Secondhand Horses Read online

  “I bet you did close the door,” Esther said. “They must have found another way out.”

  Esther was a good friend.

  Right after Esther finished speaking, the back of Sunny’s neck began to prickle like it did when she knew her brothers were sneaking around to jump out and scare her. Sunny didn’t scare easily, but not seeing the danger and just feeling the danger was, well, creepy. Looking around on full alert, she slowed to careful steps so her flip-flops wouldn’t crunch the gravel. Neck still prickling here.

  Esther walked so close she might as well have been in Sunny’s pocket. In a low mutter, she said, “Do you feel like someone is watching us?”

  “Yes.” Sunny mumbled the word out of the corner of her mouth. “Maybe it’s because it’s so dark?”

  Arriving at the barn door, Sunny’s heart sank.

  The barn door was open.

  Not a lot, but definitely not closed with the long bolt shot down through the two iron rings.

  Ughness.

  And worse, the tingly feeling intensified.

  “Is—is—anybody there?” Esther tried to sound tough and loud.

  Sunny thumped her on the arm. “You don’t say that!” Her voice rasped with fear. “What if somebody is there?”

  Esther hunched her shoulder to the ear where Sunny’s whisper had been more like a shriek. “Ow. Okay.” She looked around, too. “I don’t see anyone.” She shivered. “I—I just feel like we’re being watched.”

  Sunny blew out a bubbling breath of relief and hysteria. “We are.”

  Esther gasped. “Where?”

  Sunny pointed back from where they’d come. In a straggly line the zoo stood silhouetted against the dark of the meadow. “But you know, I know I closed the door. Tight. I told Which Way I was closing the door. He saw me. I mean, I forgot the list and pen, but I did finish closing up the barn.”

  Esther turned in a slow circle, eyes squinting, checking the outbuildings and the field that extended beyond the back corral. She surveyed the driveway in front of the house. “Bob’s almost finished the oval,” she observed. “I don’t see anybody.”

  Sunny ducked into the barn thinking about the zoo. Piggles excelled at digging gardens. Bob mowed weeds. What about Which Way and the mini? What about me now that I don’t have Great Ideas? She must keep trying. She had one Squader left to imitate. It would involve being bossy and getting people to finish things.

  The list was right where she thought it would be. As she walked out, Piggles, Bob, Which Way, and the mini—what was that horse’s name?—walked into the barn as though someone were leading them with invisible leashes.

  “So do you think we were imagining things?” Esther asked as the two girls walked quietly back to the window.

  Sunny’s neck had ceased to prickle. “Yeah.” Once Esther had tumbled herself into the bedroom, Sunny placed both hands on the sill, bounced, and tipped over the edge. She wriggled a bit more and fell onto the floor with a clunk.

  “Shhh! You’ll wake your uncle!” Esther helped her up. “You still have the list?”

  Yes, Esther was good at being bossy. Pulling it from her pocket, Sunny laid it on the dresser. “Trying to be Vee didn’t work. I forget the stuff to be organized.” She flopped on her bed. “Now I’m really sleepy. Good night, Esther.” Already her eyes felt like bags of sand pressed them down. The sheets were cool and smooth. Her voice began to drag. “Tomorrow I’ll be bossy. Maybe that’s me.”

  No response from the other girl, although Sunny heard her lie down on the mattress.

  She murmured to Esther. “You did see me close the door the second time, right?”

  Esther huffed and flopped over so her back was to Sunny.

  What’s the matter with her?

  Chapter 14

  Why Is Esther Mad?

  The next morning when the alarm sounded, Esther rolled off the mattress, dressed quickly, and flounced out of the room without a word. She didn’t look at Sunny either.

  Why isn’t Esther talking? Sunny was moving a bit slower after their late night. Mom called this “stupid thirty” in the morning. Why did animals have to eat breakfast so early? Sunny yawned, leaning over to tie still-wet sneakers. Today she would make a stupendous breakfast for her uncle. He hadn’t been eating much. Maybe today he wouldn’t have to take pain pills so she could finally tell him about the temporary zoo in the tractor shed. Once he knew, and knew they would look for homes, they could begin.

  Rather than make her happy, the thought saddened her. Having the mini follow her around and wuffle in her ear was pretty great. She was sure, however—as sure as she had burned yesterday’s dinner—that her parents would never go for a mini horse in their backyard.

  Still yawning, she stood up, thinking about what she had to finish today. She and Esther would hustle through the chores and attack their schoolwork. That had been one of the rules when Esther’s mom had said she could stay with Sunny rather than attend her school’s service project day. “School has to be done,” she’d said.

  “Oh yes,” Mom had agreed, shooting Sunny a look. “Sunny’s going to be diligent to get hers finished as well.”

  Once school got out, Vee and Aneta would join them for the whole weekend. One of them would figure out why Esther was ignoring Sunny. She stepped to the window. Esther stood on the ground outside, an odd look on her face.

  “Sunny.”

  Good. Esther wasn’t mad anymore. Whatever she had been mad about, Sunny had no idea. They’d climbed out a window, freaked each other out with thinking someone was watching them, closed the barn door, and gone to bed. Where could Esther have gotten mad?

  “You’re talking to me now?” she teased, grabbing a sweatshirt from the floor and pulling it over her head.

  Esther placed her hands on her hips. “I’m only talking to you this once to let you know there’s a horse out there.”

  Sunny chuckled. “There’s three. Shirley, Mondo, and the mini. Two and a half if you count that the mini is a mini.”

  The hands turned to fists. “I know there were three horses. Now there are four.”

  Sunny sat on the sill and swung her legs out. “Maybe you just counted wrong ‘cause you’re not used to seeing horses.” She landed on the ground and wiped her hands on the back of her capris.

  “I just remembered I’m not talking to you,” Esther said, zooming past her along the side of the house. “And I know how to count.”

  Sunny came around the corner, breathing a sigh of relief that the barn door remained closed. Then she noted movement in the first corral. A brown horse with a black mane and tail was chasing around the biggest soccer ball Sunny had ever seen.

  Chapter 15

  Sunny Gets It Wrong

  Whoa,” Sunny said. She and Esther stood together. Esther still had her hands on her hips. “How did you get here?” she asked the horse. The animal noticed them and came up to the rail, stuck his neck over, and sniffed their hands. Black lashes longer than the mini’s framed the brown eyes, and a well-combed forelock partially covered a jagged white blaze down the long nose. Its tail was also well brushed.

  Sunny took a step nearer. The horse nickered. She reached out to get a velvet nose and prickly whiskers in her hand. She hunched her shoulders. “I don’t think he’s mean. I wonder how he got lost?”

  “You can’t get lost and put yourself in a corral if you’re a horse, Sunny.” Yep, Esther was still mad about whatever.

  Keeping a careful distance from the watchful horse, Sunny bent and peered through the rails. “Esther! Check out that giant ball!”

  “Did you bring your own toy?” Esther directed her question to the brown horse while Sunny opened the barn door to release Shirley and Mondo into their adjoining corral. They exchanged nose bumps with the mysterious horse over the dividing rails.

  “I know Uncle Dave wouldn’t put a strange horse in with his secondhand horses right away,” Sunny said. “So we won’t.”

  The brown horse walked to the hayr
ack in the corner and nosed it. Now Sunny noticed the ribs on the dull brown hide. “He’s hungry!”

  “I’ll get some hay, Mr. Horse.” Esther backed away from where she’d been leaning her elbows on the railing and dashed into the barn. She reappeared a few moments later, arms full of hay. “I couldn’t carry a whole bale.”

  “I can’t either. They weigh eighty pounds.”

  “I’m not talking to you. I’m talking to the horse.”

  Sunny felt like she’d been hit with a test on a subject she’d never studied. What was Esther’s deal?

  “Well, Uncle Dave’s gonna have a surprise when he wakes up.” Sunny twirled a piece of her hair. “And this time it’s not my fault.” She looked at Esther. “And why aren’t you talking to me?”

  Esther faced Sunny. “You called me bossy. That’s not very nice.”

  “I didn’t call you bossy.” Sunny twisted her mouth as she mentally scurried through the previous evening. When had she said Esther was bossy?

  “You just about did. You said that being Vee didn’t work because you left the list in the barn. You said you were going to try to be like me and be bossy. Right before you went to sleep.”

  Color and heat poured into Sunny’s face. Oh. That comment. “I—I just meant that you finish things and tell people what to do and they—do it. Except maybe for Vee when she wants to be the one to tell people to do stuff …” Her voice trailed off. Esther’s face had transformed from an angry flush to madly blinking. Had she made her friend cry?

  “Esther! I’m sorry. I’m so sorry!” She stepped forward and threw her arms around her friend. Esther burst into tears. “I’m so mean. I didn’t mean it in a bad way. Oh, the ughness of it all!”

  Peering at her through her tears, Esther sucked in a shuddery breath. “Oh, Sunny! You and your sayings.”

  Sunny squeezed her friend tightly and released her. “Yeah, it’s like the opposite of yayness, I guess. It’s been a lot of ughness around here with me and my Great Ideas.” She repeated her apology, and Esther accepted.

  “Now, let’s go make breakfast for your uncle and let him know he has another secondhand horse. Let’s hope he hasn’t taken any medicine lately.”

  The two girls linked arms and began an awkward skip back to the house, hee-heeing as they lurched into one another. “I don’t think he’ll mind. Shirley and Mondo are secondhand horses, and Uncle Dave said he was building his horse ranch. Now he’s got four—well, three and a half—secondhand horses. He’ll have to get a sign that says SECONDHAND RANCH.”

  Esther chuckled over the reference to the mini. “Wait till we tell Vee and Aneta about the creepy feeling last night and the door being open and the zoo outside the window and now this mysterious horse.…” She sighed. “I so love being a Squader.”

  The girls together put their shoulders to the front door and fell into the kitchen.

  Over a breakfast of scrambled eggs only slightly brown, bacon that was just perfect, and toast with chunks of butter because Sunny had forgotten to leave it out the night before, the two girls explained how the Squad had purchased the zoo. They also learned that no, Uncle Dave had not taken any pain medicine yet and yes, he had quite a different idea for his horse ranch. One that did not include a zoo or additional secondhand horses.

  “You bought a zoo? Someone abandoned a horse here? I’m calling the sheriff.” He reached for the phone and groaned. “Dagnabbit, any time I move, this stupid ankle hurts. Sunny, hand me the phone, will you?”

  “Why would someone do that, Mr. Martin?” Esther asked.

  He shrugged, letting the phone fall into his lap. “Lots of reasons. Maybe they’re moving and can’t take the horse. Mostly it’s because people have run out of money. Sometimes it’s a choice between paying the mortgage or taking care of the horse.” He glanced at Esther’s indignant face. “They’re not bad people, Esther. Sometimes they get overwhelmed. Taking care of a horse is a big responsibility in terms of time and money.”

  Sunny shifted in her chair. This conversation was not going exactly the way she would’ve liked. “Uncle Dave, I’m sorry I couldn’t tell you about the zoo sooner. Mom said to wait until you were off the pain meds. And I’m sorry about your ankle. And so sorry I didn’t clean the outbuilding.” Which I still haven’t. Sunneeee! “I thought since you had secondhand horses and were talking to someone on the phone about a mare, you were getting more secondhand horses.”

  “On the phone?” Uncle Dave’s brow cleared. “That was a breeder. I’m going to start a sport pony ranch. Very high-end. No more secondhand horses for me.”

  Sunny gulped. She’d been wrong all the way around. Her Great Idea of buying the zoo had been a Great Mistake. So had her Great Idea that her uncle would be okay with owning a zoo. “Okay.” Her voice trembled, but she tried to steady it. “The Squad will find homes for all of them. Or”—she brightened—“we’ll find a way to have the zoo make money to help take care—”

  Her uncle rubbed his face. “No, Sunny.” His voice sounded as tired as his face looked. “Finding homes for the zoo, yes. Trying to find a way to make money with the zoo? No way. That’s one of your great ideas I have no interest in.” Opening the pill bottle on the table next to him, he took one out, grimaced, and put it back. “A miniature horse? Now that’s a minor horse. What good is a miniature horse? You can’t ride it. It can’t pull a plow.” He sighed. “Now it’s time for me to take a rest.”

  A few minutes later, as Esther and Sunny stood in the kitchen, breakfast dishes in the sink, boxes still crowding the room, Sunny heard Uncle Dave’s slow, deep breathing on the couch. Esther was chewing her lip and avoiding looking at Sunny.

  Sunny heaved a sigh that filled her lungs and left her dizzy on the exhale. “For pizza sake, me and my Great Ideas. Uncle Dave wants to breed horses, not rescue ones that are already alive.” Deep inside, somehow, she was disappointed in Uncle Dave.

  Esther slid an arm around her friend’s shoulders and squeezed. “Okay, so we can’t make up stuff to have the zoo earn money. We’ve adopted out dogs and cats. We’ll let people know what the zoo is good at. In fact,” she said, her serious face beginning to relax, “we already know Piggles is good at gardens. Bob is good at mowing.” She started toward the sink. “Now we need to find out what the goose and the mini are good at.”

  Staring off into space, Sunny nodded. “Yeah.” She kind of felt like the zoo. What good was she? She knew from years of Sunday school that God loved everyone. That He didn’t make mistakes creating people; however, she wasn’t quite sure He hadn’t dozed off when He was finishing her brain. After all, He had done an awful lot of creating.

  Uncle Dave thought she couldn’t finish anything and that her Great Ideas weren’t. What good was a mini horse? She gritted her back teeth and made herself spin. She would make the zoo adoptions the best thing. She would show him the “minor” mini could do something major. She’d remember to take out the butter the night before, for pizza sake. For the zoo, she had to come up with an idea. Not a Great Idea. No more Great Ideas. Simply an idea she could finish. The sooner she practiced being Esther, the better.

  The girls cleaned up the kitchen and settled in with their schoolwork. Esther sat on the front porch and did her math while Sunny attended one of her online history classes. Medieval times. Not her favorite. They took the rest of the schoolwork out to the corral and read their assignments to the horses. The zoo insisted on attending, all-attentive with wuffles, bleats, honks, and grunts. Esther said they ought to allow animals in schools to make schoolwork more fun. Sunny agreed.

  With the final work checked off and a video chat to Sunny’s mom to let her know, the two headed out to play with the zoo. Only the mini was interested. Bob wanted to finish chomping on the oval. Which Way was lying next to Piggles, who was in his favorite shady, dusty place. They politely asked the mystery horse they’d named Mystery—of course—if they could borrow the ball, then took the ball and the mini to the back corral that had nearly dried out fro
m the mud party. Piggles and Which Way followed then headed toward the remaining mud.

  When the mini stood shoulder to ball, the ball was taller.

  “Are you sure you can do this? You’re awfully small,” Sunny said. Would this be one more thing a mini couldn’t do that a “real” horse could?

  He flickered an eye as if to say, “Watch me!” First he looked at it. Then he nosed it, crow hopping backward as it rolled. Sunny laughed until tears leaked out of her eyes. In the next moments, as he grew braver, he dashed straight at it until the girls gasped for fear he would roll right up and down the other side. At the last moment, he swerved and gave it a kick with a back leg on the way by.

  Which Way waddled out of the mud to see what was happening. He missed death on numerous occasions by flying into the corral during the mini’s mad charge. This went on long enough that Sunny forgot everything else. The mini was fun.

  Finally, Sunny remembered the tractor shed.

  “C’mon, Esther,” she said. They left the mini intent on his game.

  Standing in the shed doorway, they peered into the gloom, stripes of light beaming in from the long, jagged gaps in the shrunken wooden roof.

  “This place is truly creepy,” Esther said, making no move to go farther. “No wonder we felt like someone was watching us.”

  “And dangerous,” Sunny reminded her. “Watch where you step. Let me prop both doors open.” The rest of the Squad would be there shortly. Time to practice telling the girls the way to clean out the shed. Maybe she was a bossy type. It sure worked for Esther. Knocking over a rusty oilcan as she ventured farther in, she bent down to inspect it. She pulled the trigger. Amber oil squirted out.

  “Huh.” The barn doors could use a bit of this.

  At the barn, she eyed the hinges. Where to shoot it? Squirt. Whoa. That was a lot.

  “You’re supposed to oil the hinges, not drown them,” Esther said from behind her, critically regarding the operation.

  Tires crunched, and Esther squealed. “It’s Vee and Aneta!”