DELILAH
I stared out across the plains
that ran for miles in front of me. Not a soul could be seen or sound could be
heard. There was a time I wasn’t so alone. Not so long ago and not so far away
I remember how it used to be…
On a warm summer afternoon my
brother and I were up to our usual games. He’d tapped me so it was my turn to
catch him. He was so much faster than I was. One day I would run faster but at
present I was still getting used to my awkwardly long legs. Scout was very good
at hiding. I’d completed a few paces the other direction before being allowed
to give chase. When I spun it was like he had vanished. I tried to figure out
where he had gone. I glimpsed a wisp of his black hair poking out from behind I
tree. I took off at full speed. Running was one of my favourite things to do.
The wind was in my hair and I felt like I was leaving the world behind. It
didn’t take long for me to cover the ground between us. Just as I’d reached the
tree Ma beckoned from the other side of the fence. It was dinner time. Scout’s
stomach always took over his desire to win and he was out from behind the tree
before Ma had even finished her call. I tapped him and raced off towards
dinner.
Farmer Zeke and his eldest son
Gabe had come down with the food for us.
“Pa I still don’t see why you
won’t let me head into the saloon tonight?” Gabe whined.
“Because I says so and that’s all
yer need to know,” Zeke growled at him. Zeke’s skin was brown and worn by many
long days in the sun.
“Pa…” Gabe started.
“Sides yer got this ‘ere colt for
breaking tomorrow,” Zeke interrupted. He gave Scout a swift hit on the rump.
Scout kicked out but kept his head down eating. Ma watched them sceptically.
There was something about the word breaking that she didn’t like. I had heard
the word a few times before and every time one of the herd went they came back
different, if at all.I looked from Ma to Scout and back again but the only
response I got was a sigh from Ma as she started to eat again.
“Did yer hear Jessamine wants to be the one to
break that filly?” Gabe laughed. Both sets of eyes turned to me. I twitched my
ear forward at the sound of Jessamine’s name. Humans sure did speak a lot and
there wasn’t an awful lot of words that I knew but Jessamine was one of them. She
was the sweet little human filly that came to visit me every morning before she
left for school. The two of them laughed and talked all the way back up to the
homestead. I finished my meal and dozed off.
“Delilah!!” I heard my name being
called out. Startled I lifted my head ready to run from danger. Relief took
over when I realised that it was Jessamine coming down for her morning talk.
“Gabe was telling me that he is
going to break Scout today.I want to stay home to see what they do. I really
hope they give me the chance when it is your turn,” she told me. Even if I
could understand humans I’m not entirely sure I would understand her excited
ramblings.
“Jessamine, school,” Zeke barked
from the veranda.
“Yes Pa,” she called out. She
wrapped her arms around my neck, her golden hair was the same colour as my
coat.Then trotted off down the path to school. Zeke and Gabe came down and
threw a rope around Scout he snorted in displeasure. They dragged him away and
it was days before I saw him again. Jessamine visited as usual but it wasn’t
the same without my brother around. Finally they returned him to the field.
When he was lead through the gate and released I ran over and nudged him and
ran off. I was almost at the trees before I turned and realised that he wasn’t
behind me. He was still standing by the fence with his head low to the ground.
I raced back over thinking there was some food available but as I got closer I
realised his head was just hanging there and he was in fact not eating.
Scout was often taken out by Gabe
on rides. He often came back exhausted and wounded. Each time I tried to get
him to play like old times he just sighed and turned his head into the corner.
I turned to Ma for comfort and she kept pushing me away. It wasn’t until I
awoke one morning to find a new addition to our paddock that I understood my mother’s
mood.
“We got ourselves another
buckskin colt,” Zeke yelled out when he came down. They let Jessamine name the
new colt and she called him Trigger. As the time passed I worried less about
Scout and started playing with Trigger a lot more. My new brother had a lot of
energy and wore me out, now I understood why Scout had got so annoyed with me.
One morning they took Scout out
and I never saw him again. When they returned without him Jessamine came
running down to the paddock and threw her arms around my neck. I rested my chin
on her back and felt my shoulder become wet. She was leaking and I couldn’t
understand why.
“Jessamine please come inside,”
her Ma, Esther, called out. I was ready to doze off when I felt a little muzzle
tap my hip. The thunder of tiny hooves in the opposite direction told me that
Trigger was keen for a game. I stood my ground. He came back and tapped me
again. When he came back for a third tap I pinned my ears and barred my teeth
at him. He knew then to leave me alone.
Each day as the sun set I watched
the path hoping to see Scout. Although Trigger was always happy to play he
could never quite fill the void. Jessamine spent more time with me. She would
come down to the field after school as well. After a few weeks of this I
started looking at the path for her to come home instead of Scout. I saw other
yearlings in the herd get taken away for a few days to be “broken” and when
they came back they were changed.
Jessamine started bringing things
to the paddock with her. She started with a rope, then a blanket and then what
she called a bridle. She started getting me used to them bit by bit.
“Tomorrow we will show Pa how
well we are doing,” she told me as she kissed my muzzle and went inside for the
night. As the sun rose the next morning I was waiting by the gate for her to
return. She didn’t come down that morning nor the morning after.
“Gabe I know that Jessamine had
her heart set on breaking this filly but we need her broken,” Zeke grumbled as
he slapped me on the shoulder.
“Let’s give her a few more days,”
Gabe protested.
“Look son, I know this is hard
but she has the measles. We can’t put the farm on hold for her,” Zeke said
gently but firmly. He handed his son the rope and Gabe threw it over my neck.
The rope was pulled tighter than Jessamine had ever pulled it and it pinched my
skin. I snorted as I tried to back away but Gabe pulled it tighter. It was very
uncomfortable. He dragged me out the gate and around the other side of the
house. There was a small fenced off yard that he put me in. He went away for a
minute and came back with the thing that Jessamine had called the bridle. But
it was very different when he put it on. The cold hard bit was jammed in my
mouth and the straps pulled so tight that it was painful. I pulled away and was
met by the sharp hit of a stick. Startled I tried to flee. I’d never been hit
before. The bit in my mouth was attached to leather straps that Gabe was holding
onto. He pulled at them and the bit put painful pressure on my mouth. He pulled
at the bit and hit me and chased me for hours on end.
Eventually as the sun started to
set he gave up, hobbled my legs tightly and left me in the yard. I hung my head
as I had seen so many other horses do when they had returned from their
breaking. I closed my eyes and sighed and then I felt a small hand between my
ears.
“Oh Delilah what has he done to
you?” she cried. Weeping, she untied the hobbles from my feet. She then took
the bridle off the fence and placed it on my head. I pulled back but she
whispered to me and I felt calmed.
“Now we are going to try
something that you have never done before and I need you to be good,” she
continued. She disappeared for a minute and returned with what she told me was
a saddle. She put it gently on my back and tied it up underneath. She put it on
the fence and led me over to it. She climbed the fence so that she could reach
my back. I stayed still for her. I felt she was ailed by an illness and it was
making the task more difficult for her than it should have been. She finally
got the saddle on and climbed down from the fence. She struggled with the
buckles and then stood back and smiled at me.
“Why Delilah you are broken,” she
whispered. I didn’t feel broken. Jessamine was so happy. “Now one last step.”
She went round to my and she
gently tried to pull herself up. She slipped and fell to the ground. I turned
to look at her and noticed she was pale besides the spots that covered her. She
looked like a frail human appaloosa.
“Oh Delilah if only I could show
Pa so that Gabe doesn’t keep hurting you,” she wept. I knew that I had to help
her up so I bent my knees so I was closer to her level. She struggled up onto
my back and then she tugged gently on the leather straps that led out the gate
and towards the front of the house.
“Papa. Papa,” she called out. It
wasn’t long before Zeke and Esther were on the front porch.
“Oh Jessamine what are you
doing?” Esther cried as she ran down the stairs she pulled Jessamine off my
back and carried her inside. Zeke came and took the saddle off me. Then he let
me free in my old field. I raced up to Trigger and gave him and nudge on the
rump. He squealed with delight as he took off after me. As I quickened my speed
I felt the cool night breeze in my mane and I kicked up my heels in delight.
Trigger caught up to me and nudged back he raced across the field back to where
our mother was. She looked proud of us and that made it the best night of my
life.
It felt like a long time before I
saw Jessamine again. I worried that she had gone wherever Scout was. One night
I was resting and was awoken by Jessamine. She lowered herself to the ground and
curled up between my feet. She was paler and thinner than when I had last seen
her. I could feel the heat radiating from her but at the same time she was
shaking like a leaf in the fall breeze. I looked to see that Ma was keeping her
eyes out for danger and I knew that I was safe enough to lie down. I curled
myself gently around her. She snuggled up into me and twined her fingers into
my mane. Her breath was raspy. I nuzzled her as she started to get quieter and
colder but there was no response. When the sun rose there was nothing to my
favourite human but a lifeless shell. I could hear the other humans searching
for her but had no way of telling them where she was. I whinnied to them so
they could find her.
When Zeke came to the gate and
saw her he ran over and picked her up. He made it only a few steps before his
knees gave way beneath him and he screamed to the sky. Esther heard his cries
and came to see what had caused them. Her screams were higher pitched and
longer. It was the first time I wished I could scream and weep like the humans
to let them know that I too was going to miss Jessamine. They took her away and didn’t look back.
That afternoon Zeke came back to
the field smelling of a substance I didn’t reckognize and swinging a large
plank of wood.
“It’s all your fault,” he
screamed as the wood thwacked loudly on my side. I tried to run but he had a
rope around my neck before I could get anywhere. He continued bringing the wood
down roughly again and again. He repeated this process every day for some time.
My sides and legs were gaping and bleeding. My head hung lower than it ever had
in my life. Ma whuffled at me gently as she tried to lick me clean. She
confirmed the smell was whisky and that Zeke had not touched it in years. She
was disappointed that he had turned back to it to cope with the death of his
daughter. I turned from her trying to get away. There was nothing left for me.
Without Scout and Jessamine I didn’t want to go on.
Later that night I heard the gate
creak open. A rope slipped over my neck and I winced ready for another beating
but it didn’t come. The rope was tugged gently as Esther led me out the gate.
“Delilah I am so sorry. I know Jessamine would
be so disappointed that I let this happen to you,” she told me. She had the
same golden hair and kind blue eyes that her daughter had possessed. She mounted
a horse I didn’t know and she led me as far away from the homestead as she
could in a few hours. She took the rope off me and when I looked out there were
no fences as far as the eyes could see. Before I had the chance to look back
Esther was gone. I really was alone.
CHALLENGE- To write a western in 2500 words
ACTUAL WORD COUNT- 2498 words
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