Taking Chances: Centerfold's Chance

“And to think I could be in Florida right now,” I muttered as the frigid February air slapped me in the face. I shoved my hands deeper into my jacket that read ‘Stopwatch Stables’ across the back.
It was four thirty in the morning and in Lexington Kentucky, it was eighteen degrees. At Gulfstream Park, where most of Stopwatch’s thoroughbred racehorses were training, it was sixty degrees.
“And there’s only one reason I’m here and it’s sure as hell not school,” I muttered to myself as I entered the nearly-empty training barn. The only horses that still remained at Stopwatch’s headquarters were the yearlings, the horses that were laid up with injuries, and the few that weren’t good enough to race at the meets in the warmer southern and western states.
That one reason chose that moment to pop her head out of her stall and whinny to me.
“Morning pretty girl,” I said, patting the filly’s neck. Silver Chance was a yearling out of my father’s Horse of the Year Risky Business by the late stallion By Chance. I had convinced my father to give me half ownership of Silver in exchange for exclusively riding his Grade 1 stakes colt and best two-year-old last year, Centerfold.
The big black colt had tied with his rival, Off the Record, in The Breeder’s Cup Juvenile the previous October even after a gate attendant was paid to delay him at the gate. The stewards had awarded the race to Centerfold, believing that he had run the better race. There was talk of disqualifying Off the Record because of his farm’s involvement in holding Centerfold back at the gate, but there wasn’t enough proof to implement that the attendant had been paid by Rosery Acers or Allan Rosery, the owner of the stables, himself. The attendant had refused to talk to the stewards, even before a judge in December.
There had also been a trial regarding drug problems on the backside. One of our most trusted grooms, Jaime Carmichael had been paid by Rosery Acers to administer the drug etorphine to a colt to over stimulate him, which had caused him in the long run to break his leg. She had then been instructed to give the same drug to Centerfold to make him test positive and disqualify him from racing in The Juvenile. Jaime had gotten jail time for being in possession and distributing the drug that could kill a human with one drop, assault on me when I tried to stop her, and a couple other charges. Of course, she hadn’t said one word about Rosery Acers paying her either even though there was a suspicious influx of ten thousand dollars into her bank account just before the first horse started acting up. Obviously they hadn’t though she’d get caught of they probably would have been more careful.
But everyone in the racing world knew that Rosery Acers had been behind the drugs at Stopwatch. Al Rosery had wanted to buy Silver last year and pressured my father into making a bet: if Off the Record won The Juvenile, my father sold his half of Silver, and if Centerfold won, my father got four free covering from Rosery Acers’ best stallion Off the Radar: Off the Record’s full brother. In order to win the bet, Al Rosery had tried cheating and failed.
It hadn’t been easy to convince everyone of that fact at first. A year ago Rosery Acers’ reputation had been squeaky clean and no one would have believed that they would do anything against the rules. But we had destroyed their reputation with Al Rosery’s one skeleton in the closet: an illegitimate son, my boyfriend Bowen Athens. Bo had been happy to get revenge from his father’s abandonment and the way he had treated both Bo and his mother who had died in a racing accident four years ago.
Now that we’d won the bet, Mr. Rosery was slightly reluctant to own up to his end of the bargain even though my father had no plans to cash in this year. Next month, Risky was being bred to the Grades Stakes winner Supreme Affair and next year my father had been thinking about breeding her to Centerfold’s sire, Center of Attention whom had won The Kentucky Derby as a three-year-old.
Centerfold himself was on The Triple Crown trail and was racing in the Grade 2 Fountain of Youth Stakes at Gulfstream in two weeks. His workouts since he’d gone to Florida in December had been unimpressive. Not to brag or anything, but the colt ran his best for me. On occasion, he ran well for Bo who was also down in Florida.
“But no, I stay up here freezing my ass off to work with you brat,” I said to Silver as I slipped her halter over her nose and led her into the aisle. She was a nice-sized yearling, just over fifteen hands. My father expected her to mature to sixteen plus hands. She’d been in training since late December along with the stable’s two dozen other yearlings. My father, head trainer at Stopwatch, had left one of his assistant trainers, Brennan, in charge of the yearlings and few other horses.
“What do you think about backing her today?” Brennan asked, pausing beside Silver’s head, chewing the omnipresent toothpick he’d had in his mouth since he’d quit smoking.
“Backing her?” I parroted.
“Yeah, you know, like laying on her, sitting on her?”
“I know what backing means,” I responded. “Is she ready? Will she hold my weight?”
Brennan rolled his eyes. My pessimistic attitude was known even to relative newcomers like Brennan. “Kayla you’ve been exercising this filly daily since she was six months old. She’s the strongest yearling in the barn.”
Silver bobbed her head in agreement.
“I guess we can try if you think she’s ready,” I said, still a bit hesitant.

A half an hour later, Silver was trotting circles around me in one of Stopwatch’s covered round pens when Brennan entered through the only gate in the enclosure. The pen was built into a hill and was ten feet tall. The walls and roof eliminated most of, if not all of, the distractions and helped to keep a young horse focused.
“I wish all the yearlings were like her,” Brennan commented as he made his way towards me.
Silver, like her mother, had progressed very quickly in her training. Most of the other yearlings were just now learning to trot on a lunge line with a saddle on their backs. Silver had been doing it for three weeks and had started cantering last week. Already she was strong going both directions.
“So do I,” I muttered. Along with Silver, I was in charge of lunging three other yearlings. Two colts: Silent Attack and Society’s Rebel and one filly: Nightengale. I already saw the winner in Rebel; he was just behind Silver in his training. Attack was slightly unfocused; it took the first two minuets of his workout to let him examine the round pen and the lunge line and the saddle and anything else he wanted to look at. Once he got focused, he worked nicely. Gale on the other hand, was not a racehorse. She was an adorable jet black filly with so-so breeding and a mind as sharp as a tack. The filly knew how to lunge, but got bored easily with the exercise and tried making up her own rules. The first time I’d lunged her with a sersingle, she’d dropped to the ground mid circle and tried to roll. Overall, she was a pain in my ass.
“Alright girlie, come here,” I called, bringing Silver on a smaller and smaller circle until she came to a halt. I walked up to her and patted her well-muscled shoulder. “We’re going to try something different today,” I told her.
Brennan brought over a mounting block and put it next to Silver’s side. I let the filly sniff it and walked her around it several times before bringing her to a halt in the position she’d started in. Brennan held her head while I climbed onto the block of plastic.
Silver turned her head to watch me. She sniffed me and snorted.
“All right start by taking your hands and pushing down on the saddle,” Brennan instructed.
I followed orders and Silver shifted just a little. I started by pushing and releasing, slowly increasing the length of time I pushed down. Eventually, the filly stopped shifted.
“Try laying on her,” Brennan instructed, softly stroking Silver’s cheek.
“Easy girlie,” I whispered, carefully lying across the saddle.
Silver turned her head to look back at me. I scratched her pole affectionately and her eyes closed on a contented sigh. I stretched out across her saddle and softly patted her right side. The filly moved over towards me, emphasizing her sensitivity to leg aids. Other than that, she seemed unfazed.
“Alright hang on,” Brennan instructed. I anchored myself to the filly, wishing I had bigger boobs to keep me more solidly laying over the saddle.
Brennan led the filly forward. Unlike a lot of other young horses, Silver didn’t seem to mind my weight. Brennan led her in a circle, and then I slowly slid off of her and returned to the mounting block to do it all over again.
Finally, after I laid three times on her back and walked around, Brennan said, “alright, up you go. Yes she’s ready,” he said before I could ask.
I took a deep breath and gently eased myself into the saddle. Silver bobbed her petite head and shifted under my weight. Not that I weighed much anyway. I had to stay under 115 to be a jockey and I’d been stuck at 107 for two years. I had grown an inch for a whopping 5’3, but height on a jockey didn’t matter much. Bo had wanted to be a jockey but he towered over me at a solid six four and his muscular build made it impossible to stay under the weight limit. Not that I had any complaints about what he looked like.
“How does she feel?” Brennan asked, looking up at me.
As Silver stood calmly, I began to relax and smile. I was riding my filly. Certainly not the first horse I’d ever owned: through the years I’d owned and ridden pleasure horses, jumpers, polo ponies, and even and ex-cutting horse. When I’d hit fourteen I’d become bored with just leading the racehorses to the track and begged my father to let me start exercising them. After I bugged him for a few months, he reluctantly agreed. I loved riding the horses but told myself I would never get attacked to any of them because of the too-frequent injuries racehorses suffered. So much for that.
“Well hell she can smile,” Brennan said. “I’ve been here almost six months and I think this is the first genuine smile I’ve seen from you.”
“I smile,” I defended myself.
“Only when Bo and Mik make you.”
Mik Anderson was the heir to Stopwatch Stables. We’d grown up together and because both of us were only children, we were like brother and sister. Mik and Bo always said I took everything too seriously and they were probably right. I loosened up around my boys, but Brennan was right: it was only because they tag-teamed it and forced me to laugh until my sides ached.
This year I was even more subdued than normal. This was the first year I’d been left at home with no one to talk to but my mother. Last year Mik had been a senior in high school and had been stuck behind too. I was also stressing about Silver’s training and Centerfold’s upcoming races.
I reached down and patted my filly. She turned her head to look up at me and she seemed to be asking what I was doing up there. The filly reached back with her extremely flexible neck and nibbled on the toe of my boot.
“No m’am,” I scolded, gently removing my boot from her lips. The filly was very smart, very curious and very mischievous. Her manners still needed some polishing with she was hopefully going to get over the summer traveling from track to track with me. The other yearlings would stay behind but I trusted no on with Silver but my father and myself.