Free Emmerson's Heart by Diana Fisher

it to my lips, I looked over at him out of the side of my eye , making sure he wasn’t going to come after me for eating one. I didn’t think he would, but I didn’t know that my dad would be so angry toward me like he was over little things. Then again, after my mom killed herself, he blamed me. That was why he hated me, according to him. I didn’t remember that at all. I didn’t even remember my mother.
    “I will have to have a talk with that woman. She knows my favorite is sugar cookies.” Shoving the other one in his mouth, he gathered his reins again as his shoulders eased. “If you do come with us, we will be riding over a lot of land. Don’t be afraid to tell me if you need to stop or if something is wrong.”
    “How much is a lot of land?” Managing to take a small bite, I let the flavor explode in my mouth. Will had some cookies in his lunches, but nothing this good. It was heaven. Pure heaven. Riding on the horse and eating a cookie. Others may think that this was nothing, but to me, this was an experience I would dream about when my birthday came along, when I endured the most of my pain.
    “Um….we have about fifteen hundred acres. All this you see is all our land. The Andrews’ land starts way past the creek over on the west end.” As he talked more, I missed a little while savoring the flavor of that fresh baked cookie.  
    Putting the rest of the cookies back into the pocket, I wanted to save one for later. I wanted that taste again before I would have to go home once again to my dad.
    When we had gotten through the start of the woods, I knew what Paul was talking about when he said a steep decline. When the horse started to go down the hill, my heart jumped hard. What would happen if the animal stepped wrong or slipped? What would I do? I didn’t want to do anything to hurt Will’s mom’s horse, but I had no idea what I was doing. Instead, I just watched Paul and how he carried himself in the saddle. He should know how to ride. He was raised on horses.
    Getting to the bottom, I let out my breath as I heard the little chuckle. When we arrived to the fence, I watched him get down as if it were nothing. I could do that. I could….get down myself just as he did. Swinging my leg over the horse’s back, I went down to the ground with my right leg, just as Paul did. When I was there, I pulled my foot out of the stirrup and I went straight down to the ground, hard on my backside that was a little sore from my last disciplinary action. It was two weeks ago, but darn it, if I didn’t feel it now.
    “Emmy!” Paul’s hands scooped under my arms as he helped me back to my feet. Tears rolled down my eyes as I just wanted to cry more. I couldn’t. I had to pull it back in. If Paul found out, either he would tell his parents and I wouldn’t be able to come around anymore or the authorities would be sticking their nose into my dad’s house and I would get it worse. “You should have waited.”
    “I thought…I could…get down…”
    “I know. You’re not used to this yet. You’re going to be sore.” As I watched him draw his bottom lip in through his perfect teeth, my heart stopped. He was upset that I fell. So what. It didn’t hurt. That didn’t hurt. The old bruising I had was what hurt. “Are you okay?”
    Nodding, I waited for him to scream. Here, he was nice enough to let me ride along and now, I had to fall getting down off the horse. I just wanted to show him that I could do it. This weekend was coming up fast and I wanted to spend one weekend not sleeping under the broken steps on the side of the house. I didn’t want to be alone. I didn’t. I didn’t want to sleep under there and spend the daylight trying to hide from others in town.
    “Let’s get this fence fixed and get back to dinner. I have a barn that needs to be cleaned tonight.” Turning back to the horse I rode, he gathered the reins and tied them to the tree. Heading over to his black horse, he unlatched the