MSRA ⇢ Starting New

⇢ 4 ; gossip

"I thought you were majoring in dressage," I said to Noah as he rode next to me to our dressage ring.

"Show jumping," he said. "Dressage isn't really my thing."

Just then, Bridget rode up next to me on Scarlett. "Hey Kat."

"Hey," I said. This dressage class only had six people in it, Me, Noah, Bridget, Abby, Ethan, and Amelia. All my friends.

"Hello class," our instructor said, giving us a wide smile. "I'm Mason, your new dressage instructor. This class will build your foundation for all your other classes. Without dressage, you would all be very crappy riders. And before you say 'dressage is boring', dressage has gotten you to where you are today."

"Is that Mason..." I asked Bridget.

"Yep," she replied.

"Is there an issue?" Mason asked, looking over at us.

"Not at all," I said, shaking my head.

"Good," he said. "Everyone take your stirrups off."

I internally groaned and leaned down to pull my leathers off. I hung them together on a fence post and waited for our next instructions.

-

"That," I said, getting my stirrups back on, "was miserable."

"I think my legs are about to fall off," Abby said, pulling Mojo away from Hope.

"Good luck in your next class, everybody," Mason said before turning away and heading back into one of the barns.

"Damn, what's his issue," Noah asked, rubbing his thigh out. "He's acting like we're the ones that almost killed his girlfriend."

"Did they ever get back in touch?" Amelia asked.

"I have no clue," I said. "Probably not by the way he's acting."

"Great," Bridge groaned. "We'll have to deal with his moody guy hormones all year."

"Oh, suck it up," Ethan said. "Have you guys never had a mean trainer?"

"I had worse," I said. "My mom was my trainer."

"Oh, yeah that's bad," Noah said. "All they talk about is how bad your eq is."

"This is true," I laughed. Abby and I headed to our next class, show jumping. My legs are burning and Hope is beyond sweaty, but we keep pushing through.

-

By the end of show jumping, I thought I was going to pass out. I was hot, tired, and my whole body ached.

"Don't forget to hose off your horses, refill their waters, and give them plenty of hay!" my show jumping teacher yelled after us as we left class. Hope and I lazily headed back to Acacia barn, where the rest of the sophomores in the school were getting their horses situated. Oh yeah, I found out during Geometry today that the dorms and barns were split between the four houses. Acacia happened to be the sophomore house.

Instead of waiting for a cross tie to get free, I just brought Hope into her stall and tied her up in there, quickly removing her tack so I could hose her off outside. After making sure I got all the sweat off, I quickly squeegeed her off and brought her back inside, filling her water to the top and tossing her an extra flake of hay. I also stretched her legs out and gave her back a much needed massage.

By five, I was completely done everything, and was able to head back to the dorm to take a long shower and finish my Geometry and Biology homework, along with read a few pages for English. I finished at six-thirty, then headed over to the Student Support center to get some pasta salad for dinner. By the time I got back to the dorm it was almost seven-thirty, and I found Bridget, Noah, Ethan, and Abby sitting in the Acacia lounge doing homework. I sat on the only empty couch and lied down all the way across it