But something was wrong. Instead of perking up, Lady Snow just grew more listless. Julie had to find Blaine, but before she could go looking for him, she noticed drops of blood on her riding jacket. Damn! Not another nosebleed, not now! In a panic, she tore off the jacket and went to the tack room to wash it out. By the time Julie had finished ironing the jacket until the creases were just right, the announcer was calling her number. There was no time for Lady Snow's warm-up, no time to find Blaine. As she swung up on her horse, the certainty Julie had felt that morning vanished. She gathered the reins in her hand, fighting down something close to panic.
After all their years riding together, jumping had become instinctive for both Julie and Lady Snow. It was as if horse and rider could read each other's minds. Julie would tighten the reins almost imperceptibly, and Lady Snow would immediately adjust her stride. Julie didn't need to think about when to signal Lady Snow to start her takeoffâshe felt it, and so did Lady Snow. But today was different. The connection between them had somehow been broken and Julie felt as if she were riding a stranger.
The first fence was an easy one, only four feet high, the kind of jump that Lady Snow could clear with a foot to spare. But this time, instead of feeling the mare spring up underneath her, Julie felt as if Lady Snow was barely sliding over the jump. On the way down, Julie heard a clunk. Lady Snow's back hooves had hit the top rail. Just a close call, Julie told herself, trying to psych herself up for the next jump. We'll be fine now.
Julie tightened the reins, trying to get Lady Snow to shorten her stride before the combination, but the horse continued at her own languid pace. They somehow managed to clear the first jump, but knocked over a rail on the second. Four faults. Damn! Julie looked around frantically, trying to find the next jump. She was sure it was an oxer. Too late, she remembered the water jump. Julie pulled desperately on the reins. At the last second, Lady Snow responded with a halfhearted leap. Julie thought she heard a splash. Or was it two?
“Come on, Lady Snow,” Julie muttered. “Let's get it together.” Lady Snow didn't even twitch her ears back. Julie had never felt so out of sync with her horse, never. It was as if Julie's brain was racing into overdrive, while Lady Snow had left hers somewhere back at the starting gate. But she had to keep going. The wall loomed ahead. Even the best jumpers can have trouble with a solid wall, Julie knew, and this particular one was the highest jump in the ring, with a sharp left-turn approach. Several riders had already taken a spill going over it.
Julie steadied herself and began to rein in Lady Snow for the approach, but Lady Snow took the turn wide and as they neared the jump, Julie could tell that their angle was all wrong. Thoughts were flashing through her brain at a million miles a second. Should she pull up now and avoid the risk of injury? Or take a chance and hope they managed to pull off that fifth-place finish? How many of Lady Snow's hooves had landed in the water? Julie was trying to replay the splashes in her head when she realized they were already in the air. For a moment, she thought they might make it. Then she pitched forward, feeling Lady Snow fall away beneath her, and hearing the heart-stopping sound of a thousand-pound horse crashing through a solid object.
Julie lay on the ground for a sickening minute, eyes tightly shut, trying to pretend it hadn't happened. Then slowly, she opened her eyes and turned toward Lady Snow. The horse lay on the ground, perfectly still. It felt like an eternity before Julie saw Lady Snow's chest rise and fall with a breath. As Julie made her way to a standing position, Lady Snow did the same. There was a polite spatter of applause, as the horse and rider exited the ring. It had not, after all, been a bad fall.
Julie cooled down the eerily calm mare, as she waited anxiously for the remaining riders to take their turns in the ring. She breathed a shaky sigh of relief when she saw that both Chase Cardwell and Isabella d'Acosta del Sol had finished out of the points as well. Julie had kept her spot in the standings. She and Lady Snow were on their way to the Grand Prix, the culmination of all their years of hard work. Yet Julie felt no joy, only an emptiness. She tried to convince herself that falls happen to every rider sooner or later, that there was nothing wrong with Lady Snow that some bran mash and a good night's sleep wouldn't fix, that everything would be okay by the time they got to the Grand Prix. But the sound of Lady Snow crashing into the wall kept echoing in her head.
Digging her hands deep in her pocket, Julie's fingers touched the vials from that morning. Maybe there'd be a little something left, something to distract her from her thoughts. When she pulled the vials out, she saw that Blaine's labels were peeling away and there was a second set of labels underneath. Julie's vial had a
C
and Lady Snow's an
H
. Julie pondered the meaning of the letters briefly, but the vials were empty, and so she tossed them away.
Brittany was waiting for her in the parking lot, leaning against her Porsche, looking cool and beautiful. “Poor baby,” Brittany cooed, “let's take you home and get you fixed up.”
Julie smiled weakly and slipped into the passenger seat. There she saw a blue ribbon resting on the dashboard. Julie could only manage a whispered, “Congratulations.”
“Oh that,” said Brittany, quickly tucking the ribbon into her bag. “You know I don't care about that, honey. All that really matters is us. You and me.” Yet she radiated a satisfaction Julie could almost touch. Julie tried to feel happy for herâafter all, it wasn't Brittany's fault Julie had lost the Citrus Classic.
At the condo, Blaine gave Julie a handful of pills that he promised would help her recover from her fall, but the pills only quieted the aches and pains of Julie's body. She couldn't get away from the thoughts that kept running through her head. She remembered how Lady Snow had looked standing in the stall that morning and the sickening thud as she hit the ground. She remembered the blue ribbon on Brittany's dashboard. She thought about what Liz would say if she could see Julie now. Brittany talked away as they sipped their gin and tonics and snorted some heroin, but Julie just wanted to be alone, to rest. Abruptly, Julie asked, “Would you mind if I took a nap?”
Brittany looked a little put out. “My, you must be tired!” Quickly she recovered her cool. “You know where the bed is.”
Julie was asleep moments after slipping between the black satin sheets. She dreamed that she and Brittany were riding toward a jump, a wall which kept growing taller as they approached it. Brittany's horse soared high up in the sky, as if on wings, but suddenly it started to snow and Julie couldn't see the wall. She couldn't even see her horse, or herself, and she knew that she was going to crash into the wall.
Julie woke with a start, sweating and shaking. She heard noisesâDavid Bowie on the stereo, the buzz of chatter punctuated by shrieks of laughter. It was the final party of the Florida seasonâBrittany's usual blowout. Julie stumbled downstairs, still in her riding clothes. She needed to find Brittany. Brittany would make the nightmare go away. At the foot of the stairs she saw Ashley, carrying a bottle of gin. “Where's Brittany?” Julie asked. A strange smile spread over Ashley's face as she pointed toward the back of the house and said, “You know where the hot tub is, don't you?”
Julie walked toward the back patio. As she got closer, she heard Blaine's voice, “Come on, Brit, I'm soooo bored.” Julie stopped. Then Brittany: “She'll probably wake up any minute now.” There were splashing noises. Laughter. Brittany again: “Well . . . ooooh . . . all right . . . mmm . . . don't stop.” In a daze, Julie parted the fronds of a potted palm, and there were Brittany and Blaine, naked in the hot tub, deep in a passionate embrace. Automatically, Julie noted the small amber bottles strewn around the foot of the tub. Brittany saw her first. “Oh good, you're awake. Come join us.”
“But I don't . . . but I'm not . . . are you?” Julie stuttered.
“Bisexual? Of course. Isn't everyone?” said Brittany with a languid wave of her hand.
Julie's head was spinningâshe needed to leave that patio, with its stench of sex and betrayal and chlorine. But even though her mind was screaming, go! her feet were rooted to the floor. She needed to get out, but there was something she needed even more, and Blaine knew exactly what it was. He leaned over the edge of the tub and started pulling an assortment of vials out of his little black bag. Just one more time, Julie told herself, then she'd be done with Brittany, with Blaine, with all of this.
Like a zombie, Julie slipped out of her clothes and into the hot tub. It was strange, she thought, how she could feel so dirty while sitting in a tub. She stared hungrily at the lines of white powder that Blaine was neatly arranging on a small mirror as he chattered away. “It's too bad about today, Julie, but I'm getting my pharmacist to cook up a little something for Lady Snow that should be just perfect for the Grand Prix.”
Suddenly Julie remembered the strange markings on the vials. “Blaine, what were those letters on the vials you gave me this morningâC and
H
, I think it was?”
“Oh dear,” Blaine replied, putting his hand to his cheek in mock horror, “did I give you one of heroin and one of cocaine? No wonder you two weren't connecting. That was awfully bad of me, wasn't it, Brit?”
“Shut up, Blaine,” Brittany shot back, “I think you've said enough. It's time for Julie to have some coke.”
Brittany grabbed the mirror from Blaine and pushed it at Julie. Julie reached for the mirror, but when she looked up at Brittany, there was something in Brittany's eyes that stopped her, something cold and calculating. Pictures flashed through Julie's headâCaro on crutchesâAshley begging for cokeâthe blue ribbon today. She didn't know yet what it all meant, but she knew something was wrongâ horribly wrong. Julie knew she had to get out of that tub, and get out now.
Before she could change her mind, Julie pulled herself out of the tub, splashing water all over the powder-laden mirror. “Julie!” exclaimed Blaine in irritation. She threw on her clothes as Brittany pleaded, “Julie, what are you doing? C'mon back in, I can make you feel good.” Her shoes still untied, she fled the patio. She could hear Brittany calling after her, “Don't go! You're ruining our fun!” Ignoring the aching hunger she felt for that tantalizing white powder, she ran past the startled partiers and out of the condo. It was after midnight when she walked on blistered feet into the parking lot of her motel.
Back at the condo, her resolution had been strong, but now her hunger started to take over. Julie began to shake and twitch all over. There was an inch and a half of gin left in her bottle, and she gulped it down. She pawed frantically through the clutter on the nightstand, to see if there was anything there, anything, a 'lude, a valium, a percodan, a dexie, a bennie, a mickey, a finn, lithium, steroids, even a goddamned Tylenol. Finally, she stumbled to the bathroom, downed a bottle of cough syrup, and ate a tube of Sensodyne toothpaste. It wasn't much, but it got her through the night.
The next morning, a twitching, shaking Julie hitched up the trailer and led a twitching, shaking Lady Snow into it. As Julie drove north, the ache got worse and worse. By the time she hit the New Jersey Turnpike, she was starting to calculate how quickly she could get Lady Snow settled in at Hunterdon, and where she could find Brittany and Blaine.
At Hunterdon, Julie stumbled out of her car and rubbed her eyes. Everything was just as she'd left itâbucolic and peaceful. Only Julie had changed. She felt as if she'd aged a hundred years.
“Juuuulieeee,” cooed a voice behind her. Julie jumped a foot, and turned, twitching. Brittany and Blaine had pulled into the driveway and were getting out of Blaine's BMW. As they approached, Brittany shook her head and purred, “Poor Julie, she doesn't look well.”
“Not well at all,” Blaine chimed in, opening his black bag.
Julie was shaking all over. She watched Blaine slowly undoing the buckles as if she were hypnotized. She had no awareness of anything else in the world but that black bag. Then, she heard a gasp. “Julie!”
She turned, slowly, reluctant to let the bag out of her sight. Liz was looking at her, eyes wide with horror. Julie knew she hadn't been eating well, and that she hadn't slept in two days, and that she was still wearing yesterday's riding clothes, which were now spattered with dried blood from numerous nosebleeds, but did she really look
that
bad?
“Liz!” Brittany exclaimed, “It's been ages, darling. You're looking . . . older.”
“And you, Brittany, you haven't changed a bit, have you?” Liz responded angrily, gesturing toward Julie.
“Long time no see, Lizzie,” Blaine said. “What step are you on now? Forty-three?”
Julie's head was awhirl with confusionâwhat was the connection between Liz and Brittany? What was Blaine talking about? And when could she get some coke?
“I want you two out of hereâand away from Julie,” Liz said fiercely.
“But Julie wants to come with us,” Brittany responded.
“She doesn't need youâyou, your blow, or your bag of bisexual tricks!” Liz shot back.