Mom had even decided to enter the same event, right before the Wednesday four o’clock cutoff, after she saw how many of the other top riders were in the field.
Maybe they were angling to keep themselves and their horses sharp. I was there to win. Rode that way. Went clean in my first round, then straight into the jump-off.
“Ride like hell now,” Gus said as I passed him at the gate. “Post a kick-ass time and let the rest of them chase you.”
Gus didn’t make a big deal out of the water jump when he’d looked over the course alongside me. Just talked about my line, and my distance, the way he did all the other jumps.
“We treat all jumps the same,” he said, and left it at that.
Then Sky, bless her heart, handled it perfectly the first time through. I was nervous as we approached, even panicking a little as I saw the light reflecting off the pool, right before the sun, almost by magic, went behind a cloud.
Now we had to clear it again in the jump-off, where the water was on the other side of the second-to-last jump.
A lot of jumps before that. Sky took them all clean. The course wasn’t built for long-striding horses. This one was built for speed. And my little horse had a ton of that.
The cloud was gone now as we came up on the water. We were going straight back into the sun. I heard Gus from behind me, yelling, “Get your head down!” I did. Thought at the last moment that I’d gotten Sky too close to the jump, and I had. Then my horse’s big heart took over. And took care of it. When I looked at the video later, I was amazed at how high she’d gotten, how easily she’d cleared the top rail, how far past the water she’d landed.
Like she really was flying this time.
We sprinted to the finish from there. I jerked my head around to look at the big screen.
29.4.
We’d beaten thirty seconds on that tough, close-quarters course.
I couldn’t help myself then, brought Sky back around to where Gus was sitting and threw a fist.
He didn’t change expression.
“Bad ass,” he said.
EIGHTY-THREE
THERE WERE FIFTY in the class. Tyler Cullen, going after me, got an early rail. He was out. Matthew Killeen in his first round had bested my time but couldn’t beat thirty seconds in the jump-off. Nor could Georgina Bloomberg or Eric Glynn. Or Andrew Welles. Two rails for Tess McGill. Two for Jennifer Gates.
Six other horses had made it clean through the jump-off.
Nobody under thirty seconds by the time it was Mom’s turn, going forty-eighth. Best rider left. Best horse. Gus and I were watching from up on the pedestrian bridge.
“Gotta be weird for you, right?” Gus said as Mom walked Coronado into the ring, Daniel beside her.
“Wouldn’t be a problem if it was somebody like Tyler,” I said. “But it’s my mom.”
Then we both watched in silence as Mom went clean. Not a particularly fast first round, but she was in control of herself and her horse, knowing exactly how to avoid a time fault.
Now the jump-off for her.
I want to win, I thought now, the feeling coming over me like one of those hot flashes Mom talked about from time to time.
I don’t want her to beat me.
I wanted her to ride well. Wanted her to go clean. Just didn’t want her under thirty seconds. I wasn’t going to say that to Gus. I would never say it to her, no matter how things came out.
Nobody was making the Olympics today.
I still wanted to win. Wanted to beat her. Maybe to prove to myself that I could.
Prove to her that as competitive as she was, I was even more so.
Bad Ass Becky.
I watched her. Then watched the clock. She was riding like a dream today, even with her big horse, even on a tight course.
She was coming up on her only big choice, on the rollback, inside the two huge flower baskets, or outside.
Inside was where you picked up time.
She was sitting on my time. It was one of her many strengths as a rider, the clock she had inside her head when she couldn’t see the screen.
She had Coronado set up perfectly as they made their turn. I thought she had him squared up in time. He might have drifted slightly to the left, the way he did. But it was a left-hand turn.
She still had room to make it.
But at the last moment she played it safe.
Went outside.
Cleared the jump fine. Handled the water like a champ. Finished strong.
Before her score was official, going into the last jump, Gus quietly said, “You got her.”
“Yeah,” I said. My voice sounded weird to me, thick.
She was 30.5.
Still two horses to go. Both got rails. My time had stood up.