It was a gold day. One of those summer-heat days where the blistering sun comes to close to the earth and fills the air with sweat. The musty stink of lathered horseflesh mixed with human sweat was everywhere. Wild, beautiful blue clashed with gold-green where sky met the tall grass that hummed with insect song. For me, it was an aching day, as I wheeled Aztec, my horse, around for another go at the jump, hands raw on the reins, legs burning and trembling and begging for stirrups.

Riding bareback, a horse is slippery and fluid, another creature than when under saddle, something with no bounds. Every muscle taut, I tried to relearn the suddenly alien stride of the canter as we hurtled towards the fence. Aztec’s breath roared in and out of his lungs. Every hoofbeat was a muffled drumbeat that reverberated into me like an earthquake. Jarring and shaking my feeble balance, my hands clutched too hard on the reins, tearing on the bit in his mouth. All too soon we were there, at the fence, and Aztec gathered himself, body as hard as stone between my knees. Desperately, I seized fistfuls of his long, thin black mane, greedily hanging on. As he flung our bodies into the hot air, I fell onto his neck, and when front hoof finally met ground, coarse mane was all I could see, my shoulders nearly touching his.
My hands moved instinctively, trying to push myself back up and slow Aztec down and not yank on the reins all at once. “Have a plan!” I could hear my coach yelling at me, a phantom in my mind. “You’re going to crash!” I had no plan. All there was was Aztec cantering on, hopefully staying straight on the track, as I tried in vain to concentrate on riding.

Something tiny and brown twirled across our path, and vanished into the depths of the cool dark forest on our right. My thoughts flew to it- was it a young bird of some sort? Aztec almost hesitated in his stride, and a horrible spark of adrenaline washed through me. Don’t spook, I hoped. It’s just a little chick.

A scramble of noise erupted from the grass in front of me, stalks parting as two enormous brown and black wings exploded into being right next to me. I gripped Aztec’s sides hard with me knees, terrified that he would startle and I would fall.

The monstrous bird labored into the air, wings thudding against the atmosphere. I was close enough to see the sun glow through every barb on every brown and black feather. It swung towards the woods, long neck and bare head extended, beak open in a panic. It was far too close, and I could already feel the impact, heavy warm feathers smashing into me, Aztec a whirl of panic. Wind from its wings washed over me, cool as a raincloud.

I ducked, shuddering, away from it and waited, so tense, for Aztec to bolt.

Nothing happened.

The turkey hen, I guess it was, didn’t even scrape our heads as it careened into the woods after its chick. Aztec did nothing. He kept his canter beat, one-two-three, one-two-three, one-two-three, in the gold grass, under that blue-er than blue sky. Wonder bloomed in me at his nonchalant air. Had I not been holding on for dear life I would have thrown my arms around his neck and whispered good boy to him. What. A. Good. Boy.