A Leap For The Sky - Kc Wheeler (popular novels .TXT) 📗

You don’t need to worry, she’s not in pain for now. But that’s a clean break. I’m sorry,” a man with shaggy dark hair answered beside me. The fence judge.

“That’s right,” Dad agreed apologetically, placing his hand on Gypsy’s shoulder.

“I’ll untack her,” Lucy offered.

Gypsy hungrily finished her feed and tossed the bucket away. I rubbed beneath her forelock in gentle, circular motions, watching her big brown eyes soften. She sighed and lowered her head, resting her nose upon my thighs. I cried quietly. No words could describe the sadness I experienced. These were my final moments with my beloved horse; all because I took a stupid risk.

Everybody stood watching in silence, lost for words. There was nothing anybody could say to make this nightmare any easier.

All too soon the vet arrived- a short, wiry, little man with glasses. He drove a red truck, towing a big trailer. The trailer was to remove Gypsy’s body once she was euthanized, I knew.

Once she was killed. Dead.

A fresh flood of tears exploded to the surface, and I once again buried my face into Gypsy’s neck.

“Such a shame,” the vet spoke in a surprisingly deep voice for his petite size. “How did it happen?”

“She slipped showjumping,” Dad spoke under his breath, as though trying to stop me from hearing. I didn’t understand why. I knew she’d slipped showjumping. I knew it was all my fault.

“Hmm, yes. It’s not the best day for it,” the vet replied. He stepped up beside Gypsy and I. “Is she your horse?” he asked me.

I nodded without looking at him.

“She’s a very nice mare,” he commented.

“Not for long,” I said hastily, my voice cracking.

“This happens more often than you’d think,” he said. “We should probably do this quickly. I think the pain is starting to kick in.”

I gasped and grasped her tighter, afraid to let her go.

“This won’t hurt her a bit. I promise. It will just be like she’s going to sleep,” the vet assured me.

Except this time, she won’t wake up… I thought.

Trembling, I took a step back. I didn’t ever want this moment to come, but the idea of the pain coming on made me terrified for her. I didn’t want her to suffer… I owed her that. And as I looked at her, I knew I was making the right decision; the time was now. She appeared to stand hollow, her ears drooped to the sides. Her head was lowered and her beautiful eyes looked sad; so sad. I whimpered softly, over-whelmed with guilt.

“Can everybody please back away?” the fence judge called out to all those watching. “Give these guys some privacy please. Go back to your vehicles.”

Mum smiled gratefully at him. I didn’t care either way. Whether there were strangers watching, or only us, we got the same result- Gypsy’s death.

I stood stroking my mare, unable to speak; unable to say goodbye. As her legs waivered and collapsed beneath her, I too, fell to the ground still stroking her warm body. I lay against her, ignoring the mud seeping into my clothes, and I cried. Everybody else was forgotten once again. It was just Gypsy and I.

Then it was just me, stroking the corpse of which once was my horse.

The rest of the day went by in a blur. A man in a forklift had to hoist Gypsy’s body onto the trailer. I didn’t know who had arranged that. Plans had been made for her to be buried at Ridgewood stables.

The rest of the competition was called off. Lucy had placed second on Bugs, but it was no longer a day worthy of celebrating.

Sorry people kept glancing my way as I headed to my parent’s car; I was traveling home with them. Even Larissa had nothing rude to say as I grabbed my gear from Steve’s truck.

The drive home was morbid and quiet; even Natasha didn’t speak.

As soon as we arrived home I climbed the stairs to my room. I refused dinner and got into bed where I cried, occasionally falling into a light sleep to escape agony, not only emotional but physical, for my head pounded with a bad headache. I’d escape for a little bit only to wake up again and cry some more. I even managed to sleep for a straight hour and when I woke up again, just for a moment, I’d forgotten that anything bad had happened. For just a moment everything was okay, only to have the day’s events flashing back to me, horrifying me once again.

The day quickly turned into night. Tossing and turning, the day’s events repetitive in my head, I somehow found a way to cry myself to sleep.

Chapter Seven

The sun shone through the gap in the curtains, warming my face and awakening me the next morning. I opened my eyes groggily and cursed myself for not shutting the curtains completely. I longed to close my eyes and disappear once again, to a world where yesterday was unknown to me; but the fresh pain washing over me meant that was not an option; I was wide awake. I reached over to my dresser, gasping as a sharp pain thundered down my back, and read the time on my cell phone. 9.05am.

Today Gypsy would have had a day off riding as a reward for her hard work the day prior. I would have headed out to the stables, given Gypsy a small feed with all the vitamins and minerals she required, then groomed her until her coat shined. I would have spoken quietly to her as I always did, talking about absolutely anything that crossed my mind. The radio would have been playing quietly in the garage beside us. Gypsy would have stood contently, enjoying the feel of the brushes bristles gently massaging her skin.

Now, Gypsy had forever off riding. Never again would her golden coat glisten. Never again would she be there to listen.

Tears filled my eyes. I knew today was going to be a long and horrible day. Maybe the rest of my life would be. I lay back down; I might have been wide awake, but I felt too devastated to do anything at all. I cried until I had nothing left, then I curled into a ball and simply lay there, forcing my mind into a blank state. I longed for a drink of water and a wheat pack for my back, but I couldn’t bring myself to leave the bed.

I must have drifted back to sleep. I woke an hour later to a gentle knock on the door. Mum wandered in with a plate of pancakes and a big glass of water. “Hungry?” she asked softly.

“No,” I replied, but reached for the water. How could anyone be hungry at a time like this?

“Well I’ll leave these here for you. Is there anything else I can get you?”

“Um… My back is still really sore,” I mumbled.

“I’ll go and heat you up a wheat pack and bring you some paracetamol.”

She left, re-entering the room five-minutes later to pass me two paracetamol tablets and the wheat pack. “I struggled to sleep last night,” Mum told me quietly, making me guilty that I’d managed to sleep.

I placed the wheat bag onto my bed and lay down on my back so the heat was applied to the painful area. It soothed it, and I felt a mild sense of relief. Mum sat down on my bed brushing a piece of hair from out of my eyes. She sat there, simply watching me. I ignored her and closed my eyes.

After a while Mum stood back up. “Let me know if you need anything,” she said.

I lay there all day, Mum occasionally coming to heat up my wheat pack. I had a sense of ‘not being’ and I welcomed this as opposed to the sadness I’d felt so much of.

By 6pm my stomach rumbled loudly, and guilty that I could feel hunger in my grief, I reluctantly picked up one of the now-cold pancakes.

I was munching away when Lucy opened my bedroom door and peered at me. “Can I come in?”

“Mm,” I mumbled in reply, propping myself up against the wall.

She sat down on the bed beside me. “How are you doing?” she asked. She looked so uncomfortable, fiddling with her hands.

I looked down and shrugged.

“Your Mum told me to tell you we plan to have the burial tomorrow,” Lucy murmured.

Sadness rushed over me, drowning my blank state of mind. I blinked back tears; I didn’t want to cry again. I wasn’t ready to face the burial of my horse; but then I’d never be ready.

“I…” I tried to speak. “I don’t want to be there.” But I knew I’d go. It was my last chance to say goodbye.

Lucy placed a hand on my knee and looked at me with sad eyes. “It’s not your fault. You know that, right?”

I shook my head. “No Lucy. It is my fault. The ground was so wet and so muddy… so slippery.” I stared at her solemnly through tear-blurred vision. “I risked her life.”

“You didn’t know… It was a freak accident; it could have happened to anyone,” Lucy insisted.

“The worst part is, a moment before the bell rang, I had doubts. I had doubts Lucy; but I rode her anyway. If I’d listened to them, Gypsy would still be alive today.” A hot tear ran down my cheek and I furiously brushed it away. I hated myself.

“There’s no point thinking ‘what if?’ Adele. We’re only human, and not all of our choices can be the right ones. I competed Bugs despite the grounds… So did everybody else there. Does that make us wrong too? Am I… I mean are we all, bad people?” Lucy cried.

I didn’t reply. I didn’t know how to.

“It could have happened to any of us Adele…”

“But it happened to me. The grounds weren’t as bad when it was your turn. By the time it was my turn, it was so much worse,” my voice cracked.

Lucy sighed. “It doesn’t really matter now.”

My face flushed and I glared at her. “My horse is dead, and you say it doesn’t matter now?! It will always matter Lucy! I’ll always be carrying this guilt, and I’ll always miss Gypsy! Always!” I shook my head in disbelief. How could she say that?

“I… I didn’t mean that,” she stammered. “I only meant it doesn’t matter whose fault it is… It doesn’t matter what you could have done differently. She’s gone and there’s nothing that can be done to change that.”

My anger was quickly taken over with the all-too-familiar feeling of sadness. The idea of Gypsy really being gone was too much to comprehend. The fact I’d never see her again hurt more than words could ever describe. Only technically, I would see her again; her body; her empty soul-less body dumped into the ground and covered with dirt.

Lucy smiled at me suddenly. A sad half-smile. “Did you know she won for you?”

I stared at her in confusion.

“You guys got first. You won your first ever 1.25 metres class,” she explained. An un-readable expression crossed Lucy’s face. “She carried you to a win with a broken leg.”

Chapter Eight

I stood staring into the huge, deep hole.

My family was there. Lucy and Steve were there. Michael, the owner of Ridgewood stables, stood with us too. The hot sun shone shot brightly above us. A gentle, warm breeze played gently through my brown air. The weather didn’t fit the atmosphere at all. It was a reminder that while everything felt so broken to me, the world would keep spinning; with or without my happiness.

It had been a struggle to get out of bed; a struggle to face what lay ahead. My face was blotched with pink and my eyes were rimmed red.

All else was silent as Gypsy’s body was lowered into the Earth. Natasha appeared unable to watch, her head buried deep into Mum’s coat. All faces were serious, with the exception of Michael who stood so contently that from his expression