Gold Secret - Short story

Instructions

tw for whole thing :: animal abuse, implied child ab5$e ;; I decided to try writing a short story, and I decided to do one written from a horse's perspective. anyways, now for the actual story! ;; There are a lot of things I remember. Winning, for one. Racing. My name being called out as I streaked like a comet to the finish line, lengths away from the other horses. "Gold Secret!" they would shout. Racing was all I ever knew. And then I started losing. No one knew why. Except for me. I had simply lost my passion for it. But my owner didn't care. He kept racing me until I lose on purpose, and then I was beaten and forced to race till I went lame, and then I was sold. Again, and again. No one wanted me. After what felt like a lifetime of passing from owner to owner, I was sold to a man. I only saw him once, for once he saw I was lame and tired, he didn't bother with me. He trapped me in a stall for months on end. Months. Coming only to change my food and water very little. I became wild, a shadow of my former self. I never wanted to see a human again. Finally, I was taken. Forced into a horse trailer and placed in a wide, open pasture. I resolved to never, /ever/ let a human touch me, saddle me, or even pet me. I was as wild as I had been in the stall, only now I could run. The only times humans managed to control me was for the vet, who I liked. But humans as a whole were terrible-or at least I thought they were. Then came the girl. Her name was Grace. She was small, and had long blond hair, green eyes, and light skin. With humans, I never heard her say a word for the longest time, but with us horses? With Cider, Bloom, Rainbow, [my pasture-mates, who I preferred to stay away from] and me-she called me Secret- she talked to us and sung to us, telling us her secrets and fears. She had been recently adopted and didn't tell us much about her past at first. My pasture-mates loved her, and at the beginning, I didn't-but I listened to her sing from afar, pretending to graze. Then one day, when the trio-Cider, Rainbow, and Bloom-were far away grazing, I heard her talking. Saying things. Things about her past-terrible things. I knew what being hurt felt like. And so, I trotted up to her. The two of us were eye level with each other. She slowly reached out a hand. I didn't move. She started to pet my chestnut fur. I didn't move. I let her touch me. I let a human touch me for the first time in a year, besides the vet [who didn't really count]. Grace's adoptive mother, Jenna, had seen all of this from the porch. She slowly walked up to Grace. "Secret Gold let you touch her?" she asked incredulously. Grace nodded. "Yes." From that day on, I was tame again. Mostly. I never let myself be ridden again, though. Or that's what most thought. Sometimes Grace hopped up on my back and I carried her around the pasture, but that can be our secret. ;;