What They Always Tell Us (7 page)

When the doorbell rings, he stays on his bed and waits for James to answer the door. He hears the door open and then voices—James’s and someone else’s. Then the voices get clearer and he realizes it is Nathen, now inside his house, come to see
him,
not James.

Alex’s heart pounds and he lurches off the bed. He leaves his room and moves to the head of the stairs. Nathen, in the foyer with James, glances up and nods. “Hey, buddy,” he says, not even pausing for a response. “Good news: Coach Runyon gave us the go-ahead. He says he wants to see you run tomorrow. After school.”

“Really?” Alex starts moving down the stairs. “You’re not kidding or anything?”

“Nope. So get your running shoes on. I figure you might need one last training session, me and you.”

James just stands there silently, blank-faced.

“Okay,” Alex says. “I’ll be right down.”

As he changes, Alex can hear them talking downstairs, but he can’t really make out any of the words. He puts on his gray sweatpants and a navy blue sweatshirt, laces up his worn-down jogging shoes, and finds Nathen where he left him.

“Let’s go,” Nathen says.

“Have a good run,” James says. “See you at school tomorrow.”

The two knock fists and then Nathen and Alex head out.

“Let’s run to the river and back again,” Nathen shouts as they take off. Alex nods. Talking while running is bad for his lungs, so they run in silence for a while, at a fast clip. Alex wonders if he can keep it up, but it’s easier with Nathen next to him. When they get to the river in the new subdivision, Nathen jogs in place on the freshly laid asphalt, while Alex catches his breath.

“We gotta keep going, buddy. Only a brief rest!”

Despite being beat, Alex smiles at Nathen’s bossy tone.

“You’re doing great. Just keep it up,” he says, before darting off again. When he looks back, flashing his big smile, Alex summons his legs to get moving. They run together all the way back to Alex’s house. His parents’ cars are in the garage now, and the lights of the house burn in the twilight.

“That was good,” Nathen says. They both walk in circles around the front yard, catching their breath and keeping their legs moving.

“I’ll meet you after school tomorrow at the track field? You can change in our locker room.” Nathen lifts his shirt and wipes his brow.

“I’ll be nervous,” Alex says, his hands clasped behind his head, opening his mouth wide to gulp in extra air.

“Don’t be. You’ll do great. I’ll be there to root you on.”

Alex nods, and when he looks at Nathen looking at him, he almost asks him why he is being so nice to him. Why he has
always
been nice to him. The night air is chilly, and soon winter will arrive in full force. Standing there, it almost seems like Nathen is the only warm and kind presence that exists on the entire planet.

During dinner later Alex waits for James to say something about Nathen and cross-country, but he barely speaks, just shovels the baked chicken and new potatoes and salad into his mouth. His parents ask their usual questions—how was the doctor and school and so on—but Alex doesn’t dare tell them about tomorrow. Because what if he fails? Why get their hopes up? Alex knows
he
can handle the disappointment, but his parents? Haven’t they had enough to deal with when it comes to him?

“Nothing big going on at school?” his mom asks.

“No, just the usual,” Alex says. Across the table, he and James trade knowing glances. And Alex realizes James won’t say a word because he’s thinking the same thing: why set them up for more disappointment? For this, Alex is grateful.

Later, just as Alex is about to turn off his light and go to bed, James taps on the door and pokes his head in. “Hey, good luck tomorrow,” he says, and before Alex can even thank him or anything, James pulls the door shut and is gone.

After the school bell rings and most kids clear out, Alex takes his book bag and the duffel with his jogging clothes in it to one of the bathrooms and changes in a stall. He wants to show up ready to run. Plus, he doesn’t want to change in the locker room with all the other athletes, all of them likely wondering what the hell
he
is doing there.

Thankfully the track field isn’t crowded when Alex shows up. Most kids have gone home for the day. The track is the usual size—about 400 meters of bright red surface, recently refurbished, surrounding a field of grass. This used to be the football field, too, but two years ago they built a new one on the other side of the school campus, with stadium-size seating and custom-designed locker and weight rooms just beyond the north end zone. Football rules the roost in this city, in this state. Track is an afterthought, really. Cross-country especially, which lacks the glamour of the sprints.

Alex sees Nathen in the grass along the track, stretching his long, toned arms toward the tips of his blue and white jogging shoes. Alex walks to him and plunks his bags on the ground. Nathen looks up from his stretch. “Hey, buddy. You ready?”

“Yeah. As ready as I’ll ever be.”

“Here, sit next to me and stretch. Coach R will be over in a minute.”

Coach Runyon is across the field, talking to another runner, a tall black guy Alex recognizes as Joseph Ewusi-Mensah, the star of the team. Coach Runyon is short and lean, probably in his midthirties, with receding red hair and a gaunt face.

“You’re gonna kick some ass today,” Nathen says.

“If you say so.” Alex is so nervous that he can barely complete a stretch. His limbs feel heavy and rubbery, and his belly feels like it wants to explode. And now he sees Coach Runyon pat Joseph on the shoulder, sending him toward the locker rooms. He starts crossing the field, heading right toward them.

“Alex?” the coach says, pausing in front of him.

“Yes, sir.” He stands and, for lack of anything else to do, shakes his hand. “Uh, thanks for letting me try out today.”

Coach Runyon is all business. “We have a solid team here. Not the best in the state, but pretty darn good. But we’re short one man, which I guess Nathen told you about. And we need a full roster to be competitive in the team competition. So I’m looking for someone to fill in this coming spring season. We’ll be doing some track events, but we also have some road races.”

“Great,” he says, even though he knows this already.

“I’ve tried out a few other guys already, but no one has really impressed me. Nathen says you’ve got talent.”

Alex lets out a shy smile and shrugs. He’s never been able to take a compliment or praise.

“So,” Coach says, “I’m going to have you run a mile, just to get a look. That’s basically four laps around the track. You about ready?”

“Yes, sir.”

With Nathen watching and with Coach Runyon’s hand on his stopwatch, Alex takes his place behind the fat line that marks the starting point in the innermost lane. Coach counts down from five and then Alex takes off. His rubbery legs suddenly kick to life and he lets loose, as if racing next to actual opponents. He hears Nathen shouting encouragement as he passes them after the first lap, and then the second. By the third lap he is sucking for air. He probably started out too fast, but he feels good—nice, even strides, pumping his fists, his legs feeling bouncy on the track, like they could keep going for hours. When he passes them for the last lap, he sees Coach Runyon scrutinizing the stopwatch, Nathen hovering at his shoulder.

Approaching the end of the run, Alex knows that in a few minutes his fate will be sealed. Coach will want him or not. He’ll either return to gym next semester or be part of this team. Both prospects are scary. And how will he face Nathen if he fails, not to mention James? Will Nathen drop away, back to being James’s friend and on the periphery of Alex’s existence? He almost doesn’t want to finish running, afraid of what comes next. But he crosses the finish line anyway, slowing down, breathing heavily but evenly. He walks ahead and soon Nathen is at his side, slapping him on the back, saying, “Great job, bud!”

Nathen is proud of him, at least. Alex turns back and heads toward Coach Runyon, whose opinion is the only one that matters.

Coach Runyon walks toward him, still eyeballing his stopwatch. “Five minutes, forty-three seconds. Not bad for a novice with no training,” he says. “You’ve never run competitively before?”

“No, sir.”

“Doesn’t matter. Nathen’s right—you’ve got talent. A nice stride, though you need to shorten it. And you definitely need to learn about pacing. But it’s a good start.”

“Thanks.”

“Now, I want you to work on cutting your time before January. I’ll give you a chart with times to aim for, and splits. And I want you to come see me after school a few days a week, to work on your form. You’ll need to do some training on weekends, too.”

Alex nods, then says, “So…” He looks at Nathen and then back at the coach. “Does this mean, well, that I’m on the team?”

Coach, ever stone-faced and earnest, extends his hand. “You’re on the team. Congrats.”

Alex is speechless for a moment, but he manages to squeak out a thanks.

“I knew you’d do it,” Nathen says, walking Alex to his car. He has his arm draped lightly around Alex’s shoulder, and this only adds to his stunned euphoria.

“I still can’t believe it,” Alex says. But he edits himself from saying what he’s really thinking—I can’t believe I’m an athlete now; I can’t believe I belong to a team; I can’t believe your arm is around me.

Almost everyone from school is long gone, so there’s nobody in the parking lot, save for a few cars here and there, sprinkled about like the misplaced toys of some giant. No one is there to witness his moment of glory. But it’s okay. He doesn’t need an audience. He’s almost embarrassed about how good he feels.

“Take the night off, and we’ll go running tomorrow, and this weekend if you want,” Nathen says, finally pulling away and stationing himself in front of Alex.

“Sounds awesome,” he says. “Thanks, you know, for all this. For making this happen.”

Nathen just smiles and gives a thumbs-up sign and walks off. It’s as if he’s shy, too, all of a sudden.

At home, Alex waits in his car before going inside to face James, who is probably expecting bad news, and his father and mother, who have no idea he’s just made the cross-country team, have no idea that Alex is even a decent runner. He wants to savor the moment, alone, for a few more minutes.

It’s been so long since he has felt, well, happy. Or this happy.

He’s not foolish—he knows it won’t last, this euphoria. It will be replaced by the realities of the hard training on top of the daily grind of school and homework. And he can still fail, can’t he? He’s on the team, but what if, after all this, he really
isn’t
a good runner? He could go on and on with these negative thoughts, but he shuts them out through sheer will. Because it’s not even the jogging or making the team that is making him feel so ecstatic. It’s the charge he feels with Nathen. The charge of having a friend again.

He finally gets out of the car and heads toward the side door. That’s when he sees Henry across the street, sitting on his porch with his dictionary.

Henry waves, like he’s been waiting for Alex to notice him. It’s a wave that Alex can’t just brush off with a wave of his own, even if he wants to. He drops his bags in the driveway and crosses the street.

“Learn any new words today?” Alex says. He sits next to Henry on the brick stairs.

“Not really. So many of them are stupid words no one ever uses.” Henry’s tone sounds down, like he’s pouting about something.

“Yeah, I guess you’re right,” Alex says.

“But I guess we need them sometimes, to describe stuff.”

“I guess so.”

“This kid at school called me a ‘redheaded bastard’ today.”

“That’s horrible,” Alex says.

“I didn’t really know what ‘bastard’ meant, not really. But now I do. Most kids just ignore me. I don’t care, either. I just listen to the teachers. They’re the ones who are nice to me. But this kid, he won’t stop calling me stuff.”

“What a creep.” It dawns on Alex that Henry is sort of a younger version of himself—an outcast, a misfit. A weirdo. And he’s not even in middle school yet.