Greener Pastures - Alyssa Brugman [18]
Here she was thinking about it again when she had promised herself she wouldn't.
On the other hand, Shelby had to accept the reality that she could only have one horse, and if she wanted to be a serious horse person and seriously compete she wasn't going to be able to do that on a small, ageing paint pony.
She could wait until she was old enough to buy her own horses, and then she could have as many as she liked, but that was years and years away. Meanwhile, other girls like Hayley would be going from horse to horse, to bigger and better achievements. Shelby would be left far behind.
The truth was, Mrs Edel would never give Shelby a horse to start because she didn't think of Shelby as a serious horse person.
Nobody was ever going to think of Shelby as a serious horse person as long as she owned a beginner's mount.
9 A Jenny Craig Paddock
Out of the side window Shelby saw a sign: 'Wanada Park Pony Stud'. Mrs Crook flicked on the blinker and they pulled into a driveway lined on each side by conifers. For most of the way the trees obscured the view, but in the gaps she saw tantalising glimpses of ponies grazing. She tried not to press her face against the window. She thought that would look too impatient.
The driveway swept around in a curve and Mrs Crook pulled up behind a shed, which contained horse trucks and floats of differing sizes and states of disrepair. The two girls climbed out and stretched their legs.
Cheryl's house was old and in need of a paint, but it must once have been beautiful, with scrolled timber work around the windows and gables. It was surrounded by a formal garden, now overgrown and scrappy. Roses clawed their way up the window frames and lavender bushes escaped their rock boundaries, reaching across the lawn.
As the front door opened a pack of dogs ran out to greet them. There were three shabby-looking terriers with pink stains around their eyes. Two long-haired border collie crosses had green-coloured stains on their shoulders which looked and smelled suspiciously like fresh horse poo. A young great dane, clumsy on her long legs, gambolled ecstatically, splattering the girls with strings of drool.
'Get back here, you cheeky monkeys!' called a voice from inside. 'Sorry! Just push them away. They have no manners at all.'
Cheryl emerged – a tiny woman in a long floral-print summer dress and bright blue gumboots. She planted a hat on her head and skipped down the steps to embrace Mrs Crook. 'Jill, you look fabulous! Hayley, gorgeous as ever, and who's this?'
'I'm Shelby.'
'Welcome to Wanada Park. Do you ride? Of course you do! Do you want a pony? You've come to the right place. What are we doing standing around here? Come and see these foals.' Cheryl marched round the side of the house. Shelby almost had to jog to keep up. Most of the dogs ran ahead. 'It's been a fantastic season. Foals dropping all over the place. I haven't had a decent night's sleep in weeks. Down, you little rascal!' She pushed away one of the terriers that was dancing by her side.
At the back of the house there was a big, old, timber barn, filled with round bales of hay. Cheryl noticed Shelby staring. 'We've been cutting our own hay the last few seasons because of the drought. My darling husband says if we dedicate more paddocks to hay that's less room for ponies.'
On the other side of the hay shed there was a row of stables. Each one was at least three times the size of the stalls at the Edels' stables. They were breeding stalls, designed to give the mare and foal room to move around together. About half of them were occupied. Shelby looked over the half-doors as they made their way along.
Some of the foals were tiny, with sweet, dishy faces and big eyes.
'We've brought Song and her foal in this morning,' Cheryl told them.
'That's Echo's mum,' Hayley explained to Shelby. 'She's just had a foal to one of the stallions we're thinking about.'
Song was in the breeding stall on the end. She called out