Page 30 of Apple of My Eye
‘Are you kidding?’ Nick asks happily. ‘Lead the way! Get it, like don’t horses go on leads or whatever.’
I laugh. ‘I’m surprised you knew that.’
Nick stills as soon as we step into North Barn. I hear JJ paw at the floor in his stall. ‘He’s excited to meet you,’ I tell Nick.
When JJ sticks his head out of his stall, nuzzling at my cheek, Nick’s jaw drops open.
‘Can I?’ He reaches his hand towards his neck.
‘Of course,’ I say, mirroring his motions on the other side, both of us stroking JJ’s coat.
‘He’s beautiful,’ Nick breathes.
JJ nickers. ‘He likes you,’ I say, feeling a rush of pleasure in my chest. ‘Here.’ I hand Nick an unripe apple. ‘He loves these.’
‘Really?’ Nick looks at me with so much gratitude in his eyes that I feel like I’m seeing what he was like as a little kid, and my heart squeezes.
‘Really. Just hold it up to his mouth.’
JJ chomps away happily as we lead him to the paddock and let him run around.
‘How long have you had him?’ Nick asks, his gaze tracking JJ as he canters about.
‘Almost fifteen years .?.?. my parents gave him to me in a last-ditch attempt to cure my loneliness. Linden had just hit puberty and decided I wasn’t a cool sidekick anymore.’ I laugh. ‘The irony of it was that right after I got JJ, I met Lily, and—’ I shrug ‘—well, you know how that ended.’
Nick grins. ‘By the frequency with which she calls you, I sure do know how that ended.’
I smile, but watching JJ my smile quickly falls. ‘He got hurt a few years ago,’ I explain to Nick. ‘We really shouldn’t be keeping him here—he’s lonely. But I can’t seem to let him go.’ Just then, he stops prancing and comes up to where we are on the fence.
‘I see why,’ Nick says, reaching out to pet him.
‘It’s no excuse,’ I admit. ‘It’s on my list of things to do.’
‘Ah yes, Eloise and her infamous lists.’ Nick elbows me gently.
‘Who told you about those?’
Nick’s eyebrows knit together as he looks at me. ‘You? You reference a list like every day. Yesterday I’m pretty sure it was something about the places you still needed to clean.’
I roll my eyes, but I’m secretly pleased that Nick pays so much attention to what I say.
After making sure JJ will be happy in his paddock for a few hours, we walk back to the path that joins our two houses.
‘What would you do if you could do anything?’ Nick asks me. We’re walking close, our shoulders bumping every now and then, and each time I want to make touching him last longer. I wish our hands would start brushing against each other too.
‘Work in a lab,’ I answer, ‘like an agricultural research lab.’
‘No way, really?’
‘Really. What’s so surprising about that?’
Nick laughs. ‘I don’t know, I thought you’d say you would travel or, like, open a café or a plant store or a bookshop .?.?. something more .?.?. aspirational?’
I can’t help but laugh at his confused expression, the little divot that appears between his eyebrows when he furrows them. I shrug. ‘I worked in a lab this summer and really loved it.’
‘Why’d you stop?’
I gesture at the hills around us, the rows and rows of perfectly spaced apple trees. ‘This won’t take care of itself.’
