Riding on Air (2 page)

“What are you doing?” Sally squeaked. “William, I don't think you should be doing that.”

“It's alright, Sal.” William looked into my eyes. “Ready?”

I nodded, I guess, because his fingers tightened and then he stood up from his crouch and lifted me with him. I swung up from the ground, rising as if I was a puppet and he had pulled my strings. But once I was upright the world slid away from me and I staggered against him.

“William!” Sally cried shrilly. He said “Steady!” but whether to me or to her, I didn't know. He moved one hand from my arm to my back and pressed it firmly against me, as if he was afraid I'd fall, and as fast as it had gone funny, the world slid back to where it usually was. My throbbing hands were still tucked safely out of harm's way and I was upright again. I let go of a breath I hadn't even known I was holding.

“Melissa, look at me,” Sally said, coming close and peering into my eyes. “Let me see your pupils. Are you concussed?”

“I'm fine.” I eased back from her, a little freaked by the way she was shoving her face into mine. She ran her long, slender fingers through her expensively-streaked blonde mane and I wondered if that was genuine concern or an artful attempt to catch William's attention.

William barely glanced at her. Oh, be still my heart.

“OK?” he said to me.

“Yes. Thanks.” I concentrated on reassuring Sally, unable to meet William's challenging stare. It was hard to hide things from him when he was looking at me like that, but I managed. I'd had plenty of practice at that, too.

Sally nodded doubtfully, even as she cast a sliding glance towards the others in her troop waiting with a mixture of boredom and impatience. Riders with their feet kicked out of the stirrups, one girl sneakily texting on her phone. The laid-back horses rested their hind legs as they snoozed, ears flopping, while the more fiery ones sidled and fidgeted, throwing an occasional restless front leg forward to paw at the dirt. Cross country was a high point of camp for most of them. I'd never hear the end of it if the session was ruined because of me.

“Sally, really, I'm fine. I'll go and get checked out, OK, just as soon as I find Jinx.”

“I don't know,” Sally said, clearly torn between being shot of me so she could get on with things and fear of doing the wrong thing.

“I'll be fine, Sally, I'll walk slowly.” I ignored the dull ache now settling into the front of my skull. It was nothing to do with the fall; I nearly always ended up with a bit of a headache during long riding sessions in the heat. I longed to take my helmet off, but the hot throb in my knuckles warned me off even attempting the buckles.

“I'll take her on the quad,” William offered and my stomach dived, twisted, backed up and finished off with a forward roll with half-tuck.

Stop that, I cautioned myself, firmly squashing the hopeful quiver of my leaping heart. He's just doing his job as a camp assistant. He'd never shown the slightest interest in me personally in all these years. Much as I wished it was different. Or wished that I could at least accept reality and just stop thinking about him. Stop hoping.

Yeah, you'd think I'd have worked out it was hopeless by now. But I couldn't seem to cure myself of wanting him; all I could do was try to hide it.

“Oh, that would be great,” Sally said, flashing him a beaming smile. I suppressed a fresh wave of resentment for her gorgeous, streaky hair and curvy body. Her beautiful hand-model fingers, straight and slender, knuckles tiny and true. I know it's weird, most people look at eyes and faces, but I notice hands the most.

The pounding in my head increased and I turned away, towards the waiting quad bike. I just wanted to get going. Now I was reasonably sure I hadn't broken myself on impact I was swamped with worry about Jinx. I wanted to make sure he was OK. I wanted to take my helmet off before my brain squeezed out through my ears. I wanted to be as effortlessly flirtatious and pretty as Sally, who at 18 was the same age as William. Only two years older than me, though it seemed an impossible gap.

William caught up to me as I swung my leg over the sun-warmed seat of the quad bike. When he hovered, obviously unsure again how to help without hurting me, I blinked back the treacherous sting of tears. I turned my face away and slid forward so William could climb on behind, the thrill at the thought of his arms going around me mostly killed by yet another reminder of what I wanted and couldn't have.

Sally could keep her shiny hair and her eye-popping cleavage. I didn't actually want to look like her. I certainly didn't want to
be
her. I just wanted to be me, still with my long, straight, dark brown hair and insignificant boobs, but without gnarled fingers and swollen joints. But I knew better than to let myself want it too badly. Because I also knew you don't always get what you want.

William made me go straight to the ambos. He insisted I get checked out and said he'd find my horse for me, ignoring my (truthful) protest that he'd have a hard time catching Jinx. At least they took my bloody helmet off. Eventually.

Even better, Stacey Smith, the first aid officer, came by to see if I was OK and asked me if I needed a pill. I've got these prescription stun-a-Clydesdale painkillers for arthritis flares, but I'm limited to one in a 24-hour period and anyway, camp rules mean that kind of stuff can't be left lying around. Dad had handed them over to Stacey for safekeeping when he dropped me off, so the only way I could get one was to convince Stacey I really needed one.

Apparently hammering into the ground in front of the entire troop is convincing enough. Stacey produced a pill and a bottle of water and stood by to make sure I swallowed my medicine like a good girl. She waited to hear the verdict from the ambos and then added one of her own; no more jumping this camp (oh, what a shame) and I could ride tomorrow,
if
she was convinced I was OK after giving me a once-over in the morning (bugger).

As I headed up to the horse yards I reckoned it was just as well I'd followed an impulse born of pure fear and only pretended to take my pill. When I wiped my mouth after I drank, I just popped the pill out into my hand. I'd never had to do anything like that before and I almost swallowed my heart I was so afraid Stacey would notice. If she caught me I doubted she'd be impressed. She might phone Dad. If Dad knew I'd fallen off or—even worse—that my hands were sore enough to cause the fall in the first place, I'd be back home before you could recite an Introductory dressage test. But I was stiffening up already and without the insurance of an extra pill I doubted I'd be fit to ride the next day.

I had my dressage session in the morning and I really had to be fully operational to show Petra Hein what Jinx was capable of. He could be difficult at the best of times and lately the good times had been pretty scarce. If we were going to crack it at Novice level, he had to be round and soft and thoroughly on the bit, able to collect or really cover ground as required. The guidelines for Novice competition level might not be that advanced, but in reality that was what you had to do if you wanted to be competitive. Jinx thought all my signals meant ‘go faster' and I'd been struggling physically with this latest arthritis flare, so our riding sessions usually ended with me teary and sweaty and Jinx in a bit of a lather.

I waited until I was almost back to the horse yards before I slid my thumb—least swollen of all my digits—into the pocket of my jodhpurs and pushed the pill deeper in to make sure it stayed safe.

I was always careful with pain meds and I usually only took one when it got so bad I couldn't stand
not
to. I'd had the dangers of medication abuse drummed into me over and over—how if I relied on them too much now, when my joints deteriorated further I'd have a high tolerance and the drugs wouldn't work. That was a really scary thought; things could get pretty bad now. And lately, my good times, when I felt almost normal, had been scarce. I'd had one flare after another. They were still saying I might grow out of it, but I was having trouble believing it these days. It felt like time was getting away on me.

The chance to ride with Petra Hein had never happened before and might never happen again. I had to be fit to ride. If my hands were puffed-up crab-claws in the morning I may as well not even bother rolling out of my swag. That extra pill was insurance against that happening.

I turned up the alley between the pony yards, heading towards the back where the bigger horse yards ran parallel to the road beneath the shelter of a belt of gigantic old oaks and plane trees. I wanted to dump my helmet, currently slung carefully over my forearm, and get Jinx's halter before I went looking for him. But as I stepped out of the alley into the sun-speckled shade, what I saw startled me so much I missed my next step. Slowing down long enough to avoid a stumble—I didn't think my rattled bones would appreciate another crash—I went to where Jinx was standing calmly in his yard, pulling at a bulging hay net.

His reddish brown coat gleamed with brush strokes, black forelock hanging sleek and straight as he turned his head in recognition. His yard was immaculate: water bucket brim-full, halter and lead coiled neatly on the gatepost. Even the brushes and other bits and pieces I'd left strewn around when I got him ready that morning had been picked up, probably packed into the grooming kit that rested on top of Jinx's neatly folded rug outside his yard. No sign of his saddle or bridle, but I guessed those would be just as neatly put away in the float Dad had parked in line with all the others, about twenty metres away along the back fence of the grounds.

William. It had to have been.

I looked at Jinx, who gazed back at me briefly from his large, honey-flecked dark brown eyes before swinging his long, elegant head away to tend to the much more important business of scoffing his lucerne hay.

Sliding the helmet strap down over my arm, I tucked my wrist to make sure it didn't bump into my fingers as I dumped it on Jinx's folded rug. Then I carefully climbed in through the rails and went to my horse, making a slow circle around him, peering at his glossy black legs for any bumps or cuts or swellings. Once I was sure he'd survived his little adventure unscathed, I wrapped my arms around his neck, wrists cocked to keep my hands safe, so I could bury my nose in his mane. He bumped my side gently with his muzzle and went back to munching.

I inhaled, strands of his mane tickling my face, sucking in his unique Jinx smell, which was distinctive from the surrounding scents of horse manure and pee, lucerne and canvas and leather. All good smells—familiar and comforting. I didn't know exactly how to feel, finding Jinx in his yard. I knew I should be grateful and of course I was, not just to find him safe, but so well looked after. I'd been dreading the thought of getting all his gear off and brushing him down properly with the way my body was aching. But now I felt sort of deflated. Cheated, even. Usually nobody could catch Jinx but me.

I was fully aware of how ridiculous I was being, but that didn't change anything.

Leaning into Jinx, absorbing his warmth and his smell and his solid sense of himself through the bare skin of my arms, I felt like I was reconnecting with him. Reclaiming him.

William did strange things to my insides. Part of me was
thrilled
that he'd bothered to unsaddle Jinx and take care of him. The crazy fantasy that he could possibly be interested in me was trying to creep into my brain, doing my head in. But I'd get over that. I just had to look at my twisted hands to get a reality check. Guys like William went for girls like Sally. Pretty girls with straight fingers. Girls a guy could hold hands with.

But Jinx didn't care about my hands. If anything, he probably loved the fact that sometimes I didn't have much in my hands but a fiery weakness. I doubt he minded when I couldn't hold him, judging by the way he made the most of those opportunities to get away with going faster. Not that I'd admit it, even to my friends, now that I was getting a bit old for that kind of thing, but it was Jinx I loved most in the world. And I wanted the world for him. I wanted the world to know how wonderful he was, like I did.

So far, the world seemed to see him as a moderately talented thoroughbred who was too hot and too ordinary (aka not an expensive, flavour-of-the-moment warmblood breed) to make a top dressage horse. But I knew better. I knew what he was capable of, what he'd sometimes produced during riding lessons or at home. We were getting there, getting better all the time. I just needed more time.

But time is definitely
not
on my side. Juvenile Rheumatoid Arthritis, or JRA as it's usually known, is a degenerative condition. Eventually my joints will get so bad I won't be able to ride. There is a chance I might eventually go into remission (JRA is something you can literally grow out of) but I have the polyarticular kind of JRA and the chances aren't good, even though the doctors never want to admit that. Still, I'm lucky I don't get all the other crap that can come with it, like random fevers and crushing fatigue.

My parents get that I'm chasing a dream, but we're talking real parents here, not fantasy land. There are conditions attached to my riding and we're all pretty clear on the consequences. During flares (like I was having right now) I'm supposed to skip it, leave Jinx getting fat in the paddock and stick to swimming, which is non-weight bearing and helps keep me active and flexible, blah blah blah. High impact or strenuous sports are a no-no when my joints are actively inflamed and riding ticks both those boxes. If Dad knew I was riding at camp during a flare I'd be in deep trouble and Mum would start nagging again about me spending more time with her in the city.

Mum thinks I'd rather be with Jinx than with her. I deny it, but there's enough truth in it to make me all hot and guilty. Jinx has never bailed out on me. It makes no difference to him that I've got a crappy disease. If Mum got me to the city I'd be lucky if I
saw
Jinx for the next month, let alone managed to ride him. I could hardly train him for the upcoming dressage competitions and forget selection for an elite squad. If anyone found out how bad my hands had been lately, that I fell off because I couldn't hold Jinx not because I misjudged the jump, then my riding was over for the rest of the year at least. Maybe forever.