Portrait of a Girl Running

by J. B. Chicoine

  Myles sprung to his feet and leaned into Kyle. “Oh, yes I can. And watch your tone. It’s time you actually had to work for your grade.”

  Kyle backed down and glared at Leila. Cursing under his breath, he stormed out.

  Leila remained, her mouth agape. “What are you trying to prove?”

  “You wanted a tutor, now you have one. End of discussion.” The old Myles had returned.

  Leila’s eyes rolled sideways, and she stomped out of the room.

  Kyle slammed their locker door as she approached. “You had to ask for a tutor.”

  “I’m sorry. I had no idea he would pull that. Isn’t there some way you can get out of it?”

  “What, are you nuts? Were you not in there?”

  “I just need to brush up on my algebra and geometry a little.”

  “You can’t be serious.”

  Leila shrugged.

  He frowned. “And I suppose you barely passed those classes.”

  “D-minuses.”

  “Are you kidding me?”

  “Well, the past couple of years haven’t been very good for me.”

  He did not smile, not even a little.

  She winced. “Why do you have to be so mean about it?”

  “My grade’s on the line. I can’t afford to have you drag me down. I’ve got scholarships hanging in the balance.”

  Leila wilted. “I promise I’ll study all the time, you’ll see, you won’t have to do hardly anything. I’ll even give up running to school so I can spend more time on my formulas.”

  “Don’t be stupid.” He glanced at his watch and hustled back to Myles’ class. They both flew into their seats just as the bell rang. Myles twitched a half smile.

  Rather than slapping her failing quiz results on her desk, Myles held it up for her to see and directed his comment to Kyle. “This is an unacceptable failure, Miss Sanders. I will be expecting a turnaround this week.”

  When Myles invaded her home, Leila had no idea just how things would change, but they would. Although his presence had agitated her, she craved something in his strength and boldness, something in which she found comfort. He had been fatherly in a way she never would have imagined him capable. At the same time, he now had information, information that gave him power. Control. She hated that. Ian had the same information, but she never sensed he had any desire to control her with it.

  After math, Leila and Kyle made plans to meet outside the gym after eighth period to work out the details. Just before the agreed-upon time, she changed into her running shorts. The gym door groaned and she hurried into the alcove to meet Kyle in the hall, but instead she tripped headlong into Ian.

  He steadied her. “Whoa. Big hurry today.”

  Leila withdrew. “Coach!”

  “You doing okay?”

  She wavered. “Yeah.”

  “I heard you might have had a rough weekend.”

  “Really? What did you hear?”

  “That you looked like hell and Kyle had to take you home. Was it parent-teacher aftermath?”

  “Interesting play on words.”

  Ian grinned.

  Leila continued, “Myles paid me a visit at home. He—” just then, Kyle stuck his head between the windowed alcove doors.

  “There you are!” Kyle glanced from one to the other. “Should I come back?”

  “Yeah, Kyle,” Brigham said. “Just give us a minute.”

  “Sure thing, Coach.” He stepped back out into the hall.

  Ian maintained a respectable distance. “What happened?”

  “Mr. Myles knows. All he had to do was look at me. He wasn’t in my apartment for more than two minutes and he figured it out.”

  Ian’s brow arched.

  “I told you, we have this weird thing.”

  “What was his reaction?”

  “If I stay out of trouble, he’ll keep it to himself. He even sounded, I don’t know, fatherly.”

  “Fatherly?”

  “Yeah … and he knows that you know.”

  As if to ask how? Ian’s eyes widened.

  “I’m sorry. I told you, it’s this weird thing we have. Besides, it didn’t seem to faze him.”

  “How much does he know?”

  “Only that you’re aware of my situation.”

  “It doesn’t matter.” Ian’s eyes softened. “Are you really doing okay?”

  “I just think some things are beginning to catch up to me, but other than that ….” She shrugged, forcing a smile.

  They again stood at the impasse. He stepped closer and then caught himself. “You’d better run.”

  She nodded, the frustration in his eyes reflecting her own. She turned and pushed through the doors to where Kyle waited.

  She pasted on a smile. “Okay, so what do you want to do?”

  A couple of days a week she would drive to school and they would run track before classes. On those afternoons, they would study math at his house, given that it was less than a five-minute walk. Since Maryanne was cheerleading on Saturdays, they could put in some extra time at the track, early, before games.

  ~

  Kyle stepped through the cut chain-link fence early the next morning, spotting Leila across the field where she sat on the track bench. Yawning, he walked to meet her, his breath, heavy in the crisp, forty-five-degree air. Cold settled in his chest. He rubbed goosebumps beneath the sleeves of his hooded jacket.

  The sun, low in the sky, set aflame maple trees lining the athletic fields. It appeared as though their tips had been dipped in crimson. He squinted. Could Leila be wearing only shorts and a sweatshirt?

  “You must be freezing,” he called out, toasty in his sweat pants.

  “Not until I stopped moving and sat down.” She shivered and stood as he approached. “This is what I normally wear. I warm up as I run.”

  “Oh yeah?” His brows arched. Kyle stood before her. Leila was tall but, at six-four, he towered over her.

  Leila started toward the track. “Let’s go.”

  Kyle laughed. “You’re killing me. Haven’t you ever heard of a warm up?”

  “Sure, I warm up as I jog, you know, before I start running.”

  He shook his head. “Girl, who taught you how to run?”

  “Nobody.”

  “Stretches! We stretch first.”

  “Oh. Right. Like in gym class.” Leila returned to the bench.

  He shook his head. Coach was right, Leila was a virgin runner. “First we’ll work on our quads.”

  “Quads? What are my quads?”

  Sitting on the bench in front of her, he ran his hand up her outer thigh feeling goosebumps. “These are your quadriceps.”

  She gasped and Kyle grinned, drawing his hand back.

  “Sorry,” he said, comparing her legs to Maryanne’s. His girlfriend had nicely shaped legs—they looked great in a cheerleading skirt—but at five-four, her legs didn’t go on and on like Leila’s.

  “Just warn me next time,” she said.

  “I’m allowed a next time?”

  “Don’t be a pig.”

  He chuckled and demonstrated the quad stretches, then the hamstring stretch, and a few others she said she had never heard of. She mimicked each movement.

  “Now we hit the track.” He gestured and she followed. “We’ll start off slow. You just keep pace with me.”

  Kyle took the outside lane on account of his longer stride. They started off slow. As he pushed a little harder, she matched his speed. Kyle liked that she kept up. He enjoyed running with her even more than imagining it. Not that he had fantasized about her at length, but her mysterious ways intrigued him. So what if she seemed a little rude sometimes.

  On the second lap, Kyle picked up his pace, monitoring her exertion. Coach Brigham had said she claimed to be noncompetitive. Testing her, Kyle slowed, hoping she might continue their previous pace or try to outrun him. When he pulled back, she lagged.

  “Do you want to run faster?” he asked, hoping to egg her on.


  “If you do.”

  “You think you can outrun me?”

  “I don’t know.”

  He stepped it up. Turning to face her, he ran backward. “You’d like to know though, wouldn’t you?”

  “I guess it doesn’t really matter to me.”

  “I don’t think you can.”

  Leila shrugged. “Who cares?”

  He smiled. “Do you want to race me?”

  “Don’t be a jerk.” She scowled and pulled back to a jog.

  Alone and ahead of her, he stopped until she caught up. “So, you really aren’t competitive?”

  “Is that what this is? You want to test how competitive I am?”

  “Well, believe it or not, track is competitive. You need to know how to compete. It’s not like just getting out there and trying to run faster than everyone else. You start off in a line, but you’re immediately vying for position. You may be a fast runner, but if you can’t push your way into a slot as it opens up, you’ll be heading up the rear.” He had not meant to intimidate her, but her insecurity surfaced in the widening of her eyes.

  She slowed to a walk. “I’m going to really suck at this.”

  “Don’t say that. Come on.” He tugged her arm and pulled her forward. “Let’s run some more.”

  She acquiesced and they jogged for a minute longer.

  He nudged her. “In a few weeks you are seriously gonna want to whup me. You’ll see.”

  ~

  Mr. Myles pulled into his parking space. As he climbed from his Volvo, two running figures caught his eye. The corner of his mouth curled with satisfaction at his astute match. How fortuitous that Kyle was as much Brigham’s pawn as his own. In homeroom, he smirked at his two favorite students from behind his Rolling Stone. It was still unclear if the handsome young Brigham fit in somewhere beyond simply coaching. Myles had no intention of approaching him—not without solid knowledge or proof—or of divulging what he knew or at least presumed. Just the same, he had no problem putting Brigham on notice. When Myles had seen him in the staff lounge that morning, he had put a visual lock on Brigham and paid close attention to the young man’s reaction. Brigham returned his stare, unflinching. An interruption from Miss Michaels put an end to the face-off, but as soon as Myles stepped out of the lounge room, Brigham followed.

  “Do you have something you want to say to me?” Ian asked.

  Myles would not expose his hand, but he respected his colleague’s forthrightness. “I see you’ve enlisted Kyle in your scheme to get a girls’ track team.”

  “Is that what you think?”

  “I think we both have our own agenda, and Kyle has become useful to us both. I know whose best interest I have at heart ….”

  “Don’t presume upon my motives, Mr. Myles. You don’t know me,” Ian said and walked away.

  ~

  Leila turned her Bug down the dead-end lane, her shortcut, and glanced at Kyle. “I didn’t know you live down here.”

  They drove under a canopy of mature oak and maple trees, all showing autumn color. Barberry bushes hedged either side of the narrow court. She pulled up in front of the large colonial that seemed right out of New England, with cedar shingles, trimmed shrubbery, and weedless lawn.

  Kyle laughed. “You know, you’ve been running past my house practically every morning since last July.”

  She may not have noticed his house before, but apparently she had not been as inconspicuous in the white neighborhoods as she assumed. She followed Kyle up the brick pathway onto the stoop as he pushed the front door open. It squeaked and echoed as they stepped in onto hardwood floors.

  “C’mon.” He motioned for her to follow. Taking two steps at a time, he bounded up the staircase, ascending two, half flights of stairs. He slowed to walk up the third, and then stepped into his room. It boasted as much floor space as Leila’s entire apartment.

  “Wow, this is nice,” she said.

  His double bed barely ate into the room, and a built-in desk nestled under a gabled window looking out over the back yard. A large shelf supported quite a few track-and-field trophies. Leila moved around the room with awe and paused in front of a large collection of albums.

  “Wow, I never would have taken you as someone with such broadminded musical taste,” she said.

  “Oh, I’m full of surprises.”

  “So did your mother decorate your room?”

  “What?”

  “I mean, everything matches. And there’s no poster of Farrah Fawcett.”

  “I’ll have you know I picked plaid—it’s not my fault that my mother went overboard with it,” he said, crossing his arms. “And I wouldn’t want you to think my room is always this clean. I knew you were coming so my mother made me get rid of my smelly socks and underwear.”

  Seating her at the desk beside him, he opened a notebook. “Okay, we’re going to start with a few algebra equations so I can see where you’re at.” He handed her a sheet. “Reduce the equations to the lowest common denominator.” Thus began their first tutoring session.

  An hour later, on their way out to her car, he said, “Well, at least you’re not a total math moron, just a little retarded. You’ll be a math scholar in no time.”

  She forced a smile and shrugged. How could Kyle have so much on his side of the equation, while on the other side, she lived with such a deficit? It didn’t add up.

  He leaned against her driver’s door. “So, Leila, what are you going to dress up as on Friday?”

  She rolled her eyes. “What’s the big deal with wearing a costume?”

  “What’s the big deal with not wearing one?”

  “It just seems, well … it seems stupid.”

  “What are you saying? You think everyone who wears a costume is stupid?”

  “Well, no … I’ve just never been into that whole thing.”

  “Why not?”

  “I don’t know. I guess we moved around too much.”

  “Well, you know, it’s supposed to be fun. You know what fun is, right?”

  She shot him a squint. “Yes.”

  “Sorry—just wasn’t sure if fun fit into your whole antisocial profile.”

  “I’m not antisocial.”

  “Really?”

  “Alright. I’m a little antisocial—you would be too if you’d been to so many different schools that you didn’t even bother to keep track anymore.”

  His eyes widened. “Why’d you move around so much?”

  A small bit of information seemed harmless enough. “My dad was a musician, always looking for a better gig, a better situation.”

  His brow flicked. “Seriously?”

  “Actually, I’m in the witness protection program. If I divulge anything more, I put the lives of myself and my family in jeopardy, and I’d have to kill you.”

  He laughed and rolled his eyes. “You are a moron.”

  “You’re a moron.”

  Chapter 13

  A drafting exercise seemed like a good idea to Kyle. He explained it to Leila while puffing alongside her, early Saturday morning. Breath shot from his mouth. Brisk air chilled his neck.

  “Drafting?” she puzzled.

  “Yeah, it’s when I run directly behind you to benefit from the reduction in wind resistance that you create as the leader. It’s like if your little car is behind a big truck, it’s easier to go faster,” Kyle spoke in rhythm with his heavy breathing.

  “But it still doesn’t put you in front to win.”

  “Not initially, but it conserves some of my energy for the final push so that I can pass you and lead.”

  She nodded as he tucked behind her. He hoped that with no one at her side to regulate her pace, that Leila would push ahead. She did. Kyle kept up for a few paces, but within seconds the distance between them expanded. He didn’t bother to reel her back. He grinned, realizing she was unaware of having defeated the purpose of the exercise. Several paces turned into meters—a quarter of the track later, she finally turned to him.


  When Kyle caught up, he panted, “You are seriously fast.”

  Exertion colored her cheeks. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to do that.”

  While they stretched to cool down, he kept glancing at her with a grin but said nothing. She ignored him. Perhaps she was even toying with him. He wished they could run together all day, rather than go to the homecoming game. Just the same, he looked forward to seeing Maryanne. She was one of the four girls nominated for homecoming queen, and he did not want to miss her big day.

  As they walked back to his house under a canopy of autumn color, he said, “You are going to homecoming, aren’t you?”

  Leila half shrugged. “I hadn’t planned on it.”

  “Aw, come on. You got through costume day. Your Stevie Wonder glasses were great.”

  “They were Ray Charles glasses.”

  “Whoever—I think you were even having fun with it by the end of the day.”

  “I guess it wasn’t so awful.”

  “So you’ll come?”

  “Honestly Kyle, you don’t know how uncomfortable it is, showing up alone. Besides, I have plans.”

  “Who says you’d be going alone? And what plans could you possibly have on a Saturday night?”

  “You think I’m going to tag along with you and Maryanne? She’ll love that. And I actually have friends that I hang out with on Saturday nights.”

  “Oh please,” he chuckled. “What friends?”

  “Older friends.”

  “Oh really?” Not much of a surprise there. “And what do you do with your older friends?”

  “We ….” She twisted her mouth and wavered. “We jam.”

  He smirked, letting her step through the chain-link fence ahead of him. “Did you just say, you jam?”

  “Yes. You know, when a group of musicians hang out and play for fun.”

  That surprised him. “I had no idea you were musical.” He continued to smirk, unsure of her sincerity. “So, what do you jam on?”

  “Piano.”

  “Are you any good?”

  “What difference does that make?”

  “You are good. I can tell, just like you’re good at running.”

  “Yeah, well you’ll never find out.”

  He kept smiling as they arrived in front of his house. “Can’t you back out just this once? This is your last homecoming. I’m sure your older friends will understand.”