Welcome to Hickstead, home to both Seven Oak Stables, and Blue Acre - two rival stables. Both offer opportunities for their clients to reach the highest level of excellence. Each stable differs from the other, so choose wisely and never forget, loyalty is everything... Meanwhile as the stables battle it out, there's trouble brewing at the university. Be careful, if you don't pick a side you may get caught in the cross-fire...
This is an chilled out rpg with a super friendly and relaxed atmosphere! Remember to sign up with your characters full name in all caps and don't forget to do your claims! Thank you and Welcome, we've been established since 10th March 2009 but unfortunately have had to close guest view of our boards due to multiple sites ripping off our hard work, such a shame! Come chat to us in Discord before joining if you like!.
there was not a tear left within her, she'd cried more than she'd cried in years when she'd heard that ben had been hurt in the hold up at the coffee shop. she'd been on duty when the call had come through, her and her partner one of the units tasks to attend and assist the injured once the scene was secured. she hadn't even thought of ben as they'd been driving there. her work brain was able to focus on what she was doing and what she needed to do before they arrived. they'd gone over the checks, how they'd have each other's back and their exit plan for if things went south. that had all been thrown out the window when they'd pulled up and ben's car was the first one she'd seen in the parking lot. she had never experienced that snap in her mind before, forgetting everything she'd been taught, what she'd planned and that she needed to keep an eye on her partner as she'd legged it into the cafe past the officers, other people and other injured people. she needed to lay her eyes on him, to make sure that he was okay. there was reports of a stabbing. she needed to know that it wasn't him.
then she'd seen the officers working on ben and there wasn't much she remembered after that moment. she'd screamed his name as she'd run over to him, dropping to her knees beside him as hands tried to grab at her to pull her away. they were right, she'd been a mess. she hadn't been able to help the situation and she would have been making it worse but she'd fought them, reaching out to grip ben's hand tightly and refusing to leave him. she hadn't left him since. she'd gone with him to the hospital when they'd gotten him out of there, she'd gone with him into the er, she'd stayed right outside the doors of the surgery room he'd been in and she'd been sitting in his room while they waited for him to wake up. no one had been able to convince her to leave, not ben's parents, his siblings or any of the people who knew her at the hospital.
she was still in the clothes that had his blood smeared over them. she'd cleaned her hands but that was it, leaving to change wasn't an option. she needed to be there when he woke up. they hadn't been solid for a while. the distance between them had been something they hadn't been able to fix yet and now she was terrified that she'd never get the chance. she needed to see him open his eyes, to be able to tell him that she loved him and that she needed him more than anything. if this last few hours had taught her that, it was that her love for him wasn't going anywhere. she had his hand clasped in both of hers, listening to the steady beep of the machines he was hooked up to. she lowered her head down onto the mattress next to their hands, exhausted from the events of today but far to wired to even think about closing her eyes. every time she did she was taken back to the moment she'd seen him on the floor of the cafe and she didn't want to go there right now.
blair closed her eyes as she felt the wind blow softly past her face and she sighed into it. the trail was quiet and polly was calm although blair wasn't sure if those were good things. it meant she didn't have to think to hard about what she was doing and when she didn't have anything to focus on, she was at a loss. the last few weeks had been hard. there had been joy first, though that joy had been mixed with sheere panic and terror but she'd been excited. then it had been ripped from her and they'd been told it had never been real and then .. that it never would be. from there things had gone from bad to worse and words had been said, people who thought they knew best had gotten involved and worse had become terrible. the things she'd said to ben, she knew she would always regret them. that heat of the moment passion where she'd let her emotions and feelings get the better of her and she'd just let lose, unleashing her grief and pain onto him when she should have known better.
since then she'd been throwing herself into her work, taking every shift she could, covering as much as she could ans doing her best to avoid going home because she had to travel past his floor, walk into her empty apartment and know he wasn't there and he wouldn't be coming. so she'd been sleeping at the station as much as her boss would let her. though enough had finally been enough and he'd told her not to come in today. to get out and do something other than work and it had been then she'd decided to come to the barn. she'd been avoiding it, knew she'd been neglecting her three other loves but she'd known they were well taken care of. they'd probably even enjoyed the downtime but she had missed them. the moment that she'd seen them it had hit her like a ton of bricks and she'd almost cried there and then.
but they'd forgive her, she knew that. they were amazing after all. she leaned down to rub her hands over polly's neck as they walked back into the yard and she pulled her up gently before she hopped off her, her feet stinging a little as she landed on the stone floor. "let's get you sorted." she said softly as she gathered the reins in her hand and started walking her into the barn, walking through the doors and almost coming face to face with ben as she did. "uh .." she came to a sudden stop as she made the noise and polly snorted in disapproval and bumped her head into blair's shoulder to show it.
that's usually when my favourite barista makes me amazing coffees. she can be, but she usually thinks first. jake, bless him, doesn't. i guess the sentiment was there.
that explained why she hadn't seen her while she'd been at the barn. she hadn't spent much time at seven oaks while the horses from blue acres had been there, she'd been working double shifts and some overtime so her horses had been worked and looked after by the staff and some friends of hers. "so it's the trifecta." she said with a smile as she took in the girls stretched legs and was glad to see that they really did look okay, there were no bones sticking out, no odd lumps and bumps that could have indicated that a bone was broken, she knew a lot of people thought pain was always a good indicator but everyone felt pain differently. "that must be fun." she loved kids but she wasn't quite sure how she felt about them at the moment. she was almost an aunty to her boyfriends brothers horde of children but she'd pulled away from them the last few weeks, not knowing how to act around them after being so sure she was going to be giving them a cousin and then finding out she might never have that chance to again.
she could tell that the girl was restless and at least she'd had something of a rest now, blair knew the chances of her keeping her sitting here any longer were probably slim to none so she threw a bone and she stood up from the log they were sitting on. "how about i walk you back?" she offered. she wouldn't push if the offer was declined but someone to talk to on the way back might be nice for the girl, if she wanted to at least.
she smiled a little as it seemed that the question had worked. even if she'd had said no, blair could have used it to talk about some other animal or used it to venture off onto some other topic. so she did like horses. blair didn't remember her from the stables but sos wasn't the only one in town, it was just where her horses were boarded. they were happy and settled there and the staff did so well taking care of them when she couldn't. her jump swung in shifts so some weeks she was there all the time and other weeks she couldn't be there. but they helped her make it work.
"it's good to have something we're talented at." she thought that for everyone. of course it mattered if what they were good at was a danger to other people, then that was a different story but if no one was hurting anyone, it was fine. she'd learned at a young age she was good with horses, it had run in her family but she'd been no where dedicated enough to make a living from it. she loved her horses but she rode for fun, sometimes in competition and she let others use her horses if they wanted to compete.
"that's alright, i think cal's pretty glad for the break." she said with a smile as she watched him nip at leaves from the tree he was tied to. "he's a little too good looking for his own good, i swear i saw him checking himself out in the creek earlier." she joked a little as she rested her elbows on her knees. cal wasn't one of her horses, she was just riding him for a friend while she was out of town but that wasn't something she needed to say. "do you ride at blue acres?"
i promise i will and i'm not that bad! am i? i know, it was sort of like an ambush and it scared me a little. i have the feeling it was jake's idea and poor carly was just pulled into it and he didn't let her say no.
i wish i couldn't, but it's been helpful the last few weeks. it'd be nice to talk, i know we didn't do that so well at the bowling alley and i'm sorry.
well that was a reason, and a decent one at that. people could vomit from stress and while it wasn't ideal, it did make blair worry just that little less about the fact that cara might have smacked her head on the way down and not known about it. but the thought that someone might be chasing cara was the next one that blair wanted to be able to settle down and thankfully it was the next thing out of her mouth. so it was something personal she was running from. blair could understand that, she'd spent most of her spare time riding through the woods since she'd found out she'd never been pregnant, even though everything, even a test, had pointed towards it. it was funny to miss something she'd never had but she was grieving all the same and she felt silly for feeling it but she couldn't help it.
she settled onto the log and was glad when cara decided to sit down on the log next to her. even if all she did was take ten minutes to really recover from the fall so she could let the adrenaline settle and she could feel if anything was actually hurt. sometimes people could run on broken ankles if they were determined enough and the last thing blair wanted to do was find out that cara was actually hurt and she just let her go. "thank you for humoring me though." she said with a small smile as she looked back down the trail to where cal was standing happily. "do you like horses?" she knew that most of the people in this town were horsey and it was a way to start conversation.
blair held her hands up lightly as cara took a step back from her. she was starting to get a little concerned that not all was what it seemed to be. had someone attacked the girl? that might make her afraid of someone and afraid to talk to her. she felt herself tense a little and she glanced around, making sure that she could see no one else around them. pol was resting further down the trail and she was relaxed so blair made herself take a breath before she looked back at cara. "no one expects to fall." she said, softening her tone just a little, wondering if there was really a reason the woman was afraid. "people don't generally vomit because they're fine." she said as she kept a careful watch on the girl who seemed determined to pass herself off as fine.
"it has it's perks." she said with a smile as she lowered her hands and decided on another approach. she knew that she wasn't the best paramedic in the world but she did have a real desire to help people and help them she was going to try to do, she just wasn't going to force her help on someone who didn't want it. but she did want to make sure that cara was okay. she took a quick look around and she took a few steps backward to sit on a long that ran along the edge of the trail and she patted the log gently, motioning for cara to come sit down on it too. "how about you humor me by just sitting for a minute?"
that was a stretch if she'd ever seen one. being a paramedic she was used to seeing people in pain. everyone's face showed it a little different and sometimes it was hard to work out just how much pain someone was in but it was made all the more obvious to blair when the girl turned and showed her pain to the side of the trail. "hey, don't say sorry to me." she said with a smile as she stood by the girl, her hands hovering almost uselessly as she didn't know what to do with them. had she known the girl she'd have tried to support her, rub her back and make sure she didn't fall over. when she was on the job she'd have done the same thing but she'd come across this stranger and she knew some people didn't like to be touched so she would air onto the side of caution until she could ask or be told.
"i'd say it's nice to meet you cara but i'll wait till we're somewhere different." she said as she took a step towards her, her trained eyes examining her from head to toe, going through the mental checklist she usually did. she was breathing okay, she was conscious, her eyes didn't look like her pupils were different sizes, there were no signs of cuts on her head and other than the vomiting she wasn't worried about a head injury. "that's why i always tell people working out is dangerous." she said, another small smile on her face. "now how about you tell me what's sore?" she asked as she pulled out a phone so she could take notes in case she needed to. "just so you know i'm not just a weirdo or anything, i'm a paramedic with the fire department." just in case cara wanted to check or was scared of her for some reason.