All we managed to get done in that time was to name Kai and make his stall as safe as possible. The rest of the time, we had all the other horses to take care of, Robbie’s schoolwork, and Dr. Herks’ careful monitoring of Kai’s extraordinary growth. Extraordinary was Mom’s word. I just thought, Wow! Is he getting big fast! It was as if the boy part of his body had to grow extra quick to keep up with the horse part. In those first few days, he got more and more control of his legs, grew baby teeth, and learned to put a few words together to make sentences, something it would take a regular human kid a year or more to do. He developed muscles in his upper arms by pushing at the stall door whenever we left and never got that pouchy baby tummy that some of my little cousins had. Along with the growth, his hair grew in red-brown tendrils till it was halfway down his neck. He looked so adorable, I took three pictures of him with Mom’s Polaroid camera. I showed them to him, and he said, “Who that, Awee?”
