STRANGE LOOP
Trample the weak, hurdle the dead
“I don’t really like her,” Elias confessed, squeezing his fists together. “But I just wanna, you know…”
Keegan did not know, really at all. Eli clearly thought that he knew, the way the sophomore wriggled about as he tied on his spikes, yellow sparked and vivid like tropical birds. Keegan was a quiet sort, and people often spoke to him as if he knew a great many things he did not.
“…fuck her.” Eli finished the loose knot left hanging on his shoes.
Keegan reached over to fix it for him. “You want these tight. But not too tight. You pronate, remember, so get the heel snug.”
“You know how it is, don’t you?” Eli kept his voice low so the other boys sprawled crisscross on the grass within earshot wouldn’t discern his desires.
“Maybe,” Keegan said. He looked around at Texas dusk, the halide lights blasting on over the blue rubber track and the field’s spring grass. Parents trickled up and down the clanking stands, his own somewhere amongst their number. A relay was about to be called. The shouts of pole vaulters sounded from somewhere behind their team’s tent. The Spartans. It was Friday night, and they were the lucky few teenagers ensnared by further extracurricular duty.
All long-distance runners, off season technically. Brought in to run the events no one else wanted to: the grueling two miles and the lung-busting sixteen hundred. The long races were separated by three endless hours, in which the cross country boys had to entertain themselves. From the shade of their tent, they cast wistful looks toward the girls’ team encampment, where thighs pulled tight as toes tapped asses. Flexible as anything. Coach Betts did not allow intermingling with the girls. The gangly-legged blondes and pocket-sized Latinas of the parallel crew had been mostly poached by the sprinters now, making off to canoodle in the labyrinth of parked school buses.
Keegan was oddly grateful. The pressure removed by outside forces. More time to catch up on homework. Lost was on tonight. There would be time for girls again at some point in the unforeseeable future. Television told him so.
That future much more seeable, though, for young Elias. “I will just lay her out on the table and—” His words consumed by violent thrusting grunts, guttural, visceral, cartoonish and sly. Keegan smirked, hiding his discomfort. Was Eli seeking advice? Encouragement, or its opposite? “Her mom’s gone all weekend. I figure, two days…then I end it.”
“Right…” Keegan squinted into the grass, plucking it, rubbing it to bits between his fingers. The wind picked up around them. “But you don’t love her.”
Eli blew out guilty air from his cheeks, laughing. “You’re the type of guy who wouldn’t even let me cheat off you in a test, huh?”
“Probably not,” Keegan admitted.
But Eli was a good kid at heart, Keegan knew that. A strong runner too, surprising even Coach Betts who always looked askance at Eli, a punk, skater adjacent. Keegan was whiter than white bread, while Eli’s parents didn’t speak much English. Their high school’s district sat on the line between suburbia and sprawling apartment blocks, inter-income levels. Keegan from one, Eli the other. In athletics, it only mattered like this: their school could sprint like motherfuckers but the long-distance kids always got whupped by the pale spindly Jesuits from across town. Shaved bald ascetics of the running gods.
But Keegan and Eli were a few of Spring Hope’s real long run competitors. A junior, Keegan stood to inherit the mantle from reigning champ Simon, their all-star senior. The rest of his initial classmate runners had trickled off over the years into other activities and interests or just simply quit the grind. Coach Betts had recently moved them to three-a-days, expecting the boys to run before school, after it, and then once more when they were home. It sparked a minor rebellion still rippling through the squad, especially in what was usually considered their off-season.
Eli was the one sophomore with promise, along with a couple freshmen below him. The team needed rebuilding as the upperclassmen departed. Simon made it clear that Keegan’s role was to rise and inspire these new recruits, to assume his rightful place and hold the team together. But Keegan was not Simon, in his own humble opinion. Simon was tall, straight backed with dignity and aerodynamic. Keegan had thunder thighs. Powerful motors when needed, but he always felt bottom heavy. His mind now heavier with a deeper desire for freedom from this schedule in which he had trapped himself as a freshman.
Eli was the only person who knew Keegan wanted to quit. His last cross country season had ended with a premature collapse before the finish line at regionals. His parents, inveterate worriers, good people, spent time and resources digging into his fall. It gave Keegan the chance to escape months of practice. He could tell Coach Betts didn’t believe in his apparent weakness, beyond the mental sort. Keegan wasn’t certain he had ever believed it himself. That race had been under blazing heat. Regardless of the science, pounding pasta the night before did not always result in increased vitality.
His heart wasn’t in it, was the problem. He wasn’t sure where his heart was these days.
Only a remark made to Eli without caution in a training run let the secret into sunlight. Eli didn’t think it was such a big deal. “I’ll probably drop out too if Betts stays on my ass like this next year.” Keegan fought the automatic urge to discourage in his friend his own feelings. “You’re gonna be a senior,” Eli said. “Time to have some fucking fun. You need that, take it from a friend.”
Rationally, Keegan knew his parents would accept it too, maybe wouldn’t even be disappointed. He wasn’t aiming for collegiate sports, his running career just a malignant growth on his time unintended from what had been elective gym credit fulfillment. But the risk of disappointment itself stank of failure, prompting his sluggish reluctance toward any motion, forward or back. So he returned to training as winter thawed. He hit his intervals. He imagined maybe somehow that his freshman PR was still in reach. 4:53. If he broke 4:53, maybe that would be enough. A first-place final won in his freshman year remained his peak, with further promise yet unfulfilled. He did not think himself the man for this moment.
Case in point, the moral quandary at hand that Friday night. “Bro, you know what it’s like!” Eli shook his head with hormonal despair. “I’m not trying to be an asshole. She wants me. She’s like, obsessed with me. She basically begged me to come over.”
A gunshot split the evening as the track came alive. Keegan watched the sprinters, so free to leave it all on the first and only lap. Girls ran alongside them for stretches, shouting encouragement, leaping and cartwheeling. He thought of Maribelle, then smothered it. To Eli: “She thinks you like her more than you do.”
Eli picked at a mauve and somber scab on his knobby knee. “I know.” Both of them were Catholic, somewhere in the deep genes. There was genuine guilty feeling in his friend. “But you only live once, huh?” His chapped lips upturned, devils winning the war upon his shoulders.
“Hello boys!”
Laurie ducked into the tent, cooler embraced, a thin line of cleavage peeking out before vanishing like a mirage beneath loose fabric. Most boys turned. Freshman Harvey, her son, looked away into the middle distance. “Thanks mom, we have some.”
Laurie wasn’t the official team mom but she made recurrent stabs at contention as Judith, senior Oscar’s mother, proceeded to retirement. Laurie Davis was not particularly suited to the task, in Judith’s estimation. A single mother, Laurie worked full time and often missed events. She brought the wrong kind of drinks and didn’t fit into the established social circles of the neighborhood. Keegan had heard some suspected Laurie must be sniffing around at Coach Betts’ bachelor doorstep. The other boys on the team hoped she might be sniffing at their own, to Harvey’s chagrin. Jeff and Grey often poked and prodded their fellow fish, making lewd gestures whenever his mother came around.
“Stay hydrated, y’all, seriously now. Don’t run around like those girls and waste your energy.”
“You got it, Miss Davis,” Grey winked, before Harvey shoulder-checked him. His mom looked ready to scold, but then Coach Betts ducked under the tent flap and spread knees in commander mode. He worked xylitol in his teeth like cud or long forsaken chew. “Thank you kindly, Laurie, now let our boys gather themselves for the fights ahead.”
His back luckily to Coach, Eli contorted his face in mockery. “Trample the weak!”
“That’s right, Eli. And hurdle the dead,” Coach drawled, spitting gum to grass and leaving the boys to masculine contemplation. Laurie followed, waving as she went.
Is she looking at me? Keegan thought. He caught Eli’s amused glance who was clearly thinking the same thing.
Waiting a safe few seconds, Harvey saluted Coach’s backside and other boys laughed with him. Simon shushed them, already on his feet shaking loose. “Got about forty-five to go. Keeg, Eli, how ‘bout a warm up?”
No, Keegan thought, but he got up anyway. Duty called. At least it would break off the subject of Eli and the poor girl smitten with him. He bid the sophomore stand too. “Let’s go. Easy perimeter run.” Clear your mind of dishonorable things.
Eli heaved with resignation and got up grunting. “Go follow the leader!” Harvey ragged them as Keegan gingerly stepped over a cluster of legs. Eli kicked Harvey with an impish laugh and took off running after Simon. “Douchebag,” Harvey shouted, “you spiked my fucking knee!”
Keegan was more than happy to leave the rest behind. The others were done for the day, but Coach didn’t let anyone leave until everyone was through. Keegan understood this was to honor the downtrodden milers, but it just made the rest of the guys resent them.
He soon caught up to Eli, though both dragged ass behind Simon as they made for the fence line. They adjusted to the dainty feeling of spikes beneath their feet, so much more delicate and exposing than trainers. Keegan still wore his sweats, but Eli let his legs breathe free in their nearly indecent uniform shorts.
“I bet you could nail her.” He was incorrigible.
“What?”
“Miss Davis, she’s clearly into the whole athlete thing. Doesn’t have no husband, always so desperate to come by when we’re stretching out.”
“She wants to support Harvey.”
Eli rolled his eyes. “You think he wants her around in those tops she wears? He doesn’t even ride back with her ever, he takes the bus home.”
“I think she works nights or something.”
“Yeah, at a massage parlor I bet.”
“Dude,” Keegan picked up the pace a little, feeling bad that Simon strode so solitary ahead of them.
“Just kidding, chill…but for real. She’s a milf.”
Eli wasn’t wrong. Laurie had some hardbitten edge to her, and smoky eyes. Tits, of course, swelling beneath clothes worn well. Her hugs lingered, now that he thought of it too. Why was she hugging him so often anyway? He was sixteen. Sleeping with moms? That was a joke, at least Keegan had always taken them as such. There were rumors in middle school about that eighth grader with the triplets’ mom. But there had also been rumors about rampant skin-eating viruses due to Spring Break hookups with cannibals, and downstairs-maggots from butter-lubed zucchinis, and other such degenerate tales passed around their generation with titillating glee. That didn’t mean any of it was actually happening.
Or maybe it was.
Every pang of lust Keegan felt seemed intertwined with the internet somehow, and therefore unreal. IM and texting flirtations, porn, and all the flashing images he consumed with primordial shame. Maybe the barriers were lower for others.
Keegan had it real once, with Maribelle. Not sex, but close enough maybe. Right here, even, under the Friday night lights of Spring Hope, like some jock in a high school movie. Sucking face in the shadows behind the pole vault mat. Running faster for her, wanting to win because of her, because he meant something to someone else in some special holy way.
It was why he couldn’t just tell Eli to let fly his dogs of war over his poor not-really-girlfriend, whoever she was. Things meant things, he believed it, he had to. If he couldn’t run like Simon, he could be like him. Instill those values. Persist for the good, the redeeming of self by secular sweat. Let the bad thoughts bead and cool against him in the wind, pain to comfort.
“You telling me you wouldn’t, though?” Eli asked.
“She’s Harvey’s mom!”
“I’m talking about Emily, this girl I got! If you were me. Though clearly you’d fuck Miss Davis, I already know that.”
“I said what I think, you’re just not listening—”
“What are you two yapping about!” Simon ran backwards with the same ease that carried all his motion. “Get those legs loose, you’re stumbling along like a couple fools!” His jokes were grandfatherly but spoken with unselfconscious charm. Even Eli couldn’t hate Simon, and he despised a lot of people. Keegan saw in the sophomore that same part of himself, still hoping to prove himself to the good ones in life.
Keegan kicked up his speed and Eli was forced to follow. Simon yelped as he led them along the perimeter, his enthusiasm for this miserable slog of a sport inevitably infectious. He belonged with the Jesuits. They could use his smile. And he could use the better teammates.
Simon was religious, so probably a virgin. It comforted Keegan to know he wasn’t the only one left. Simon gave off that virtuous innocence despite his considerable skill and discipline at seemingly everything in life. But the senior restrained himself by choice. Out of a deep-set mantra Keegan couldn’t even begin to imagine. While he held back for reasons not even discernible to himself.
He could’ve slept with Maribelle. That time in her living room, after midnight. Or the Honda’s backseat, after midnight. Or the neighbor’s backyard, dogsitting in the summer. I mean, she made lip contact with his dick that time. Before he sheepishly tucked himself away, glancing around like there were hidden surveillance cameras. He knew that had annoyed her. Keegan, always so eager for the thrill of almost, and always denying Maribelle any all the way. He had loved her, but that gave him the excuse of protecting her from his own base impulses. Protection not requested.
As she slipped away from him last year, he had felt it happen, every excruciating inch. He didn’t like to think about how he begged, tears in his eyes, and Maribelle assented to keep him comfortable yet again for those pitiful last few months of watching DVDs on the couch and never moving past second base. She even stopped attending his meets. When that final phone call arrived, it was a punch in the balls, but one Keegan long expected. Now he avoided her in the hall when he could and tried to lose the scent of her dating passage through the school. Onward, upward, and him still here.
Why was he always such a fucking almost? Afraid to step up and do something, to push beyond his limits. Missing his chance to have been Eli, to ever be Simon. To stay himself instead, a fuzzy image of a person, like a Pokémon caught in mid evolution pixel haze. A child, not a man, but one with man’s desires denied. A willful child then.
Meanwhile, Eli, his supposed protégé or whatever, he spoke of weekend sex with a casualness that betrayed deeper experience. A sophomore. A good runner. A cool kid, who could cross between worlds. A kid who really worked for what he got, who was going to sink or swim on that lung capacity, not cushioned by Keegan’s upper middle-class privileges, his time to bide. His cowardice. If Eli knew Keegan’s weak heart, he wouldn’t be asking his advice anyway.
But Keegan still had one thing over the sophomore for sure. A 4:53 mile.
They crossed over into the center ring of the track, but Keegan pulled Eli back before they reached the tent. “Okay, you want to besmirch that girl’s good name or whatever?”
Eli considered his words with genuine pause. Keegan still had him then.
“Beat me in the race.”
Eli rolled his eyes. “Defending her honor?” But then he smirked. “We’ll call it my victory meal.”
“Gross,” Keegan shook his head.
“But if you win?” Eli offered in return. “You tell Betts you’re quitting. On Monday, before you even shower.”
Keegan almost pressed back. This was the last regular season event, but to drop out before regionals? It felt sacrilegious.
And very, very tempting.
Eli stuck out his hand. “Come on, live a little.”
“Okay then,” Keegan replied, living, tired of not for too long. The friends slapped palms, bumped fists. Deal sealed.
As the last half hour ticked down, the blues and lavenders and sunburst of Texas sky went full black, the only stars the blazing lights and humming firmament of insecthood overhead. Keegan felt that old familiar thrill set in. Stomach acid fear transfused to exhilaration, a brew that somehow always made this goddamned race, right under the wire, worth it. Almost.
Old Crow Medicine Show rattled from someone’s iPod somewhere, floating like a mystic’s drawled chant in the dusk. One event left. His event. He was adjusted to his spikes now, lighter than air on his feet. He didn’t even mind his exposed thighs, the bristling teenage hairs. Maribelle always used to say she loved his runner’s ass and maybe she actually had. A final prep from Coach Betts, short and sweet like they should know it already. A wave to his parents up in the stands, their beaming smiles.
Keegan and Eli trailed behind Simon toward the starting line. They eyed the girls gathered at the edge of the grass, the last stragglers flushed pink from their own mile run. Eli waved, eyes sparkling. Keegan managed a half-grin before turning away.
Eli gently nudged him. “I’mma beat your ass, man.”
“Good luck. A deal’s a deal, yeah?”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah…”
Simon spun, dancing in place, antelopean. “Goals, guys, name ‘em. We got two Jesuits, but I don’t wanna see you behind anyone else for long, right? Pace off me.”
“Like we can keep up?” Eli asked. “What? I’m a realist.”
Simon didn’t accept negatives. “You both keep up on our six miles all the time. This is five less. Don’t get in your head. It’s over before you know it. Get to the third lap, feel that burst. If you lose me, don’t lose the rhythm.” He winked. “And we beat those bald boys, yeah?”
Keegan suddenly remembered what he had promised Eli. To tell Coach Betts of his intent to quit. But that meant he would have to tell Simon too. Beautiful, noble Simon, who laid Eli down on the grass for one last thigh cross. “Feel that stretch, son, come on!” Keegan left them, the punk and the preacher’s son, joshing and rolling around like brothers, while he fought the threat of lock-in limbs. Pushed it away. Counting, one, two, three. Cleared his mind.
But here came Laurie, onto the track.
Miss Davis, the angel told him. The devil just smiled.
“Good luck, K!” She hustled over, bubbly and bright, accompanied by musical jewelry jangling and an aura of perfume. Not like Maribelle’s—Victoria’s Secret he recalled. This was something more complex.
She hugged him. Of course she did. He tried not to let his shorts make contact with the rough fabric of her tight black jeans. But her aroma was everywhere now, swirling about his head. That was the most magical discovery, with Maribelle, kissing her, holding her. The shelter of the scent, the world of another person opening to you unashamed.
Laurie pulled away, but kept her hands on Keegan’s shoulders, looking him in the eye. “I see you as a mentor to Harvey, you know?”
That didn’t help with the guilt. The best mentorship he could think of was when he caught Harvey and some of the other guys smoking weed outside the locker room one AM. Come on, y’all, he had muttered, before hurrying away to their misbegotten laughter.
“He really loves his time on the team,” she told him.
That was true, at least. Harvey was one of the boys. That tangle of youth who were supposed to be Keegan’s charges next year, his minds to mold.
“I really love that he has older guys to look up to.” Older guys. “I know he’ll be running this next year, right?” She drew away, but ran her fingers down his shoulders, down his arms, until both of her hands clasped one of his. Right here, upon the rubber track, his spikes sinking low, the race coming now, the whistling, the line up, bald Jesuits and all.
“Right,” Keegan sputtered.
Laurie kept his hand in one of hers, even as she stepped back. Her arm outstretched, a downturned smile, waggling her free fingers. “Go for gold.”
She let go. Keegan spun around, mind totally off the race now, too disoriented, luckily, to even be aroused. Or to be anxious, as he took his place next to a none-the-wiser Simon and a shit-pleased Eli. All their bony shoulders smashed together, crowded and breathless and ready as ever. “Good luck, Mr. Davis,” Eli whispered, right before the gun cracked. Twelve fingers clicked their pace watches and their feet flew.
Immediately, Keegan felt the lack of breath in his lungs like his training meant nothing. A shallow pain combined with the fleetness of his feet, the airy nothing of every stride. Adrenaline mind, out of body. Not optimal. He figured Simon never felt this way, that a champion’s focus was something else and thus Keegan nearly damned himself from the start.
The first curve to the left was always a scramble as positions collapsed, waves of boy bodies bumping and shoving for early dominance. Simon always kept pace with the top guys, the early pack, though he never took the lead right away. He knew which Jesuit to track— a kid literally named Blaze, god bless Texas—and Simon in his wake for the first 400. Their champion’s gusto rang in Keegan’s head: shake and bake baby!
He fell into the midst of the second pack, Eli huffing at his tail. The next hundred meters straight. He manically swung from depressed back to glee, spring air his fuel, the lightness in his bones no longer nerves. Loosening now to spirit and flow.
But with the next curve came another crash, the exhaustive loop slamming into his chest with futile repetition. He recited the platitudes he barely believed about mental toughness. His grim despair at his cynicism itself bubbled into fresh reaction. Teenage stubborn refusal, pressing back and forth as if his legs cycled upon some great invisible contraption. He caught sight of Simon ahead, his strides never bounding so far that he lost time in the air, his spiked feet clawing forward ground against his monkish rival.
Over Keegan’s shoulder came chugs from Eli, rhythmic beats he recognized as Drowning Pool. Let the bodies hit the floor. Trample the weak, hurdle the dead. A gaggle of misfits they were, fast but too cerebral to black out on speed alone, these boys navigated the blue rubber and its lines like a chessboard. Each a Pheidippides in his own mind, running for the honor of a doomed and ancient cause. At the next curve, Keegan suddenly found himself smiling, high on his own supply.
The laps blurred, not only together but with the laps past. Reconfigurations of faces in the stands, expectations of the stands. His parents, Maribelle, his retired and ever-bemused Coach Kelly from freshman year; the teachers, and peers, and friends who came to watch with varying levels of interest and engagement, but who had watched still. The faces now, the girls, his boys, the stern clapping Betts, stopwatch held aloft. 3:42, FUCKING MOVE! The ghost of a voice overtaking that command, Laurie’s voice, shouting his name in the wind. This communal swarm of time that was his life right now. He wanted to stop regretting it so much.
Keegan made his push against the last Jesuit in his pack, gliding along his right side and overtaking him over the 1200-meter line. Back to the start, one more time. Simon and Blaze nearly one hundred meters ahead, far gone, but he locked sight on them anyway. A third kid from Memorial trailed behind those two leaders. Third place didn’t sound terrible. It sounded pretty good, as if Maribelle whispered it in his ear. Or Laurie.
It sounded good to Eli too, who shot up to Keegan’s right. Keegan glanced over but sweat-gleamed Eli kept eyes forward. All business now, their contract at risk. Keegan tried not to imagine the images that motivated him onward now.
They curved into the last two hundred together. They overtook the Memorial boy in sync, who spewed fumes. There was no chance to reach Simon or Blaze, who battled for a last second first. So third it would be, one of the Spartans.
No time to check his watch. Off Coach’s last report and his internalized clock, Keegan intuited he had about fifteen seconds to make it clear. Eli burned up next to him, no more heavy metal humming, just gritted teeth and fury. He could beat Keegan, that’s what he was thinking. He could beat him, he didn’t need him, or his feckless advice.
But Keegan wanted to beat himself too.
The slight tilt to every heave of Eli’s body reminded him that his friend’s feet tended to pronate. That his shoes had probably loosened by now. That it would only take one last blast and Keegan would have proved it, whatever he was torturing himself over.
One stride ahead, three strides now, two seconds to go, muscle fibers exploding with glorious fireworks in his thunder thighs. His watch beeped as he crossed the line.
Keegan wheeled down, twenty meters, ten, right into the damp outstretched arms of a victorious Simon. “Woo, boy, that’s what I’m talking about!” The world spun.
Keegan breathlessly congratulated the champ on first place, noticed the Jesuit Blaze crouched in despair nearby; watched the rest of the runners hurtle through the finish, their colored jerseys draping their skinny forms like limp flags on a windless day; spotted Eli as he puked clear liquid into the grass and Coach Betts beat on his shoulders with pride. “That’s a PR, son. That’s commitment, son. That’s training paid off. You see it now. You feel it.”
Keegan looked at his own watch. 4:53.
Record met, not broken.
He laughed but it came out as dry cough. His body racked, and he keeled over too and touched his forehead to the track, asking for blessing or forgiveness or a steady earth beneath his feet.
Keegan’s own congratulations came soon, pulling him back up. His parents so proud for this comeback run after his difficult autumn. The grinning camaraderie of his teammates, their pent-up boredom finally released as everyone agreed to a ceremonial late night Whataburger trip across the street. Keegan told his parents that he would catch the bus home with the guys, and bid them adieu into the warm night.
His watchful eyes ever upon the circling girls, Coach Betts rallied the squad into formation for a reluctant cooldown jog. Simon at the helm, their golden boy let them off the hook after a perfunctory couple of minutes. “All right, all right…let’s eat!”
The boys broke apart into constituent packs. Harvey threw his arms over Eli’s shoulders. “Bro, I invited Michelle,” Harvey confided. “She’s bringing a few of the girls.”
“Sure, man, sure,” Jeff snorted, before Grey leapfrogged his shoulders in a single bound and sprinted for the Whataburger. “Never see him run like that when it counts,” Simon sighed, with a commiserating look to Keegan. Keegan shook his head, and told him to go on without him, he’d catch up.
The tent long gone, he went back for his bag that sat alone in the middle of the field. He watched the last folks drift off, suddenly feeling very small. He picked a spring dandelion from the trampled grass, impossibly intact, and blew the seeds away. He lifted his phone to photograph the lights above the stands before they could go out.
almost had u. came a message from Eli. good one
you almost did. Keegan texted back. 4:54 as a sophomore? clutch. I smell letterman…girls love letterman
thx
… Eli kept typing. but still gonna fux her, sry. u kno how it is. shes really hot
Keegan felt betrayed, ridiculous as their contract had been. dude
u only live once, Eli responded like an illiterate sage. now cum get ur milkshake and honey bbq bitch
So Elias would despoil as he pleased. Keegan supposed he was off the hook for Monday, a stand-off with Coach Betts once again deferred. He stood, slung his bag, and left the field without further fanfare.
In the parking lot, their bus was the last left. A few sleeping trucks and SUVs, teachers grading late, who knows. And a Subaru, hatch up, with Laurie stowing the cooler away for next time. With no eyes on her, she moved slower, an ambiguous expression on her face. But hardy, always hardy, as she closed the hatch with a definitive slam. She paused, looking out at something, or nothing. She toyed with a bracelet on her wrist.
I could go talk to her, Keegan thought. I could ask for a ride home. He’d avoided the crowds after the race, but he hadn’t forgotten her hug. Her touch trailing down his arms. His hands in hers. Her voice in the wind. The part that was wrong was what he liked, and with terrifying speed it overtook his better nature. He started walking toward her car, prepared to let whatever words come what may, to go wherever she wanted to bring him. Some devilish black part of his heart would guide him true.
But her door shut, and Laurie cocooned herself under the lonely dome light. She lifted her phone to her ear, calling someone. Keegan stopped, bracing himself on the corner of the school bus. Waiting with her. No one answered. She hung up, gazing down at her phone for a few moments more. Keegan watched until the light above her went out. He felt like the world’s biggest bastard.
Her engine started. Keegan turned away, pulling his gym bag tight to his chest. He jogged down the driveway and onto the street. The Whataburger sign shone against the freeway behind it, a suburban shore on that rushing river of light. He ran past his team gathered inside, back toward his neighborhood. Four or so miles, a proper cooldown. He kept his mind on the path ahead.
He will sweat out the guilt, and need, and regret. He will be grateful for his 4:53 PR and let it stand. He will think:
Regret compounds, even the bad choices he neglects to make. He will wonder why nothing makes him perfectly happy or satisfied, and when the real life of fake television dreams will begin. He thinks he will keep going anyway.
He will not judge Eli, and contract be damned, he will fulfill his end of the bargain. He will tell Coach he’s quitting on Monday. He will call Simon over the weekend so as not to spring the news on him. He will explain his feelings to his parents. He will take senior year easy, and try not to think about all the years he’s already let pass by hard. He will come to learn it only slips faster from here on out. He will hope that one day he forgets Maribelle’s perfume, or the way Laurie’s fingers felt on his skin, and how her own regrets pooled so unknown behind her smoky eyes. He will hope, for everyone’s sake, that such unanswered desires ease with the passing of time.
Not all of them will. But he did not know that yet. So he leaned into the curve of the road and took off under the arch of darkened oak branches that hung above all he did.