and shook her so she squawked and flapped. The horse’s hide went tight and she complained, but kept moving very slowly toward the hen. Addie leaned low, whispering. I knew what the horse felt, that sweet harmonic blossoming through her bones.
If Cole sensed anything unusual beyond the ruckus of the chicken, he gave no sign. He held the angry hen at arm’s length. His eyes followed Addie intently, ignoring me, ignoring the chicken shit on his sleeve. I saw the admiration on his face and wanted to say, “She’s cheating, she has something you don’t know about.” But all I got out was his name.
He turned, the excitement still on his face, then it changed. It wasn’t the usual guarded expression he’d had since I’d stopped sleeping with him, but there was still a small hesitancy. Part of me wanted him to look at me with the same admiration. But I was happy to see them working together, excited about what they were doing. He tucked the chicken back up under his arm, held his hand out for the coffee, and mouthed the words “thank you” with such a broad smile that I felt forgiven for whatever potential future I might have taken from us. He raised the cup high in a toast.
Within a couple of days, the horse could pass the chicken without hesitation even as it bobbed furiously in Cole’s hands. Getting the mare to take the plow harness went easily after that.
When the old farmer returned, Addie asked him to wait in the yard. She rode the horse out of the barn and Cole brought out a hen, which he handed to her. She rode the horse around the barn, past the chicken coop to the corral, holding the clucking hen in her arms. The farmer jogged behind them, shaking his head.
When they got to the corral, Addie signaled the old man to follow them in as she dismounted. “She’s going to have to trust you as much as she trusts me. Last she knew, you were the one who whipped her. You can’t whip her again. Ever again. Now she needs to know something of you that is not the whipping.”
The old man nodded and wiped his eyes. “That chicken next to her. Good Lord, that was a beautiful thing.”
Addie led him to the mare. She reached for his hands. The old man obviously wasn’t used to young women holding his hands. His arms stiffened and he stepped back.
I couldn’t hear what she said to him, but he let Addie take his hands again and they slowly circled the horse, touching her all over. Then they walked away together, letting the horse follow them to the chicken coop. The farmer spit his tobacco juice and cackled.
Addie and the farmer took short turns plowing. The mare pulled steady and straight. The poor hens released in her path fluttered to the ground and strutted in confused circles.
The old farmer bought his feed at Rayburn’s feed store downtown, and the story of his ornery, chicken-scared mare and Addie’s “cure” spread fast.
A few weeks later, a bright new truck pulled up, hauling one of the fanciest horse trailers I’d ever seen. A big girl wearing an English riding outfit that probably cost more than a year’s groceries for us tumbled out of the driver’s seat and told us she was from Charlotte. I don’t know how she’d heard of us or found us.
“My daddy gave me this horse, but I can’t ride him. He won’t let me,” she announced. “I’ll pay you. A hundred if you can get him so I can ride him and show my daddy when he gets back.”
I sucked in my breath. A hundred dollars was an enormous sum then.
Addie went to the horse and stroked his neck. She let him mouth her hand inquisitively as the girl watched, keeping her distance. “Two.” Addie held up two fingers. “I have a partner and I’ll need his help on this. One hundred dollars now and one hundred when you can ride out of that corral, happy and easy, on this fellow.” The girl nodded and took out her wallet.
I was in shock. We were in business.
It turned out that the problem was the girl, not the horse. Her father loved horses. She wanted to please him, but she was terrified of them. We boarded the horse while the girl’s father was out of town. Cole and Addie required that she come several times a week to feed