Thanks to The Real TC for helping me!
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Lisa walked out to the barn that evening trying to forget everything that had gone on at dinner. Though it was almost dark, Lisa walked out into the pasture and led Sky. The old reining horse followed Lisa like a puppy dog. Lisa smiled before climbing on a bale of hay to mount.
It had been a while since she had ridden bareback and bridle-less. To her, it was the most fun way to ride. It took the most concentration to keep her seat and control the horse when there was no bridle or saddle to get in the way. Lisa walked the horse to one of the small, open pens Amy used for new horses.
As she rode through the open gate, she smiled with sheer exhilaration. Before signalling Sky to lope, Lisa cleared away her troubling thoughts; she couldn't afford to think while riding. If she thought, she would lose focus and end up with a broken ankle.
"I don't want to think," she muttered. She cued Sky to do a flying lead change in the middle of her figure eight. When the horse complied she bucked just a little bit and Lisa couldn't help but laugh slightly. Cassie had been watching Lisa from the fence.
"Are you going to let that horse get away with bucking?" she called out. Lisa jumped and tuned to look at Cassie. Sky stopped and Lisa fell forward on to Sky's neck.
"Why did you do that?" Anger radiated through Lisa's body. Cassie had distracted her, though she was honestly angry at Cassie for many reasons. Cassie never thought before she spoke; her comment about Lisa's bankruptcy had rubbed her emotions the wrong way, and this was one of the last straws. Lisa was not sure how long she could put up with Cassie's comments about the past. "Did I do that?" Cassie asked innocently. "Yes. You cannot distract me when I am riding!" "Sorry. I just can't believe you are riding slow and elegant. You used to only jump and race." "Two things I can't do any more," Lisa snapped. "When I started riding again, I discovered my legs just don't bend the way they used to. English just was not an option. So I switched to Western, and a few years ago when I started seeing Jack and riding Sky, I started to do reining. Just for fun - not to win or pay the bills. I ride without a saddle when I rein, and sometimes without a bride. If I lose my concentration I mis-cue her and she will stop. I can't afford to fall off." "Sorry," Cassie mumbled. Lisa sighed. "I need to finish before it gets dark. Excuse me." Lisa pivoted Sky before asking her to lope away from the fence. /\/\/\/\/\ Later that evening, Lisa walked in to her room and couldn't help but smile at Jack's predictability. She knew she would walk in and find that he would be reading a farming magazine.
"Hey," she said in greeting. Jack looked up from his paper. "How was your ride?" "Fine," Lisa replied. She sat down on a chair in the corner of the room and started brushing her hair. "I saw you almost take a header. For you, that's not okay." "Cassie distracted me," Lisa snapped, remembering the incident with fresh annoyance. "Now what has you so short with her?" "She just gets under my skin. Her care-free personality in general is just aggravating sometimes. She acts like she is still in high school. She has never had a hard time with her life. She never had to worry about anything but what color to paint her finger nails. While I was struggling to eat dinner, she was planning major parties to celebrate one of their many horses' wins. She was adding on to their house and I moved into my car. But what aggravates me most is that every little thing that ever happened to me is public notice. She makes no secret of every little detail public, but hers is a locked door." Jack looked at her. He had questions about just about everything Lisa had said, but he thought it would be wise to keep his mouth shut.
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Lisa walked into Maggie's three days later in no better of a mood. She was sick and tired of her broken wrist getting in the way of things. She still could not drive and she had to be chauffeured around if she needed to go anywhere. And to make matters worse, she couldn't go for her run; the doctor had baned her from that because of the swelling in her ankle. "'Morning , Lisa," Maggie said, while pouring her a cup of coffee. "Thank you, Maggie," Lisa said as she sat down. "Jack will be here in a second; he got stuck talking to Val." "You still mad at her?" "Maggie, someone has to be mad at her." Maggie started laughing. "So true!" She looked over at Julie who sat two seats down from Lisa. "Lisa, have you met Julie Nelson? She just moved here." Maggie motioned for Julie to move closer. And before Lisa said anything, Maggie was talking again. "Julie, this is Lisa Bartlett." "Maggie, we have met. Briefly, but nevertheless…" Lisa started. "So long as you have met… Just want to make sure she knows that not everyone is like you know who…" Maggie motioned to Val, who had walked through the door a moment before. "Maggie, be nice," Lisa warned with a sly smile. "I will. I will." Maggie said, making a placating gesture with her hands as she walked away. "So, I take it you know everyone in this town," Julie said quietly to Lisa. "Hard not to," Lisa replied. She was so glad to have a simple conversation with her daughter, that she did not hear Jack come in. Jack put his hands on Lisa's shoulders, and she looked up at him with a startled expression. "You scared me!" Jack kissed her hair and sat down. "Sorry; didn't mean to." Jack looked at Julie. "Hello! Jack Bartlett. And you are?" Julie looked her mother's husband up and down. "Julie Nelson," she finally said after an interminable pause. Lisa flinched inwardly at how awkward this was. Jack looked at Lisa. "So, this is Cassie's daughter." Lisa faked a smile. "Yes." Jack returned his gaze to Julie. Her fiery red hair was a total opposed of Cassie; everything was.
"Nice to meet you, Julie. I must say you look nothing like your mother," he said casually. Julie looked at Jack evenly. "No. I was adopted when I was little." Jack was slightly taken back. "I had no Idea. I'm sorry." "It's fine. My birth father left when I was a baby, and my mother… well, she is dead." Julie fixed Lisa with a hard stare. Lisa looked at Julie with tears in her eyes, and Julie just continued to glare at her. Lisa's hand let go of the coffee cup as her hands went numb.
"Shoot," she whispered, as the cup crashed to the floor and shattered. Jack put his hand on hers. "You all right?" Lisa squeezed Jack's hand when the numbness went away. "Fine," she answered. Lisa looked over at Maggie. "I am so sorry; I don't know what happened." "It's fine, Lisa. It's only a coffee cup. I had almost all of them destroyed a few years ago when Stumpy brought a cow in here and tuned it lose during some meeting they decided to hold in my diner," Maggie smiled at the memory.
Lisa couldn't help but chuckle. Even years later, the townspeople still liked to tease Maggie about Stumpy's calf being tuned lose in the diner and breaking everything in sight. Julie turned away. She had questions about everything, and she was the outsider to everything. Even when people included her, she didn't get half the things that were talked about. And she had racked up a list a mile long of questions. Now, she had more to add to that list, and the one that bugged her most had to do with her 'mother'.
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There a new Chapter finally! I have been so busy and have been out of town. I ment to post this but forgot I was going to post it the other week, Then I had a horse dump me at the track while traninging him to break from it. I got pined in the gate and broke a few ribs re blew my left knee and messed up my back. So I had surgery on my back last week as well as my knee. There 4 unless you want some realy crazy chapters (I am so loopy on pain meds half the time now) updates will be few and a time beetween. But I would realy love to hear what you think of the story. So revew and I will work on writing a chapter though it might take a week or more to write corect and add.