A Chance Meeting... {Light & Ani Jay}

It was tradition to have a horse show, at least for us horse people, and we made sure it wouldn't conflict with the Games since lots of people watch them every day. This time it was right after the Games were finally over; I was particularly thrilled because we - Black Lightning Farms - were hosting this one, so I'd get to show off 'my' horses, the ones I'd trained. I also had helped set up the ring where the horses would be put through their paces, there were jumps and water hurdles and also an outer ring which was a race course. So, I was glad I'd slept the night before, because I'd been exhausted but excited, but no problem there, and now I was awake and alert and ready to go.

I was wearing a pair of new jeans, my newer pair of boots, and a red button up shirt, and my hair was combed back and neat; I'd even shaved. I was pretty excited to see some people who I only ever saw at horse events like this one. I had gotten up early, and went to the stable to check on my horses, the ones I was responsible for. There were four of them, a big bay gelding, a gray stallion, and a mare and a filly too young to be ridden. The gray was the one I'd be racing, though they all had to be on display. It wasn't uncommon to see some obvious servant type, though well dressed, wielding a camera at these events. No Capitol folks would come out here where you could actually get muddy and dirty, but the horse people among them sometimes sent cameras, to evaluate what to buy next.

This used to make me real nervous, but now I just ignored them. Not rudely or anything, I just pretended they weren't there at all as I went through the paces with the filly, first, while people were still arriving as I worked her in the center of the ring; I'd gotten her to obey nicely, even though she'd started out headstrong. But the Capitol doesn't much want headstrong horses, so that had to be trained out of her. People were arriving on their horses, leading others, since no one really had any other means to transport them. There were temporary stalls set up outside the stable to accommodate them. I glanced around to see who had come, mostly familiar faces, but a few people that looked to be new. Or else they'd just grown up or gotten old since the last time I saw them - I wasn't too good with faces and setting names to them. Not on humans, at least.

The horses were neighing and pawing, excited by being around all the new horses, and I finished with the filly and led her back, 'my' stallion in particular was really raising hell. I went over and tried to calm him down, which took a while 'til he was marginally more serene. At least he wasn't threatening to kick out his gate anymore. I went out to where the little crowd was gathered and looked to spot my family, and nodded greetings to the guests, or murmured a polite greeting as I did.