The Storm Before Dawn

Chapter 13

Picture of Asha's backpack

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Then the room went dark...

I heard someone walking around down stairs.

"Mom?"

There was no response. Zara and I were huddling together on the couch. I looked out the window and all of our neighbors had power so it was just us. I looked at my phone, it still had life so I called 911.

"Hello?"

"This is 911, Police, Fire, or ambulance?"

"Police please"

I gave her my address and told her what was going on. She stayed on the phone with me until I could hear sirens. The person down stairs heard it too, they ran out the door and disappeared into the night. The police pulled up and I could hear shouting and then the police ran off chasing someone or something.

A few minutes later they came back and were holding someone. Zara and I walked down stairs and out the front door. The same policeman as earlier came up to us and started to ask us questions. We answered as best as we could, and then my mom pulled up.

"What is going on?"

The police officer explained everything and my mom unloaded the horse from the trailer, and had me put it in the arena. The new horse was named Day Break, but her nickname was Day. She was a Thoroughbred off the track, who had a racing accident then was left in a stall to starve. She had a torn ligament, but it had healed so once she was healthy again, I could start training her. She was really sweet, and would most likely make a great Dressage horse.

"Hello Asha..."

I looked up in the rafters, and knew I had to get out of there. I screamed. The policeman came running and the guy who was talking to me ducked down, but not in time. The cop ran up to the hay loft and I ran out of the barn. This was an interesting way to celebrate my 13 birthday!

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The next morning when I woke up I was supper nervous. I didn't know if anyone was out there waiting for me or not. The cop caught both people last night but... After about ten minutes I convinced myself to get out of bed. My mom and came up to make sure I was ok, and reminded me that school started tomorrow. I was so excited and not both at the same time, I wanted to see all of my friends, but not be away from the horses six hours a day. That also meant that I had to spend a few hours getting all of my school stuff ready.

When, I finally made it out to the barn, I had a pocket knife in my back pocket, just in case. The horses nickered at me, as to reassure me there was nothing wrong. I said hi to all of the horses in the aisle then went to the indoor arena.

Day was doing pretty good, as good as any rescue. She looked happy and was really excited when I brought her her food. By the patterns in the dirt I could tell she laid down last night and rolled. Day trotted over to me and shoved her face into the hay and started to eat.

Since it was chilly out side, I decided to go inside and get my school stuff ready early. All of my stuff was in my closet, so I pulled it out and tried to close my closet. My closet is really messy so it didn't close all of the way. Sometimes I organize my backpack other times I don't, today I did but it still wasn't perfectly organized. I also laid my clothes out for tomorrow, it was a light teal skirt with a light gray long sleeve shirt, and light teal shoes to go it. 

After finishing getting ready for school, I padded outside to work the horses. Sky looked out of her door at me and I decided to work her out on a trail first. We trotted along until the meadow, then I asked her to canter.  She was performing beautifully, until she tripped. Sky went down on her front knees, then finished crashing to the ground. I was thrown off of her back, somehow I didn't hit my head and it didn't get hurt. Sky lay on the ground for a few seconds, then she started to get up, but when she got up, she was favoring her left front leg. 

Her knee was swelling and was really hot, both signs of damage. The meadow is about a mile away from my house, so I called my Andrea. Luckily, my phone didn't break during the fall. About five minutes later, my mom showed up with a trailer on the road that ran right next to the road. We loaded Sky into the trailer and drove home.

When we got home, Amy was already there ready to heck out Sky. After Amy looked at Sky, she decided that she twisted her knee, but it would heal pretty fast. I helped my mom apply ice, then went and worked Flash. 

Flash, I still couldn't jump but we worked on our dressage. I was hoping that Flash could become a three day eventer. After Flash, I worked Onyx who, like normal, was being insane. She ran around the round pen for about a half hour, and after ten minutes I went to work Day. After Day I played with Dawn and Star. Star was a really sweet stallion, I hoped we could breed him to one of our horses. 

It was about 3:00 pm so I went into my house for a quick snack. There were some apples on the counter that looked good. After my snack, I worked Cheerio, Wind Whipped, Ultimate, and Sweet Heart. They were all being really good, so to finish off my day I worked Gunner. Gunner, was an amazing dressage horse so we worked on extensions and 15 meter canter circles. To finish off Gunner we worked on Showmanship. He had never done that, but was still really good at it.

I looked at my iPhone and realized it was dinner time. Mom was making chicken pot pie, it was really good and once it was cleaned up I had to go check on the horses.

The horses were all good and were happy I brought them their food. Sky needed more ice on her knee so I had to get the ice out of the fridge. It didn't take long and the swelling was starting to go down. Once that was done my mom called me into get ready for bed. 

I took a shower and braided my hair in a tight braid. When I finally laid down I was too excited to sleep much, I did get a few hours but not much. My dreams were all over the place, but mostly they consisted of horses. 

At 5:00am the next morning I felt like it shouldn't be morning.