Valuable Lesson: Day 14

Word Count: 84,013

Summary of Events:

Kingston and Drew were having an early lunch prior to the go-round — which ran in the afternoon — when Wyatt arrived; he stayed for lunch before taking Kingston to his house to show him what sort of exercises he needed to do to help him ride broncs better. The exercises left Kingston quite worn out, and he still had two horses to ride yet . . .

Excerpt of the Day:

Kingston sighed wearily, watching as the horses were loaded into the chutes before getting up and going to gear up his horse. Now that everyone had ridden once they had scores and those scores were determining the order of who was riding when.

The riders yesterday that had been bucked off — only four — would go first in an order that’d been determined by their money earned on the season, and then it would go lowest score to highest, which meant that Kingston was the fifth rider out because his sixty seven was the lowest score in bareback yesterday.

Through a force of will somewhat inspired by Wyatt’s words yesterday Kingston had been able to get a sixty nine in the saddle bronc. Kingston doubted he’d really do all that much better today.

Three of the first four riders stuck their rides and got scores in the seventies — including Hayden, who’d taken to working out with Tanner shortly after their chat at the pizza place — the fourth rider, Brody, had been bucked off again.

Kingston felt badly for Brody, who looked more than a little frustrated. If this proved to work for him he might have to get Wyatt working on Brody too before Brody went and did something to get himself banned for the season.

Settling into position, Kingston hoped his arm wasn’t going to fall off from all the work Wyatt had put him through; in fact, Kingston just hoped that he didn’t fall off at all.

He nodded and the chute door flew open; the horse sprang out and Kingston held on, all of the exercises Wyatt had just taught him flying through his head — as were the exhortations Wyatt had given to him as he’d been doing them.

Kingston rode hard and was actually surprised and a little disappointed when the horn sounded. He could’ve sworn eight seconds had been a lot longer last night.

He safely dismounted the horse and left the arena. Wyatt was waiting for him with a smile on his face.

“You looked better already kid,” Wyatt said, putting an arm around his shoulders.

Kingston made to shift out from under the touch and go on to get his rigging, but Wyatt grabbed his shirt and stopped him.

“Let’s listen to the score,” Wyatt said.

“I don’t want to hear it,” Kingston said.

Wyatt shushed him.

“. . . is seventy five points,” the announcer’s voice rang out.

“See?” Wyatt said. “Better already, guaranteed you got equal to the horse on that one.”

“I thought you said it took multiple doses,” Kingston said.

“It does, kid, it does,” Wyatt replied. “But what good is the dose if it doesn’t have any effect? Sure we may not see it, but if the doctor probes deep they’d see an improvement like this.”