Leap of Faith (22 page)

And now this bloody horse had been here two minutes and he was trotting off to town to spend money that was half hers – worse, money from the sale of
her
horses. Jesus! She knew if she said all this aloud it would sound very childish – hell, it did in her own mind. But she couldn't help how she felt. The situation was ludicrous.

*

Steve came in just after dark. Jessica had itched to eat dinner without him and leave his plate in the oven, but had refrained. Just.

As they ate, Steve chatted away and Jessica chewed silently. The steak that was as good as ever felt like cardboard in her mouth and was just as hard to swallow.

‘I think she was lonely. Didn't touch the tub while I was there,' he said. ‘Oh well, least she can't waste so much water now. I've told the dogs to stay over there and keep her company. Wonder what her fascination is and where it comes from?'

Just a naughty habit picked up by a bored horse
. But Jessica stayed silent. She wondered when it would start chewing the pristine timber of her yards. If it did, Steve would be bloody well fixing it. She frowned; Steve always did the maintenance. Jessica could carefully place a horse at a jump – well, more often than not – but she barely knew one end of a screwdriver from the other. Otherwise, she might have had the proper feeder troughs in well before now.

‘I'll let her out in a few days, once she's cleaned out and won't introduce any new weeds. I wonder if she likes cows or sheep,' he said thoughtfully, and got up to get another beer from the fridge.

Jessica knew she should keep her mouth shut, but just couldn't.

‘And then what?'

‘What do you mean?'

‘You're just going to put it in with the sheep or cows depending on what it prefers?'

‘Yeah, what's the problem?'

‘And it's going to just live out its days grazing?'

‘I don't see why not,' Steve said cheerfully, sat back down and resumed his meal.

‘But …'

‘Jessica,' Steve said, looking up at her after placing his knife and fork carefully on the sides of his plate. ‘I wouldn't have had a problem with you keeping Prince and Beau, but you chose to get rid of them because of your ridiculous notion that they had to pay their way and were too valuable to be doing nothing.'

‘They would have cost a fortune in upkeep.'

‘We would have found it somewhere. Stop using that as an excuse.'

‘But …'

‘Jessica, I have never told you what to do with your life, your horses, but quite frankly, I'm getting a little tired of you moping about feeling sorry for yourself and beating yourself up – or whatever it is you're doing – over getting rid of Prince and Beau. That was your decision and no one else's. You either get them back or learn to live with it, but don't be taking it out on me!

‘That horse out there needed saving. I don't know why it was me who had to do it, or why, but it was. And it feels bloody good. So don't you dare start making me feel bad because you've realised how badly you've fucked up. I won't have it. This is as much my land as it is yours and if I want a chestnut horse – or a donkey, for that matter – in a paddock, then I bloody well will, and there's not a damned thing you can do about it!

‘And if you stopped being so damned self-righteous for a minute, you might just realise that a creature doesn't have to be a winner in some competition in order to bring meaning and joy to someone's life.' And with that, he thumped both clenched fists on the table, got up and strode to the bedroom. She heard the ensuite door closing loudly.

Jessica was left gaping – at his words, as well as at the forcefulness of their delivery. Steve was the silent, brooding type, not an angry ranter. She felt unsettled and was shocked to find herself shaking slightly.

Steve's words continued to bother Jessica as she tried to focus on watching the evening's television.

Her husband sat silent and brooding on the other couch. Golly, this horse really had got under his skin. She gnawed at her lip as she wondered why: why this one, why now? Was it because of her, was she driving him away, into the solace of rescuing some worthy creature, fixing it, because he couldn't fix her? She was sure she'd been doing well at hiding her angst, her true feelings, but Steve had uncharacteristically snapped at her – more than snapped, actually bellowed – as had Tiffany.

Though it might not all be about her – wasn't that one of the latest sayings: ‘It's not all about you'? Whatever was going on, she would have to work harder at pretending everything was normal. And she could see that meant humouring Steve with his new hobby. She would show an interest, guide him if necessary, but definitely keep a healthy emotional distance from the horse. It was Steve's project.

She wondered if he would take it so far as learning to ride. There wasn't much point having a horse if you couldn't ride it. Only horses showing promise and recovering from injury were allowed to loll about for any length of time in the paddock, not being ridden. Early on, she'd become used to horses coming and going at her father's whim. She'd shed many tears over them as a child and become hardened as a result. She'd thought that was a good thing. Now she wasn't so sure.

It wasn't a whole lot different to people keeping a pet cat or rabbit, or whatever – completely useless except for the apparent health benefits the medical fraternity were now lauding: reduced blood pressure and incidence of depression. Oh well, Steve had put up with her horses cluttering up the place and the money and hours she'd put into them, so she supposed she could be a bit more supportive. No, not just show support, but actually
be
supportive. She'd force herself to; she owed it to him, their marriage.

Actually, it might be quite nice to have a horse without any of the expectations and pressure caused by eventing. Jessica frowned. Did she really think that all those years of competition were down to fulfilling expectations? If so, whose? Hers? She frowned harder. No, she'd loved the exhilaration of competing, the thrill of taking a green horse and turning it into a champion. Hadn't she?

But now she thought about it, she didn't miss all the hours going around and around the arena, perfecting each pace, each dressage movement. That was hard work, and also incredibly boring at times. She felt a stab of guilt at wondering how the horses had coped with it. It had been necessary, but they wouldn't have understood that, though they had appeared to enjoy pleasing her. And she didn't miss being yelled at by her father or being made to repeat a jump over and over until she could barely stay upright in the saddle and the horse felt like jelly underneath her.

Shit, had she just been carried by his will, his dream, all those years? Had she been on a merry-go-round and thought it easier to stay on than try to get off while it was moving? It had well and truly stopped now. The thought made her feel weird, which was weird in itself – the merry-go-round had stopped when she'd sold the horses; when they'd left the property. It had slowed enough to let her off when her father died, but it hadn't stopped, and she hadn't got off, until her decision to sell Prince and Beau.

She noticed her heart rate was very slow. Rather than being jittery about this realisation – really, it wasn't all that new, but seemed to be coming at her from a different angle, and thus felt new – Jessica felt strangely free. There was some residual remorse when she thought about letting her father down, but if she let herself be annoyed with him for dying on her and being such a smothering, forceful figure in her life, she could push the stab of red-hot guilt aside.

A new realisation hit her like a bolt of lightning passing from the top of her head down to the soles of her feet: her courage to ride cross-country had more to do with fear of her father, more to do with letting him down and having him yell at her, than letting herself down. But that influence had served her well through twenty-odd years of competing. And they say if your heart's not in it, you don't achieve. Well, hadn't she proven that wrong? The realisations were tumbling from her mind like dominoes now. The secret to her success wasn't passion, it was fear.
I got more out of my father being proud of me than winning.

Damn you!
she cursed under her breath. She meant her father, but knew deep down she was referring to herself. He hadn't exactly tied her to the saddle and forced her to do anything. She'd willingly fed, rugged, groomed, learnt dressage tests by heart and walked cross-country course after cross-country course. Gone on with it all after she'd left home and got married. But if she had to be totally honest, she'd got as much gratification out of seeing a shining coat as she had tackling the nation's toughest cross-country courses.

She'd loved pony club – roaring around as a youngster without a care in the world – but somewhere it had all become so serious. No, Jessica realised, it had always been serious. She'd been as well groomed as her horses to fulfil Jeff Collins' lifelong ambitions that he'd never accomplished. While it hadn't been discussed in any detail, Jessica suspected a lack of finances was the reason – a topic rarely discussed in their family – given he had so often declared the trip to a competition a waste of money if she didn't do well enough.

She could see it all now as clearly as a movie showing in front of her. She'd always loved jumping and might have been a jumps jockey if her mother hadn't expressed her horror. Besides, Jessica had grown too tall and robust. She'd also never have found the will to starve herself.

She thought about Jasper – a horse she'd loved but who, in her father's opinion, hadn't measured up. She'd come home one day from school to find him replaced by Billy, a feisty grey straight off the racetrack. Apparently Jasper was for the fun rider and Billy for the serious rider. Thus the line was drawn in the sand and the hard work began. Jessica didn't have the time or energy to pine for Jasper and, in a matter of weeks, she was now ashamed to admit, he'd been largely forgotten.

But you couldn't be a twelve-year-old pony clubber forever. A time came to either give up or get serious, according to her father. And she'd been swept along in his wake. She loved horses and didn't think life was worth living without them. And her father had apparently just spent a fortune on Billy, so she couldn't exactly have gotten out of it even if she'd wanted to. The thought of letting her father down in any regard cut her to the core. So, as much as Billy didn't have a fun, quirky sense of humour like Jasper did, they'd bonded and made a pretty successful team, quickly climbing the ranks of pony club eventing. Just like many Olympians had started out. That was the goal.

Now she thought again with a slight shock and then a strong wave of sadness that Olympic success had been Jeff Collins' goal not hers. If it had been hers, she wouldn't have dropped the ball as soon as he'd fallen off the perch. She'd have remained driven. And if it really had been her goal, she wouldn't have let her head full of doubts convince her she could never ride cross-country again and she wouldn't have sold the two horses. Instead, she'd have done everything to get back to where she'd been. Oh well, it was done now.

*

The following morning Steve stomped back into the house after feeding his new acquisition. They had barely spoken the previous evening and had exchanged curt greetings since. He set about making two mugs of coffee. He was silent, but frowning, shaking his head, running his hands through his hair as if something was really bothering him.

Oh, God, please, not another round.

After a few minutes, Jessica's curiosity overrode her fear of the consequences; she could stand it no longer. ‘What's wrong?' she asked.

He leant back on the bench and surveyed her as if trying to decide if he should tell her something or not before saying, ‘She's terrified of me. I don't know what I've done.'

‘What's happened?'

‘Well, nothing really. It's just, if I go to put my hand out to pat her she freaks out and leaps back. And then she stands eyeing me like I've hit her, or something. It's terrible. She was fine when I loaded her in the float – though the old lady was there, and some other woman – and that first night she seemed fine when I fed her, and yesterday morning.'

‘She's going to need time to adjust to her new surroundings, to us.'

‘But she was fine when she arrived.'

‘Maybe she was so hungry she didn't have the energy. She is very thin.'

‘She's probably dangerous. I don't know anything about her. What an idiot.' He sighed. ‘You're right, a horse is not just a horse – it was a big mistake. I don't know anything about horses. What was I thinking? I've been feeling so helpless – I really wanted to do a good thing.'

‘You did do a good thing.' Jessica felt like her heart was being wrenched out of her. He was really distressed. The only times she had ever seen him like this was when he had to put down injured stock or when he came home after a CFS callout for a motor vehicle accident.

‘But look where it's got me.'

‘She's been here two minutes. Let's give her a few more days. Perhaps she's had a bad history with men, or something.'

Steve appeared shocked. He eyed her warily. Clearly he was surprised at her being supportive when she'd been so against the horse in the first place.

‘Okay. But could you see if she has the same reaction to you – um, test your anti-men theory?'

‘Later, after I've been for a walk. Um, what's her name?'

‘Faith. Thank goodness I'll be at CFS all day. I can't stand to look at her; it breaks my heart.'

Jessica's heart surged. That's what she'd fallen in love with: Steve's big, soft heart buried under his tough, blokey exterior. She would have loved to have got up and embraced him, but was too afraid of having read the situation wrong and of being rejected. They would come back from their estrangement. For the first time in weeks, she felt everything would be okay. But they needed to ease their way.