Fact or Fiction - 25

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Yesterday's story Here was...

ALL TRUE

I was an absolute nightmare. I really can't imagine how Trev had the patience to put up with me sometimes, but I'm glad he did (and still does).

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Today’s Fact or Fiction comes to you from my childhood (again).

I hated housework (nothing much has changed over the passage of time) and in the summer holidays, I would get up early, sometimes have breakfast and then off I’d go on my own adventure.

By the time I was hungry enough to make my way home, either the housework was done or it had been forgotten about – or my mother had gone to work.

I wandered far and wide on my solo adventures and met lots of ponies – I made a bee-line for ponies whenever I could. There were two lots of ponies if I went in one direction and any number if I went in other directions. I usually made my way to the wild, unbroken ponies because I could hop on their back without being seen.

The other horses, two fields away from the wild ponies were better-bred – at least some thoroughbred blood in one and the other may have been an Arabian. It took a number of visits for them to become at ease with my presence and longer still to make friends with them so they greeted me when they saw me.

One day, I made my way to the horses I’d made friends with. They lived a few fields distance away from my home and their field was attached to their humans’ home.

Their field was huge, with plenty of shelter, including a copse of trees that shielded them from wind and rain very well.

I got on well with these two horses, but I’d so far managed to keep away from their owners – I wasn’t sure how they’d react to a scruffy kid hanging around their beautiful pets.

On this day, I went to visit them and they didn’t greet me like they usually did. They stood all forlorn and quiet. Heads down, but not eating. I shouted to them even though I never knew their ‘official’ names.

They didn’t even look up. Something was seriously wrong. They’d never ignored me like that.

I ran across the field towards them.

I instantly knew something was wrong. As I got a little closer, I could see the problem. They’d hurt themselves. They were both bleeding quite badly and I was extremely worried – on the verge of panic.

I knew exactly what to do. I veered off away from them and went to their owner’s house and knocked on the door.

A tall blonde man came to the door and I got a little flustered. The adrenaline had worn off a little and I was no longer running on pure instinct. I now had to explain myself.

“The horses in the field behind your house, they’re yours, aren’t they?”

“Yes,” he said.

I could tell he was curious as to where the conversation was going.

“They’re injured, there’s something wrong. I was worried so I thought I’d best come and tell you. There’s blood…” I blustered and finally managed to say.

“Yes, we know,” the man’s wife joined him at the door. She was just lovely. She smiled at me as she spoke, but I could tell there was something that was amusing her – even though her beautiful horses were seriously hurt.

“You know?” I said, bewildered that they were so calm.

“Yes, the vet has been this morning. We had them castrated,” she said.

Hence the blood… and the lack of interest in anything including food and me.

Well, I kind of stammered and stuttered my apologies and I left. I went back home via the field where the other ponies lived because I thought it best to leave the others alone as they recovered.

Naïve? Me? Yep.

One good thing, however…

If the owners saw me in the field with their horses from then on, they waved. I guess they knew that I had their pets’ best interests at heart and I wasn’t a worry.

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Truth? Fiction? A little bit of both?

Let me know what you think in the comments.