Matt & Zoe Read Free

hundred pictures of Jasmine riding horses, including Mom’s giant Shire horse Mono. At 18 hands high, Mono looks fearsome, but he’s a gentle giant. The name was Mom’s little joke. He’s called Mono because he was sick for most of first year after Mom bought him. Mom said it was because he wasn’t getting decent nutrition, she got him from a divorcing couple in Hadley. When I was home on leave the summer after she bought him, her eyes were glassy with tears when she talked about the condition he’d been in. The first two months she’d had him, he had thrush in two of his hooves—from standing around in a soggy and filthy stall.
    Mom’s Facebook page displays hundreds of photos of Jasmine with the horses, and especially riding Mono. She’d ridden him during the Memorial Day parade this year, a tiny girl on top of a giant horse.
    As we approach the stable, I hear the horses nickering through the open stable door. A deep voice croons something to the horses. Who is it?
    “Stay back.” Jasmine ignores my order—instead, she runs for the door and into the stable. I’m right behind her, but I come to an instant stop as I walk in the door.
    It’s Paul Armstrong, owner of the adjacent horse farm that runs behind the line of homes on College Street for a solid half mile from here. I haven’t seen him since my senior year in high school. He’s somewhere in his late thirties, I think, or maybe a very young forty. As always, he has red skin and ruddy cheeks from working outdoors. Paul and my Mom have always been rivals, but friendly rivals. Right now he’s chatting with Mono as he brushes him. Mono looks restless, and when he sees Jasmine he lets out a loud whinny.
    Jasmine runs straight to him and without hesitation slips between the slats of the stall. My chest tightens with immediate tension—Mono was Mom’s favorite, and I know Jasmine rides him all the time. Still—he’s enormous. His black fur glistens from the light streaming in the door of the stable, and his hooves stamp at the ground, raising clouds of dust. Jasmine doesn’t hesitate, climbing up the slats to sit on the top rail. Mono nuzzles his face against her and she wraps her arms around his head.
    Paul grins. “He adores her. Welcome home, Zoe.”
    I nod. I’m not discourteous, just unsure why he is here. “Thanks. I didn’t expect to be here.”
    “I’m so sorry about your Mom and Dad. I’ve been coming over here to keep an eye on the horses when I could—I was hoping you’d be back soon. Are you home on leave? How long are you staying?”
    That was a lot of words all at once. I open my mouth, unsure of myself.
    “I’m sorry, honey,” he says. He moves straight to me and wraps his arms around me. I stiffen at first—who the hell does he think he is? Then I almost collapse inside. The tension in my muscles slips away as if it had never been there.
    “I think I’m here for good,” I whisper. “I’m out of the Army.”
    “Ahhhh,” he whispers. “So you’ll be taking care of Jasmine.”
    “Yes.”
    “That’s good,” he says. “That’s good. I didn’t know if she was with relatives or a foster home or what. I just knew no one was feeding the horses.”
    “Do you have time to be over here feeding Mom’s horses? What about your teams?” Paul’s horses often win national prizes in shows around the country.
    He releases me and waves a hand in dismissal. “Husband’s covering for me.”
    My eyes widen. “You’re married now? When did that happen?”
    He says, “Four years ago, honey. Blake quit his job two years ago to work with me.”
    I smile.
    Then I remember that four years ago I was in Iskandiriyah. I missed a lot of what was going on back home then. “I’m so happy, I just didn’t realize.”
    “It’s all right.” I will say this: he looks happy, and that’s a change. I remember seeing him at competitions on the circuit the summer before my senior year in high school—when Mom and I were arguing all the