“What’s your job, Alad?” Miranda asked.
“To trust you, mistress.”
“What are you going to do?”
Stay here with Mistress Phoebe, and trust you, Mistress.
“Good Boy.”
“I’ll be back soon; don’t worry, it’s a fun thing, a secret fun thing.”
I sat talking to Kevin, Tina’s sub. He gave me a couple of tickets for a fetish club he and Tina owned and got me to promise I’d bring Miranda; Susie ran it for them. He was waiting for an operation to fix his knee, so they had just come to watch. I know so many guys from rugby who have had or are having knee replacement surgery.
The guy sounded as though he was a bit of a mechanical genius. He had made a racing Sulky for Tina, but they now had the frustration of not being able to use it.
We worked out we had met in the past; he had been a top hooker for a team who were, at the time, probably the best in Yorkshire. He was in his last season when I was playing Colts rugby for their main rivals. We could not be sure, but we agreed it was unlikely we had actually played against each other.
When Miranda returned, she had a smile from ear to ear. I was beginning to learn that her smiles were not usually a sign of good things coming to me. She wouldn’t give me a clue as to what she had bought, but she assured me that this toy wouldn’t cause me any pain. Now I was really worried.
The big race was timed to start a1111:000a.m. 14:00. The parade at noon. It was now getting on for 11.00. Katy and Duncan appeared, and the girls went off to get Katy ready to become Duncan’s fantasy driving mistress. The sulky isn’t the ideal style of cart for this; something where a three-quarter-length coat, a blouse, and a full-length skirt can be worn comfortably is the order of the day. Of course, at a meeting of the Other Pony Club, it’s going to tend towards the Coco de Mere rather than the Coco Chanel.
Given this was a last-minute entry and not much planning had gone into it, Katy came out of Phoebe’s camper in breathtaking human pony driving attire. My mistress Miranda obviously had a hand in it; the woman was head to toe in latex, but I was puzzled by a guy–I think he was a guy–with pink hair sprinting in and out of Phoebe’s van carrying bundles of stuff.
Kevin lived up to his mechanical genius title. Using bits of wood and a pallet we pinched from Guy, the organiser’s garage, a few screws, electrical tie wraps, and hairy string, we managed to bodge a bench seat that didn’t look like a bodge at all. The pink-haired guy came to Duncan’s rescue as well. He came up with a roll of rubberized fabric that would pass for leather at five paces to cover our bench.
At five minutes to twelve Driving Mistress Katy carefully drove Pony-boy Hermes onto their starting position. This is not a race; it’s an exercise in close, precise control. Katy is a master of it, and Duncan has years of experience with Katie and Miranda. They tackled the course with some serious application, ending up dropping 7 points out of 100, close to their best score ever. Three points clear of second place to win it. Zac and his wife completely missed a turn and ended up dropping 55 points in their efforts to get back on track.
There was no time for celebration. Tina took control of dressing Miranda, and Kevin set about removing the bodged bench seat and returning our sulky to full racing spec. Peter took the harness Miranda and I had bodged together from the racing harness he had originally made for Duncan, and with a few scraps of leather, a punch, a rivet gin, needles, and thread, he turned something Miranda and I had hacked about, and up until that point I didn’t realise how bad it was. He manufactured a very comfortable piece of kit for me to perform my sulky and Mistress towing roll-in.
Miranda and I nearly had our first argument. She wanted me to eat a doorstep sandwich just before the race. She doesn’t really understand athlete nutrition. Kevin understood that I needed easily digestible sugars. He pinched a couple of bars of Tina’s posh chocolate; it’s her addiction, apparently. Much to her disgust, I swallowed them in lumps. Then we went off to the starting gate.
Half an hour later, I was very grateful for the “ponyboys can’t talk” rule, as six of us lined up at the start. It meant I could ignore Zac and his false bravado.
Zac and Marieann got away well, but I didn’t; I got away dead last! That suited me; I tracked him, picking up places until, surprisingly enough, skinny-boy and Phoebe were the only pair between us. As I went into the last bend of the first lap, I passed Skinny-boy, and as I came out of the last bend, I picked up a step and moved past Zac. He tried to hold me off on the outside, so he had the inside on the next bend. I didn’t care; I let him have it. I knew if I got him to try to match the pace I was setting, he wouldn’t have it in him to keep it up. Sticking to the outside and one outfit in front, I kept him with me for half a lap. I sensed him beginning to falter. He made a real schoolboy error, and in an attempt to push me even wider, he allowed Skinny and Phoebe to take the inside track.
The real bad news for Zac was that I had another gear. I hit my top speed for the last 500 metres and was halfway home, and all I could hear was Miranda hollering and cheering me on. I started losing speed about 50 metres from home. I think next time I get Kev to get me three bars of Tina’s posh chocolate, I will be well over 100 metres clear by then. There was a surprise: Skinny held the inside, Zak was going backwards now, and Skinny and Mistress Phoebe piped Zac and Marieann for second.
I was out on my feet. I had put so much effort into those last 500 metres that I was reaching for theile. I had only ever done that in training. It’s a curious sensation to be laughing, sick, and on the edge of passing out all at the same time. I have done it once or twice before after big, hard-fought rugby matches.
Miranda was unbuckling my straps, unclipping my reigns, and removing the bit from my mouth as fast as she could. Are you okay, Keith? Talk to me. “Ponies can’t talk, mistress,” I said. I could do with some biscuits and a bottle of cheap lemonade, though.
You can poke isotonic energy drinks up your arse. Biscuits and cheap, high-sugar lemonade are the way forward if your blood sugar levels have dropped off the graph.
All she had in the horse box was Diet Coke. Duncan came to the rescue. It wasn’t lemonade; it was full-sugar Orangena, along with a packet of Scottish Shortbread Fingers, and Tina willingly donated her last bar of chocolate. That lot lifted my blood sugar off the floor and kept me on my feet.
I need to get my boy rubbed down and settled. Miranda added, “Isn’t he beautiful?” People were cheering and clapping. Zac and his posh bitch of a wife were not. He looked daggers at me, and I laughed at him.
Mistress! I begged you to take my hood off. I want him to see me. I want him to see who beats him again.
“Miranda is good enough now.”
“No, Mistress, it’s not, not until I’m out of this gear.” Miranda took my hood off, and Zac choked when he saw it was me. I just gave him and his missus my best working-class yobish grin. He called me a yob years ago when we first crossed swords. I think that’s why I despised him so much.
Miranda announced it to the crowd. “I’m going to put him to bed.”
“Is he not well?” asked Phoebe.
“Ooh no, he’s fine; in fact, he’s very good”, said Miranda. “I’m going to fuck his brains to mush.”
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