Stable Vices (Show Jumping Dreams ~ Book 21) Read online

  “Thanks Dad,” I said.

  “Uh huh,” he mumbled as he fed Owen. “Just hurry up.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY FIVE

  Bluebird was in the trailer and we were on our way to the vet clinic. Lucky for us there was a university with a veterinary hospital attached within an hour’s drive. They were the best in the state and even though I wasn’t too keen to have vet students looking at my pony, I knew that his main care would be supervised by some of the best vets there were. If they couldn’t find out what was wrong with him then no one would be able to.

  We sat there in awkward silence. I didn’t know what to say. I wanted to ask my father a million and one things but none of it seemed important now. All that mattered was getting Bluebird better.

  “Thank you for doing this,” I said.

  “That’s okay,” he replied. “I would have liked to see him starting to improve by now and he’s not. We could wait and see but he has a career. It’s not like he is retired and just hanging out in the barn. The longer we let this thing go on, the longer his recovery will be. Missy told me how you had to scratch at the last show. You might already be out of the running.”

  “But there is no way that Bluebird will be well enough to compete in the last Talent Scout show,” I said. “Even if they make him better, it still wouldn’t be fair to him. He’ll be weak and I won’t have ridden him. I can’t do that to him.”

  “I know,” Dad said. “But there is always a chance.”

  I just shrugged. I knew that even if there was some magic shot that they could give my pony to make him immediately better, I still wouldn’t feel that great about riding him. I knew how bad I felt after having the flu. It took weeks for that wobbly, tired feeling to go away and I couldn’t ask Bluebird to jump after that. It wouldn’t be fair and it would also be dangerous. Besides, we didn’t even know what was wrong with him.

  “Maybe if we explain it to the Talent Scout committee, they’ll let you ride another horse instead?” Dad said.

  “Maybe,” I replied but I knew that he didn’t really think that they would allow it.

  CHAPTER TWENTY SIX

  The vet hospital was a white washed concrete barn that had little paddocks with four board fencing attached where a couple of horses were grazing.

  “I guess they all can’t be too sick,” I said.

  We pulled in and Dad went to find out where we were supposed to go while I went to check on Bluebird. My pony was standing in the back of the trailer looking miserable. He hadn’t eaten any of his hay and he felt hot like he was running a fever again.

  “Oh Bluebird,” I said, laying my head on his neck. “You have to get better, okay? I want you to really try. I need you.”

  I listened to the sound of his breathing and the noises outside the trailer, the horses and the vets who were caring for them, going about their daily business. I didn’t know how much a stay at a vet hospital cost but I was pretty sure it wasn’t going to be cheap. We were already expecting bills to start arriving any day from my father’s hospital stay that we couldn’t pay and now we’d have horse ones too. We really needed to win the lottery.

  I thought of the horses that Dad might make me sell to pay for Bluebird’s treatment. I’d be willing to find a new home for Four. He was only ever meant as a summer resale project anyway and I could already tell that he’d never make a jumper. He was going to have to find a different career. But Arion? He was as precious to me as Bluebird was and Hashtag too. Even though I hadn’t known him as long, he still had a special place in my heart and I felt like we’d rescued him from Jess. I didn’t want to put him up for sale and risk Jess buying him back out of spite.

  I knew it was selfish to want to keep them all and I knew that if I was serious about having a career in this business then I was going to have to get used to the fact that horses would come and go. A lot of the top riders didn’t even own their horses. They belonged to sponsors or wealthy people who liked to support the sport and see their name up there as owner on the scoreboard. But those owners could just as easily take that horse away from you and give it to someone else to ride and I’d already decided that I wanted to bring along my own horses so that no one could ever do that to me. But good horses cost money and where was that money supposed to come from? I hadn’t figured that out yet.

  “You ready?” Dad asked. “Because they are ready for him.”

  “We’re ready,” I said.

  I led my pony out of the trailer and into the barn. It didn’t smell like a barn, at least not really. It was like a cross between a barn and a hospital, all shavings and hay mixed in with alcohol and disinfectant. We passed a couple of empty stalls and then one with an overly pregnant mare and one with a black horse hooked up to a bunch of IVs. I looked away, not wanting to see anymore horses suffering.

  Since they didn’t know what was wrong with Bluebird yet, he was being housed in the infectious disease ward, a wing of stalls separated from the others by a long aisle way and two heavy doors that swung open with a whoosh when you pressed a big round button.

  “Down here on the left,” Dad said.

  Our stall already had Bluebird’s name written on a white board and the name of his attending vet, Dr. Brown. I didn’t want to seem too picky because I would really be happy with any vet who figured out what was wrong with Bluebird but I really hoped that Dr. Brown was the oldest vet there. One who had been around the block and seen everything there was to see. One who would be able to look at Bluebird and know exactly what was wrong with him and how to fix it.

  Bluebird went into the stall with a sigh and a soft snort. It was deeply bedded with fresh shavings and though there was a window in the back, it was up high so that he couldn’t stick his head out. I guess they didn’t want him spreading his germs around to the other horses until they knew exactly what those germs were.

  There was another horse a couple of stalls down. He was skinny and looked even worse than the black horse had with tubes and IVs all up and down his neck and all four of his legs bandaged up to the knee.

  “I wonder what is wrong with that one,” I whispered.

  “Don’t worry about it,” Dad said. “Just concentrate on your own pony.”

  “Okay,” I said.

  But I knew it was going to be kind of hard and besides, thinking about the other horses took my mind off all the horrible things that could be wrong with my own.

  CHAPTER TWENTY SEVEN

  As soon as Bluebird was settled in his stall, his team of vets swooped in like a swarm of locusts. The vet students were all eager with white coats and fresh faces like every sick horse was a shiny new toy to be explored but Dr. Brown was an older man with a frosted beard and kind blue eyes.

  “This is your pony?” he asked, putting a hand on my shoulder.

  “Yes,” I gulped. “He’s a really great show jumper.” I blinked back the tears that were welling up in my eyes.

  “Don’t worry,” he said. “We’ll have him back in the show ring again in no time.”

  And since vets weren’t supposed to lie to make us feel better just like doctors weren’t supposed to, I could only hope that Dr. Brown was telling the truth.

  They all got to work examining Bluebird. Taking vials of blood and listening to his lungs and heart. He seemed a little startled by the fact that so many people had swarmed in on him like that and so I stood by his head and stroked his face, telling him that they were only there to help him and that the better behaved he was then the sooner they could fix him up and send him home.

  “He’s dehydrated,” Dr. Brown said. “Hang an IV.”

  One of the vet students, a young guy with mousey brown hair, nodded.

  He disappeared and came back with a giant bag of fluids and soon my pony looked like he belonged there with all the other sick horses, an IV in his neck and purple vet wrap around it to keep him from yanking out the tube.

  “We won’t know anything for a while,” Dr. Brown said. “We’ve got a lot of tests to run and
those results will take time. You can leave if you want and we’ll call you when we know something.”

  “I’d rather stay,” I said, looking at Dad.

  I wondered if he was going to make me go back to the barn. I had horses there that needed work and the foal, who I was supposed to be looking after but all I could think was that I didn’t want to leave my pony alone in a strange place to be poked and prodded by people he didn’t know.

  “Did you bring your laptop?” Dad asked me.

  “Yes,” I said, glad that I’d shoved it into my backpack at the last minute.

  “Fine. You can stay and catch up on your school work. I’m sure by now that you are really behind. But I don’t want you getting in the way, okay? Let the vets do their job.”

  “I will,” I said, feeling relieved. I’d already made my mind up that I wasn’t going to leave and if he tried to make me he was going to have to drag me out of there and it wouldn’t have been a pretty sight. I didn’t want to make a scene but I wasn’t leaving my pony alone.

  “We have a waiting room,” Dr. Brown said. “There is a vending machine and we always have coffee and snacks that the nurses bring in. There is a TV and some couches so just make yourself at home and we’ll know where to find you.”

  “Thanks,” I said. “But can I stay with him for a little while longer?”

  “You can,” he said. “Just sometimes we might ask you to leave his stall because we need to do a procedure.”

  “I know,” I said. “I won’t get in the way.”

  “You promise?” Dad said.

  “Yes.” I nodded. “I promise.”

  “Alright. Well I’m going to go back to the barn and I’ll come and pick you up later. I don’t mind you staying here during the day but you are not sleeping here. Do you understand? I don’t need you making yourself so ill that you end up in the hospital too.”

  “I won’t,” I said.

  “I know you think that but I know what you’re like. You’re stubborn. I can’t imagine where you get that from.”

  He pulled me into a hug and this time it wasn’t awkward.

  “I love you Em,” he said.

  “I love you too,” I replied, my voice muffled.

  “Good, now don’t get into any trouble and I’ll see you later.”

  “Okay,” I said. “See you later.”

  And as Dad walked away leaving me and my sick pony at the mercy of the vet and his students, I suddenly felt a little bit scared.

  CHAPTER TWENTY EIGHT

  Even though there were a lot of vets, they didn’t really seem to do much until Bluebird did. When he pooped, they came in with gloved hands and whisked some of it away for analysis. When he coughed, they came and scooped up the mucus. They took skin scrapings and more blood and I felt bad that they were turning my pony into a pin cushion. He wasn’t too happy about it either. Luckily he was a pretty laid back pony who tolerated the vast majority of things but even he started pinning his ears when they came in his stall with their little plastic trays. I hated seeing him upset but I hated seeing him sick more and so if their tests helped then he was just going to have to put up with it.

  Eventually I did get kind of bored of standing there watching my pony be mad and I had to pee. I was also kind of hungry. I found the bathroom and the lounge where Dr. Brown had been right, there was a large selection of home baked cookies and cupcakes, a full pot of coffee and a vending machine. I didn’t usually drink a lot of coffee but I was so tired that I almost felt like a zombie. I poured myself a giant mug and left it black, hoping it would give me at least some kind of energy surge even if I did crash later, which between that and the sugar rush from eating three cookies was pretty much inevitable.

  So I sat there trying to do school work but I couldn’t figure any of it out. I just stared at the blank screen and the flashing cursor, knowing that I was supposed to be writing a history report on Napoleon Bonaparte and not remembering anything about him. I lay my head back and closed my eyes for a second, heart racing in my chest from all the caffeine I’d consumed in a really short space of time but my eyes flashed open when I heard the door. I thought maybe it was Dr. Brown or one of his minions coming to give me an update but instead it was a tall, thin girl with long black hair and pale skin. She looked about my age, maybe a little older because I sucked at guessing people’s ages but she looked just as worried as I was so she had to have a horse here too.

  “Hey,” she said.

  “Hey,” I replied, feeling awkward.

  It was like meeting people in the hospital waiting room when you had sick relatives. You didn’t know what to say or whether to ask people why they were there or not because you didn’t want them to burst into tears or start giving you their life story. But the other girl didn’t seem to be worried about things like that.

  “That chestnut pony, is he yours?” she asked, pouring a mug of coffee and sloshing a lot of hazelnut creamer into it.

  “Yes,” I said. “Bluebird.”

  “He’s cute. He doesn’t look too sick though.”

  “Well he is,” I said, feeling defensive. Who was she to judge whether my pony was sick enough to be here or not?

  “Don’t take it the wrong way,” she said, flopping down onto the couch opposite me. “I just mean that it’s good. He probably won’t be here long. What’s wrong with him?”

  “They don’t know yet,” I said.

  “Well don’t worry, they’ll find out soon enough. They’re really good. My horse has been here for two weeks already and he’d be dead by now if it wasn’t for these vets.”

  “Is yours the bay with all the tubes?” I asked, curious now.

  “Yes,” she said. “Quantum.”

  “What’s wrong with him?” I asked.

  If he’d been in the clinic for two weeks, I figured they had to know by now.

  “He’s got a lot wrong with him,” she said and for the first time she looked sad.

  “Is he going to make it? I asked, remembering how the horse’s ribs had showed and how many tubes he was hooked up to.

  “I don’t know,” she said and then she burst into tears.

  CHAPTER TWENTY NINE

  Frankie and I bonded over chocolate chip cookies and our shared misery. It turned out that even though her horse Quantum had been there for two weeks, they didn’t really know what had triggered his slow but steady decline. It had started with a fever, sort of like my own pony and he hadn’t got better. They waited two weeks while their local vet treated him but everything they tried didn’t help. By the time they got him to the clinic his organs were starting to shut down.

  “I think Bluebird was poisoned,” I said.

  We were laying on the couches, me on one and Frankie on the other, our legs hanging over the edge and plates of cookies on the table between us. No one else was around so it didn’t seem to matter that we’d hogged them all and somehow in this weird sterile vet barn it didn’t seem strange to talk about things like your pony being poisoned. Here people believed you and didn’t just look at you like you were crazy.

  “He could have been,” Frankie said, stuffing half a cookie into her mouth and chewing thoughtfully. “There was a horse at my old barn that got poisoned at a show. Someone threw something in his feed bucket when no one was looking and he ate it.”

  “See,” I said. “When I told our vet that, she just looked at me like I was some crazy person.”

  “Well she doesn’t sound like a very good vet,” Frankie said.

  “Our regular vet was on vacation.” I sighed. “Maybe if he’d been here then Bluebird would be better by now or the vet we used to have. He was the best but then he went and retired.”

  “I hate it when that happens.”

  “I know,” I said. “It’s so selfish.”

  We both laughed.

  “I know he couldn’t help it but all vets are not created equal,” I said. “Some are special. They have a gift. They do it because they were born to not because it’s a
job.”

  “They are good here,” Frankie said. “Even if they can’t figure out what made your pony sick, they’ll still treat the symptoms until they get to the bottom of it and maybe he’ll just get better on his own.”

  “They’d better,” I said. “I really need him. He’s the best pony in the whole world.”

  “Everyone thinks that about their own horse,” she said.

  “No, really, he is. He’s a show jumper. He competes against horses and wins. He is so talented that every day I can’t believe how lucky I am to be riding him.”

  I swallowed a strangled sob. Frankie’s horse was in much worse shape than mine and she seemed to be holding it together okay after her first wave of tears had dried up. I couldn’t fall apart now that my pony looked like a pretty healthy specimen next to hers.

  “Look.”

  I opened my laptop and showed her the photographs from the last show. Bluebird and I soaring over a triple bar. Leaping over the big water jump. Bouncing through a double combination.

  “Pretty impressive,” she said. “Look how he tucks his knees.”

  “I know,” I said, feeling a proud wave surge through me. “He never refuses and he hardly ever knocks a rail. He hates to touch them. He’ll do anything to get over a jump without contact. That’s how I knew there was something wrong with him. He started acting funny at the show when I was schooling him. He kept knocking the rails, not enough to make them fall but I knew that it wasn’t like him to touch them at all. Then he got a fever.”

  “And that is why you think someone poisoned him?” Frankie asked, sinking back into the soft cushions. “Horses don’t usually get fevers from poisoning, do they?”

  “There is this girl,” I said. “She hates me. Well, she used to hate me. Now she acts all nice but I think it is really just an act. She’s pretending to be nice so that she can do something horrible. Something totally unthinkable like this and I won’t suspect her but I do. I’ll always suspect her. She can’t be trusted. Maybe she slipped him something bad like a weed or a plant or rat poison.”