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Twice every year, Cara Alverez fell apart. First, on the day of her sweet little boy's birthday. Second, on the anniversary of his death. Today happened to be the latter.
Crying constantly since early morning and not fit company for anyone, she had kept to herself, shunning well-meaning, but ineffectual platitudes. After seven hours of hard work on one task or another, her chores were done. One problem remained. Her watch read 2:17 p.m. Far too much time left in the day to fill
and survive.
Dabbing at her damp eyes with a wadded-up tissue, Cara wandered to the horse stable. Yesterday, in preparation for this moment, she'd moved Hurry Up from the mustang sanctuary to a stall for the night.
The small gelding, with his mousy brown coat, Roman nose and stubby legs, was perhaps the homeliest horse Cara had ever seen. He was also the slowest, hence the name. But all that mattered little because Hurry Up had the disposition of a kitten and an eagerness to please. Of the over two hundred head of abandoned and rescued mustangs residing at the sanctuary, Hurry Up displayed the most potential for an excellent child's mount.
Had Cara's son, Javier, lived, he'd have been four, almost five. The perfect age for his first horse.
Fresh tears threatened to flow, but Cara kept them at bay. Barely. Removing a halter from the row hanging outside the tack room, she walked to the stall where Hurry Up waited. Patiently, of course, as was his nature.
"Hola, chiquito. Ready for a workout?"
The gelding nuzzled her affectionately while she buckled the halter.
"Wait, wait," she said, pretending to scold him. "We'll get there."
"There," in this case, was a small corral adjacent to the round pen where Cara planned to exercise Hurry Up and maybe reinforce a lesson or two.
Dos Estrellas was a cattle ranch currently running over two thousand cows, calves and young steer. The mustang sanctuary occupied sections six and seven of the ranch, about five hundred acres. The late owner, August Dempsey, had bequeathed the land to Cara for her exclusive use.
August had been under no obligation to name Cara in his will, though he'd loved her like a daughter and she him like a father. But he had named her. The sanctuary, with its neglected and sometimes abused mustangs, was what gave Cara a reason to rise every morning and step outside her room when she'd rather remain buried beneath the covers.
Saddled and bridled, Hurry Up looked a little less ugly. He waited stoically at the gate for her to open it, then stood while she mounted. After several laps at a leisurely walk, she nudged the horse into a trot and circled the corral. Eventually, they practiced reining. Hurry Up executed perfect figure eights and zigzags.
"Come on, chiquito." Cara attempted to coax the horse into a lope, to no avail. Hurry Up had exactly three speeds: slow, slower and slowest.
On the plus side, there was never any danger of him running away or bucking. The only way a rider could fall off this plug was to misjudge the distance while dismounting.
Her son, Javier, had been fearless and wouldn't have thought twice about leaping from a horse's back. Had he been a tiny bit more timid, he might not have
have climbed up the shelving unit and
Cara promptly burst into tears. This time, there was no stopping them.
A cold January breeze, originating in the nearby McDowell Mountains, chased through Mustang Valley and across Dos Estrellas, drying Cara's cheeks almost the moment they were wet. Hurry Up stumbledprobably because he was getting mixed signals from his riderthen quit moving altogether.