Leaping Hearts

Chapter 1

“Ow!”  I pulled my finger back from the red hot flame on a pale pink birthday candle that was being reused from my aunts 54th birthday. There was a red burn on the side of my finger.

“Kathryn! Stop messing about and sit properly!” my mum glared at me. I scowled back at her.

We were at a weird posh restaurant to celebrate my wonderful, fantastic, successful sister’s victory at the Badminton Horse Trials, on her brand new, £23,000 eventer, Austin’s Mrs Darcy. There were waiters prancing about in tails and stiff white shirts, and pieces of expensive looking art plastered all over the walls. Rich foreign couples were scattered about on two-seater tables daintily picking at their Caesar salads and lobster claws on silver platters, and the tables were covered in white satin table cloths and platinum cutlery. This place just screamed ‘expensive’.

I looked down at my faded grey hoodie and rubbed anxiously and the various jam and ink stains. I glanced up at the rest of my family. They were dressed smartly enough, but somehow didn’t fit in with the rest, in their diamond necklaces, and fur coats. Maybe it was the Mickey Mouse tie and the woollen cardigan on my dad, or the ancient bronze necklace on my grandmother, who looked like something from before the ice age. My sister, however, after two years in the international eventing circuit, had some sort of dress sense.  Her black silk dress, reminiscent of Audrey Hepburn’s in ‘Breakfast at Tiffany’s’, had been bought with some of the £350,000 winnings from Badminton, and I knew for a fact that she had spent over four hours in the hairdressers earlier, getting her hair done. It was hard not to feel jealous of her anyway, particularly when she looked like she did now.

My mother snapped me out of my jealous criticisms, by standing up and tapping her crystal glass with her spoon. Excellent, I thought moodily, more praise for angelic sister. I zoned out, not able to bear any more sweet words for Rose, but paid sudden attention to her, when I heard my name mentioned.

“Hopefully, Rose’s success can be echoed by Kathryn.” She told my relatives, through gritted teeth. “But she’ll need some help, won’t you Kitty.” I stared at her, moodily, and turned away again, to lean my arms on the table, and my chin on my arms.

“So, I’m sure we’ll be able to do something about that.” She said cryptically, staring at my dad. My dad smiled and nodded, nervously, and I sat up a little straighter, my interest piqued, waiting for her to continue. Frustratingly, she just went back to more Rose-worship, so I stopped listening, and stared boredly at a little dog who was peering curiously out of someone’s handbag.

“What were you talking about, earlier? About me needing help?”

Over an hour later, in the car on the way home, I was still thinking about what my mother had said previously.

“Oh, yes. We have some good news for you.” She turned round in her seat to face me. “Your father and I were thinking about your future-“

“My future? I’m twelve!”

“Don’t interrupt me. As I was saying, your father and I know that you are… struggling, umm, academically, so we’ve decided to, well, we’re going to, umm, we’ve decided it would be best to, uh, well, we’ve…uh-“

“What?!” My mother’s nonsensical ramblings were getting irritating.

“We’re sending you to Hollyview Academy. It’s an equestrian school. You’ll like it there.”

This was good news?!

Written By Sliverhorse

Revised and Edited by NuclearFallabella