Kate Lattey Quotes

I’d looked around my room at the ribbons and sashes and rosettes hanging from the walls, at the photos of my ponies clearing the highest fences with me crouched in the saddle, a look of utter determination on my face. I’d made myself look hard at the pictures, at my legs swinging backwards over the fences, at my body lying low over my pony’s neck, my hands grasping at the reins as I turned them in mid-air. At the way that Teddy’s eyes were bulging as I pulled him around a tight turn, at the way the veins popped out on Buck’s lathered neck, at Springbok’s open mouth, dripping with foam. I’d looked hard at them all, and I hadn’t liked what I’d seen.

The pony is mad. She can go from a relaxed walk to a flat out gallop in seconds if something spooks her, and she won’t stop until she practically crashes into something. I’ve seen her buck, rear and spin around in circles. She’s completely unpredictable and I don’t even trust her on the ground. As far as I’m concerned, Alec’s welcome to her, and he relishes the challenge. For some reason, he loves that pony most of all. Perhaps it’s because no-one else would give her a chance, that they’d written her off as crazy, mean, dangerous. Alec admires her independent spirit, I think, and maybe he likes that she still has that strength of spirit, that she still challenges him every time he rides her. He can’t completely dominate her, and he doesn’t try. He wants a partnership with her. And slowly, slowly, his father is taking that away from him, bullying the mare and his son at the same time, seeking to fit them into the same mould, the only one he knows. The strong succeed while the weak fall behind.

Because that saying about sticks and stones is a pack of lies. Unkind words hurt more than anything else. You end up carrying them around in your head, wondering if they’re true. Bruises fade, but self-doubt follows you forever.

The future hovered in front of her, and she rode Cruise towards it, her hands steady on the reins and her head among the clouds.

I clung to the dream like a lifeline, the only thing worth keeping going for. That was why I had agreed to come here. I'd always said I would sell my soul for a pony of my own.

Everyone's pain is relative. We've learned how to deal with grief, because we've had to. But Bree hasn't. And our grief was shared, because we all felt it at the same time. She had to deal with hers alone.

Goodbye," she told him, running her hand across his broad back one last time. "I love you. And I'll never, ever stop missing you.

I think you're wrong.""Well I think you're naive," Hayley snapped."Maybe," Marley conceded, starting to walk away. "But I'd rather be that than a bully like you.