No Horse Wanted (15 page)

I was finishing my algebra homework when I
heard a key in the front door. I closed my math book and got up
from the kitchen table to walk into the hall. I spotted Vicky’s mom
sliding out of her coat. “Hi.”

She stopped and stared. “Robin, what are you
doing here?”

“Babysitting,” I said. “Vicky can’t get
kicked off cheer, Mrs. Miller.”

Utter silence while she opened and closed her
mouth like a fish. I folded my arms and waited. Her mom looked like
an old-age version of my best friend, but I’d never catch Vicky in
a green tuxedo style shirt and black slacks and shoes.
Brown-haired, brown-eyed, five-feet-six, her mother looked old and
tired under the cosmetics she wore.

“I got called in to work,” Mrs. Miller said,
“and I needed Vicky to take care of the kids today until her dad
got here.”

“Well, guess what? He didn’t show up. And
Vick missed the assembly at school today so her cheer coach was
majorly pissed. If she’d missed the game too, Ms. Walker would have
suspended her.” I wasn’t about to cut this woman any slack. She
dumped all the crap on my friend, and Vicky barely had a life
anymore.

“So, you came to look after the kids so Vicky
could go.” Mrs. Miller pasted on a smile and reached into her
purse. “That was really nice of you. What do I owe you?”

“Nothing,” I said. “Vick owes me. You don’t.
I did all of Vick’s other chores, too. I made dinner, cleaned the
kitchen, did four loads of laundry, and put it away. The kids went
to bed at eight.”

“Their bedtime is ten on Friday nights,” Mrs.
Miller said.

“I know. They told me, but when they started
the pushing, shoving, hitting, and kicking the crap out of each
other over the TV remote, I did baths and put them to bed,” I said.
“Next Friday, it’ll be seven. Vick’s your maid or slave. I’m
not.”

More gulping. If she was a fish, I’d have
thrown water on her so she didn’t die. I dug out my phone to text
Jack. We’d already agreed that he was to leave Vicky at our house
if he had to tie her up and chuck her in my closet. “Your dinner’s
in the microwave. You just need to nuke it.”

“Where is Vicky? The game must be over by
now.”

“At my house,” I said. “You can pick her up
at Shamrock Stable tomorrow after she does her internship
hours.”

“She can’t go to the barn. She was supposed
to call and cancel that. Who will take care of the kids?”

I tapped my foot. This woman was seriously
annoying me. I didn’t care what my parents said about being
diplomatic. With some people, it just didn’t work. “Really? Do you
plan to have Vick fail all three core classes when she screws up
her Sophomore Project for you and her father?”

No answer. Had I expected one?

I went back to the little dining area off the
kitchen and gathered up my books and backpack. I was going to be a
lot nicer to my mother even if she never let me have my Mustang. It
didn’t matter how many kids she had. If there were six of them
instead of three, my mom wouldn’t turn one into Cinderella to look
after the others.

Mrs. Miller came into the kitchen. “This is
hard for all of us, Robin. You may not believe me, but I’m not
trying to ruin my daughter’s life.”

I zipped up my backpack. “I’m not the one you
need to tell that. You should tell Vick in front of your other kids
how much you appreciate her help. Unless your ex shows up next
Friday for visitation, I’ll be here to babysit. Oh, and I wouldn’t
make a habit of pulling Vick out of school, unless you want the
counselors, the teachers and the principals on you about her
potential for being a dropout instead of a graduate.”

Chapter Eighteen

Saturday, September 21
^st
, 12:30 p.m.

I leaned back in the passenger seat of Jack’s
truck while he drove home from Shamrock Stable. If we lived further
away from the barn, I could have a nice snooze.

He glanced sideways at me while he waited for
the light to change at the intersection on Highway 9. “Babysitting
last night so Vicky made the game was above and beyond. She
couldn’t believe you would step up like that.”

“Yeah, I’m great.” I yawned. “But if she
messes with me again when I’m chasing Harry, all bets are off.
You’ll have a bald girlfriend.”

Jack was still laughing when we pulled into
our drive. “Go catch some zs, little sister. I’ll feed horse lunch,
and then I’ll help you give Twaziem a bath when he finishes
eating.”

I groaned. That had been my lesson today with
Prince Charming. Sierra taught me the ins and outs of bathing a
horse from wetting them down to scrubbing every inch, rinsing off
all the soap, and finally drying them so they wouldn’t catch cold.
Plus, I’d had to shampoo Charming’s mane and tail, condition them,
and then comb out every hair. And now, I was supposed to apply
everything I learned to Twaziem. It sounded like so much fun.
Not!

I walked past my parents’ cars and wondered
why both of them were around on a Saturday. Didn’t they have some
riding activity to do? Usually, Mom took Singer out to work on the
Centennial Trail and condition her for upcoming endurance rides.
Dad would be off with his roping buddies.

I went in the kitchen door. Salt and Pepper,
the black and white kittens, raced to meet me. They wound through
my legs. I bent and scooped up the pair of small flea-lions as Dad
called them. “Shall we find some meat for you?”

Salt mewed at me and Pepper tried to bat at
my face with a paw. Mom glanced at me from the counter where she
made roast beef sandwiches. “If I told you they were lying and I
already fed them, would you believe me?”

“No.” I laughed, cuddling the little monsters
close. “I can tell starving kitties when I see them.”

Dad came in from his office, rubbing his ear.
“Hi, sweetie. I just heard all about you from Vicky’s mom.”

“Yeah,” I muttered. When he frowned at me, I
mustered up a smile as I put the kittens on the floor. “Did you
tell her what it would cost for a housekeeper-cum-caregiver for her
brats for five hours, and that the bill is forthcoming?”

Mom winked at me when Dad chuckled. Then he
said, “No, but I did tell her that I was very proud of you for
helping Vicky stay in school, and I wished you’d clean the cat box
the way you cleaned her house.”

Mom high-fived me. “When she sniveled at me
and said she didn’t like the way you did laundry, I told her that I
taught you how and asked if there was a better way to fold T-shirts
and diapers.”

“Anything else?” I opened the cupboard to
pull out a can of cat meat. “Did she gripe about me putting the
kids to bed when the four of them got into a ‘knock-down, drag-out’
fight over the remote?”

“Yes,” Mom said, “and I said that was the way
Felicia handled it with you and Jack. I thought it was a much more
effective method than time-outs and spankings when the parents got
home.”

“It sucked being sent to bed at seven.” I
spooned meat into the double-sided dish and got out of the way
before the kitten attack. “But, we never hassled Felicia again when
she took care of us. And I don’t remember her ever having to clean
the entire house, make dinner, do a day’s worth of dishes, run
mountains of dirty clothes through the washer, and supervise bath
time. No wonder Vick looks exhausted most of the time.”

“Well, her father is coming for the kids next
Friday immediately after school.” Dad filled four glasses with
milk, then placed the pitcher in the fridge. “And I told her mother
that she was absolutely right about you going to the game next week
with your friends, so your mom and I will take care of the little
kids if he doesn’t show up. I’ll pick them up at day care when I
get off work.”

“
You are a very evil daddy and I love
you lots.” I dropped the empty cat food can in the recycle bin,
then hugged Mom. “Are you okay with it?”

“Yes,” Mom said. “You’ll have to cheer extra
loud to make up for us missing Jack’s game, but I’m not taking
Vicky’s brothers and sisters to high school football. We’ll talk to
him about all of this at lunch.”

Later that afternoon, I headed down to the
barn with an armload of old towels that Mom said were appropriate
for horse bathing and a bucket of long, skinny carrots from the
garden. I hoped Twaziem agreed this was a good idea. Charming had
been a complete gentleman, but Sierra warned me that young horses
might dance around the shower stall the first time they got wet. I
was glad Jack promised to help, but figured I couldn’t go wrong
with bribery too.

I hung the towels in the shower stall, took
two carrots, and went after my horse. I didn’t use the flat nylon
halter this time. I opted for what Sierra had called a training
one. The thin rope halter had knots that placed pressure on nerves
in a horse’s face. This should get Twaziem’s attention and keep him
from biting my brother. I attached the lead to the bottom loop and
led him out of his regular stall.

“I don’t think you’ve had this done before,”
I said, “but you really need a bath to get rid of those dead lice
and that awful smell from the delousing powder. This won’t be so
bad because we’re not doing it the old-fashioned way with cold
water from a garden hose the way I did Prince Charming. We have a
nice shower with lots of warm water.”

Twaziem nuzzled me as I led him into the
stall. It had rubber mats on the floor so he couldn’t slip and
drains so he wouldn’t have to stand in water. A lot of horses hated
puddles because they couldn’t see into them. Jack arrived with
bottles of soap and shampoo, and a bucket filled with sponges and
scrapers. Twaziem made an ugly face at my brother.

“Okay,” I said. “What do you want to do? Be
chewed into little Jack bits or scrub?”

He laughed. “I think I’ll scrub for a while
if you can hold him.”

“Let’s try and see what happens,” I said.

Jack put the bucket with the sponges out of
the way. He turned on the faucet and adjusted the temperature,
holding the hose away from Twaziem until the water was warm, but
not too hot.

Meanwhile, I used the sealant that Sierra
recommended on the hooves. I didn’t want Twaz to have foot problems
because his feet got too wet. Once I finished painting each hoof
with the iodine mixture, I stepped back and held his head.

Jack slowly stepped up by Twaziem’s neck and
began spraying him with warm water, up the front legs to his chest,
over his left shoulder and then onto his neck. Twaz snorted, but he
didn’t move, so my brother kept wetting him down. As Jack soaked
the back, then the ribs and finally Twaz’s hindquarters, I saw the
yellow patches of dead lice slide down the coat and onto the
floor.

All right, I thought. This was going to work.
My horse would feel and look so much better when the parasites were
off his body. Once Twaziem was totally wet, Jack put the sponges
out of the way while he filled the bucket with warm water and a
couple squirts of dish soap. Then, he grabbed a sponge. “Do you
want me to keep going or should I try holding him while you do
it?”

I shook my head. “Like Sierra told me this
morning, if it’s not broke, don’t fix it. Right now, he’s standing
super quiet. Let’s get this done. Next time, I’ll wash him. He has
so many gender issues. Maybe, I can get Vicky here, and she’ll be
able to hold him.”

Twaziem stomped his hooves at the sound of
Jack’s voice but the bay settled down when we got quiet again. He
was a strange one. Most of the other horses I’d known liked
listening to people, but not this guy. Somehow, he associated
chatter with abuse. I slipped him a couple carrots while Jack
scrubbed him down with the sponge until suds covered Twaziem’s
entire brown coat.

Next came his tail. Jack stayed carefully to
the side while he washed it. After he finished with the tail, Jack
worked shampoo into Twaz’s mane. And finally it was time to rinse
off the horse. It took what seemed like a long time to get rid of
all the soap and shampoo. More carrot pieces to eat and my bay colt
stood like a rock. I praised him while I gave him another
treat.

When Twaziem was soap free, Jack passed me a
damp sponge. “Wipe off his face. We won’t use any shampoo this
time. But if you do it, then he can’t bite me.”

“Okay.” I draped the lead over my arm so if
my horse jerked, he could get away, and I wouldn’t get hurt. Then,
I washed off Twaziem’s head, around his ears and down the center
over his blaze. Jack took the sponge from me a couple of times and
wrung it out in clean water. I even cleaned under the forelock and
wiped around Twaz’s eyes. A couple snorts before he nudged me,
looking for carrots, and we were good to go.

I handed back the sponge and adjusted the
lead so I could hold the horse while Jack used a scraper to get rid
of the excess water. After that we toweled Twaziem dry. I stayed up
by the front end of him, and Jack did the rest. We couldn’t put him
back in his usual stall until he was completely dry or he’d catch
cold.

Jack left partway through to go clean
Twaziem’s stall and reload the manger with a new bale of hay. This
was the perfect time for daily maintenance since my horse couldn’t
kick or bite if he was in the shower. I kept talking to him while I
finished drying him and figured out that he didn’t mind my voice
when it was just the two of us. For some reason, he just didn’t
like the conversations people shared. They must pose some kind of
threat.

So much of this was pure conjecture and
detective work. It wasn’t as if I could ask the Bartletts what
they’d done to Twaziem. I had to figure all of it out on my own. He
nosed me and I passed him another carrot piece while I toweled his
mane. He seemed to enjoy my company. He never tried to bite or kick
me, much less charge at me the way Nitro did. I could tell Twaz my
problems and he didn’t answer me, but at least he didn’t tell me I
was stupid for wanting my Mustang.