But the cancer moved incredibly fast. It ravaged her body before she could figure out how to transport the horse to her.
Her final diary entry was a desperate plea to me. She asked me to be braver than she was. She asked me to find Hannah and give her Copper.
The weight of it all absolutely crushed me. I was just fourteen years old. How was I supposed to reach out to a total stranger and say I was her secret sister?
Arthur put a heavy, reassuring hand on my shoulder. He told me I didn’t have to do it alone. He promised to help with the logistics and transport, but he said I had to be the one to take the first step.
I started spending every single afternoon at the rescue farm. I wanted to feel what my mother felt. I wanted to be close to the animal she spent her final, precious days with.
But Copper wouldn’t let me anywhere near him. He was grieving, too. He paced the fence line constantly, looking toward the long gravel driveway for a car that was never going to come.
One afternoon, the frustration and grief were just too much to handle. I collapsed in the dirt right outside his pen, buried my face in my hands, and sobbed.
I cried for my mom, for the agonizing unfairness of the cancer, and for the sister I didn’t know how to talk to.
Suddenly, I felt a warm, incredibly heavy breath on the back of my neck. I slowly looked up.
Copper had walked over silently. He lowered his massive head over the top wooden rail and gently nudged my shoulder. He smelled my mother on me.
I slowly reached up, my hand shaking violently, and touched his velvet nose. He didn’t pull away or pin his ears back.
