“Higher! Higher!” I heard a little girl shouting and giggling.
“If I let you go higher, mom will kill me” Jack laughed, still pushing our daughter, who was enjoying herself almost touching the sky on a swing.
“But I wanna fly!” she insisted.
Jack smiled at me and I just chuckled and turned around to hide the blush that crept on my face, since our daughter ran off to the swings form the moment we stepped in the park and Jack followed her straight away, I was standing a few metres away from them, contemplating the father and daughter scene in front of me.

I opened my eyes. It was 5am and felt Jack’s arms holding me weakly in his embrace. I continued hearing her soft and cute giggles and how her blonde hair moved when she was ‘flying’, that cheerful expression on her face, just like Jack’s. I felt something hot go down my cheeks and wipped off the tears that fell from my eyes and slowly got up, being almost forced by my own instincs, and headed to the kitchen, going on my tiptoes just in front of that cupboard where I put my loyal friend, also known as my bottle of vodka.
I started to drink, looking around every so often and listening as carefully as I could whilst I started to get drunk. Once I drank half of the bottle, I put on my flip flops which I left, for some reason, in the kitchen and grabbed my car keys.
I was soon in the equestrian center and went straight to the tree which I learnt how to climb, every time becoming easier, over the past weeks. Once I was in, I ran to Stella’s paddock, tears streaming down my face and the little girl’s giggles shouting in my ears.
Needless to say, Stella spotted me straight away, but I didn’t go for her saddle and got the briddle, changing it with the headstall and putting her reins over her head and walked her outside the paddock and straight to the jumping arena, I just needed to clear my mind, and dressage let me think too much, jumping was better in these occasions. I didn’t put down the bottle in this whole time.
We got to the arena and I awkwardly walked to Stella’s side, put a hand between her back and her withers, holding the reins, and the other hand on her coupling. I tried to memorize this pose for a second and let go of her reins and started to walk backwards.
“Don’t move” I ordered her with an unsteady voice.
She looked away but I saw her beding her legs a bit, making it easier for me to jump. I ran and put my hands in the right places quickly, pushing my body up and swinging my right leg to the opposite side of her body, keeping myself in place and sitting up. I left the bottle of vodka on the fence.
It felt weird, but I ignored it; when you ride with a saddle, the horse’s muscles’ movements are completely ignored by the rider, that’s why when you ride bareback, you feel like you’re about to fall, because you take notice of every little muscle moving underneath you, and that makes you feel somehow unstable on the horse, but you have to always convince yourself that’s why you feel weird, because you’re not used to it, and that you aren’t going to fall if you press your legs.
So I did that, pressed my legs and encouraged her to move with two soft, but firm kicks (I still don’t know how my kicks turned out to be firm when the rest of my body felt light), and did four circles walking and started trotting.
I know Stella wasn’t stupid, she knew why I was here and slightly drunk, so she was constantly looking at me, making sure I didn’t slide off her.
I got fed up trotting and started cantering at a steady pace, my hips following numbly and my hands keeping a constant and comfortable pressure between Stella’s mouth and my hands through the reins to keep her balanced. I showed her to the first jump and in the second lap cantering started jumping, my legs pressing her sides in a strange way, not quite keeping myself balanced on top of her.
Of course, I fell in the third jump, after completely unbalancing myself in the previous one. I hit the floor sideways, Stella accidentally kicking my legs when she jumped, but as soon as she touched the ground, stopped herself and turned to me. I was standing up slowly and walked to the bottle of vodka and took two sips before going back to her and putting her next to the fence, so I could jump on quicker. We went on like this until I finished the 1,5l bottle and slowed down Stella before passing out on top of her.

I woke up in the small cottage in her paddock, on a pile of soft straw and seeing Stella pinning her ears back at Ladrón. My heart hurt and I felt like I was dying, but got up and leaned against the cottage’s poles, smirking at the scene.
“If you carry on like that, you’ll end up loving him, Stella” I chuckled, both of the horses’ heads turning to me, Ladrón looking at us with a playful expression and Stella sending both of us death glares. I closed my eyes and did odd kiss noises with a smirk in her direction and chuckled when I opened my eyes to see her stomping her back leg on the ground, as if she was threatening me, but coming from Stella, it was pretty obvious she didn’t mean it.
My legs then failed me and I fell to the ground on my butt and groaned a bit, but stood there and smiled at Stella, who was walking to me when her ear pinned back and forward, meaning she heard something, and turned to see what was what she heard. Or, more than what, who.
I didn’t see anything because my eyes were closing and her body didn’t give me much vision, so I closed my eyes and tried to sleep a bit more right where I was, when I heard quick footsteps in my direction and felt a body next to me.
“María, oh my god! You’re here! Baby, please wake up!” Jack shook me and I supressed a groan.
Shit. So, I left my house with no clothes, no helmet, no phone, no nothing, just his hoodie and panties and flip flops and a bottle of vodka and didn’t think of leaving a note. Genius, María, you’re such a genius.
“Jack? What-?” I asked, my hangover not going away.
“I was so worried when I woke up and saw you were nowhere to be seen” he hugged me tightly, “Thank god you’re okay” he whispered.
“Jack, I’m not a baby, you know” I hugged him back, “I missed you” I kissed his cheek with a small smile.
“I missed you too” he smiled back, but frowned when he took my face in his hands and looked at me, looking at my eyes. Not into my eyes, but to my eyes. “What happened? Your eyes are bloodshot”
“I-I” I looked away. I remember I rode last night, or that morning, and I remember drinking and riding but nothing else.
“And why are you covered in bruises?” he pointed at my legs. I guess I fell?
“I think I rode last night, bareback because I see Stella’s not wearing a saddle and she’s still wearing- oh, shit” I got up too quickly, loosing a bit of balance and walked to Stella, taking her briddle off, Jack right next to me. He wrapped his arms around me and pulled me into a hug.
“Let me guess, a nightmare?” he said after a while, I nodded, not 100% sure, but 97% certain that was the case.
“Probably” I turned around and buried my face in his chest, taking in his scent.
“Why didn’t you wake me up?” he rubbed circles on my back.
“I guess it didn’t cross my mind” I shrugged, “I’m sorry”
“Don’t apologise” he kissed my hair, “By the way, how on Earth did you get on top of her without a saddle?” he pulled away with a chuckle.
“It’s quite easy, you take a few steps back, run and jump, and try not to jump to the other side in the process” I chuckled, looking at Stella, who was pinning her ears back at Ladrón.
“But she’s huge!” he cried like a little kid.
“She’s not that big, you should see other horses I’ve ridden” I stuck my tongue out.
“If you’re not gonna use that tongue, you better put it away” he growled, staring at my tongue and back to my eyes.
Instead, I bit my tongue (not agressively) and smirked at him, he started shaking his head.
“You got yourself into trouble, young lady” he tried to put a british accent, which made me laugh, and lowered his head to bite my neck.
“Jack, stop it!” I laughed, his hands tightening around my waist.
“NEVER!” he giggled. I shot a glance at Stella, who seemed to be finding this amusing, looking at me with playful expression.
That’s when my stomach growled and Jack gradually stopped and looked at me with raised eyebrows and a cute little smile in his lips.
“We better head home, I’m hungry” he said, “And so are you, princess”
I smiled and walked with him out of Stella’s paddock and to the parking lot, still trying to remeber what happened last night. I had an unclear idea of it, but I wasn’t gonna tell Jack because it may not be what happened.
I was submerged in my thoughts and before I could come back to real life, Jack had opened the passanger’s seat and waited for me to follow him into out house. I did as expected but he picked me up bridal style and carried me to the sofa. My hangover was starting to go down, but not really, and I felt numb and tired.
I had a small breakfast, Jack really insisted on me staying at home, altough I had to work, he said I needed a day off. That was bullshit but the idea of staying at home, cuddling and watching films in Jack’s warm embrace, kissing his soft lips and taking ocasional naps, made me stay at home.

Notes

Every day I keep telling myself not to be a lazy ass and write, but I keep thinking nobody likes it and it looks so messy, please forgive me.
I'm having a tough time also, relapsing and getting bad again but I'm emotionless, for some reason, so I don't know how to describe feelings properly, so yeah.

Title credit: Sad Girl by Lana del Rey.