I Was Her Everything When We Were Young

I was the culmination of an entire childhood of wistful daydreams.

I was the unattainable wish with every dandelion breeze.

I was the most beautiful creature she'd ever seen.

I was the only thing she'd ever truly wanted.

I was the best birthday surprise ever.

I was her biggest challenge yet.

I was her constant companion.

I was her closest confidant.

I was her crying shoulder.

I was her listening ears.

I was her best teacher.

I was her only friend.

I was her everything.

and then?

I wasn't.

I wasn't anything to her anymore.

I was confused at first. Then I was angry. And then I was just sad. How could she do this to me? To us? Had I done something to hurt her?

I've had a lot of time to think about what terrible things must have gone wrong between us and, in time, I came to realize that nothing did.

She just grew up.

Most of them do, I guess, in time. Horse girls, I mean. They grow up and they lose interest or join the marching band or get jobs or have too many honors classes or not enough money....or they find a boyfriend.

She and I had seen it all over our years together. We even talked about those things from time to time whenever we saw them happening around us. It certainly wasn't a rare occurrence. We horses change hands all of the time.

We get old, we get tired, we get injured, we get sick, and we get more and more expensive. Sometimes we just get outgrown, physically or emotionally, and in the best case scenarios we end up only moving on to fulfill another child's wildest dreams. In the worse case scenarios though, we change hands so many times that no one knows where we end up...or what happens to us in the end.

On the day that my next door neighbor was trailered away forever, she hid in my stall and cried on my shoulder for hours. She brushed my coat and gave me treats and told me that I had nothing to worry about. I nickered at her and nudged her with my warm, fuzzy nose. She promised me that something like that would never happen to me. She promised me that she loved me more than anything. She promised me that I was stuck with her for life.

and, in a way, I guess I am.

It's been 20 years now since the day she gave me away to her friend and nearly 15 years now since the day she heard about my accident.

...nearly 15 years now since the day she heard that I died.

She still keeps this photo of us together on her fireplace mantle and she still cries about me when she remembers the years we spent together back when we were young. Visitors see our picture displayed there beside the pictures of her kids and they ask about me once in a while.

"Oh, yea! Isn't he gorgeous? That's Justin! He was the horse I had back when I was a kid."

She doesn't say, "He was my best friend. He was my first real love. He was my dream come true. He was everything to me when I was young."

But I know the truth. I see her eyes well up when she looks at us together and remembers how happy we were back then.

She still feels guilty, I think? Guilty for the promises she couldn't keep and guilty for the way she couldn't come and say goodbye in the end.

I forgave her long ago though.

All she did was grow up.