Centaur Rising by Jane Yolen Page B

it standing up!”
    â€œYou aren’t a horse.” I smiled at him. Neither one of us said that he couldn’t stand by himself either. We didn’t have to.
    I turned to Agora. “He’s all yours now.”
    She nickered, and her head bobbed as if saying, Yes, he is .
    But he’d been hers from the very beginning. Unlike any of us humans, who looked at him funny, or who fainted when we saw him, or called him names like freak and monster , Agora had never shied away from Kai. Not once.
    Nor—I thought fiercely—had Robbie.
    So I left, checking Agora and Kai one last time before wheeling Robbie out of the stall and locking the door behind us. I peeked through the window, thinking that we needed to rehang those blinds. Not something I could do on my own.
    Agora was nuzzling Kai, whose thumb and forefinger were both jammed into his mouth. He leaned against her as he slept but didn’t wake up.
    It had been a rough day for a young centaur.
    *   *   *
    As Robbie and I got to the office, I was hit by the silence. I thought we’d missed the entire meeting, but I was wrong.
    Pushing open the office door, I called, “Mom, listen…” Then I stopped.
    What I’d thought was the quiet of an empty room was anything but. It was filled with people silently scribbling down their thoughts. So without finishing my sentence, I pushed Robbie in.
    They glanced up at us, heads swiveling in a single motion.
    It seemed Mom had handed out paper and pens as a way of calming everyone down, asking them to write out suggestions about the best thing to do to keep a baby safe.
    A baby .
    Not a horse. Not a freak of nature. Not a monstrosity. A baby.
    â€œAri!” Joey cried out, waving his paper at me, our previous fight obviously forgotten.
    Angela was not so forgiving. She sniffed—that sniff perfected with all the other high schoolers in town—and turned her back as if she’d more writing to do, but her pen never touched the paper again.
    However, the rest of the folks in the office stared at me without a word.
    They seemed to think I was the enemy.
    Or the freak.
    â€œArianne, who’s watching the foal?” Mom asked.
    â€œHis mother, ” I said. I hadn’t meant it to come out quite that way, implying she should be watching out for Robbie and me, but there it was.
    Mom got the pinch mark between her eyes, and Martha huffed through her nose at me. Dr. Herks shook his head, like I’d somehow disappointed him, and maybe I had. But someone had to say it.
    â€œHe’s sleeping,” I said.
    Joey dropped his paper on the floor. “Can I go see?”
    â€œNo!” At least five voices answered him at the same time: Mom, Dr. Herks, Martha, me—and Mrs. Angotti, the last a surprise.
    â€œI’ll be quiet,” Joey said and made a cross over his heart.
    Mrs. Proper put her hand on his arm. “Joey, do you like people tiptoeing into your room when you’re asleep?”
    â€œIf I was asleep , I wouldn’t care, would I?”
    But Mrs. Proper, in her quiet way, persisted. “But, Joey, what if you woke up and saw a stranger in your room?”
    He gave a yelp. “I’d call the police!” He made it sound funny, but I could see in his eyes that he understood. At least he didn’t ask again.
    â€œIn a nutshell, folks,” Mom said, “ we have to protect him. So let’s read out those suggestions now.”
    Dr. Herks whispered to me, “She’s bringing them all into the process. Helping them seek and possibly reach consensus, Quaker style.”
    I knew what he meant. Quakers don’t make decisions by majority rule. They keep talking about a problem until everyone agrees with the next step. It can take a really long time. But in the end, everyone is on board with the decision, and everyone feels that their objections have been fairly heard and fairly dealt with.
    Dr. Herks stared at me.