Chapter 18
Every night since Tom and Leo had played some pranks at school, they had been going to the library for two hours for their two weeks of detentions. Tom had had plenty of detentions before, but this time, it was different. He had been punished with his brother and both boys were going home to a father every night who was extremely disappointed with them.
In a lot of ways, the boys were just like their father and, in fact, Tom pulled a couple of the same pranks that Riley pulled when he was in primary school.
Riley put soap in the drinking fountains, and so did Tom.
Riley also put shaving foam on the principal's car, and so did Tom.
The boys liked being like their father, but it was clear that other people didn't like it at all.
The worst part about having so many detentions was that Tom and Leo weren't able to ride their horses after school. They needed to get up an hour earlier every morning just so their horses could get the exercise they needed.
It was no different this morning. The boys were up at six and they were getting their horses ready for an hour's worth of riding. Tom had still been thinking of ways that he could get his mother to ride again, and he thought that he had finally come up with something.
Tom had been thinking about asking his mother to ride Charley for him in the afternoons so that he could get exercise, and Tom would be able to sleep in. He was just about to do it when his father asked him to come and help him. Riley had found out about Tom's plans to get his mother to ride again, so he got a lecture about staying out of it.
So, Tom was stuck once again and he had no idea what to do.
Why did Riley have to be so protective over his wife?
Why wouldn't he allow Tom to help his mother?
Tom loved his mother and he couldn't bear to not see her ride anymore. It was so unfair that she deprived herself of riding because of just one bad experience she had years ago now.
Tom mounted Charley once he saddled the horse up and he started trotting him around the paddock. It was bad not being able to ride in the afternoon. It was bad because they didn't have enough time to go on the trail before school. Some of the trails were so long that they would take all morning to ride on. That was why it was better to ride in the afternoon because they had much more time to ride on the trails.
But it was better to look on the brightside.
Tom was lucky, and always would be lucky, to have a horse. And he told himself to remember that.
...
Tom groaned as he groomed Charley after he finished his ride. It seemed that Leo had been progressively shaving off all of the fur on Charley's body. This time, he had shaved off some fur off of his right shoulder. Couldn't Leo find some new trick to pull on his brother because this one was just getting old.
Tom glared at his little brother as he groomed his mare, "would you stop shaving Charley's fur off? I am sick of it."
Leo laughed and continued grooming Keeta.
"Can you not ignore me?" asked Tom, "this is so unfair."
Leo continued laughing.
Tom then walked around Charley and he flicked his little brother on the ear. Tom felt like a good argument right now and clearly Leo wasn't going to give it to him. Flicking Leo's ear to rev him up was the only way that he was going to be able to get an argument.
