Summer Rider Read Free

he’s made some pretty odd comments lately …”
    Lisa’s attention drifted back to her own thoughts. Carole might think Barry was the busiest guy around, but Lisa was sure that his schedule had nothing on her own. She poked her fork at her salad, feeling her stomach knot as she thought about everything she had to do before the end of camp. In addition to working her way through her reading list, she would have to spend a lot of time with Major practicing for the big show. There was a lot to do, and for a second Lisa wasn’t sure she was going to be able to do it all. It was just too much. Then she remembered Piper.
    Piper Sullivan had been Lisa’s cabin mate for the first week and a half of camp. She was a tall, thin, pretty girl a couple years older than Lisa. Besides being a fantastic rider, Piper was a top student at an exclusive school and an accomplished dancer. And she made it all seem effortless, as though being perfect came naturally to her. More than anything, Lisa wanted to be exactly like that. She had always tried to do her best in everything she did. Thatwas why she got straight As in school and why she had progressed so fast in her riding.
    But lately everything Lisa had worked so hard for seemed in danger of slipping away. For the first time, she had received a less-than-perfect mark on her report card—a B+ in math. And these days it seemed she was always being reminded that as far as she had come in her riding, she still wasn’t as good as Carole and Stevie. It was true that they had both been riding years longer than Lisa, but that didn’t make it any easier to hear how good they were. Even worse, people usually went on to say how much Lisa was improving—implying that she still had a long way to go before she could hope to catch up to her friends. She had never been second-best at anything in her life, and she didn’t particularly like the feeling now.
    Piper never had to worry about things like that. What’s more, she had seemed to understand Lisa’s need to succeed, because she had the same need herself. Knowing that, and seeing how perfect Piper was, had been an inspiration to Lisa. She wished Piper were there now. But Piper had disappeared the week before without a word of explanation. All Barry would say was that she had been called away for personal reasons.
    By this time, the conversation at the table had turned to the upcoming show. Lisa heard the words
blue ribbon
and started to listen.
    Todd was grinning at Stevie. “Well?” he said expectantly.“What do you think? Will Phil win the blue ribbon in dressage, or will I?”
    “Yeah, come on, Stevie,” Phil urged. “Who’s your pick, me or Todd?”
    Stevie just shrugged and took a bite of her tuna salad sandwich. Dressage was her favorite event, and she and Belle were good at it. Phil and Todd knew that, and they knew she wanted that blue ribbon. They were just trying to get her goat, and Stevie wasn’t going to give them the satisfaction. “I don’t know about that,” she said calmly once she had chewed and swallowed. “What I’m wondering is who’s going to win the show-jumping event.”
    Carole’s eyes lit up. “Me too,” she said eagerly. “I still can’t believe we’re actually going to have the chance to be in it.” In show jumping, the competitors had to jump a course of fences within a set amount of time. Unlike hunter jumpers, show jumpers didn’t have to show perfect form or an even stride to score well. All they had to do was clear the fences any way they could. Nobody at the table had ever competed in a show-jumping event before, and everyone was sure it would be the highlight of the show.
    “I know the answer to your question, Stevie,” Todd said with a glance at Phil. “Barry will have to award
two
blue ribbons—one for me and one for Phil.”
    Carole laughed. “You know that’s impossible,” she said. “There’s no such thing as a tie in show jumping.” That was because all ties in the first