Free The Other Half of My Heart by Stephanie Butland Page A

clean,’ he says, ‘and you always do such a good job.’ Tina blushes at the thought of being noticed for her work, but she isn’t really sure what to say. Roddy is looking at her and she realizes that he’s waiting for assent. His closeness makes her world warp a little, at the edges.
    She nods and smiles. ‘Of course,’ she says.
    â€˜Good,’ he says, and smiles back. It feels as though he forgets to look away, or perhaps that’s her imagination. They set to work. Roddy’s favourite mount is a chestnut thoroughbred who is quick to respond and fast over jumps. First Roddy checks his hooves over. The horse lifts his feet automatically when Roddy runs his hand from knee to pastern. Once all four hooves are picked clean, Tina and Roddy take a curry comb each and start rubbing circles from the top of Foxglove’s neck to his chest, shoulders, back, belly, rump and finally haunches. To begin with, Tina slows if she starts to get ahead; she doesn’t want Roddy to think her too casual. But they soon find a rhythm that matches, and by the time Foxglove is groomed with the stiff brush, then the soft, they are working as a single unit, tick and tock. Sometimes they catch each other’s eyes and smile. They talk about nothing except the work in hand, a murmur here and a ‘could you pass’ there.
    Foxglove is a handsome horse. As Tina works she admires the slope of his shoulders, the length of his neck, and the white markings on his lower legs that Fred calls his go-faster stripes. He is almost always the fastest round a course, but in his haste he can be careless. Roddy is keen that he does better this season, and is spending a lot of time with him.
    The horse is wiped down with a cloth, and his eyes and nostrils cleaned, then Roddy takes the mane while Tina takes the tail. As she rakes her fingers through it to separate the tangles before she begins brushing, she catches Roddy looking at her again, but there doesn’t seem to be a reason for it: he doesn’t offer advice, or say anything, he just looks until she looks away.
    â€˜Foxglove likes you,’ he says to her, quietly, as they come out of the loose box, eyes stinging in the bright February sunshine. Ells and Fudge, who have been standing outside, murmur to each other and giggle as they walk off.
    â€˜I like him,’ Tina replies. Roddy nods, as though she’s just confirmed something important, and then he’s off through the stable yard, joking and chatting, and Tina is wondering what just happened, because it felt like more than just grooming a horse. That is as much of a conversation as they have, but it’s enough.
    Over the weeks and months that follow, her name is called more often than all the others, and there is no hope of this going unnoticed. ‘Roddy wants you,’ the others grin, not unkindly, but are still delighted when Tina blushes, her freckles no longer brown, but becoming a pale dapple across her skin as her face reddens. The attention doesn’t last long, though. As the months move, and Roddy has another stellar season, the yard finds other things to gossip about. During the summer, when other riders come for training, she barely sees Roddy at all, or if she does, he’s with at least one of his fellow riders, most often the beautiful Aurora, who can’t seem to be close to Roddy without touching him or leaning against him. He seems always to catch Tina’s eye when he passes. Or maybe she imagines it.
    â€˜It’s funny, your hands are a lot more confident than the rest of you,’ Roddy says one day as he and Tina sit in the tack room. Autumn is here and the yard is getting quieter again with the summer visitors gone. He is cleaning bridles while she is working on a saddle, deftly pulling the straps from their fastenings so that she can make sure that every part is clean, soft, supple, as it should be.
    They so often work in silence that she is a