“I have big news for you guys.” Gary drew out the words big and guys and then paused dramatically. A few confused looks were passed around the room, but no one said anything, and a look of disappointment fell over Gary. “Well, since no one is going to bite, here it is! We are being propositioned by the Urban Bobcats. They approached Fabio after one of the recent workouts at the Armory with a proposal. They want to pit the top five finishers on our team against their sixth through tenth finishers.”
Gary stopped again and surveyed the room.
“I know, I know. It confused me at first too. Basically, their second string does not feel challenged because they are in the shadow of their own teammates, who are some of the fastest runners in the city. And we’ll never be able to compete head-to-head with the top runners on a team of their caliber, so this levels the playing field. We designate one race a month and compete against the Urban Bobcats. At the end of the year, the winner gets some sort of dinner out on the town and, more important, bragging rights! Fabio thinks this is an absolute no-brainer. Our club must accept this challenge.”
Continuing to punctuate his speech with purposeful moments of reflection, Gary stopped and walked over to the end table where his drink sat and took a long, slow sip.
“I agree with Fabio,” he said with gravity. “This is just what we need to restore our racing focus. As president of the club, I’ve called you all here tonight because I think that as the fastest guys on the team, it’s all of you who need to accept or reject this challenge. If you accept, then you’re committing to racing seriously this whole year. I am not going to vote on the proposal because I am not one of the runners who will be toeing the line in the ice of February and in the humid grip of August, so it wouldn’t be fair of me. But you all know how I feel about this team and our racing potential, so I’ll just open the floor.”
When Gary stopped for yet another pregnant pause in which all of the runners were supposed to ruminate on the immenseness of the situation, Liam found himself puzzling as to whether or not he had realized that Gary was the club president. In some ways, Zane appeared to be at the helm of the club. Gary did, however, lead the Saturday run, which the club referred to as the centerpiece of Fast Tracker tradition. It occurred to Liam just how little he understood about the relationships, the protocol, and the members of the Fast Trackers. So far everything he had gathered had been by innuendo or by the triangulation of shoddy clues from sources of unknown reliability.
After about thirty seconds, a Greek chorus voicing doubt, skepticism, and some unbridled enthusiasm sounded through the room. Zane rose first to say that the team’s pride as runners and as gay men rested on taking up the gauntlet. With a smirk of irritation, Gene reduced the idea of the challenge to an effort by a dominant team to belittle the city’s “squadron of queer-footed athletes.” It would be a revival of the neighborhood bully strong-arming the pansies on the playground. What laughs the Urban Bobcats would have after their second string runners annihilated the best possible team that the gays could assemble. Gary looked fearfully among the men who sat and stood speechless while Gene orated. It was clear that the prospect of unmitigated failure weighed heavily on at least two or three of the members gathered around.
Ben then offered his two cents, seizing the chance to pillory Gene. “Don’t you think we’ll look like a bunch of pansies,” Ben spoke without looking up from the hat that he had begun to knit, “if we’re afraid to take them up on this challenge, Einstein?”
In a sharp and sudden whirl of gesticulation, Marvin bolted from his armchair to speak about competition and what it means to be a runner. The only person whom you should be in a neck-and-neck or foot-to-foot race with, he implored, was the man inside your head. The beauty of running and what completely separates it from almost any other sport, Marvin went on, is the ability to compete with yourself. What did it even matter, he asked in disgust, if you beat someone else on a day when you didn’t run your best? Everything outside of the self-test was arbitrary, meaningless, and juvenile.
A look of defeat settled into Gary’s face, as he seemed determined to stay quiet and let the runners duke this out themselves. As he finished his drink and walked across the room for a refill, Gary eyed Liam imploringly. Liam had no idea if he could even race competitively for a whole year and decided he was far too new to the club to be leading the charge in either direction. The only thought that crept through his mind was that Fast Trackers had a schizoid identity—the club constantly underscored the importance of remaining a casual and social outlet for all runners, but then this powerful cabal of the, by and large, cuter, younger, and faster runners made decisions in private that would dictate the club’s reputation among the city’s racing community.
“Does anyone else have anything to add before we vote on this?” Gary asked.
Zane, Gene, and Marvin scanned the room to see if any other brave souls would stake a claim of support or refutation. Ben cavalierly angled his knitting needles as loops of yarn took the form of a gray skullcap. Riser stared out the square window that faced the blackness of Central Park, and others just examined their drinks in the large silence that followed Gary’s question.
“Okay, then … ” Gary readied slips of paper for everyone to write their vote on, creating the false semblance of anonymity.
“No, wait a second, G.” It was Mitch who spoke in a reluctant tone that anticipated dismissal by others.
“I just wanted to say that I really love racing and anything that brings the team out there, all together and supportin’ each other at the races,” Mitch said. He then paused to collect his conclusion. “Well, I just think that’s a good thing … who cares about the Bobcats? It’ll be good for us. I remember watching Liam here go head-to-head with Gene at Van Cortlandt and it made me mighty proud to see Fast Tracker jerseys out there racing well.”
Liam’s face reddened from the attention as everyone in the room eyed him to measure or to confirm some fact about his speed.
“I just like to race, but it’s all new to me,” Liam started. “I have no idea what type of commitment it will take to race well at all these different distances in different seasons, month after month for the whole year. I just don’t have the experience.”
“C’mon, Liam.” Mitch leaned over to nudge Liam’s arm in encouragement. “None of us knows. We’ll find out together.”
Gary drifted off into Mitch’s eyes in a look of quiet admiration and longing that did not snap until Ben cleared his throat three times, in loud and rapid succession. This action prompted Gary to instruct everyone to write their decision on a slip of paper. If it ended up 5-5, Gary noted that he would flip a coin to decide.
Liam stared at the blankness of the white paper and thought about how easy life can be when you do not commit to anything. Every Saturday night can be a new adventure, a new trick. But, on the flip side, Liam could feel his twenties slipping away and he secretly did yearn for something to show for the decade. He realized that he could really use a mission—a sense of purpose. When you don’t push your own boundaries, you may never disappoint anyone but you also take the risk that life will just happen to you. Liam witnessed that routine complacency every time he visited his family back in the suburbs, and he knew he did not want that fate for himself. The prospect terrified him.
Just two months ago this club did not exist for him and now somehow he was in its undertow, and he didn’t know why but he was letting himself be pulled along. He realized that he felt part of something. He considered too what it might be like to have to spar head-to-head with Didier all year long—the stress, the intensity, the thrill. He wrote the word “yes” on the paper and then folded it quickly into halves and quarters and eighths and circulated the scrap toward Gary.
Instead of teasing the crowd by reading each vote one by one, Gary impatiently pulled apart all of the pieces of paper and counted quickly and quietly to himself before exclaiming the 7-3 decision to take on the challenge. The club would need to discuss the
racing calendar for the entire year with the Urban Bobcats and get ready for a possible race in the next few weeks. Now the work would begin.
MILE 9
The weather had worsened, even in the forty-five minutes since Liam left his apartment, and pockets of wind now skirted the edge of the park in little tornadoes of snow. What a day! It was the type of miserable dead-of-winter morning that could inspire someone to camp out in bed all day with a remote control and a bag of Cheetos. Liam wished he had done just that as the morning unfolded in a series of minor calamities. The alarm clock did not go off (Liam realized later that he had set it for P.M., not A.M.); his entire cup of coffee spilled in the mad dash toward the only cab he found patrolling Hudson Street at this early hour; and a hidden puddle of slush greeted him at the corner of Fifth Avenue as he jogged toward Central Park.
And as he now approached Engineers’ Gate, Liam realized he was totally unaware of where the race started. He had assumed he would see packs of joggers by the entrance to the park, but he seemed to have missed the crowds. Perhaps other runners had abandoned the idea of racing in the cold slush of a January morning. With only ten minutes to spare, Liam picked a direction and jogged off to investigate, heading north along the east side of the park. As he nearly slid down the hill that ran along the side of the reservoir, Liam saw a small row of snow-dusted Portosan toilets and a roped-off circle that functioned as the baggage drop for the race. An older gentleman with a stern and ashen face told Liam to hurry along and get to the starting line; the race would begin precisely at 8:30 A.M. When Liam asked him where the pickup tent for his race number and timing chip were, the man eyed him with malevolent satisfaction, as though crushing a young runner’s spirit was the unexpected present he had received for braving the elements all morning in Central Park.
“The number pickup is at the New York Road Runners headquarters on Eighty-ninth Street, just east of Fifth Avenue,” he explained with a smirk edging his lips. “You really better hustle if you expect to make it all the way there and still hit the starting line on time.”
Just as the man finished breaking the bad news, Liam heard the hurried splatter of footsteps and turned to see Gary and Mitch motioning frantically as they advanced. A little black plastic bag dangled from Gary’s hand; he took a moment to collect his breath before launching into his tirade.
“The father, son, and holy ghost! Where in the hell have you been, Liam? We’ve been circling the area for the last half hour trying to hunt you down. Now, pin your number to your shirt and lace that racing chip to your sneaker so that your time gets properly recorded. We need to make sure everything goes smoothly this morning … And trust me, we’re going to need all the help we can get to best the Bobcats.”
Liam fished these items out of the plastic bag and readied himself for racing. Mitch threw some warm-up clothing into his duffel bag and the three teammates jogged to the start of the race together. It was 8:28 according to Liam’s watch, but they only needed to turn onto the 102nd Street transverse, where the race was scheduled to begin.
The announcer had just finished explaining the five-mile race course, which consisted of the lower loop in Central Park, as Liam and Mitch angled their way through the scores of runners corralled according to their expected race paces. Gary had opted to cheer along the course rather than run. He claimed he would be doing a greater service to the team in that capacity. As Liam tried to thread through two rotund men in sweatpants and parkas, somewhere in the heart of the eight-minute-mile section, the gun went off.
The first fifteen seconds after the gun sounded were maddening in their stillness. Liam finally made his way to the edge of the course, and he ran along the dirt path to bypass the serpentine crawl of the recreational runners making their way slowly across the transverse to the west side of the park. Once on the west side loop, Liam lengthened his stride and began to work his arms. Zane had reminded him earlier in the week that one should never feel totally comfortable during a race. Comfort equaled death. A racer always needed to be drawing on mental and physical strength, whether that strength be readily available or held in reserve.
Due to his inauspicious start, Liam spent the first mile of the race passing runners who were considerably slower than he was. It lifted his ego. Even though the clock read a disappointing 6:15 as he crossed through the one-mile mark, Liam knew that he still had the energy and focus to pass his competitors. Approaching the two-mile point by Tavern on the Green, Liam felt himself gasp for a little air and decided to focus not on the quickness of his foot turnover but rather on the smoothness of his breathing. Within a minute of relaxing into the run, Liam found the tension in his back and the burning in his lungs had dissipated.
To focus on something external, Liam ran toward the table where volunteers were handing out Dixie cups filled with water. As Liam hurried the cup toward his mouth, he felt a thin sheet of ice break against his lip and the entire contents of the cup gushed forward, falling down the sides of his face and flooding the microfiber of his long-sleeved T-shirt with brisk water.
Rounding the southern edge of the park’s outer loop, Liam could not make out any of the objects in front of him. The wind, which had been at his back on the west side of the park, now pelted him mercilessly. Running north along the east side, which comprised the final two-and-a-half miles of this five-miler, was going to be a bear. Liam had passed several runners in the last few minutes but the swirling weather had turned people into indiscernible smudges along the white horizon, and Liam chose to relax and see what happened. To save his eyes from the burn of the wind, he peered down at the ground. At the four-mile mark, just as he came upon the southern edge of the reservoir, Liam saw the frosted blur of the race clock. It read 24:00 even. He had managed to average a six-minute-per-mile pace despite all the setbacks from the morning.
Liam looked over his shoulder and saw no one at his back, but he knew that to help the team now he needed to speed up and pass the invisible racers who must be out ahead, and he chased the last mile of this race with a heightened sense of purpose. The Urban Bobcats would surely be taking this challenge seriously despite the horrific weather. Bolting down the hill that led from the northern edge of the reservoir toward the finish line, Liam spotted the yellow and black singlet several yards ahead. The slender arms and knobby shoulders gave the runner away instantly, even under the veil of passing snow drifts. Liam noticed the gloved hands of his competitor pumping hard to work his arms faster and speed up toward the finish line, now less than half a mile away. This morning Liam took no chances. Waiting for the final feet of the race was too risky. Liam closed his eyes and sprinted past Didier. The slight uphill by the park’s baseball fields was slick, and Liam worried he might lose control and skid toward the ground. His chest burned and his lips had chapped from the icy air.
Liam ignored the quaver in his stomach and told himself that his legs would continue—they simply had to—despite the numbing that tingled through them. The wind whipped harder, blowing around the snow that had coated the branches of the trees. Liam flew around the final turn at 102nd Street, striding commandingly onto the transverse where the finish line was just within sight. He looked straight ahead toward the festive banner of red and blue floating under a tapestry of snow and ice.
Once past the line, Liam decelerated to a stop and no longer had the strength to hold his back upright. He crouched down with his two hands pressed hard against his knees and gagged on the foul taste that now resided at the back of his tongue. The wind continued to pummel him and without the concentration of the race, Liam began to feel the rawness of his lips and the damp chill of his chest.
“You can’t stop here! We have other runners coming through!” It was the woman whose job it was to clip off the timing chips. She was also in charge of clearing out the area. Liam hobbled over to have his chip removed and then stumbled off into the margin of road where a cluster of bushes listed under the weight of the snow.
As he walked over to the baggage check to r
eclaim his belongings and throw on some warmer clothes, he saw Didier hunched over in an embankment by the side of the transverse, puking into the snow. Liam knew that if another Fast Tracker saw him giving aid to the enemy, he would be lectured on the seriousness of the competition, but he could not stand to see a fellow runner in distress. Didier pushed Liam away when he approached, clearly humbled and embarrassed. Didier looked lean and severe, and Liam was drawn to him even more in this compromised state.
“Don’t mind me,” Didier said. “Bad races take more out of you than good ones.” He paused a second and then took Liam in with a long and studied stare. “I’m Didier. It’s about time we were formally introduced.”
“Liam. It’s Liam.”
With nothing clever at the ready, Liam excused himself. Didier rested his hand in the crook of Liam’s neck and rubbed it gently as he nodded good-bye.
Wanting nothing more than to return the sensation of touch to his fingertips, Liam decided to jog out of the park toward the subway. In order to be on time for his shopping safari through the West Village with Monroe, he needed a little bit of luck and a good deal of foot speed. He knew he was cutting it close by double-booking his morning plans but also knew that there would be hell to pay if he blew off Monroe. The complaints about his spending too much time with Fast Trackers had already been filed and refiled.
As he turned onto Fifth Avenue, Liam’s cell phone rang from inside his backpack. Barely retrieving the phone before the call had gone into his voice mail, Liam did not have time to look at the number of the incoming call, and the voice was unfamiliar and abrupt.
“Where are you, guy? Come meet us at Metro Diner—101st and Broadway.”
“Who is this?”
“Babe—it’s Zane.”
“I’m running late. Can I call you back later?”
“No! You can come meet us now. We’re going to look up the team results online.”
The Miles Page 8
