The worst part? Even the gentlest correction could, and frequently did, trigger the equine equivalent of a child’s meltdown. Not out of defiance, of course. It was the fight-or-flight response of a creature who’d been heavily conditioned to expect violent retribution for the slightest offense. By the time he’d settle down, there’d be a twenty-foot stretch of churned-up dirt between where it had started and the place we finally stopped. Whatever he’d done would be long forgotten, and he’d be in a panting, nostril-flaring sweat with his eye whites exposed and his legs shaking.
As I petted his neck and murmured softly to him while he calmed down from another freak-out, I decided there had to be a better way to do this. He could ground-drive without too many problems, but he still wandered and spooked and occasionally freaked himself out. Those habits were decidedly more problematic when I was leading him rather than walking ten, fifteen, twenty feet away holding a long set of lines. He had to learn to behave and work correctly when he was being led, especially since there was no getting in the saddle until he could be trusted on the ground.
And establishing ground manners with a youngster was decidedly easier than with a traumatized adult. One who’d already reached his full height and build, instead of being a spidery half-grown yearling who would have a harder time cracking a rib or something.
Oh, Blue, whatever am I going to do with you?
I finished our lesson on a reasonably positive note: getting him to walk quietly along the short end of the arena without stepping on or crashing into me. On the way back toward the barn, he settled down a little. In fact, he settled down considerably. I didn’t want to push my luck and sour the end of the lesson, but…
“Whoa.” I stopped, and Blue took two extra steps—one of them sideways—before he too stopped. It was a start. “Good boy. Walk.” I started walking. He followed. “Whoa.” Only one extra step this time, though he wandered sideways a little and nearly clipped my shoe with his hoof. When I led him in a small circle, he wandered again, turning the circle into something closer to an irregular star, but at least he wasn’t as spooky and panicky as he’d been earlier.
I glanced past him at the arena. Then looked at him. Maybe that was part of the problem. He was conditioned to expect mistreatment in the confines of an arena, and that conditioning made it extremely difficult for me to keep his attention. But outside the arena, he was better. Still nervous, still full of bad habits, but noticeably better.
It was quite possible that the more I worked with him out here, away from the arena that unnerved him so much, the more he’d learn to trust me. Which meant I’d eventually be able to coax him into the arena and make some progress in there. It would take time, but it was worth a shot.
Except you’re not going to be here forever.
Finger-combing a few tangles out of his coarse, messy mane, I wondered if there was a way to accelerate our training outside the arena. I knew damn well, though, the only way through this was to be patient and consistent. It couldn’t be rushed, and I only had
maybe
an hour a day to work with him.
Unless…
I threw a sweeping look around the sprawling labyrinth of fences across the ranch. Fences I had to check twice a week and repair as needed.
This could work. It might, it might not, but it was worth a try.
Assuming Dustin was okay with it, of course.
Don’t ask permission
, some voice in my head commanded.
Just do it, and if he asks, explain it.
No, better to be on the up-and-up with Dustin. He was obviously fiercely protective of his rescue cases, and if he was—inexplicably or otherwise—trusting me to work with them, I’d be wise to make sure he and I stayed as close to the same page as possible at all times.
So I put Blue away and went looking for Dustin.
I found him on his way out of the office. “Hey, Dustin.”
He turned his head. “Oh, hey.”
I didn’t cringe away from eye contact with him, which was a first.
Funny how you’re so much less intimidating and infuriating now that I’ve danced with you.
I cleared my throat. “Can I talk to you for a second?”
His eyes widened a little. “Sure. Yeah.” He slipped his thumbs into his belt loops, which only made him look more tense. “What’s up?”
“Listen, I was wondering—” I paused, clearing my throat.
He raised an eyebrow.
“About Blue.”
“About—” He straightened. “About…” Then he shook himself back to life. “Right. Right. About Blue. What’s up?”
It took me a second to realize what had caught him off guard. He knew damn well who Blue was and what I was doing with him, and he certainly wouldn’t have forgotten any of that, so I suspected he’d thought I wanted to have A Talk about last night.
I barely kept myself from giggling.
Nope, sorry. I’m not ready to ruin last night with an awkward conversation today.
Pretending I hadn’t had those thoughts at all, I gestured toward Blue’s stall. “Well, as long as I’m going to be working with him, I’m thinking maybe a little groundwork that
isn’t
groundwork would help him.”
Dustin cradled his elbow in one hand and ran his other thumb along his chin. “I’m listening.”
“Just, you know, leading him,” I said. “Maybe take him with me when I go around the property to check and fix fences. Not really asking anything of him, just letting him get used to being led without anything to distract him.”
He didn’t answer right away. His eyebrows knitted together, and his eyes lost focus, but he didn’t speak.
I went on, “It might ease him into the habit of having good ground manners when he’s not so wound up and nervous about everything else I’m asking him to do.”
After a moment, Dustin nodded slowly. “You know, I think that’s a good idea.”
“You do?”
“Well, yeah.” He tilted his head and furrowed his brow. “Why wouldn’t I?”
“I—”
Because until yesterday I thought you thought I was a complete idiot when it came to all things horses?
I shrugged. “I don’t know. I just wanted to make sure it was okay with you before I did anything unusual with him.”
“Unusual is perfectly fine,” he said. “With horses like him, sometimes that’s what it takes.” He locked his office door and pocketed the keys. “Just let me know if you’re taking him out for a long time. So I know he’ll be out for a while.”
I smirked. “So you don’t come by his stall and wonder if he took himself into town or something?”
“Something like that, yeah.” He smiled. Like, actually
smiled
. “Good luck.”
“Thanks.”
Casually leading Blue around turned out to be a lot easier said than done. Any ground manners he’d ever had were long since replaced by nervously aggressive habits. Biting, mostly. Stepping on my feet because he wasn’t paying attention, and then snapping at me or throwing his head because I brought it to his attention. By halfway through the first day, I’d decided I was an idiot for ever suggesting this. If I could have devoted all of my attention to leading him and keeping him from taking my hand or head off, it would have been fine, but I still had to do things like fill water buckets, open and close gates and mark boards and posts that needed to be fixed.
Pride and sheer stubbornness kept me from giving up, though. There had to be a way to get through to this horse, and I was fresh out of ideas besides this, so damn it, I was going to
make
it work.
I hesitated to use a lip chain because I’d worked around traumatized horses. I’d been around a few—Walkers and otherwise—who were so badly abused the jingle of a chain could send them into a panic. With as touchy as Blue was about everything, a chain could be counterproductive. It wouldn’t hurt him, but just the sound of it might freak him out.
After two days of narrowly avoiding teeth and hooves, and sometimes
not
avoiding them, I decided the chain was worth a try.
While Blue waited on the cross-ties, I took off his lead rope and went into the tack room. There, I found a stud chain—a thick stainless chain about eighteen inches long—which I clipped to the end of his lead rope. I wrapped the chain snugly around my hand so it wouldn’t make a sound. Cautiously, I held it out to him and let him sniff it. His ears pricked forward, and he used his upper lip to play with the links. He licked it a few times. Tried to bite it, but I pulled it away at that point.
Watching his eyes the entire time, I slowly unwrapped a few inches from my hand. He didn’t seem to care, so I wiggled the chain just enough to make it jingle. His eyes widened, showing just the edges of the whites. He snorted. Again.
I held out the chain again and let him play with it. Typical Blue: it scared him at first. Then intrigued him. Then became something he wanted to eat.
About the time Blue was probably calculating how to get the entire chain out of my hand and into his mouth, Dustin came down the aisle with a two-year-old he’d just worked. He smiled, and was just about to continue past me, but did a double take.
Halting the two-year-old, he said, “He’s letting you use a chain?”
“Not yet,” I said, glancing at him before focusing on Blue so he didn’t eat my hand or the chain. “Just getting him used to it, and then I’m going to try a lip chain on him.”
“Probably a good idea, assuming he’ll take it without a fuss.”
“That’s why I’m letting him play with it and get used to it first.”
“Good idea.” He paused, but didn’t move. The two-year-old pawed the aisle beside him, and Dustin corrected her with a sharp “no” and a light smack with her lead rope on her shoulder. She let out an impatient huff, but stopped pawing.
“By the way,” he said. “Dad and I are leaving tomorrow morning for that show in Oregon.”
“Right. I saw it on the calendar.” I tugged the chain out from between Blue’s lips. “Your dad gave me a list of everything you need in the trailer, so I’ll take care of that once I’m done with Blue.”
“Oh, okay. And you’ll be all right handling everything here while we’re gone?”
I glanced up and smiled. “I’ll be fine. Don’t worry.”
“Good. Well, just let Mom know if you run into any problems.”
“Will do.”
We exchanged a long look that made my heart skip. Like we were each waiting for the other to say or do something. Like he wanted me to mention the other night just like I wanted him to mention it. But then the filly got impatient and Blue got mouthy, so he continued in the opposite direction, and I continued grooming Blue, all without saying anything about beer and slow dances.
It occurred to me then how bizarre it still was to hear Dustin asking how I was doing with Blue rather than snapping at me to stay a safe distance from the rescues. Something had changed in him. Or how he looked at me. He’d relaxed. He gave me the benefit of the doubt with the horses. He backed off, and that let me release my breath enough to go through my work without sweating bullets that I was a heartbeat away from being sent packing.
Whatever had changed between us, I liked it. And I’d have been lying if I said his attitude adjustment didn’t add to his attractiveness. Exponentially. Of course it did. Otherwise I wouldn’t have been carrying this vague pang of disappointment that he hadn’t kissed me on the porch the other night. That vague pang that seemed to intensify every time I looked at him.
Wow, Amy. You really
are
losing it, aren’t you?
I laughed at my own thoughts as I took the chain away from Blue again. Dustin was just some eye candy while I got my head together. Just because he wasn’t so insufferable now didn’t mean we were both sitting on go and waiting for the first opportunity to sleep together. It just meant I was a little less miserable here while I sorted out my emotional crap.
But man, right or wrong, for better or worse, that didn’t stop me from wondering what that front porch kiss might have been like.
Dustin and his dad left the next morning with three horses in the slant-load trailer. While they were gone, I had my usual tasks, but working with Blue—as well as Star, though for shorter periods—was quickly becoming the highlight of my days.
Three days in a row, Blue and I played the same game with the stud chain. I let him inspect the chain, lick it, nibble it, play with it, until he didn’t even bat an eye at it anymore. Once he was okay with the sound and the presence of the chain, I threaded it through one side of his halter and carefully drew it around to the other side of his face where I clipped the end to the halter. With the slack of the chain hanging loosely below his mouth, I took his upper lip in my hand and played with it. He played back, trying to get his lip away, then pushing it back into my hand when I let go. It became a game, and it occupied him while I slowly tightened the chain with my other hand.
I pushed up his lip and slid the chain over his gums. There’s a nerve up in there, just under a horse’s upper lip, that works almost like grabbing a cat by the scruff; it won’t hurt them, but it
will
make them stop and pay attention. Much better than yanking on his lead rope and turning every correction into a big, scary scene.