I recently celebrated my fortieth birthday. My very thoughtful sister came up with a gift idea that she knew would appeal to me. She asked my dear friends and family to write some fiction about me. They were nothing short of brialliant – in my eyes anyway – and I thought I would share a few of them with you.

Princess Amanda

Princess Amanda was in a wonderful mood. It was the middle of October and the sun was shining and the birds were singing as they cared for their newborn chicks, and the sides of the track she was riding on were full of wildflowers in full bloom. She looked over at her sister Rebecca, who caught her eye and they shared a smile that only two sisters sharing a private joke can share.

They were riding back to the castle from the most wonderful picnic on this glorious spring day, and to the sisters, the best part hadn’t even happened yet. In company with them were their ladies in waiting, and ‘the boys’ as they called them. There was of course one particular boy that Princess Amanda could feel herself pulled toward. It was a feeling that she couldn’t quite put her finger on, and even after plenty of ‘under the bed covers’ giggling with her sister, she was still trying to run from the feeling that she could only describe as a building love for Prince Morry. It was of course, Prince Morry that would be at the unfortunate side of the sisters’ joke.

Prince Morry rode his horse like a man show was born in the saddle, and he felt it was his duty to gloat about this skill at every opportunity he could. It was the sisters’ plan to put him back in his place.

He rode up to Princess Amanda, strutting like the peacock he sometimes pretended to be. “Princess Amanda, I believe you need to watch something.”

“Oh really Prince Morry? And what would that be?”

“I think you’ll know when you see it.” And with that he rode back to the other ‘boys’ which laughed at some joke he said.

“Do you think this will work Rebecca?”

“Of course it will. We’ve been planning this joke for ages. Do you know how hard is was to get the stable boys to agree to this? It’s perfect.”

“I hope you’re right. And I also hope he doesn’t break his neck.”

“I wouldn’t worry about that. He knows how to ride that horse so well, I’m sure he’ll have learned to know how to fall off it without breaking anything.”

“You’d better be right. I don’t know what I’d do if he got hurt.”

“You worry too much Amanda. He’ll be fine.”

Just then Prince Morry rode ahead of the others, turned around and started riding back. All of a sudden, he slipped his feet out of the stirrups, stood on the saddle and rode right up to Princess Amanda.

“So what do you think Princess?”

“Very clever Morry! Why don’t you get down before you break your neck?”

“I will, just one more thing.”

He rode away again, sat down and leaned over the side and started to reach under the saddle. It was just then that somehow, the saddle strap broke and he fell to the ground. This brought rapturous laughter from the two princesses and the other ladies, as well as a few chuckles from some of ‘the boys’, although one of them did go over to help him up. He got up groggily and looked down at his saddle girth and held one of the broken ends up to everyone to see.

“Very funny…! Who on earth would cut through half of someone’s saddle girth?!”

“Well I thought it was about time you came crashing back down to earth! Are you ok?”

“I’m fine Princess Amanda, no thanks to you!”

“Well that’s good. Maybe you’ll learn to check your horse better in future?”

And with that she rode off with the rest of the ladies leaving the Prince to go and find his horse.

                                                                                                                                                                                         RP