The ranch was quiet in that pre-dawn way that felt like a held breath. The sky over the foothills was still black, but the air had that thin, cold edge that promised daylight was coming whether I was ready for it or not.
I hadn't slept much.
Again.
Twenty-five years after the accident that took my parents, my body still didn't trust rest. I'd never quite shaken the feeling that sleep was a trap. That if I closed my eyes too long, something would slip in and rewrite my life while I wasn't looking.
Stress was the easy explanation. The ranch. The bookings. Payroll. The endless list of things that could go wrong if I stopped paying attention for even a second.
My therapist, Dr. Carlisle, would call it hypervigilance.
I called it a normal Tuesday.
Boots on. Hair up. Hoodie pulled over a tank top because the ranch didn't care about my feelings and the cold definitely didn't. I grabbed my flashlight even though I knew every board, hinge and squeak by heart.
The short path to the barn was all frozen dirt and my own breath puffing white in the dark. Somewhere in the distance, a coyote yipped, and one of the horses answered with a snort like,I heard that. Don't even try it.
When I pushed the door open, warmth hit my face. Hay, horse and leather, and the faint sweet tang of grain. The only place that ever made my shoulders drop without permission.
"Morning," I whispered, not because anyone needed it, but because the barn liked to be greeted as if it was a living thing.
A soft chorus answered with shifts in the stalls, the gentle creak of bodies settling. A couple of nickers. One offended squeal from a mare who thought the entire world should revolve around her breakfast schedule.
"Yeah, yeah," I murmured. "I'm here."
I went straight to Starlight's stall, a bay mare with a white blaze and a dramatic streak that could power a small city. The kind of horse people fell in love with because she was beautiful and then regretted it because she was also convinced she was smarter than everyone.
She poked her head over the stall door as soon as she saw me, ears forward, eyes bright, like she had opinions about my punctuality.
"Hi," I said, softer. "How are we feeling today?"
She blew a warm breath at my face and tried to nibble my hoodie string.
"Don't," I warned, but I was already smiling.
The abscess had been on her front hoof. The kind of thing that could turn into a nightmare if you ignored it. I'd been soaking and wrapping and checking it repeatedly. Horses were fragile in the most unfair ways. They could survive storms and predators and dumb teenagers. They could also go lame because of an infection the size of a pencil eraser.
Starlight swung her head toward my shoulder the second I unlatched the stall, demanding attention in the most affectionate, manipulative way possible.
"In a minute," I told her. "Let me see."
I crouched and ran my fingers down her leg, feeling for heat. Her skin was warm under my palm, but not hot. Good. Her hoof rested heavy on my knee as I worked the wrap loose, ignoring the fact that she was a thousand pounds of creature and could make me regret existing if she felt like it.
The wrap came off clean. The hoof looked… better. Less swelling. Less tenderness when I pressed gently along the sole.
"Okay," I whispered, relief slipping through me like a quiet victory. "You're healing."
Starlight flicked an ear, as if to say,Obviously. I'm fabulous.
Cleaning the area, repacking and rewrapping. The motions soothed me in a way I didn't want to admit.
It didn't fix everything.
But it fixed this.
When I finished, Cassiopeia was watching from her stall. My first horse. The foundation of everything.
Patrick had bought her for me when I was fifteen because he'd read somewhere that horses helped with anxiety, and he was right, though not in the way he expected. When I got her, she was a three-year-old chestnut mare, half-wild, full of energy and a stubborn streak that matched what the family gently called my "strong will." Six months I'd spent earning Cassie's trust. Patient. Repetitive. Showing up every single day until she decided I was worth believing in.
