Crashing into a New Realm
The sound of the steam coming from the radiator is a welcoming one. It reminds me we are no longer moving forward. I look through the spider-webbed windshield at the massive tree filling the view. It’s dimly lit by the headlights which spot light the titanic trunk. I turn off my warped-speed windshield wipers and wonder what kind of tree this is before pain punches into my awareness.
My shoulder throbs and my right thigh has a persisting sharp pain. I reach down and encounter soft fur. “Cody, you alright?”
My Australian Sheppard puts his red freckled nose in my face but the kisses don’t come, only more pain in my thigh. “Jesus Cody! You have the sharpest elbows of any dog… ever!”
I push him off my lap slowly as my passenger moans and movement to my right catches my attention. I ask, “You alright Lyssa?”
Lyssa wasn’t wearing her seat-belt when lightning struck a tree beside the dark, two lane North Florida road and blinded me. She was sound asleep but the first bounce had woke her up. I was dimly aware of her head hitting the ceiling several times as we crashed. “Fuck Morgan! What happened?”
“We crashed, I guess.”
Lyssa, blue ribbon queen of the horse show hunter ring, is rubbing her head and neck slowly, “Well duh!” She motions sharply to the dash of deflated airbags and the huge tree that looms in our view. “Did you fall asleep at the wheel?”
“No, the road just ended. No signs, no barriers, just woods and then this.” I also motion to the dimly lit tree. My hand drops to turn off the engine, only to find that I had already turned it off at some point. Lyssa is barely an acquaintance. She’s only here because I was being nice and agreed to give her and her horse a ride home from the horse show we attended this weekend.
The truck rocks as if someone outside pushes it. My gaze rises to the rear-view mirror but all I see is a shadow of the huge goose-neck horse trailer. “Shit! Horses!” I push on the door to get out it won’t open. I throw my weight into it and pain shoots through my shoulder. The door screams in defiance as it opens and I’m jerked back by my seat-belt. Cody scrambles onto my lap to jump out, “Ow! Cody!” More pain as I undo the seat-belt.
I slip through the barely open door and my boots hit the grass. My hands shake when I pull it through my tangled hair. My gaze takes in the three-horse goose-neck trailer sitting at an odd angle behind my ruined truck. It’s upright and not quite jack knifed due to a large branch from the tree we assaulted as if to cradle the precious cargo inside the trailer.
Lyssa slips out the driver’s side behind me. I’m not waiting on her though. I move toward the doors at back of the trailer while rubbing my painful collarbone and shoulder.
The horses are eerily quiet as I flip on the interior trailer lights. My ‘new to me’ horse trailer is ruined just like my ‘new to me’ Dodge Ram 2500. Neither of which I had any business driving in the middle of the night, in a Florida storm, on a two lane road, towing anyone else’s horses but my own.
My mind flashes the possible carnage that might lie inside and I hesitate before opening the door to verify. Can I handle this? What if they’re bleeding to death in there? What if one is pinned under a divider? What if they’re dead and the movement we felt was the last movement we’ll ever feel from the horses?
I take a deep breath and swing open the door. Figment, my half Andalusian stallion falls out backwards, slamming the door and me aside in his frantic attempts to flee his confines. Of course I do everything you’re not supposed to do when dealing with horses. “Figment! Whoa!” As he falls on his rear I reach to grab a halter that’s not there.
“Whoa!” When has that ever worked in the history of horses? It doesn’t work now as he regains his footing and wheels around in the darkness. I stumble trying to chase him. Chasing a horse never ends with a caught horse, I know this but I give short chase anyway. I say short chase because I’m fat and out of shape.
Ten steps later, I halt and change my shouts from “Whoa!” to “Cody No!” Cue the herd dog instincts. His high pitched barking fades into the darkness as he chases the horse further away. “Fuck!” Can my night get any worse? Never ask the universe this question. The universe will answer with much worse than before.
A whinny pierces the night from inside the trailer stealing my attention. I reluctantly turn from the runaway horse and dog and back to the trailer. Two other horses need me and there is no way in hell I’m losing another animal tonight. The remaining two horses are starting to cause a ruckus now. Hooves on aluminum walls and the sound of the trailer rocking against the large tree branch make me cringe before jumping into motion.
I manage to get Lyssa’s huge gray warm-blood gelding, Herschel, out and pass him off to her. My stomach churns when I see his right front fetlock bleeding. From first glance, it’s only a surface cut but this horse costs more than my truck and trailer combined. I push aside the worry of being sued for ruining a valuable show horse and the self chiding that I wouldn’t be here if I had just told Lyssa that I couldn’t take her and her horse home from the show we were at this weekend.
Another whinny from the trailer gains my attention and I croon to him, “Hey Choco, I got you buddy.” While my show horse Figment, puts distance between us, my heart horse has my full attention right now. He’s a Rocky Mountain Horse and while I’m not into gaited horses, he changed my mind about gaited breeds. I put my hand on his chocolate colored hindquarters as I manhandle the gate that secures him in the trailer.
He turns his head and looks at me. He calms immediately. This super intelligent horse loves me as much as I love him. As I back him out, my gaze travels over his legs and body, and there’s not a scratch on him. Thank God he’s alright. Thank God we don’t have a mangled mess of bloody bodies lying inside this damaged trailer. This could have been so much worse. You hear that universe? I’m not asking what else can go wrong, just giving you my gratitude right now.
