Chasing Gold (3 page)

“Tell me what?” Haley dug into her locker, wondering if she'd remembered to stick her math book in her bag before she left home.

Tracey poked her in the arm. “That Owen so obviously likes you!” she said in a loud stage whisper.

“What? Oh, please.” Haley sighed. Tracey
had
told her that—probably a million times in the past two weeks, or at least that was how it felt to Haley. What had happened to Tracey this year? When had she turned so boy crazy?

Never mind—Haley knew when it had happened. Over the summer, at the same time Tracey suddenly became interested in clothes and makeup and the latest hairstyles. Before that, she'd been a tomboy just like Haley. In fact, the two of them had always looked enough alike that people often took them for sisters. Tracey's light-brown hair was just a smidge darker than Haley's strawberry blond and tended to get snarled by the wind just as easily. With their matching pointy chins and constantly sunburned noses, they'd been “two peas in a pod,” as Uncle Mike always said.

But over the past year, some of that had changed. Tracey still had the pointy chin, but she'd cut her hair shorter and added blond highlights. She'd grown taller, too, spurting up nearly two inches and even adding the beginning of some curves to her skinny frame.

The physical changes in Haley's best friend were weird enough. But it was the other changes that bugged her a lot
more. Haley still wasn't sure when she'd first noticed that Tracey was more interested in hiking through the local mall than through the woods, but it had been impossible to ignore after Tracey's older sister had whisked her off down to “the city”—that was what Tracey had started calling Chicago—for a back-to-school haircut at some fancy salon last month.

“I bet he's going to ask you to the dance.” Tracey pulled a compact mirror out of her purse and peered into it, poking at her elaborately blow-dried bangs. “Too bad that freak John came along and interrupted.” She snapped her mirror shut and elbowed Haley. “I'm so psyched about the dance! Aren't you?”

“Sure, I guess.” Haley probably would have forgotten all about yesterday's announcement of the back-to-school dance as soon as she'd heard it, except that Tracey and Emma had spent the entire lunch period talking about it.

“It's going to be so amazing!” Tracey hugged herself, practically vibrating with excitement. “I need to figure out what I'm going to wear.”

Haley blew out a sigh of relief as she finally found her
math book at the bottom of her locker. That answered the foggy question in her mind about whether she'd done the homework—obviously not—but at least she wouldn't have to explain to strict Mr. Washington how she'd forgotten the book.

“Let's get to homeroom,” she told Tracey. “I need to do those math problems.”

“Okay. Want to copy?” Tracey fell into step as they headed down the hallway.

Haley shook her head. She'd never cheated on an assignment in her life, and she wasn't planning to start now. Besides, Tracey had always been terrible at math. The last thing Haley needed was a bad grade on an assignment, or Aunt Veronica and Uncle Mike might change their minds about letting her do all that extra work to earn money for the clinic.

When Haley and Tracey walked into homeroom, Emma was already in her seat, bent over a magazine. She looked up when Tracey called her name, smiling and peering at her friends through the thick lenses of her glasses. Emma had albinism and was legally blind, which meant
she needed those glasses to see well enough to get by. Her funny-looking glasses, white hair, and pale-lavender eyes had made her a target of teasing during elementary school, and occasionally even now. But Haley and Tracey had always stuck by her loyally, and Haley hardly even noticed Emma's differences anymore.

Well, not the differences brought on by her albinism, anyway. Like Tracey, Emma seemed to be developing a strange obsession with clothes, makeup, and boys. Haley wasn't sure which of her friends had gone crazy first, or why they were acting that way all of a sudden. She just hoped they both got over it soon.

“You're finally here!” Emma exclaimed as Haley and Tracey took their seats on either side of her. “I've been dying to talk about the dance. What are we going to wear?”

Tracey squealed and started chattering about dresses and shoes and makeup, but Haley tuned out as she flipped open her math book. She was halfway through the set of problems when Emma poked her on the shoulder.

“Earth to Haley!” Emma said with a giggle. “Did you hear what Trace just said?”

Haley blinked. “No, sorry. What?”

“I said we need to plan a serious shopping trip,” Tracey said, leaning past Emma's desk. “I wish we could get down to the city and shop on Michigan Avenue for something really cool. But we might not have time to plan that kind of trip, so I guess we're stuck with the mall.”

Emma nodded. “That's okay—I saw some really cute dresses at Finders Keepers last time I was there.”

“Ooh, good call. I love that store.” Tracey glanced at Haley. “So when do you want to go? How about Friday?”

“Friday?” Haley hesitated, not sure how to respond. She was way too busy to take time out for stuff like shopping or dances. Besides, even if her friends managed to drag her to the dance, there was no way she was wasting any of her hard-earned money on a new dress. Not when she was still counting every penny she earned, hoping it would be enough to pay the clinic fees.

“Yes, Friday.” Emma giggled. “You know, it's the day that comes after Thursday? And before Saturday?”

“We really should go then,” Tracey urged, pulling a lip gloss out of her purse and slicking it on. “The dance is next
Friday. And we'll need some time to plan our hair and makeup to go with whatever dresses we get.”

“I'm not sure I can afford a dress,” Haley said. “I'm saving up for that clinic, remember?”

Tracey shrugged. “Just ask your aunt and uncle. They buy the rest of your clothes, right? A dress for the dance is just as important as jeans or whatever.”

Not to me, it isn't,
Haley thought.
Probably not to Aunt Veronica and Uncle Mike, either.

Besides, her uncle had just replaced his old tractor and had been grumbling about being in the poorhouse ever since. No way was he going to give Haley money for some stupid dress she'd probably only wear once. No way was she even going to ask him.

She opened her mouth, trying to figure out how to explain that to her friends. The shrill buzz of the bell cut her off before she could say a word.

As the homeroom teacher called for attention, Haley slumped in her seat, relieved.

Saved by the bell,
she thought.

CHAPTER

AS SHE STEPPED INTO THE
barn on thursday afternoon, Haley had forgotten all about her friends' shopping plans. She'd forgotten about the long list of chores waiting to be completed before dinnertime. She'd even managed to forget—mostly—about blowing that English quiz earlier in the day. All she wanted to focus on right now was Wings.

“Ready for a dressage schooling, Wingsie?” she said as she clipped the pony into the crossties in the asphalt aisle of the big, airy old barn. Wings hadn't been happy about being pulled away from the pile of hay Haley's uncle had just tossed into the pasture, and as usual, he wasn't keeping
his feelings a secret. He shifted his weight from one foot to another, tossing his head so the clips on the ties jingled against the metal halter rings.

Haley sighed. She knew this mood, and if she'd been planning a cross-country session or even more trot sets, she wouldn't be worried. Wings loved to eat as much as any other horse, but he was easy to distract with something fun. But with dressage on the agenda for that day, she knew it would be an uphill battle. She could only hope that Wings would settle down and focus once he was warmed up.

“I know, buddy,” she said as she fetched her grooming bucket from the tack room beside the office, stepping over a cat snoozing in the doorway. “Dressage isn't my favorite phase, either. But it's important, and you know Zina Charles won't be impressed if we rush through every transition and totally forget how to leg-yield.”

Dressage was one of the three phases that made up the sport of eventing, the other two being cross-country jumping and show jumping. In the dressage phase, horses and riders had to perform a series of maneuvers and gait
changes that tested the horse's training, obedience, and gaits, along with the rider's skill.

Wings raised his head and pranced in place as Bandit dashed into the barn. “You goober,” Haley said with a laugh, poking the pony on the shoulder as he almost bumped into her. “It's not like you've never seen a dog before.”

She bent to give Bandit a head rub. Then she grabbed a hoofpick out of her bucket.

“Stand still,” she ordered Wings. “We're on a tight schedule today.”

She was bent over picking out Wings's left front foot when her cell phone rang. Releasing the pony's leg, she straightened up and fished the phone out of her jeans pocket.

“It's me,” Tracey's familiar voice said cheerfully when Haley answered. “Just calling to make plans for tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow?” Haley pulled the hoofpick out of Wings's reach as he lipped at it, clearly wondering if it was edible. “What's tomorrow?”

“Duh, it's Friday! We're going shopping, remember?”

For a second Haley's mind went blank. Then she
remembered that conversation earlier in the week and cringed as she realized she'd never bothered to follow up on it. Or even think about it again. She'd had more important things on her mind, like reminding Wings during their jump school yesterday that it was possible to jump a flower box without slowing down and trying to grab a bite of the flowers first. Obviously, her friends had taken her silence as a yes.

For a second she was tempted to tell Tracey that she couldn't go. But Tracey could be just as stubborn as Haley herself when she cared about something, and for some unknown reason she seemed to care an awful lot about this stupid dance. Besides, Haley had been so busy lately that she hadn't had much time to hang out with her friends. Maybe a trip to the mall wouldn't be the end of the world. Maybe it would even be fun—sort of, anyway.

“Um, sorry, I sort of forgot about shopping,” she told Tracey. “But hang on—let me check.”

Setting the hoofpick aside, she scrolled through the calendar app on her phone. She was scheduled to babysit the Vandenberg triplets on Friday evening starting at six
o'clock. She didn't get home from school until almost three thirty. Which left plenty of time to work Wings and do her chores before Mr. Vandenberg arrived to pick her up, but not nearly enough to add in even a short trip to the mall, which was a twenty-minute drive away.

“Hales?” Tracey sounded impatient. “You still there?”

“I'm here.” Haley pressed the phone to her ear. “Sorry, I don't think I can make it tomorrow.”

“What? No!” Tracey exclaimed. “You have to come! We won't have any fun without you.”

Haley smiled weakly. “I wish I could. But I'm babysitting tomorrow night, and I really can't skip a day with Wings right now, so close to the clinic.”

“Sure you can. Wings is awesome—he's not going to forget how to jump in one day, right?” Tracey laughed. “Come on, you have to come!”

Haley hesitated again, trying to figure out if she could swap out Friday's planned cross-country session with a shorter show jumping school and still make it to the mall and back in time to do stalls. . . .

“No, sorry,” she said at last. “It's not going to happen.
I'm sure you guys will have fun, though.”

There was a moment of silence on the other end of the line. Haley had known Tracey long enough to be pretty sure that she was just mustering her next argument. If she'd given up, she'd already be whining about it.