Invincible
By: Hanna G.


Bridge End Farm is located in northern New York, near the boarder of Vermont. It’s in the horse country and about the only English riding barn around the town and some surrounding areas. Darren and Jo Smart, two of New York’s wealthiest horse owners in the state, own the hunter-jumper farm. Living with them is their niece, Alyssa Smart. She’s twelve-years-old, a wonderful rider and a nice girl. Although she’s been through a lot, she still has the courage to move on. Then, her headstrong horse qualifies for the National Hunters End-Of-The-Year Show. Slightly afraid, Alyssa takes on the challenge, which tests the real strength in her and her power to handle the horse.

Chapter One:

“Mouse! Get down here! You’re going to be late!”
        Twelve-year-old Alyssa Smart barely heard her aunt as she blared “My Immortal” on her radio. She quickly hit the power button and the music instantly stopped playing. She grabbed her backpack and flung open her door, sending it back too quickly and it banged on her wall. She winced and ran down the hall, pausing at the stairs to glance out the window and look down on her light gray Thoroughbred gelding, Hero. She smiled as she saw him trotting around his green pasture.
        “Alyssa!” Josephine Smart, the child’s aunt, yelled in her warning tone. “Now!”
        Alyssa quickly ran down the stairs and skidded to a stop in front of her aunt, who was waiting by the door.
        “Would you like to be late for your first day of school?” Jo asked her niece as she swung open the door and walked out.
        Alyssa nodded. “Yes, very much so,” she replied to her aunt. She turned and slammed the door shut.
        Jo smiled and laughed. “I don’t make the rules,” she said. “That law does.” She started to walk down the long porch.
        Alyssa jogged to catch up with her aunt. “But we can be late,” she protested.
        Jo glanced at Alyssa and frowned. “Sorry, hon,” she said as they descended the steps and walked to the car. “It’s only for seven hours. Get in the car and go.”
        “Yeah, seven hours that I could be riding!” Alyssa retorted as she slid into the car’s leather interior. She folded her arms across her chest and stared hard at the seat in front of her.
        “Oh, stop, Alyssa,” Jo warned her niece as she turned the car around and drove out of the driveway. “Only three days this week; I think you’ll live.”
        “I don’t think I will,” Alyssa mumbled. Then, she said louder, “I don’t even have any friends! No one will like me. They’ll think I’m a stuck-up snob, Aunt Jo.”
        Jo shook her head. “No, they won’t, sweetie,” Jo assured her niece. “I promise. My best friend’s daughter is in your grade and she’s a doll. She can’t wait to meet you.”
        Alyssa shrugged. “So?” she asked. “Can’t I get home schooled?”
        Jo sighed. “I’ll talk to your uncle today,” she replied softly. “As long as you do something for me.”
        “What’s that?”
        “Invite Marissa, my friend’s daughter, over for a lesson today and then you two can hit the trails.”
        Alyssa thought for a moment and then nodded. “Deal!”


        “So, do you have a horse?” Marissa Anderson asked Alyssa as the girls made their way through the crowded hallways of the middle school. School had finally let out after the seven hours and Marissa has agreed to go home with Alyssa.
        Alyssa nodded. “Yeah,” she replied. “Hero, an eight-year-old light gray Thoroughbred. His show name is Among The Heroes. He was breed to be a stallion, but he was too hard to handle so they geld him. And then he was going to race, but he wouldn’t settle down and get into it. So, they sold him and my aunt and uncle bought him and then gave him to me.”
        Marissa smiled. “I was beginning to wonder what happened to him,” she replied. “I used to ride him at my lessons.”
        “Who do you ride now?” Alyssa wondered.
        Marissa grinned. “I have my own horse,” she told Alyssa. “She’s a colored Warmblood mare. Her sire is Painted Rugged Lark. She’s ten and her name is Majesty, but I call her Magic.”
        “She sounds awesome.” Alyssa smiled. “I think I remember seeing a painted horse in one of the stalls.”
        Marissa nodded. “Yeah, I was coming over for a lesson that day, so Jo brought her in for me. Magic stays outside for most of the day.”
        “So does Hero. He loves it, too. And, he doesn’t get rain rot and his hooves are much stronger than the horses that are kept in twenty-four/seven.”
        Marissa nodded her agreement. “I brought Magic to a clinic once and she was kept up in her stall and she was kind of hard to ride, you know?”
        Alyssa bobbed her head. “Yeah. Hero hates being cooped up, but if he has to, he deals with it.” She looked out at the cars as the girls left the school building. She spotted her aunt’s black Mustang. She began to walk in that direction and Marissa followed. Alyssa slid in the front seat and Marissa in the back.
        “Hi, Ris,” Jo said to the other girl after greeting her niece.
        “Hey,” Marissa replied. “Are you dropping me off at my house so I can get some proper clothes on?”
        Jo nodded and started the car. She waited until it was safe to go and then sped off towards Marissa’s house, fifteen minutes away from the school. When they reached the large Victorian house, Jo slowed the car and Marissa jumped out. She ran to her house and quickly gathered her things, making a fast trip back down to the car.
        “Thanks for letting me have a double lesson this week,” Marissa said to Jo as they cruised down the road that Bridge End was located on.
        Jo smiled. “No problem,” she replied. “I get to work you twice as hard and tease you twice as much! What could be better?”
        Marissa laughed and shook her head. “Always thinking,” she commented.
        “Well, you hafta say two steps ahead of you, you know.”
        Alyssa leaned back in the seat and stared out the window, thinking and listening to bits and pieces of Jo and Marissa throw jokes and such back and forth. She started to think how fun it was to joke … and how it felt. But, lately for the past two years, going on three, she hadn’t felt like joking much, or talking for that matter. It still hadn’t fazed her that in exactly one week and one day would mark the three-year anniversary of her parents’ death. She winced at the thought and sighed. Life was sure different without, spending most of the past two years with her grandparents in Washington State and then transferring over to her aunt and uncle’s farm that summer.
        “Hey, Mouse, what’s wrong?” a soft, quiet voice asked.
        Alyssa looked over to her left and saw her aunt studying her with a worried face. The young girl shook her head. “Nothing,” she fibbed. “Just tired, I guess. School tires you out, you know.” She plastered a fake grin on her face, although that made her aunt smile back.
        “Okay,” Jo said. “Just making sure you were alright.”
        Yeah, I’m okay, Aunt Jo, Alyssa thought, turning her head and rolling her eyes. My parents’ death date is coming up in a week, that’s all. Not like you’re s’posed to remember or care.       
They finally reached the farm and Alyssa jumped out of the car and fled into the house, charging to he room. She slammed her door, threw her backpack aside and jumped on her bed, belly down. She buried her head in one of her pillows and squeezed her eyes shut, making sure no tears escaped her ice blue eyes.
        Get ahold of yourself, Smart, she scolded herself mentally. Just move on like you have these past two years!
        Alyssa finally rolled off her bed and grabbed her riding clothes. She put on the black breeches and her “Happy Tails” T-shirt. She picked up her helmet after putting on her boots and headed out the door, grabbing her apple treats as she did. She skipped down the stairs and did so all the way down to the barn. When she reached the big barn, she put a smile on her face and entered the barn. She walked down the aisle and placed her things near the tack room. She entered and grabbed a rope halter, which she had made for Hero. She had chosen the colors light sky blue and light yellow for the gelding. She then walked out of the barn and past the house to Hero’s paddock.
        “Hey, buddy,” Alyssa greeted the Thoroughbred happily as she slipped on the halter. Hero grunted and looked at her. She smiled back and fed him the treats she had in her hand. He greedily chomped on them and then she walked him back to the barn.
        “Your aunt says to hurry up.”
        Alyssa glanced over her shoulder at the voice as she did the girth. “Hi, Uncle Darren,” she said. “Tell her to start without me. I’ll be there in a few.”
        Darren nodded and retreated from the barn. As Alyssa pulled the girth up higher, Hero pinned his ears and kicked out. As he did so, he craned his neck around and sank his teeth into Alyssa’s side. Alyssa yelped and jumped back. Hero stared at her, his ears pinned. The light-brown haired girl held her side for a while until the pain stopped. She bit her lip and quickly did the girth once again, being cautious this time.
        “How nice of you to join us,” Jo teased Alyssa as her niece entered the outdoor ring.
        Alyssa scowled and brought down her stirrups.
        “What’s wrong, Mouse?” Jo asked Alyssa, walking over to her.
        “Hero bit me,” she replied flatly as she checked the girth.
        “Why?”
        “Because of his girth.”
        Jo studied the horse. “He’s never done it before?”
        Alyssa shook her head. “Never even pinned his ears before.”
        “Hmm.” Jo studied Hero for several seconds while her lesson trotted around the ring. “Well, get on and we’ll see how he acts.”
        Alyssa nodded and Jo gave her a leg-up. She placed her feet in the stirrups and collected one of her reins. Jo moved back into the center of the ring and Alyssa bent her horse both ways, releasing when Hero released his pressure. She patted his neck and sent him off at a walk. She then picked up one rein and bent his head around and moved his hindquarters. She did the same with the other side and then did the front legs. Finally, she joined the rest of the trotting group.
        “Half seat!” Jo called out as the group broke into a canter.
        Alyssa stood in her stirrups and grabbed some of Hero’s mane. Hero flicked his ears back and Alyssa rubbed his neck with her fist that held the reins. Hero rounded the bend, rounding his body as he did so, and then cantered down the straight.

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hope you enjoyed!

Just remember in the winter
Far beneath the bitter snow
Lies the seed
That with the sun's love, in the spring
Becomes the rose

Sunbeam

More than just a pretty face

Sunbeam

Sunbeam