Lonely Pastures: A Black Jack Series, #1

Lonely Pastures

By Deborah Blouet

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2nd Edition

Text copyright © 2015 Deborah Blouet

All Rights Reserved

The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.

To my children for their love and support.

Table of contents

Going Home

Finding your feet

Saskatoon

Thunderstorms

Wonderful Surprises

A horse to ride

Unfriendly attention

First ride

Big bangs and celebrations

Revelations

The auction

Black Jack

Chapter One - Early Fall

Chapter Two - Eerie Lights and Brave Ideas

Going Home

Finally, after sitting wearily in the departure lounge for two dull hours caused by some unknown delay, Abigail and her mum boarded the plane. Their seats were towards the back, and she had a place by the window which included a decent view of the wing. As she peered out her gloomy mood turned to nervousness. Abigail had flown before, but each time made her more nervous, like the odds were decreasing for a safe flight. The anxiety got her carefully inspecting every rivet to make sure one wasn’t loose.

Well I'm not sure if this is an improvement. At least in the terminal we could walk around, her mum moaned after several minutes of nothingness. The engines hadn't even been turned on and the flight staff were standing around looking bored.

Abigail didn’t reply, she still wasn’t talking to her mum properly, not since they stopped arguing over the move to Canada. If Abigail had been eighteen, she would have stayed and there would have been nothing her mum could have done about it, but she was thirteen. The last couple of miserable months had been very strained between them. Abigail felt like her tragic feelings and thoughts weren’t being listened to. Her mum, Gayle, hadn’t listened when she revealed to her the reasons for not wanting to go. That here in England were her life and friends. For instance, today was Saturday and it was the summer holidays. Today Abigail should have been at Valley End stables, a small riding school she helped at. Abigail looked mournfully at her watch it was two in the afternoon. They would start turning ponies out now. Then at the end of the day they would all get their helpers lesson. Abigail would be riding Magic her favourite pony, the one she had been allocated to train. But no, instead, that life had been ripped away and now they were heading to Canada to live with her grandparents. Glancing down at the concrete below and with a big sigh realised she didn't know when her feet would touch English soil again.

Her mother heard her sigh and went to squeeze her hand, but Abigail jerked it away. She knew it was hostile to her, but Abigail couldn’t help thinking she was the one being punished more. Life wasn’t fair; first her dad had been killed while deployed overseas. He had been out on patrol with his team, and they had come under attack. He had died tragically from a sniper’s bullet. Then six months later Abigail and her mum had to move out of their house. Unfortunately, her mum couldn’t afford a house in the same town, so she inevitably made the decision that if they had to move out the area then they should return to Canada.

Abigail dearly loved her dad. Everyone told her she looked like him. They both had bluey grey eyes that resembled a stormy ocean and mousy hair, but Abigail had a cow lick which meant a fringe was impossible because it never laid flat. As a result, she kept her hair long with a few layers to give it some volume as it was so straight. Her dad also loved animals, and he was the one that gave into her when she first asked for riding lessons three years ago. Her mum had tried putting her off by saying it was too expensive and dangerous.

Abigail's mum was a teaching assistant at the local school and although she genuinely enjoyed her job. It didn’t stop her sitting Abigail down one evening a couple of months ago and dropping the bombshell that she wanted to relocate them back to Canada where the rest of her family were.

Whereabouts are we going again? Abigail asked sullenly in the plane.

Your Grandparents live in a province called Saskatchewan. It's nearly two and a half times bigger than England but only a million people live there. I remember we use to visit a lake and drive for hours without seeing a soul.

Oh joy, I'm going to the back of beyond, she thought bitterly.

Gayle had described this many times, but Abigail let her mum carry on because despite not agreeing to this move. She had to leave and may as well know all about where they were to typically live for the next five years. Since Abigail had decided that once she turned eighteen, she was going back to England. Although it hadn’t crossed her mind how to realistically achieve that.

Tell me about the weather, she said knowing her mum had plenty to comment on that subject and it was something that Abigail couldn’t get her head around. It didn’t seem possible to be able to survive in the conditions her mum had depicted.

The weather especially in Saskatchewan can be harsh and extreme. Do you know they call it the land of the living skies? Well, it's because the flat prairies make the sky so big and large you are able to see what is going on around for miles. I guarantee that at some point we'll get to see the northern lights.

All this sounded wonderful, but Abigail knew it wouldn’t be enjoyable and the winter times were going to be really hard to deal with. Mum does it really get to minus thirty, how do you cope?

Oh Abi, the winters can get colder than that and be prepared to see snow on the ground all winter. Because it never melts, and you learn to cope. Besides the snow isn't like the slushy stuff over here which is nearly impossible to drive in. Over there it’s like powder and after a blizzard the trucks come along and just push it out the way. Sadly, it doesn't make good snowmen but at least it's easy to shovel. Remind me to show you that trick where I throw a cup of boiling water up in the air and the liquid disappears. Gayle was becoming enthusiastic that her daughter was starting to take an interest, but Abigail had a little crease between her eyes which meant she was still angry.

Abigail was about to say something when suddenly the pilot came on the intercom. Ladies and Gentlemen sorry for the delay. We are now allowed to leave so please make sure your seatbelts are on and your trays are in an upward position, thank you.

With that the engines started and before too long they were belting along the runway and taking off. Abigail couldn't help but let a little tear escape as the plane left the ground. She knew she was going to miss her life there, but under that overwhelming sadness was a tiny bubble of excitement inside her with promises of new adventures.

Finding your feet

The flight was long and boring. Occasionally Abigail would carefully look out the window and in between the cloud breaks she would check to see if the view below would change. Once it did and she saw the white land of what she presumed was Greenland, but after that it became just the ocean again. Abigail asked her mum when they would be over northern Canada. Her mum replied they were probably flying over the Hudson Bay which was a huge expanse of water in Canada. She explained how it would freeze in the winter allowing the polar bears to migrate.

There's a place called Churchill where you can go and sightsee the bears as they make their journey across.

I'm not sure I would feel safe, Abigail cringed. She had seen enough wildlife programs to know that polar bears were dangerous and fast!

Her mum laughed, Don't be silly they have these big buses for people to ride in.

Abigail still wasn't convinced it was something she would like to do. As it was the unique wildlife was something for the first time, she was going to have to be