Heart and Soul (rewrite)

Chapter Twenty Three

My new home, it turned out, was older than the people that owned it. But it was well kept and always immaculately clean. Dinner was served promptly at six, and breakfast by nine. During the day we had hay in our stalls (the window in mine was always open so my heaves wouldn't come back) and at night we went out. The first few weeks or so I was alone, then I was turned out with two other horses. The first was a little paint mare named Blue, for her eyes, I suppose. The second was one of those in between horses, too big to be a pony but too small to be a horse. His name was Odyssey. Both were sweet as could be, though Ody wasn't above a cynical comment.

My first client, however, was a whole new experience. His name was Evan, and when I first met him I could sense a dark, brooding anger inside. He work dark clothes that covered everything except his hands and face, and even that he tried to hide by looking away. Under careful watch from Steph, the instructor, he brushed me. As the stiff brush worked its way through my coat I could feel the anger subside, but as the powerful smell of hatred faded I could sense something else. It was what I had smelled on Molly the day of our first show, what I had smelled on that girl who was trapped in the fog of lost memories, it was what I has smelled on the herd as we ran from the helicopter. Fear. This child was afraid, terrified even. But of what?

All we did that day was on the ground, and he even laughed when Steph scratched my tickle spot and I lifted my lip. I decided I liked this child, despite the darkness within. It wasn't until the end when I discovered what he feared so much. His mother came to pick him up, and when he saw her he froze. I sensed his heart beat quicken, and watched as his hands began to tremble. But he shoved them in his pockets. He was afraid of this woman. He was afraid of his own mother. She smiled at Steph and initiated conversation and the boy quietly slipped around me, putting my bulk between him and his mother. I turned my head as far as Steph would let me to nuzzle him. As a mother, though I had no idea where my children were, it pained me to see a child so scared of something so like me. I never remembered such fear on any of my foals, even when they came to me for punishment after misbehaving. But after I nipped them and they sulked they would return to me, and all would be forgiven as we groomed the grass and seeds out of each others manes.

As I studied his mother in more detail I could sense that same anger, but darker, deeper. She was nearly consumed by it. But she carried no fear scent, only hatred. As the boy reached up to twist a strand of his blonde hair in anxiety his sleeve slipped down, and I saw the bruises. I also saw the thin red lines that flashed across his wrists. He was hurt. Inside, and out. Eventually he left, and Steph fed me my dinner while I worried about the boy.

He came back the next week, and chuckled as I searched him up and down, my warm breath surrounding him.

"She's checking for cookies!" Steph laughed, keeping me from getting too pushy by gently pulling my head back. But she was wrong. I was searching for more injuries. Week after week he came to me. His hatred, that dark cloud, was fading, but the fear only grew stronger. The scent of blood on his clothes and wrists only grew stronger, until one week, he didn't come. I stood at my stall door, watching the door eagerly for him, but Steph came in alone. She leaned against my stall and slid to the ground, hands wound through her hair, grief pouring off her. I reached to touch her shoulder with my nuzzle.

"Oh Charm." She whispered through her tears. "Charm, we tried so hard. So damn hard. But we lost him. His mother called. He- he committed suicide, four days ago. He's gone, Charm. Gone."

She cried by my stall a while longer before she dragged herself to her feet, and brought feed to the eager horses. Although I couldn't entirely understand Steph I knew enough to realize Evan wasn't coming back. Something bad had happened. That night, I didn't touch my feed.

Another week at the barn saw a new client for me. Her name was Sarah. She had curly blonde hair and blue eyes, and she was too terrified to be pried away from her mother's side. So the woman picked up a brush form the box and ran it across my coat, crooning to the child all the while. There was something familiar about this person. The red hair, the voice, the expert hands. I struggled to draw it from my memories like a fishermen works to reel in a fish, until I had it. But I had to prove it. I turned my head and pressed it into the woman's side, with pleading eyes. She looked at me, and I nickered.

Remember me, please.

But the woman only rubbed my forehead.

"You know," She began, watching as the child began to use the curry comb in light circles that barely touched my coat. "I had a horse just like this when I was a kid. She was the best horse I ever had, off the track, too. Greatest polo pony on our farm, and the sweetest thing. The woman tilted her head as a way of pointing. "She had a scar on her right shoulder, we never knew how she got it. And thin little scars on her cannon bones. That was... my fault. We were chased by coyotes and I asked her to jump a ditch. It was wider than either of us expected and we fell in. Of course, there was barbed wire at the bottom, but that little mare led us home. She was a stoic little thing, she refused to tie though."

Steph has frozen. "A scar shaped like a v?"

"Yeah, actually. Sort of."

"Look at this, then."

The woman walked around me and stared in shock.

"Just like this..." She then ducked down to study my cannon bones. "They're faded but they're there! Does she tie?"

"Flips out whenever you try. She's already broken a cross tie."

"I almost hate to say it, but I think this was my little mare, Whiskey."

At that name, it all came crashing home. The dogs, the stock trailer, Paloma and Rex and Vickingo and Doxie. The midnight rides, the races, all of it! This was the mystery girl! The one I had loved with all my heart and soul, the one I had missed all my life, even if I couldn't pull her face to mind.

"When you retire her, could... could I possibly take her? I'll pay what you got her for, and even more if you need it."

"I'll talk to Chris, but the way I see it, this is nothing short of a miracle!"

The woman took my face in her hands and planted a kiss on my nose. "Oh, Whiskey girl, I've missed you so much. Do you remember me? Annie?"

Annie! Annie was her name! I pressed my entire head against her chest and I could sense the tears as they fell from her eyes. But they were tears of joy.