs. Shyly, reverentially, she stood in the field.
The gelding's black ears and eyes had locked on her the second he'd heard her breathe, smelt the peppermint hand cream she had used since the summer she had spent all day with him. His reckless speed and joyous bucking had frightened the grand daughters long ago, his cheeky antics turning into naughtiness as his behaviour went unchecked. Hid mind revived memories of swimming in the shallows of the bay, of scaring up clouds of butterflies, girl's legs clamped around his bare sides. He had once been trusted with secrets and tears, his gleaming coat tended, mane braided and groomed, treasured entirely!
She breathed his name under her breath, and hardly able to beleive himself, he whinnied proudly and galloped clumsily to where she stood waiting.
Though he came within half an inch of her at a ferocious pace, she didn't shift, trusting him as before. The iron gray gelding head butted her saucily, the life flooding back into him. He pranced around her in a circle, then stood still with head over her shoulder, patiently receiving cuddles and the slight fingers that scratched the crest of his mane. She wept, then, because the summer horse remembered.
http://i35.tinypic.com/24pb7gj.jpg
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The Summer Horse Remembers
It was a slap in the face to visit home (for Lottie, in the idealistically coloured childhood sense of the word) to see that the summer horse had been sold to the silent old man across the road.
'For the grand daughters,' Helen apologized, seeing the look of consternation on her daughter's face. Lottie shrugged hopelessly and stared blankly out of the passenger side window.
The horse had long been a bone of contention since she had thrown her hands up in defeat and walked out of her family's many intricacies on summer vacation two years ago. He had been a hard won prize after years of dreams of a horse in the barn, saved jars of pennies, riding lessons and poring over tack catalogues in the vain hope that maybe... Her abandonment of the horse was a marked symbol to her of how bad things must have been. Nothing had been said about it since, but when Helen silently slipped her $900(the price of the horse) during a visit, she understood.
The carefully tended and healing scab that the girl had nurtured over that chaffed, sore part of her heart was pried off at the sight of him grazing. For two days, she moped about the grandmother's house, avoiding the eastern window lest her heart escape her throat at the glimpse of gray mane, a flash of hooves, black, compassionate eyes.
She remembered the sting of loss worse than any slight from a boy, which had been few in her young years, anyway. The horses had always prevailed.
When the listlessness became too much to bear, the pattern of moping feet from bed to couch to freezer to table became too redundant, and she was about to scream as the composure she had practiced over the last years crumbled away, she quietly slipped on her tatty old barn boots (stored in the basement, by Helen, in some vain hope she might return home), and made sure the screen door didn't slam behind her in the early dawn breeze. The bending stalks of frosted hay felt familiar beneath her feet as she ran across the autumn stubble. The barbed wire fence seperating her from the one thing that had ever, truly touched her heart was no obstacle.
With the ease of a farm girl, but the impatience of a lover long seperated, she clambered over the fence, shaking her trousers loose where they snagged the barbs. Shyly, reverentially, she stood in the field.
The gelding's black ears and eyes had locked on her the second he'd heard her breathe, smelt the peppermint hand cream she had used since the summer she had spent all day with him. His reckless speed and joyous bucking had frightened the grand daughters long ago, his cheeky antics turning into naughtiness as his behaviour went unchecked. Hid mind revived memories of swimming in the shallows of the bay, of scaring up clouds of butterflies, girl's legs clamped around his bare sides. He had once been trusted with secrets and tears, his gleaming coat tended, mane braided and groomed, treasured entirely!
She breathed his name under her breath, and hardly able to beleive himself, he whinnied proudly and galloped clumsily to where she stood waiting.
Though he came within half an inch of her at a ferocious pace, she didn't shift, trusting him as before. The iron gray gelding head butted her saucily, the life flooding back into him. He pranced around her in a circle, then stood still with head over her shoulder, patiently receiving cuddles and the slight fingers that scratched the crest of his mane. She wept, then, because the summer horse remembered.
http://i35.tinypic.com/24pb7gj.jpg