Road To Victory

Accidents

“Okay, now you really have to collect before the big jump, and you have to know exactly when to let her speed up. Too slow – she’ll never make it over. Too fast, well, the same thing happens.”

I nodded as I listened to Lauren intently. I gripped the reins slightly, collecting Tequila’s canter. She snorted and I watched her eye the Puissance. It wasn’t too big – only 4 feet, because Lauren didn’t want to scare her. Horses normally spooked at these kinds of jumps because they couldn’t see what was at the other side of the wall. Refusals were common, and these jumps just kept getting bigger.

“Why do I have to learn this, again?” I asked nervously, popping over a double oxer so that Tequila could get the feel of what we would do in real Puissance competitions.

“Olympia. The main reason people come is to see who can get their horse to jump the highest. You’ll be there one day, I know you will.”

“Sure,” I murmured sarcastically. Tequila didn’t seem to thrilled either because I saw her ears pinned back. She was usually so excited about jumping, but not this time.

“Okay,” Lauren began. “I’ll let you make the call, see how you do. Whenever you’re ready.”

I nodded and bit my lip, inhaling deeply. We approached the tall, plastic jump. It looked so life-like though, as if it really was made of bricks.

My black mare shook her head but I caught hold of her, readying her for the jump. She fought against the bit; against my hands.  

“Let her go!” Lauren called, cupping her hands around her mouth so her voice could go further. I gasped as Tequila literally pulled all the rein away from me, but it was too late to do anything else, because we were flying.

It didn’t feel right though. I was off-balance, as was she.  Save her mouth, I told myself as I leaned much too far forward. Tequila landed, her head ducking all the way down. Her nose grazed the dirt and I flew over her head, landing on my hip.

I groaned, wincing as I rolled over so it didn’t hurt as much. Another rider had already stabilized my horse, and Lauren was jogging towards me.

“What went wrong?” I asked, my voice coming out as a strained breath.

After a long sigh, Lauren replied, “Everything. Can someone get her an ice pack, and some Advil?” she yelled to no one in particular, leaning over me. I blacked out seconds later.

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After our ‘accident’, Lauren decided to put me on horses that were much better at Puissances so I could get the feeling. You think of that now, I muttered in my head, annoyed. Lauren was a great trainer, but sometimes she really made me question her.

“How are you feeling?” she asked me as I exercised Tippin, a smaller tobiano Dutch Warmblood.

“Fine,” I replied, trying to make the annoyance in my voice evident. Ever since my bad fall, Lauren has been treating me like I was a porcelain doll. Maybe my parents told her something when I was in the hospital…

Shrugging it off, I took Tippin over the 6 foot Puissance. He was like a dream when he jumped and never argued with the rider, even if the rider was wrong.

“Great!” my trainer praised me. “Effortless, your timing was spot on, and your equitation wasn’t too bad either! Want to try on Tequila again?” She waved her hand to my black mare. Rachel was warming her up, as she did everyday now. I hated to admit, but my friend looked really good on her. I watched Tequila’s ears which were attentive and perked.

“Katherine! Are you listening to me?!”

I shot back to reality and nodded. “Uh.. Yeah, sure. Why not.”

Rachel pulled Tequila to a stop. I watched as my mare came to a stop, without flinching or blinking, or thinking twice. She hopped off her, smiling as she handed me the reins.

“Want to cool Tippin down?” Lauren asked Rachel, who agreed instantly.

I mounted Tequila, adjusting the reins. “Hey, why you treating her better than me?” I asked Tequila once were at the other side of the ring.

She simply snorted and pawed at the ground in response. I sighed and pressed her forward, feeling a flicker of jealousy as I thought about Rachel and Tequila. What if Tequila was tired of me? What is she was afraid of me after the fall?

No, I reassured myself. Tequila’s mine. I pushed the silly thoughts away and wrapped my mind around riding. We cantered over the same double oxer we did before, circled, and headed towards the Puissance, which was down a foot from when Tippin  jumped it, but still a foot taller than our previous one. It was beyond me why Lauren would make it higher if we had trouble with the four foot one, but whatever.

Once again, something felt wrong. Tequila was pushing forward, but it was too early. She pounded forward though, almost rearing as she tried to charge, but I was holding her back. Suddenly, it was too late. I shrieked as she flew in to the air, almost doing a Capriole. She lashed her back legs out, tumbling into the wall. I got flung off by the awkward take-off, and passed out again, for the second time that week.

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“Honey,” I heard a gentle croon. “Sweetheart.”

My eyes fluttered open and I was looking at my mother. “M-Mom?” I asked dizzily, rubbing my eyes. “Mom, where am I?” I gasped suddenly, recalling all the events. Tequila and I had a disagreement on the distance, that’s it, I reassured myself. It was only plastic after all.

“You’ve been in a coma for 2 days,” she explained to me gently.

“A COMA?!” I shrieked back. A nurse ran over, pushing me back. “Shh, you’re body’s worn out. No yelling,” she told me, but I wasn’t in the mood to listen to her.

“Mom.. What about-“

She knew what I was going to ask, so she got straight to the point. “One of her flexor tendons broke. It snapped in half.”

“Is she al-“ I was cut off by my mother.

“She wasn’t put to sleep, don’t worry.” I relaxed slightly in my bed. “But,” she went on, “the veterinarian said she can’t be ridden for at least a month, and after that…” she sighed and paused, folding a towel that was on her laps. “Well, you see sweetheart. When you landed, she crashed forward on her knees. To make things worse, she was in such an unnatural position that she … crushed herself.”

“Mom, I can still ride her right? We’ll be jumping in a month, right?”

My mother shook her head sadly, tears forming in her eyes. “Katherine. I don’t know how to tell you this, but Tequila can never jump again.”

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Yeah, so the video is what happened, but it's not actually supposed to them. But you get an idea of what happened since I did a really bad job of describing. The horse in the video wasn't injured, and neither was the rider, but that's not the same for Tequila & Katherine.

And yeah. That's a picture of them . (: