IF HORSES COULD WRITE DIARIES

MinoriXKlaus, but it's also kind of just about a horse. I can't wait till my future kids ask my biggest accomplishment and I can tell them "well you see, one time I wrote a lame farming-simulation-game fanfiction from the perspective of a sassy horse." What can I say? I'm just…horsing around.

Expect updates frequently; I'm almost done writing it.

(Part 1/9)

Elise is a mess.

Her endless stream of servants (or should I say adoring fans?) think she's got it all together, but the truth is she can't handle anything on her own. She can't figure out how to wash the dirt stains out of her clothes, let alone how to tame a wild horse.

The first week she spent a couple of early mornings in the stables trying to get the other horses to at least recognize her. A few of the soft ones, like Lenny, who can't resist a human with big eyes, took to her real fast.

Bessie feels bad for her — she says Elise is lonely, and we should do our best to make her feel relaxed around us. How Elise could be lonely is beyond me, though, since she has all these goofy servants walking around.

Speaking of which, someone new tried to milk Bessie before she had her fill of fodder for the morning and Bessie kicked the girl in the shin. So much for being welcoming.

Anyway, I'm the prettiest horse in the stable. Elise knows that, and she wanted to try flaunting it off to the rest of the town. So, a couple of days ago, she took me out on a ride with Rick, the stall-keeper, around the farm. It didn't last long. I might've let her pretend to be a real princess a little longer if she hadn't insisted on wearing such awful shoes. I mean, I'm a big horse, I'm pretty resilient, but she was wearing these little white shoes with massive (and pokey!) heels, so I wasn't about to just subject myself to such nuisances.

All it took was one poke from those dainty shoes and I reared back far enough that she fell off — straight into a pile of cow dung. That last part was unintentional, I swear (after all, I may be strong-spirited but I'm not a completely awful equestrian being), though I'll admit it was quite amusing seeing her have to wipe Bessie's late-night fodder binge from under her eyes.

Needless to say, she wasn't happy. She walked into the stable with Rick yesterday and angrily pointed at me several times. No clue what she said, but it was nothing good judging by her expression. At least, nothing good for her. Maybe I'll end up home free after all.
Anywhere's better than this stall.

By some miracle (or maybe a curse — I haven't decided yet), I have a new owner.

Early this morning the stable door slid open and and in walked Rick, right on time as usual — except some small human girl was following her.
I couldn't see her very well in the dim light, except for the fact that she had a red cloth covering some of her hair and big hazel eyes.

She asked Rick a question, he nodded, and then she came straight up to my stall and started rubbing my nose and saying something in a soft voice.
I pulled away, of course. It wasn't like she was offensive in any way, or that she was repulsive. In fact, she smelled like grass, hay, and dirt — my favorite smells — and, even though she wasn't as well put-together as Elise, she was pretty in a different, homier sort of way. But I hate being pet, and I hate being treated like some sort of domestic animal. I'm a horse, not a dog.

She wasn't deterred, though. She just smiled at me like I was pulling a joke, and then turned back to Rick and handed him a crate full of the canisters I had seen the servants use to hold Bessie's milk.

Great. So I'm worth a few bottles of milk, and that's it. Good to know.

Rick handed her a bridle and a blanket in return. Then he said a couple of things, and she laughed, and then they stood there and talked for so long that I thought I was going to lose my mind just waiting for them to finish.

The sunlight coming through the stable door eventually got bright enough that I could make out more of what the girl looked like. She definitely could have benefited from some of Elise's facials — her nose was sunburned like a cherry tomato. The rest of her skin was blotchy at best. A trail of freckles went under her eyes and across her nose like a bridge over a river, and she had a dirt mark near her temple that looked distinctly like three fingers pushing back the kerchief from her forehead.

I snorted impatiently. That drew their attention back toward me, finally, and the girl said a short thank you before opening my stall to let me out.

By that point, I had caught on to what was going to happen, and I wasn't about to let the opportunity go to waste. As soon as the stall door was fully open, I bolted past the girl and Rick, and squeezed through the opening of the stable door — home free. Rick and the girl cried out from back in the stable, but I ignored them.

The exit to Elise's farm was easy to find, since I had been staring at it from the pasture every day for at least a season. A couple of servants had to jump out of my way as I galloped down the cobblestone path. One girl dropped her basket of apples, and there was a split second where I thought about eating all of them before she could pick them up but then I realized that would probably cost me my freedom (and my lovely equestrian figure).

The pathway out of the farm was long, even for me. I threw my head back to check over my shoulder, but neither Rick nor the girl, nor any of the servants, for that matter, were following me. They were all probably too shocked. And, hey, I might've been, too, if I were that dull in the head.

But then — then, well, something weird happened.

I made it past the borders of Elise's farm, and the road suddenly turned from cobblestone into something else I hadn't seen for a while: brick. It took me by surprise, so much so that my footing got tripped up. I broke my gallop and turned to a trot, thinking it would still be fast enough, but then I almost ran into something — a big flower pot.

And at my left, a building I'd never seen. At my right, there were three other paths, and then further ahead there was something that looked like a slanted cliff with bits of rock jutting out from it. A human was walking up those rocks — he was old, older than any of the farm workers, and he had silvery white hair and a hunched back.

The old man let out a cry of surprise when he saw me, and then he called over his shoulder toward another human. This one was much younger — she had baby blue eyes and short brown hair. She was smaller than all of the little servant girls that I thought were so puny on Elise's farm.

I took a step backwards and neighed. All of the activity around me was a little overwhelming — people were gathering from seemingly nowhere to see Elise's "runaway horse," the one they had indubitably already heard a lot about since I was the best (and most troublesome) one on Elise's farm.

I kept taking steps backward until my back foot hit the cobblestone again, and by the time I finally had my wits enough about me to realize that I needed to run or else I'd never be free, a hand flashed underneath my neck and put a rope inside the metal clasp in my harness.

It was the girl from before. Rick was about ten steps behind, carrying the bridle and the blanket.

I tugged against the lead rope, hoping that I might pull free, but the girl was a lot stronger than I expected her to be. Not only that, but about six other people came forward to help hold on until I "calmed down" — at least, that's what they kept thinking I would do.

And I guess I did, eventually. Not because I was actually calm, but because it was getting annoying trying to fight against something so frustratingly futile.
Once all of the people left, the girl gave me a pat on the neck (I pulled away as best I could), and started walking me through the town on a short lead. I wouldn't have admitted it if any of the animals back at Elise's had asked, but I was kind of glad she was there, for the time being. If she could get me out of the town, I could sneak away from her and run to the forest. I just had to know where I was going, first.

She ended up leading me through a mountain trail all the way back to her farm. At first I was excited, because we got so far out in the sticks that I thought she was going to end up letting me go. But then I saw a building in the distance and realized I was just heading toward another stable.

The funny part is that there are a bunch of crops on this girl's property, kind of like Elise — only this girl has way more grass, and a much smaller house, and not as many animals.

But still, an owner is an owner, and as soon as I find a way, I'm getting out of here.

(My prologues are always short - sorry.)