The Auditions (7 page)

“Look at the hideous Roman nose on that horse!” Felicity grimaced. “How can he ride a horse with an ugly face like that?”

“I wouldn’t be caught dead on it–it looks like a cow!” the other girl opined. “Mind you, he rides as if it’s a cow too! Look at his crest release over the jumps!”

“Cameron Fraser is from Coldstream in the Scottish Border Country,” Mike Partridge was telling the crowd. “His coloured cob goes by the show name Sir Galahad, but I understand this horse’s nickname is Paddy.”

Cameron was dressed in an emerald green hunting jacket that was clearly a hand-me-down. The velvet was faded and the jacket was at least two sizes too big. He was a tall boy for thirteen with pale skin and a thick mop of curly brown hair that poked out from beneath his hard hat. His riding style couldn’t have been more different to Daisy King’s. He lacked her finesse, but he had raw courage and took the jumps at top speed. He was broadly grinning as he took the last fence. Cameron gave the crowd a cheerful wave before pushing his magnificent black and white horse into a thundering gallop down the long side of the arena. When he finally pulled up to halt in front of the three selectors, Tara Kelly was the first judge to speak. “You’re a rough diamond, Cameron,” Tara told the boy. “You do everything wrong, but somehow you make it look right. Natural balance and ability in spades…. so I’m giving you an eight.”

The look on Felicity’s face when she heard this wasso funny that Georgie couldn’t resist. As she rode past she shouted out to the two girls, “It looks like the judges fancy cows as well as greys!”

With the best scores by far, Daisy and Cameron topped the competition at the end of the day.

“Well, not quite the end,” Mike Partridge told the crowd. “Our selectors have asked one of the finalists to perform once more.”

In the arena, as he spoke, the crew were busy erecting the puissance jumps.

“Remember our daredevil dual jumpers?” Mike Partridge asked. “Well, we’ve got one of them back again–Georgie Parker riding Tyro. This time she’s jumping alone.” Mike Partridge paused for effect, “and this time the wall is being raised. She’s going to try and clear the bricks at a massive one metre sixty-five!”

As the stewards moved the last rows of bricks into place and measured the wall one last time, Georgie stood at the entrance with Lucinda. She took a deep breath and wiped a sweaty palm on her jods. “I’m so nervous!” she told Lucinda. “Have you got any last minute words of advice?”

Lucinda looked at the enormous wall standing in the middle of the arena. “Just three,” she said. “Get. Over. It!”

In the ring, Georgie tipped her hat to the selectors and set off on a warm-up lap at a brisk canter. Just like last time, the first jump was the upright rail. Tyro popped over it neatly and then flew the oxer with ease. Now, Georgie turned him to face the wall once more. There was a brief moment when Olivia’s gruesome fall flashed through her mind but then Georgie focused on the task at hand. Tyro came in at the jump in a round, collected canter. A couple of metres out from the wall, Georgie felt her stomach clench. What if the black pony failed to lift his feet? What if they struck the wall and crashed? But then Tyro was taking off and they were going up, up and over. She heard his hind legs nudge a brick, but not enough to bring it down and they landed on the other side with the wall still intact. They had done it! They were clear!

“Georgie Parker, ladies and gentlemen,” the announcer’s voice was turning squeaky with excitement. “How about that–clearing the wall at one metre sixty-five! Well done, Georgie!”

The spotlights were turned on the three judges, ready for their comments. The selectors seemed impressed and were shuffling their score cards. Helen Nicholson was just about to speak when Mike Partridge interrupted.

“I’m sorry, selectors, but it seems the young lady isn’t finished,” he boomed. “Georgie Parker has asked the jump stewards to raise the wall to the next level, she’s attempting another round. The height this time? One metre eighty!”

Georgie rode back into the ring and the crowd was silent. Instead of cantering the pony around to warm up, she took him right up to the jump and let him stand in front of it, just a few metres out from the fence. One metre eighty was a huge height for a pony to jump–and when Tyro stood in front of the wall everyone could see that the jump was taller than he was! How could the gelding conquer this brick barricade when he couldn’t even see over it?

“Come on everyone!” Mike Partridge called to the crowd. “They’ll never get over it if you don’t give them a cheer!”

The crowd burst into applause and shouts of encouragement. It was just the spur that Georgie needed. Suddenly her nerves melted away.

“We’re going over it, Tyro,” she told her pony. “You and me. We’re going over that wall.”

As they came around to take the first of the warm-up jumps, Tyro gave a huge buck as if he was too excited about what lay ahead to keep his feet on the ground. Georgie had to check him hard to balance him before the jump, but he cleared the upright easily and cantered on to the oxer. He cleared this too, and gave a buck after the jump. And then another buck!

The bucking didn’t faze Georgie. It was Tyro’s way of letting her know he was keen and ready to go. As she turned him to face the wall, she could feel her heart thumping in her chest. Then a strange calm came over her and the world seemed to move in slow motion as she urged the pony on and approached the wall.

This was the biggest fence she had ever faced. She couldn’t see over to the other side and yet she had faith in her horse. Closer to the jump they came in one stride, two strides and then HUP! Georgie felt Tyro lift off intothe air. He was flying now, his feet tucked up at the front, clearing the wall. Could his back legs make it over as well? Tyro flicked up his hind fetlocks like a superstar and the bricks beneath him didn’t move. He was over! And the crowd were on their feet cheering. The look on the selectors’ faces said it all–a row of beaming smiles. But it was the number on Tara Kelly’s card that mattered the most.

“I’m giving you a nine!” she told Georgie.

No matter what happened–no one could take this day away from her. Georgie Parker had won a place at Blainford Academy.

A
s Georgie took her victory lap of honour she spotted her dad and Lily in the stands shouting out her name. “Georgie! Over here!” Lily was hard to miss. She was going berserk and trying to start the crowd in a Mexican wave whilst doing wolf whistles. Dr Parker was waving at her and beaming with pride. He had taken his spectacles off to wipe his eyes and looked quite emotional as she cantered by.

It was a bittersweet moment. Georgie and Tyro had done it together. But the last time she had spoken with her father, he had been adamant–there wasn’t enough money to take her pony to Blainford.

On the drive home from Birmingham she had given it one more try, begging her dad to find a wayto afford Tyro’s boarding costs.

“Georgie,” Dr Parker sighed, “I wish I could. Believe me, I have really tried. Over the past week I’ve been through the finances, including our savings. Your mum left enough in a trust to cover the cost of your fees. And I can afford the airfares and your uniforms. But I’m afraid it’s simply too expensive for you to take Tyro.” Dr Parker paused and then he said in a gentle voice, “I’ve spoken to the bursar at Blainford and she says they have a school horse available if you want it. It’s a much cheaper option. I’ve talked about this with Lucinda and she said that Blainford school horses are actually quite good …”

“But I don’t want to use Blainford horses! I want to take Tyro with me!”

“Georgie!” Her dad was exasperated now. “Don’t make this any harder for me. It’s just not possible. I’m afraid you’re going to have to make a choice. If you really want to go to this school, then you’ll have to go alone. Tyro will stay behind.”

It was unbearable. Georgie wanted so badly to go to Blainford, but Tyro was her best friend, she couldn’timagine being apart from him. If she couldn’t take him with her, then maybe she should give up her place at the academy and stay at home after all.

At the stables the next day, Lucinda put it in perspective for her. “Tyro is a great pony,” Lucinda said, “but there’ll be other great ponies in your future. And you only get one chance to go to Blainford.”

“I don’t understand why Dad won’t let me take him—” Georgie began, but Lucinda cut her off.

“Blainford is expensive, Georgie. My parents put themselves through all sorts to afford the fees and I had to ride a school horse. I didn’t care. I was just grateful for the opportunity–and you should be too.”

Lucinda was right. Georgie’s dad was already willing to stretch his finances to the limit for her. She was being a brat.

“If I did decide to go,” Georgie said, biting her lip and fighting not to cry, “and I left Tyro behind, would you look after him for me?”

Lucinda nodded. “If that’s what you want, I can keep Tyro here. I’d love to have him and I could really use him for lessons in the riding school. He’d be a greatmount for my more experienced pupils.” She paused. “But Tyro is a very talented horse and we have to do what’s best for him as well. If you leave him here he’s going to get bored pretty fast trotting around the arena with mediocre young riders. Tyro’s too good for that. He’s an athlete and he needs a competitive home.”

“What do you mean?”

“I think you should sell him.”

Georgie was horrified. “I’m not selling Tyro!”

“Believe me, I’ve been in the same position that you’re in now many times,” Lucinda said kindly. “It’s awful, but it comes with the territory. I’ve had to sell some of my best horses to make ends meet and keep the stable going. It breaks my heart every time, but that’s the lot of the competitive rider. If you really want to make it to the top then sometimes you have to let go of horses that are very special to you.” Lucinda looked over at Tyro, “… even the ones that you love.”

After she’d mucked out the stables, Georgie stayed late to be with Tyro, grooming him and giving him snuggles. The idea of letting him go seemed unbelievable. But her dad had made the choice quiteclear. If she went to Blainford, Tyro wouldn’t be coming with her.

“I can’t believe you’re making so much fuss over a horse!” Lily complained. “What about me? You’re quite happy to go away and leave me stuck here in Little Brampton without you!”

The two girls were walking home after school and Lily was back to her usual form. After being thrilled for Georgie about her success at the grand finals she had spent the past week being extremely grouchy at the idea of her best friend moving to the other side of the world.

“You can email me,” Georgie countered, “Tyro can’t.”

Lily kicked a stone beneath her feet. “So when do you leave?” she asked.

“Next term,” Georgie said. “The new school year starts at the beginning of September and I’ll be in the new intake of first year students.”

Lily frowned. “How come you’re a first year again?

You’d be in the third year if you stayed in Little Brampton with me.”

“It’s different over there,” Georgie said. “It’s a private school. Blainford starts in the eighth grade. You start school as a junior when you’re thirteen and then at fifteen you become a senior …”

Lily groaned, “Too complicated! Can we stop talking about this now? My brain hurts.”

They had reached the crossroads, where two narrow lanes bordered by hawthorn hedgerows intersected. To the left, the road led down into the village. To the right, the houses were sparse, spread further apart and surrounded by green fields. Lily’s house was the closest. It was a pale pink two-storey house, surrounded by rose gardens that Lily’s mother tended obsessively. The gardens at Georgie’s house got far less attention, but that had been true even when her mother was alive. Mrs Parker had always been far too busy in the stables to bother with the flowerbeds.

The Parker house was a grey stone cottage with a grey slate roof and wrought iron gates. The stables out the back were made from the same grey stone. Therewere five stalls, and at one time they had all been full of horses, but now they were empty, apart from the odd visit from Bandit, the Parkers’ cat, stalking for mice.

Behind the Parkers’ property was a bridle path that ran along the river through the woods and connected to the path that led from Lucinda’s riding school. The woods were dense, but if you rode far enough you reached open countryside again and wonderful views over the green valleys.

Georgie had never paid much attention to the landscape when she’d hacked out on Tyro in the past, but now that she knew she was leaving, she’d begun noticing just how beautiful it was here. She was developing strange pangs of nostalgia for Little Brampton.

“Really?” Lily had been surprised when Georgie mentioned this. “Name one thing that you’ll miss.”

“The pies at Thelma’s bakery,” Georgie told her, “and the cream buns they sell in the school caff. Oh, and baked beans and Marmite–they don’t have them in America.”

“Have you noticed,” Lily said tartly, “thateverything you’ve listed so far is food?”

The news that Georgie was leaving to go to boarding school in America was the talk of Little Brampton High School. Suddenly everyone was paying her attention. Lily just about hit the roof when she saw that Julie Jenkins, who sat beside Georgie in maths, had actually written the letters BFF inside a giant pink heart on Georgie’s maths book!

“Best friends forever?” Lily boggled. “It should say VVA–Very Vague Acquaintance!”

It was weird. Girls that had never bothered to speak to Georgie before were stopping her in the hallways and telling her how much they’d miss her and imploring Georgie to write them emails and keep in touch. How could they miss her, she wondered, when they had barely noticed she was there in the first place?

Georgie was beginning to realise that, apart from Lily and Lucinda and her dad, she wouldn’t really miss anyone much in Little Brampton. She had spent her whole life in this village, and yet somehow she had never really felt like she belonged here. It was as if herreal life was somewhere else, waiting for her to arrive so that it could finally begin.