A Heartbeat Away by Eleanor Jones

our youth.
    Fudge must have been twelve years old that summer, and he still followed Daniel’s every move whenever he could. He loved to go for walks, and would amble down the lane behind him on shaky legs, while Daniel walked very slowly, stopping every few yards for his old friend to rest. He said that the day the old dog could no longer follow him was the day he would have to be put to sleep because he would be so miserable that his life would no longer be worthwhile.
    One Sunday in spring, while we were eating our traditional roast, my phone rang. I picked it up and Daniel’s deep voice boomed in my ear—Daniel couldn’t do anything quietly. I hadn’t spoken to him for a couple of weeks, and I felt a rush of delight when I recognized its familiar sound.
    â€œWhere have you been, Luce?” he asked me.
    â€œWorking,” I responded. “Where have you been? Busy with the latest love in your life?”
    I could almost hear him grin.
    â€œWell, kind of,” he admitted. “Only, this love has four legs and is far more reliable than the two-legged version.”
    I squirmed with delight. “You’ve bought a horse,” I cried.
    â€œNot just a horse,” he told me. “But the most beautiful gray three-year-old filly you have ever set eyes on, and I need you to come help me break her in.”
    â€œWhat—today?”
    I glanced at Aunt V who was eyeing me with a knowing expression on her round face.
    â€œRight,” she said when I put the phone down. “You get yourself off and we will do the washing up.”
    She turned toward my mother, who was picking at her lunch.
    â€œWon’t we, Mary,” she barked. My mother smiled vacantly, and I thought that Aunt V would probably do it much quicker by herself.
    Almost two weeks had passed since I had been to Homewood. The owners of the kennel had been away on holiday and I had worked without a break until they returned. Now I had three days off in a row, and the prospect of spending them with Daniel brought a warm glow to my heart. I had so many things stored up to tell him.
    As I kissed my mother’s pale cheek and went to do the same to Aunt V, she eyed me sternly and shook her head.
    â€œShouldn’t you go comb your hair,” she suggested. “And put a bit of makeup on.”
    â€œBut I’m only going to Homewood,” I laughed. She shook her head slowly for a moment, then shrugged and went back to her paper.
    Bristling with impatience, I raced up the stairs, ran a brush through my wild mass of hair and tied it back with a brown-velvet bobble. I studied my face in the mirror. Not pretty, not plain, just boringly ordinary, with a mouth that was too big and a nose that was too small. Anyway, what was the point? Daniel wouldn’t notice what I looked like. How could I ever compare with the beauties he took out—even if I wanted to, which I didn’t. It just wasn’t about that with Daniel and me. But when I put on some black mascara to accentuate my silvery eyes and touched my lips with a soft pink lipstick, I had to admit I did look better.
    As I set off along the dusty lane toward Homewood, a breeze sprang up from nowhere and I broke into a jog, enjoying the cool air against my face and breathing in the scents of spring. The hedgerows were bursting into life again after the long cold winter. Daffodils were just beginning to reveal their golden glory and the whole world seemed full of birdsong.
    I saw Daniel as I turned the final corner, just before the entrance to Homewood Farm. He was standing beneath the sign and something about his stance, head down and shoulders hunched, set off an alarm bell in my head. My breathing quickened and I broke into a run. When he dropped onto his knees on the road, I felt a blinding pain building in my heart, for the slumped shape that lay in the side of the lane was all too obvious. Fudge’s poor old shaky legs had finally refused to