Through the Fame and Glory

CLAIM

"That's him?" The blonde haired girl asked as she stood alongside her dad as they watched horses exit the tunnel at Santa Anita for the maiden claiming race for two year olds.

"Yep," her dad replied. "He's quite the looker. You know, Minx is his grandsire. This colt is a Texas born colt, so it's kind of odd that he's running here in California, but maybe his owners just wanna get him started off at a bigger track that Minx broke his maiden at."

The girl nodded. "If I wasn't looking at his pedigree and where he was foaled I could already tell he was born in Texas. He's named after the Dallas Cowboys quarterback Dak Prescott."

Sure enough, the colt was. On his red saddle cloth that was adorned on him, the name Four Dak was visible.

"His owners must really like Dallas," her dad said.

"I mean, they live in Texas," the girl added with a small laugh.

"Now that's the Harper I haven't seen in a while," her dad said with a smile. "Everything going good at school? You haven't seemed yourself recently."

Harper looked down at the ground, toe dragging in the dirt.

Sophomore year was hard for Harper. Everything was fine in her freshman year, but when she got to her sophomore year, students finally started realizing who she was. The daughter of the owners of five of the best horses to ever step foot on a racetrack, Austin Masterson and his wife, Amber.

The horses being Minx, Linx, Midnight Mischief, Dazzle The Moon and American Dream.

Students started realizing that she was starting to get more and more into the racing industry once she turned sixteen right after the start of her sophomore year of high school.

She didn't like to talk about what was going on. The bullying, the constant name calling. But what she didn't want to talk about was they were making her feel like shit to the point where she was struggling with suicidal thoughts. With... self harm.

"It's okay," she replied, fake smile lining her face. "Just trying to get into the groove of sophomore year. It's pretty exhausting right now."

Austin gave her a smile, believing his daughter.

"So, why did you decide to start really showing me the ropes when I turned sixteen?"

Austin walked with her towards their seats where they would be meeting up with Amber. "I started learning at sixteen by my father. He passed down Rxcing Equestrian to me whenever I turned nineteen. He learned at sixteen from his father, who was the first of the family to get into the horse racing business. He believed when he taught my dad that sixteen in a good age to start you out. Not too old, not too young. Sure, there's others who got into in way before, but that's just the way that my grandfather felt."

Harper nodded with a smile as they sat down next to her mom, and horses soon started loading up.

"Hey dad," Harper started. "You think he's got it in him to win? After all, you did tell me he's a grandson on Minx."

Austin looked at his daughter whose face lit up when she mentioned the superstar Triple Crown winner. "I do. I really do. I wouldn't have claimed him for you if I didn't see potential in him. Even though you can't technically own him right now and he had to race under my name and my stables, one day you'll be able to have him under your name. Not sure if you're gonna keep the name Rxcing Equestrian going or start your own stables, but at least you got a horse to call your own."

Harper gave a smile, and then the horses were off. Toby Mays, head trainer, showed up just as the horses went off.

The horses broke really well, except for Four Dak who reared in the gates and got off to a slow start, but started picking his way through horses and finally settled into third.

But that's where he stayed the whole race.

He finished in third, and Toby looked at Austin.

"I can turn him around," he said. "He seemed distracted. But I'll get him to where he needs to be for his next race. Might be a struggle for us since he didn't really react to the gates that well when he reared up, but trust me, I'll get him there."

Harper smiled.

She finally had a horse to call her own.