Brumby - 1. Chapter 1

There is no greater love than that between a boy, and his horse.

It is a story told the world over for hundreds of years. The scenarios are different, the trials faced are different, but always a boy with no previous training takes on a horse no-one thinks he can look after, and the two of them build a deep and special relationship. The horse is sold or taken, but through faith, they will be re united at the end. You don’t need the rolling credits, the end of the print or me to tell you, it does not happen like that in real life.

The first horse I rode was Brannigan. He was my mother’s horse, a slim little Arab with high withers and a beautiful profile. There is a photo of me, four years old and dressed up like a cowboy, sitting on the back of the pale creature, walking him around the sand school. I’d been on horseback from pretty much the moment I was born, but it was the first time I actually rode by myself. Brannigan was a good horse, well trained, and all I did was sit there, but it was a moment nonetheless.

The first horse who was ever mine, was not like it was in the stories.

I grew up with horses. I am a kid who comes from horses. People think I’m either lucky or weird, the boy who lives with horses. We have six hundred acres of pasture and hay making fields, and we breed, buy, start up and train horses. Because that is what Yarraman’s do. We’re a family of horse people. Sometimes I think my parents might love some of our horses more than they love me.

*

“He’s for you.”

I was seven, so I stared at my father in horror, holding the lead rope of the big bay gelding. He was huge to me then, but years later I would pet Davey and called him a pony.

“He’s what?”

“He’s for you. About time you got your own horse.”

Davey was a seventeen year old Timor Pony with some Welsh Mountain in him somewhere, and he was skewbald with big expressive eyes and a short temper. I discovered about three minutes and one buck-off into our first ever ride together why my father had chosen him for me.

“You damn stupid horse!” I kicked the sand, send dust flying everywhere, “Learn to do what you’re told!” I slapped the reins against his neck, to which Davey’s reaction was to neigh, rear up and pull away, which had the effect of knocking me back flat on my arse in the sand, “DAD!”

My father was laughing.

“Davey has been riding for longer than you’ve been alive. I didn’t give him to you for you to teach him.”

I snarled.

“What happened?”

“I asked him to go faster,” I crossed my arms and sulked, looking sideways at the creature who I already knew was going to win this and many other arguments, “So I kicked him.”

“And if I kick you,” My father was still laughing, you could see the sparks dancing in his eyes, “Does kicking make you go faster?”

I had to concede the answer was negative.

“But he should do as he’s told!”

“No son,” My father clapped me on the back hard enough to make me cough, “He’s going to do what’s easiest for him. Your job is to work out how to ask for things, make your way easier than his way.” My father started walking back towards the North block stables, “And if I ever see you hit a horse again, I’ll match you blow for blow with a belt across your backside.”

*

When people ask me if my parents taught me to ride, I have to smile and shake my head, because while my parents gave me the tools, it was Davey who taught me how to be a good rider. Over the next two years I learnt patience from than brown and white little creature. I learnt how to be responsible for my actions, to be respectful of what he wanted, and he taught me how to be a good rider.

One of my mother’s rules was I wasn’t allowed any tack until after I proved I could ride, so I learnt bareback with a long piece of thin rope, knotted and twins into a very basic head collar and reins. Davey knew everything. He knew where his gates were, knew how to pace in a circle, trot forwards and sideways. He taught me how to hold on with my knees, how to steer without really using the reins, when to squeeze and when to sit back. I fell off a lot. I would often hear my grandfather say school taught you how to read and write, but a good horse could teach you how to be a man.

*

When I was nine, I started getting lessons from a high strung palomino called Hunter. Hunter was a twelve year old mass of energy and anger. He was a horse with a bad temper, but as I later learnt, not actually a bad horse.

“I am not riding that.”

“And why not?” My mother, strong, sensible, with her hair pulled back and wrapped up in a fleece lined jacket for the cold weather folded her arms and stared me down, “Why won’t you ride him?”

“I wanna ride Davey,” I loved the little pony, even if I was already getting too long in the leg for him, “He’s nice.”

“And what’s wrong with Hunter?”

I watched the horse toss his head, his dark eyes glinting with malice. He’d already tried to bite the man who’d lead him in, and I’d seen him aim a kick at me when I’d walked up, slapping the reins against my boot.

“He’s a bad horse.”

“There are no bad horses son,” My mother sounded incredibly sure, “Only bad people.”

Years later, I was fully able to admit I never tried to like Hunter. He hated me and I hated him, because father said I wasn’t allowed to ride Davey until I could ride Hunter. As a headstrong cock-sure kid, I assumed this would be an easy task. Get on and ride like I always did, ask-not-tell and we’d be fine. I was wrong.

“You worthless shit!” I slapped Hunter’s velvet soft nose with my palm, then clutched at my hand with my other hand, scrabbling away from the horse hoping to find a glove or something to staunch the blood and see how bad the wound was. “Bastard!” I spat. Hunter snorted and held his head high, and the bridle remained between us on the straw of the stall floor.

“What did you do?” My father growled.

“He bit me!” I checked my hand. There was a tear across the back of my knuckles about an inch long and quite deep. I’d felt the bones in the joint go crunch, but they weren’t broken. “Stupid horse.”

“You hit him.” My father didn’t shout, but his voice was low and threatening.

“He bit me.” I repeated lamely.

My father drove me to the hospital, and I got five stitches and a clean white bandage. When we got home, my father dragged me by my collar straight to the stables. The tack room was big, but slightly disorganised, musty, smelling of leather and saddle soap and horses and hair. I had never been hit before, but my father kept his word. I’d hit a horse, just once, so with my trousers pushed down past my bum he hit me, just once, with a hide bound riding crop. I was a child. I cried and whimpered, but I was a Yarraman, so I still mucked out all the stables before I went back to the house.

*

I went easy with Hunter. It did not take much to see he’d been badly damaged once upon a time and he hated humans and didn’t trust us. He bit me because I treated him like Davey, and that was the lesson I learnt. No two horses were the same. By late autumn I could walk him on a head collar, lead him close to my side, pet his neck and back. When the first batch of snow came down I could ask him to take the bit and the saddle, nicely, and he would trust me enough to sit on his back. If ever I touched my heels to his flank he would turn and bite at my legs.

I never hit him.

By the time my tenth birthday came around in the early spring, I could ride him seamlessly, and then we started running into problems.

He refused to move forwards, would ignore instructions and ride wherever he wanted. He bucked half the time, kicked the rest. I could still ride him, but he was rude.

“What have I done wrong?” I was standing in the North block stables, arms folded on the stable door and watching Hunter eating his dinner with one foot raised like he had to defend himself from dingo’s trying to steal it. “Everything was great, and now he won’t do anything I ask.”

My grandfather patted my shoulder and smiled. I suppose he wasn’t, but he seemed old to me even then, a brown and wrinkled face with neat greying hair and twinkling eyes.

“Tell me boy, when was the last time you got Hunter to do something he didn’t want to do?” When he saw my blank look, his smile spread further. “Like with gateways. He doesn’t like going through them very much. When was the last time you went on a ride where there was no other choice but to go through a gate?”

“Oh…” The realisation formed on me. I’d been so focused on Hunter’s comfort, and I’d been letting him get away with things for too long.

“You see, to him, he’s the boss. What he says goes.”

“But,” My voice was plaintive, “I don’t wanna hurt him.”

My grandfather loved horses, but unlike my mother, he knew when a boy needed a hug.

“You don’t need to hurt him boy,” He wrapped a strong arm around me, “Just get him turned around to your way of thinking, little by little, and he’ll get there.”

Little by little.

I set up a gateway in the school, and when he wouldn’t ride through it, I got off and walked. Then I went back and lead him through it on foot. Hunter watched the bits of wood panelling like they might jump out and attack him, but he walked. Finally we rode it together.

I took us on rides that would go past gateways, and simply made him stop and look at them. The next time, I’d get off and walk him through, get back on and we’d ride again. One spring day with grass under his hooves Hunter simply rode through the gate without waiting for me to get off first. It was our first success.

Good things don’t last, and the winter before I was eleven, Hunter was sold for a good price, a brilliantly trained horse that would do everything his new rider would want of him.

*

I was old enough and strong enough by then my father started working me with the yearling’s and the two year old who we bought to start up and train before they were sold on. I’d seen him start up many horses, it was one of our jobs after all, and it was good to start being included.

Fresh green horses were interesting to work with, new unbroken two year olds who were alternately panicky and skittish or soft and trusting. Pretty much all of them had nothing but head collar training when we bought them, and it was our job to make them good riding and working horses.

The first little green I worked on was a pretty bay warm blood called Shylar. We were in the school on the only day it hadn’t snowed in ages, my first job of the morning having been to sweep the school and clear the snow. Father walked Shylar around in his head collar for a while and had me do the same. The colt had been with us about a month, and had showed his true colours, a strong and steadfast sort of horse. Trained well, he was going to grow up into a good horse. Father had already had him accept a bit and bridle several times, but today was the day to accept a rider and saddle.

I was young enough and light enough to ride any horse really, and already I knew I was built more like my mother than my father, slim and short for my age, but long in the leg like my grandfather said a Yarraman should be. I walked on Shylar’s other side, chatted to him a little bit, stroked his head and thick neck. When father brought out the saddle, a slim English model, he simply carried it for a while before passing it to me over Shylar’s back. When the horse was calm and soft, I rubbed my hand down his spine before I placed the saddle softly over his withers.

“Nice. Good and gently,” I couldn’t tell if father was talking to the horse or me, “Lovely, now take it off him.”

We spent half an hour putting the saddle on an off Shylar’s back, sometimes walking, sometimes standing in the sand school, until the horses didn’t mind at all about it. Then we did the same with a set of sand bags father had sewn from old sacking, the weight hanging on his back and sides, flapping and moving when he walked. Shylar shook himself down and skittered a little, but he calmed when we spoke to him, stroked him and petted his nose.

“I’m going to walk him up to the mounting block,” Father spoke low whenever he was talking with the green horses, “And you’re going to come up on his other side and take over OK? That’s a boy.”

We did, and eventually I stood next to the horse on the mounting block leaning against his back, letting him move and feel me. By inches, I swung my leg over and settled on his back. Shylar tossed his head a little and shivered all over, but as I gathered up the reins, he settled, standing with his weight square over his hooves.

“What now?” I turned to my father, who was smiling, pleased at our progress, “What next?”

“Use your knees, squeeze him a little and think ‘forward’. It’s unlike anything else.”

I started to squeeze with my knees, keeping the reins slack, asking Shylar to walk. The horse shifted and moved, just a little.

“Remember son, he’s never walked anywhere with a person on him, you need to keep your leg on the entire time.” I pressed Shylar forwards and he walked a little, “You’ll need to show him the gates, how to trot and how to canter.” I eased the horse round in a circle, “He knows nothing. Your job is to teach him.”

And that was what we did. I would ride Shylar twice a day on the weekends and every afternoon after school. In the mornings, Billy would ride him. Billy was my second cousin, another Yarraman, and his father worked with my mother too. Billy was three years older than me, nearly fourteen, but still built light enough to ride the younger horses. He couldn’t ride the youngest yearlings, but dad preferred to train two year olds anyway. I liked him well enough, and he was a good rider.

I rode Shylar for nine months as he grew, filled out and put on muscle and weight. I taught him manners, how to ride in the school, how to take direction. Billy worked with him in the fields, got him jumping, and showed him how to gallop up a hill like it was nothing. Between the two of us we trained the horse into a fine young creature.

It was the end of summer. I was eleven, Billy was fourteen, and I wandered into the stables with Shylar walking beside me. We’d been out in the fields, some good school work and then a wonderful ride around the south pastures where we’d cut the hay and the grass was now growing back in, short and green.

Shylar walked well with his tack hanging off him, the straps and girth already undone and folded over. The stables were pretty empty, most horses out in the paddocks or the big pastures, and I wasn’t really thinking about anything much as I let Shylar into his stall, hung his saddle over the door and took his bridle gently from him. The horse nuzzled me, and set to licking his teeth and lips, and rubbing his face against the posts. I wandered to the brush box, and found a curry comb to give Shylar a post workout rub down.

Then I heard the groans.

I fingered the rubber nubs of the curry comb as I walked, following the sound. There was a panting, like a dog after a run, and another drawn out sort of groan like an animal in pain. I walked towards the end stall, wondering what on earth was going on.

Billy was in the stable, leaning against the back wall. His fingers were in his hair, his shirt was open, showing off his narrow chest, and there was a boy. He was a bit older than Billy with dark hair and I sort of vaguely recognised him from around the yard. He was on his knees in the straw, hands wrapped around Billy’s hips, doing something to his crotch that was making Billy set his teeth in his lips and groan. I felt myself going red. Billy opened his eyes and saw me.

I blushed hard, and ducked out of sight, and ran back to the stable where Shylar waited. His rub down could wait, and I got the head collar on and we walked out to the paddocks.

I shook, thinking of what I’d seen in the stable yard. Shylar turned out into his paddock like nothing was wrong, but there was a tightness running through me I couldn’t explain. I didn’t know what to do, and I didn’t want to go back to the stables, but it wasn’t time to go in yet. I was supposed to make up the dinners for the horses, buckets of pony nuts and oats for the young horses, haylage and alfalfa chaff for the rest. I sat out in the sand school on the mounting block, and picked at my cuticles.

Billy had been… the other guy was… I couldn’t work out what I’d seen, but part of my brain was telling me I should not have seen it. When Billy patted my shoulder, I flinched.

“Hey there bud.”

“H-hi…”

“You want help with feeding?”

Billy was smiling like normal, and he didn’t say anything else. I felt weird, but I got up, and we started putting the dinners together. The dark haired boy smiled as he walked past, and I didn’t look up.

We never spoke about the incident, but I didn’t spend any of my free time with Billy after that.

*

Once father had sold Shylar, there were many horses. There were ponies I started up and rode for a few months, animals half through their training who I became second rider for. I rode a variety of animals, all sizes and temperaments, trained horses, had horses train me. My father was never really one for competition, but I rode several horses at shows once I was old enough, and I built up a good reputation all of my own. Horses came and went, we bought and trained. And then it was winter again, the snow was thick on the ground, and I was turning fourteen.

I was working with a little half thoroughbred called Briar, who was nearly three, and a fine young horse if ever I saw one. He was a chestnut bay with four white socks and a big white blaze down his face. He was already a damn pretty horse, and I knew he would fetch a very good price when he was sold. He had racing horses in his ancestry, and while I didn’t think he’d go on to be a champion, he was going to win someone a lot of money at eventing shows, races and jumping routes. He was a grand horse.

That winter, we had an English boy come to work for us, one of many students who went on a gap year and never went home. Jason was eighteen, four years older than me, and had spent the summer on beaches getting a deep and even tan, his hair going blond until he looked like an East Coast native. We all thought he was mad to stay out with us rather than get a better paying job working the season on the snow slopes. But my father liked him, and he worked hard, did his bit and now that grandfather was getting on, and we had more horses, it was useful to have an extra set of strong hands to do the grunt work.

When dad was sure Jason was worth the while, it became my job to train him.

“So the red bags are the chaff mix, they have to be emptied into the hopper as soon as the delivery comes in. The brown bags are pony nuts, they’re heavier, and they go in the big bins down there.”

“Fuck that’s a lot of feed.” Jason stared at the mountain of sacks sitting in the outside yard where the delivery truck had dropped them off, “We have to haul all of this in?” He looked a little shocked at the thought.

“No, you have to haul it all in,” I took a bag of pony nuts on my shoulder as I spoke to him, “I have to back a two year old pony and then teach you how to skip out so you can do it while I’m at school. After that we’ll see about polishing the tack eh?”

“Whatever you say mate.” Jason’s numerous accent impressions were awful, but he grinned, and got on with the task at hand. He didn’t seem to mind taking orders from a fourteen year old.

I liked Jason, and everyone else did to. He got stuck in, did his job, and never complained. Most days, mother or grandma would invite him up to the house for dinner, as we did for many of the guys who lived on site. I barely remembered a time when it was just the five of us for dinner. One night, we had beef stew and potatoes; dumplings that Jason said reminded him of home, and peas. Grandma served everyone out of the big stock pot in which she did most of her cooking, and we ladled out bowls of steaming warmth and went to find a place to sit. There were never seats enough at the dining table proper, and father was talking business. I liked to be involved. I sat at the bottom of the stairs, and listened in. I was surprised when Jason came to sit with me.

“Push up bud, make a bit of room.” I was still fairly skinny, so I didn’t have to budge up much, but when his thigh settled against mine the room went bright and I sort of forgot what I was doing, “It’s never not mad here, is it?”

“Nope.”

I was conflicted. My chest felt tight, my body was hot, some sickly delicious and shit-scary feeling rising in my crotch and filling my head full of pink fog and the remembered sound of Billy moaning in the stables. But my ears were still listening to my father as the older men talked. Jason’s hand was on my knee, his breath hot in my ear, making my skin crawl and tingle, but I wanted to know what was going on, because my father had mentioned a horse sale with animals from up north. Brand new horses were as exciting as the stirring in my loins.

“You wanna come for a walk with me?”

There didn’t seem to be any more information about the sale, just that it was next week. I finished eating and went with Jason into the chill frosty air.

My skin felt hot where he touched it, and when he kissed me, it was fine, but my brain was already thinking about the sale. Horses from the north meant maybe there would be brumbies, wild horses, several years old and never ridden. It was much more exciting than kissing.

*

That next week, three things happened. My father went to the horse show and bought back a high strung brumby mare that turned out to be pregnant. The foal was born, a pale coated colt with big glassy eyes, and a bright spark to him. I let our English yard hand touch me in the stables because he asked nicely and at the time it seemed like a nice way to spend part of an otherwise empty winter afternoon. I hardly need to tell you which of these acts were the most important.

I wanted the foal from the second I laid eyes on him. He had strong lines, his mother was a good looking animal, and he had a sharp character that I recognised in a horse. With the right training, he could be excellent. He had odd colouring, pale, nearly bluish white, with a deep grey mane and streaked tail. He had a grey blushed muzzle and bright white socks. Happily, my father had decided now I was fourteen, I could have responsibilities of my own, and he gave the colt to me.

I would spend hours sitting in the field with the colt and his mother. Hours. I still had other transient horses to ride, but I would come home from school and sit silent and still in the field, letting the wild mother and her son become used to me. They would stay away, watching me warily, nostrils flared, but eventually, over many weeks and with the scent of apples and molasses in my clothes, they would nibble the grass close by my knees as I sat. I did not ever reach out to touch them.

Jason became bored with me. After a couple of false starts, some touching and kissing, one rather half-hearted attempt on my part to recreate the scene I had walked in on with Billy and his friend three years previously and the arrival of the spring, Jason decided it was time to move on. In truth, I hadn’t much cared. Sex was weird, desire for a guy was stranger still, and nothing he could tell me was nearly as interesting as watching the horses in their field, having the little colt getting closer and closer by the day until he napped and nuzzled at my hair, unsure if I was some kind of stationary plant. I did not notice much when he left.

*

I was sixteen, it was spring, and it was time to teach the pale brumby how to accept me as a rider.

Over two years, we’d grown used to each other, him and I, and when it became clear his lovely colouring was not going to change, I had decided to call him Flasche. To me, he was the most beautiful animal ever lived. Already he trusted me enough to come and stand by my side, would rub himself against me and allow me to rub his head and face, touch all of his legs and hooves. His mother had grown more trusting too, and now father and I both entered the field with soft head collars, ready to separate two horses who had known no other company for years.

“Go gently,” My father said, though he may as well not have spoken at all, “He might be a little better, but she may panic.”

Flasche trotted up to me, a big horse now at two years old, well filled out and fifteen hands which would grow into more. He had thoroughbred somewhere in his lineage, though what had given him his strange colouring I would never guess. I stroked his head, and he snorted softly as I stroked his nose and place the head collar over his ears and across his forehead. He tossed his head a little, but he stood patiently and allowed the leather straps and my hands to rub over him. They’d both been lead in and out before, but never separately. I got the head collar done up without any other worries, and looked up from the lead rope to find my father had done the same.

“You first.” He nodded to me, “I’ll keep her here, and grandfather will shut the gate after you. Don’t let him get back OK?”

“Yes pa.” I clicked my tongue gently, “C’mon Flasche me mate, on we go.” The young horse walked with me, trusting me to lead him out, but I kept a gentle hand on the rope and didn’t tug.

He was a high spirited horse for sure, because when he found himself leaving his mother behind and she whinnied in alarm he rounded, tried to pull back, and reared with his front hooves scraping the air above the level of my head. I took a step back, stayed still, and when Flasche had finished his first lot of panic, I half walked and half tugged him away, nice and gently. His mother brayed and whinnied, but I petted his nose, and though he danced about, feet high in the air as he walked, he came with me towards the stables.

“You did well out there today my boy.” Grandfather folded his arms on the side of the loose box, “He’s a fine looking beast that one.”

“Isn’t he just?” I patted Flasche’s neck and the horse turned to look at me, nosing my pockets for the wafting scents of oats and hay, “We’ll start training tomorrow. He’s had a big day.”

“Fair enough,” Grandfather handed me a wedge of hay from the bale in the manger and I fed Flasche handfuls from it. He was calmer each moment, the first minutes he had ever spent away from his mother, and I felt his pulse slow as he ate, chewing contentedly at my elbow. My grandfather was looking at me, head on one side. “You’re a poofter, aren’t you boy?”

I blinked, and Flasche took that moment to put his soft muzzle against my chest and exhale softly. I had no idea what to say to him, none at all.

“You and the English boy we had a few years back…” The old man’s voice drifted off, and I still didn’t know what to say. I nodded tightly.

He nodded back, and that was the last thing he ever said on the matter.

*

Flasche was my horse, officially and one hundred percent my property after the day my father dug out his registration papers and signed him over to me. I paid for his feed and his tack. No one else rode him. If it was a school day, I rode once before school and for at least an hour after. At weekends, I might ride three times, or go out for hours at a time. The pale brumby built up stamina and speed as he grew.

He came when he was called, a short sharp whistle followed by a longer one at high pitch. Once he was used to the idea of tack, he would stand patiently and allow himself to be dressed as fast as my fingers would do the buckles. We would spend hours together in the field, lying under the sun, rolling in the new grass. And everything I taught him, I found him echoing back to me.

It was a hard year on the ranch and a tidal wave of emotions at school. But as Flasche grew stronger, I grew stronger. As he learnt patience, so did I. The horse became resilient as I taught him to cross water, to not shy at flapping bits of plastic and sacking caught in trees and shrubs. My father had been training the new farmer hands, and I was a mixture of kind and firm with them, like I was with Flasche. Coming in one night I heard my grandfather remark to my mother I was wise beyond my years.

By the year of his third summer, Flasche would do anything. He would jump anything, gallop for half a mile and still want more. He had strong solid hooves, short canon bones, and a fine thick neck. He was everything a horse could ever be, a perfect stallion. I would stand in the stable and talking to him of my days without him, the hours we spent apart, and his dark liquid eyes would shine and glow. He knew everything. We rode together all the time. I could whistle to him from across the big forty acre field and he’d come running. He was the horse I’d spent my whole life working for.

And then, there was a boy.

*

Jack was everything a guy could want. He was tall against my narrow built frame, broad shouldered and muscled. He played every sport out there, loved to surf and snowboard and he has the muscles to prove it. I was seventeen, he was eighteen, and he was beautiful. His parents transferred him for the final year of school to be closer to the mountains and the snow. That was what Jack wanted to do when he graduated, and he was good enough too: a total show off on the piste and off it, a guy who ploughed the snow and tore down the slopes with a cheeky grin for the camera. Our school put his photos up in the sports department, and everyone was in love with him.

But Jack wanted me.

It was the usual tussle, the two of us sizing each other up around our friends, glances in the hallways that became long lingering looks, casual touches and the brushing of shoulders and arms that evolved into more. We never really spoke about it; I just remember him coming up to me in the locker rooms one day with a smile on his face and knowing look in his eye.

“I’m Jack.”

“I know.” I smiled back: he was wearing nothing but a towel.

“I was thinking I should kiss you about now.”

I reached up and put a hand on his sculpted chest.

“I like your plan.”

We became, if only unofficially, boyfriends. We hung out at school, kissed lots. He came out to the ranch and we did a few things in the empty stalls and the hay barn. Jack knew what he was doing with his body. Jason hadn’t tried to give any direction when I’d knelt in the hay in front of him, but Jack was vocal with what he wanted, and didn’t mind giving me a combination of instructions and insistent demands with his hands wrapped around the back of my head. Afterwards he pinned me in the hay and wrapped his big hand around my dick until I screamed in pleasure and bit his shoulder hard enough to break the skin.

It was good.

“You are not fucking bailing on me again?” Jack stared at me in the school parking lot.

I had my uncle’s ancient truck as a run around now I had a learner’s license and I was incredible happy not to have to wait for the bus each day. It meant more freedom and more riding time. I could not think of a better place to be than with Flasche. Every moment of the school day, my heart called to the big horse, and I couldn’t wait in a year to graduate and work with him full time. On the other hand, my boyfriend did not look happy.

“I told you I had to ride.”

“And I told you, you get to ride every god-damn day. This is a big match for me.” He growled in frustration. Dammit babe! I need you there.”

I rolled my eyes. Jack didn’t need me, I was just interesting.

“You’ll be fine, you’re great at rugby.” Jack was great at all sports. I rubbed his bicep in a rather suggestive manner, “I’ll be there afterwards babe. But you know I can’t come watch you for the whole thing. Flasche needs me, I have responsibilities.”

“You promise you’ll come to the next game?”

I sighed, knowing I was going to lie to him.

“Sure thing Jack.”

*

The next game came, and even though Jack had reminded me, and I had every intention of finishing up early feeding the horses and going to see him play. I forgot. It was easy to forget with more than half a ton of warm, strong horse between your thighs. Flasche was nearly four, strong, steadfast, and would do anything for me.

We raced along the open sided field next to the road, chasing after cars that slowed down to stare at us. At the end of the field was a three foot fence line and I gripped with my knees, Flasche gathered himself up and we sailed right over the top. It was a glorious feeling. We rode for hours that evening until it was drawing dark and I fed my fantastic horse in his stall, brushing him down, as his muscles steamed with the exertion. He had grown well into his features, taller now, with broad stronger shoulders and a fine bones face. He was beautiful. Next year perhaps he would sire a few foals, and there might be some racing and eventing champions out of his stock. I was proud to be the one who owned him.

It wasn’t until I saw Jack’s car drawing up in the drive, Flasche on his rope head collar beside me, I even realised what day it was and what I had missed.

“You bastard!”

“Shit…” I stood with Flasche by my side, the big brumby snorting on my shoulder with his warm breath, “I’m sorry Jack.” I felt, not guilty, but sort of angry. All missing the game meant was Jack would be pissed with me and there probably wouldn’t be any fun blowjobs in the stables later.

“You’re fucking sorry?” Jack shouted as he moved towards me, abandoning the car in the drive, “You’re sorry? I wait for you for an hour before the game, and like forty minutes afterwards and I find you here, with him!” He pointed at Flasche with a snarl, flinging his arm up. Flasche was better trained than to rear or fling his head, but he snorted and stamped his feet in alarm and annoyance.

I glared at Jack.

“I was riding my horse. I missed a bloody sport’s match, what’s the big deal?”

“To me it is a big deal!” Jack looked equal parts furious and upset, “I can’t believe you’d ditch me for a horse.”

“Flasche is not just any horse.” The big pale brumby snorted and laid his head against my shoulder, “I love him.”

“You love him more than me.” Jack folded his arms and huffed, obviously expecting some sort of quick denial to this statement. I stared at him.

“Well of course I love him more than you.” I clicked softly with my tongue to Flasche and walked past him towards the little paddock. Jack didn’t follow me, but I saw him as I unhitched the gate, leaning against his car looking uncharacteristically contemplative.

Flasche snorted and nuzzled me, and I rubbed his thick neck and shoulders before feeding him a handful of molasses and oats. He’d been such a good boy. Not for the first time I wondered why I’d never ended up sleeping in the fields with him. More than a handful of times over the winter I ended up kipping in the hayloft above his stall, dozing in the morning next to the huge warm body of the horse.

He watched me as I walked back towards the stables, halter in hand. I was surprised Jack was still standing there.

“You don’t care do you?” Jack sighed, arms still over his chest. I didn’t reach out to touch him.

“I care,” I shrugged, “it’s fun, but it’s not serious.”

“I want more of you.” Jack looked upset, maybe on the verge of tears. I blinked. Somehow during our months of kissing and touching, he’d discovered apart from wanting me, he cared about me too. Even loved me maybe. “I want to be with you, but you’re so unavailable.”

“I’m not cheating on you. I’m here.”

“You’re always here babe. But even with me, you’re never thinking of me. You love Flasche. You love the damn horse.”

I growled.

“Don’t call him that.”

He sighed, and put his hand on the open door of his car.

“Me or the horse.”

I didn’t even bother to answer him. I just turned away to the stables to finish cleaning up. I was surprised when Jack followed me. Caught me in the stable and kissed the back of my neck. I turned in his arms, and our hands were in each other’s clothes, even though we both knew it was over. We brought each other off in unison, and Jack might have cried, but I ignored it.

I went to bed tired and dirty, and didn’t care much at all.

*

I dreamt of Flasche, of the heat and muscle of the horse under me as we flew together through the air, the hardness of my thighs gripping him as we rode. I often dreamt of him, but that night it was so clear, so removed from the usual fogginess and confusion of dreams. I could feel his heartbeat, the thud and thunder of his hooves.

I was not surprised to wake up in his stable.

After that, I never had to put a head collar on him. I would whistle and he would come. I left the gate open in his paddock and found him walking at my shoulder. He consumed my world.

*

On my eighteen birthday, I packed a saddle bag and a knapsack, took oats and pony nuts and a quantity of dried and canned food, but no tin opener, a blanket and a tarp, and together Flasche and I rode out into the world.

I loved my horse, he loved me, and there was no need for anything else to get in the way of that.

We never came back.