Nellie’s Tale

When thirteen year old Susi goes to check on the small young Paint mare in the back pasture of her grandma’s large ranch, she can’t believe her eyes. She bursts into tears and runs next door to her foster cousin’s house.

After Cindy hears the story they both knew that they had to rescue Nellie, who has been extremely neglected. Thirteen year old cousin Cindy prays about the situation. Now both can go forward to take care of the crisis. And that they do in spite of encountering many trials and tribulations.
Cindy lives in a small house about a hundred yards away from Susi’s grandma’s house. She and her seventeen year old brother, Kerry, are Susi’s aunt and uncle’s foster children. Kerry uses Grandma’s new red Ford Mustang convertible to drive both girls to and from school each day and wherever they needed to go. Susi lives ten miles from the ranch in an apartment with her dad and step-mom. Cindy becomes a very determined teen on a mission and soon has a bill of sale signed by Nellie’s negligent owner. He knew he hadn’t a chance to even question Cindy because her foster grandma owned the ranch where he kept Nellie and several other horses.

After reading millions of horse books, Cindy felt that the young mare should be checked by the vet. Susi begins to worry about all the responsibilities. Her grandma reassures her that she’ll take care of all the Paint’s financial needs. So Kerry takes Grandma’s new pick-up truck, horse trailer, Nellie and the two girls to the vet. He checks her over, gives her a sonogram and a list of shampoos to get rid of the lice.

When Cindy washes Nellie she ends up getting a bad skin reaction from the horse which involves having a doctor’s visit, special medication and cleaning of her entire house. It actually causes her to take her name off the bill of sale making Susi the sole owner of Nellie.

Even though Susi had been riding her step-mom’s twenty five year old gray Arab mare, Missy, for many years, she was anxious to have the younger ten year old Nellie for a horse of her own. With only a month and a half of school left before summer vacation, Susi had much work to do. Her step-mom made it clear that she was to care for all of Nellie’s needs. Kerry would pick her up early and take her home late after school so she could put medicine on all Nellie’s sores and give her extra grain.

After a several weeks they could see that the horse wasn’t gaining any weight. She was in a huge pasture with her mom’s Arab and Cindy’s horse, Jay, eating grass all day and getting extra grain. Something was wrong. With another vet visit, they find that she has an infection. She gets antibiotics, would need to be fed a special feed and isolated from the other horses.

Since Grandma had no other place for Nellie to stay, the teens roped-off a part of the pasture from which she’d often escape. So Susi drove a stake into the ground with a long thick rope which she tied to Nellie’s halter. But then she got rope burns on her legs when she got tangled up.

One day the vet, Dr. James, drove by and saw Nellie staked-out in her rope enclosure. He invites Susi to keep her mare at his ranch. It was perfect until Susi gets a severe allergy from the weeds growing around the corrals and has to wear a special mask the covered her mouth and nose.
After three months at Dr. James place, Nellie had completely recovered physically and was brought home to Grandma’s ranch. Everyone was happy with the little Paint back in the pasture with Missy and Jay. Finally the girls get to enjoy some fun trail rides in the mountains and on the beaches.

But then tragedy strikes. Missy mysteriously dies. Susi is devastated and refuses to go out to the ranch. She consumes her time by playing golf every day with her dad and step-mom. Until finally Kerry and Cindy get through to her how much Nellie needs her.
Then Carol, Susi’s step-mom, comes through with a great idea. They take Nellie to a horse expert to have Susi take a lesson from her on Nellie. They actually find out that the Paint has been very well trained and has great potential.

Yet in the background of all this, Kerry has been taking the girls to church every Sunday. He doesn’t go inside but just stays outside the door where he can hear the sermons. Well, he actually has an amazing spiritual experience one day. The event which is the most important in a believer’s life. It’s hard to imagine that Kerry could become even more loving to the girls, yet Christ can change people like you can’t believe. All three teens pray, read the Bible and go to church together. With God on their side they can’t help but succeed.

They take Nellie to the riding instructor’s ranch again to practice for events in an upcoming horse show. Kerry and Cindy take notes and draw pictures so they can reconstruct all the events at Grandma’s ranch so Susi and Nellie can practice and be at their best.

The kids are on a roll but how will Nellie hold up under the pressure with the big arena and all the people in the audience. After all the practice the kids give her she’s bound to be great and she doesn’t let them down.