Riding Star

Georgie knew what she meant. An eventing rider lived for the thrill of galloping across country, tackling any obstacle that presented itself. After the wild, reckless excitement of Tara’s class, she was well aware that Bettina Schmidt’s dressage lessons would be rather… sedate. Even so, she had to stay positive.

“Bettina is a great dressage teacher,” she told the others. “It’s going to be cool.”

*

“For our lesson today,” Bettina Schmidt said, “we will be spending the entire hour and a half at the walk to focus on our lower leg position.”

“Strangle me with a martingale and put me out of my misery,” Georgie groaned. Beneath her, Belladonna shifted about restlessly. The bay mare had just spent the past two weeks being spelled for the school holidays and this was their first ride together. What Belle really needed was a decent canter to blow out the cobwebs. Instead, they were going to spend their whole lesson at the walk!

Georgie joined the back of the ride and resigned herself to her fate, but Belle wasn’t so biddable. As the other dressage horses began to circle the arena, walking politely on the bit, their necks arched and their strides neat and regular, Belle began skipping about with frustration.

Despite Georgie’s best efforts to calm her, the mare kept racing past the others and spent the first half of the lesson in a constant jiggly-jog.

When she finally got the mare to walk on and could concentrate on what Bettina was saying, Georgie realised that she didn’t actually understand most of Bettina’s instructions anyway.

“Ride from the hindquarters!” Bettina kept telling her. “Now try to feel each stride. Volte! Stay off the forehand!”

For all Georgie knew a volte might be a handstand! As it turned out, it was just a little circle. They spent the lesson doing endless little circles at the walk, and then bigger ones, also at the walk.

It was all so precise, so detailed and so… very, very boring.

“That was a brilliant lesson!” Isabel Weiss’s eyes were bright with enthusiasm as they led the horses back to the stables after class. “I really noticed how deep my seat was by the end of the session, didn’t you, Georgie?”

“Uh-huh,” Georgie agreed, stifling a yawn. “Do you want to come back to Stars of Pau with us after we unsaddle?” Mitty offered. “We’ve got a DVD that shows you how to do a piaffe in ten easy steps. We were going to watch it before dinner.”

“Umm, maybe some other time,” Georgie said. “I’ll catch you guys later, OK?”

It was a relief to be alone again in the loose box with Belle. As Georgie unsaddled the mare she was surprised to see that she wasn’t even sweating under her numnah. Mind you, Georgie thought, why would Belle break a sweat when she had only been dawdling around for the past hour and a half?

Georgie looked at her watch. It was quarter to five. It would be dark by five-thirty; she should really be untacking and heading back to the house. But she felt as if she hadn’t really had a proper ride.

“Come on, Belle,” she murmured to the mare, flinging the saddle over her back again and tightening the girth once more. “Let’s go – just you and me.”

*

Snow had begun falling as Georgie set out along the bridle path at the back of the stables. She watched the white flakes floating down from the sky, landing on Belle’s jet-black mane. Georgie usually kept it neatly pulled so that it was short and tidy for plaiting, but over the holidays it had grown lustrous and long. Belle’s hunter clip was growing out too. It had been almost a term since Georgie clipped her in grooming class.

Georgie’s own hair was braided in two thick, blonde plaits and as she put on her helmet to leave the stables she came up with the genius idea of twisting her plaits and shoving the ends through the ear-hole sections at the sides of her helmet so her hair would cover and protect her ears from the cold. It looked a bit weird with her plaits poking out from her helmet at odd angles, but Georgie figured that no one was going to see her.

She rode past the snug indoor arena where they had spent their dressage lesson. It felt good to be outdoors, to feel the icy bite of the winter chill against her bare cheeks.

As soon as they were clear of the stables and had passed through the gateway where the bridle path led to the open fields, Georgie urged Belle into a trot. The mare had lovely, floaty paces and she lifted up beneath Georgie like a hovercraft, arching her neck and taking the reins forward. She snorted and pulled, keen to canter.

“Steady, girl,” Georgie cautioned the mare. The track was twisty and turny, and the ice had made the surface slippery – not ideal for canter work. Georgie decided to turn off the track, riding the mare across the open pasture towards an uphill stretch that led to the woods. As soon as they reached the hill Georgie tipped up into two-point position, put her legs on and Belle responded eagerly, her legs working like dark pistons making holes in the white snow.

Belle knew the terrain here well and, even though it was covered in snow, Georgie trusted the mare to be sure-footed as they cantered on. It felt so good to have some fun instead of walking around getting in touch with your seatbones!

As they crested the top of the hill, Georgie pulled Belle back to a trot as she saw the rider up ahead of her. At a distance all that Georgie could make out was the colour of the horse – a chestnut – and the rider’s jersey – ice blue, the colour of Burghley House. Knowing her luck it would be Conrad Miller, and he would find some pathetic school rule about not being allowed out in the snow and give her Fatigues.

She had just decided to turn round and give them a wide berth, when the rider on the chestnut horse waved to her.

Georgie steadied Belle and peered at the horizon. The rider on the chestnut waved once more and then urged his horse on into a canter, coming up the hill from the other side towards her. Georgie watched the way he rode, completely fearless, relying on his perfect balance to control the horse, with reins held so long they were almost at the buckle. And then she realised that she knew him.

It was James Kirkwood.

James cantered right up to her and pulled his horse to a halt. “Hi, Parker. Have a good holiday?”

Suddenly face to face with him, Georgie’s first thought was her hair. The hair earmuff trick had worked – her ears were nice and toasty. But she knew that she must look ridiculous, like some sort of demented Pippi Longstocking. And here she was for the first time with the boy who had dumped her last term.

“My holidays?” Georgie said, self-consciously trying to flatten her sticky-outy plaits. “OK, I guess.”

James grinned. “Don’t give me too much detail, will you? We might end up having a conversation.”

Georgie wanted more than anything to pull her helmet off and fix the plaits, but she was certain she would have helmet-hair underneath. Luckily James didn’t seem to have noticed the weird hairdo.

“I went back home to Little Brampton,” she said. “Dad cooked a massive Christmas dinner and everyone came over. Apart from that I was at Lucinda’s helping out at the stables. How about you?”

“The usual Kirkwood family Christmas,” James groaned. “The stepmom spent the whole time planning cocktail parties for people that she doesn’t even like. Dad disappeared with the hounds every day and Kennedy and I managed to stay in different wings of the house most of the time so we could avoid speaking to each other.”

“Sounds like fun,” Georgie said dryly.

“Belvedere misses you,” James added, referring to the big brown hunter that Georgie had ridden when she had stayed at the Kirkwood mansion. “I took him for a hack to cheer him up and we went down to the edge of the woods – you know, where we went that day?”

He gave Georgie that cute lopsided grin of his. She knew the woods that James meant. They had been out hunting and they had somehow ended up there alone. That was when he kissed her. Georgie felt herself blush. Was James flirting with her again?

“So anyway,” James tried to sound casual, “are you still seeing that guy? The one you were with at the School Formal? What’s his name again?”

“Riley,” Georgie said. She wasn’t about to tell James that she hadn’t spoken to Riley since the Formal, or that she wasn’t even sure if she was still dating him.

“He doesn’t go to Blainford, does he?” James asked.

“No,” Georgie said, “he’s at Pleasant Hill High School.”

“So this Riley,” James said. “How did you meet him if he doesn’t go to school here?”

“He’s Kenny’s nephew,” Georgie said. “He was helping me to school Belle.”

“So, he’s some kind of horse whisperer?” James sneered.

“No,” Georgie said, “He rides trackwork. Racehorses.”

“Does he have his own stables?”

“You’re asking a lot of questions about him,” Georgie frowned. “You’re acting like my dad.”

“Am I?” James said, a fraction too quickly. “I’m just wondering what you see in him, that’s all. A guy like that…”

“Like what?” Georgie said.