Bloodless Day

Win Some, Lose Some

BD gave up on glowering at Goodie and strained to reach a wisp of hay that fluttered against a nearby stall door. I shuffled his lead rope back and forth in my hands, left-right-left-right, trying to formulate a response. "When do you go?" I finally asked.

Sigh. "July second."

The day after BD's race. I shook my head. "That's too soon."

Lilac's expression darkened. "Ned thought so too."

"Is that why he broke up with you?"

Silence. My eyes widened. "You didn't!"

"I couldn't hold him back!" She wailed, and flung herself at her horse. Goodie sat back on his haunches, startled, as she wrapped her arms around him, standing on tip-toe to bury her face into his mane.
"From what? Everybody here is married or dating or engaged or me or just not Ned's type," I said, morbidly amused. I was still concerned for her, but at the same time...

"What if he meets someone off the farm?"

"Yeah, because he totally spends time away from this place. All the time."

Lilac sniffled and backed away from a disgruntled Goodie. "You think?"

"Yeah." An idea occurred to me. "You'll just get back together when you come back. Absence makes the heart grow fonder, and all that."

She tried for a weak smile. "Maybe. I don't know if I will come back. There's other horses there I can ride, and make a name for myself. Piperson Farms, Dad, has given me everything, and I want to have something be entirely my own creation."

I couldn't relate, and I couldn't begin to understand, but I nodded anyways even as I began to crumble inside. For the second time in my life, my best friend was leaving me. "If this is something you need to do..."

"It is."

We shared a tentative smile as Goodie pushed his nose into Lilac's shoulder, nudging her gently. "Then alright. I'll miss you."

"We still have a few days."

*****

It's strange, really, how quickly a few days trickles into one, and then none.

Lilac and I had- stupidly- pulled an all nighter, packing her clothes into boxes and suitcases, saddles and little model horses, picture frames and spare phone chargers for the spare phone chargers. "I'll text you every single day," I promised.

"No you won't. Your damn phone is always off. But call me when you can, okay?"

And now it was the crack of dawn and Jack was driving our exhausted butts to Churchill Downs. "If you emote to BD, he'll be asleep before we even reach the gate," he chided me.

I would've rolled my eyes, but that was too much effort. "I'll just take a large coffee. With extra caffeine."

Grumbling, Jack leaned out the window and spoke into the speaker at the Starbucks drive through we were at. Lilac in the back seat shot me a glare. "Order your tea," I told her, "but I'm not a jockey yet. I don't care about staying trim."

"Yet," Lilac murmured as she accepted the tea when we pulled up to the window, "is a very hopeful promise."

Jack and I sipped our coffees and reasonably ignored her.

The sky was painted a creamy pink as we drove onto the track. Dark purple shadows lay across the shedrows, gold between them as the sun began its ascent into the sky. The truck stopped in front of the Piperson shedrow and Lilac and I tumbled out. Exhaustion tugged at the corners of my vision, begging my eyes to close, if only just for a second.