15
RUNNING gave me a sense of freedom. My elementary school days out on the track in gym class previously consisted of socializing with Gene. The teacher didn’t care how slow we went, as long as we were moving. Some of us moped like zombies because we couldn’t run— Gene. Some of us turtled along because we didn’t care about gym and wanted to be with our friends— Me.
Gene and I would talk and joke around as kids flew past us. What was the rush? Evan Klaus, the school athlete, was the winner every time. What was the point? He was equal in size to Steven, a bit taller, not as stocky, but he had more speed. Steven would be the football guy and Evan would be the basketball guy. Tall, slim, and fast, Evan was popular with the girls, even though he was shy and his mother wouldn’t let him hang out with any. He took out his insecurities on anyone smaller than him. A classic dick. He thought he deserved respect just for being gifted with looks and physique.
It was a new year. I was back in the house after two months living out of a suitcase. On the first day back to gym class, I decided right there on the field I was going to run. It was an urge that came over me and I didn’t know why, but I couldn’t ignore it. I had to go. I had to leave Gene behind.
“I’m going to run this one, Gene.”
“Whaaaat?”
“Yeah, I just feel like running.”
“Runnin’ with the devil!” he shouted in a high heavy metal voice while making the metal horns with his fingers to send me along.
I took off.
Moving my way around the field I caught up to fourth place, then third, then second. Right behind Evan, I kept at it. He seemed to slow a bit and dropped back just in front of me to my right. He nodded his head forward motioning to the finish line.
“What do you think you’re doing, Jack? You trying to run?”
“Yeah, I’m running.”
“You think you can run? You think you can beat me after all of this? You cool now?”
“Yeah,” I huffed.
“Come on, puss. Run, run, run,” he taunted.
We rounded the turn into the final hundred yards.
“You can’t beat me, Tortis.”
Something kicked on inside me. I couldn’t control it. My eyes steered forward. My legs were flying out in front of me and something inside pushed hard. I took off and left Evan in the dust by at least forty yards. The expected winner was too busy talking it up. I found I had a gift for speed and a hunger for winning. I had crossed the finish line and defeated the usual winner.
Everyone was shocked and congratulated me. If my new spiky haircut hadn’t done it. If my walks home with Jeff and connecting with other popular kids hadn’t done it. If my backyard wrestling tournaments hadn’t done it. My winning run over Evan would bring me to a whole new level of status.
The mile was mine. The hundred yard dash. The four-forty. Why stop with one race? The sit-ups, push ups, obstacle course. I crushed them all too.
I had never really won anything, so the contests were a high. There was something about seeing everyone behind me that intrigued me. I started to train after school and on weekends. I was obsessed.
Evan was suddenly second place. So quickly, he had lost everything he had been good at to a smaller kid he had tried to push around.
I wondered what my victories did to Gene. Had I abandoned him? Did he understand? I was doing something good, something healthy, something I had fallen in love with. Drag myself around in the dirt with Gene or run free with the wind in my face?
$$$
At the end of the year in June, I qualified for my age group to represent my school in the district jamboree. I would jump on a bus to go to another school to compete against kids from several other schools. Evan had gone the last several years. Now it was my turn.
I whipped everyone in the fifty, one hundred, and four hundred forty yard races. I lost sit-ups and pull-ups by two each. Tied an obstacle course. Lost some silly climb the rope contest. Easily won the push-ups. The final contest was the grand mile run. It went just like my first race against Evan.
From the middle of the pack, I made my way up to fourth place. On the second lap, number three got winded. On the beginning of lap four, I slipped into second place. This kid named Owen was in the lead by half a lap. I came out of nowhere.
Overdrive kicked in. I felt a burn, a fire inside, and adrenaline raced through my body. Just around the bend I went whipping past Owen and raced him hard to the finish line. I won the mile by fifteen yards. For a kid who had been in the lead the whole mile race, this had to be an upset. That was my strategy though. Stun him. Upset him. And it worked.
At the end of the jamboree, we all gathered in the gym. When the teachers announced Owen as the winner of my age category, I thought they were kidding with me. Owen went up and grabbed the trophy and held it up smiling to the flash of a camera. This had to be a mistake. They would still call my name, I thought. But they never did.
I had won five contests, tied in one, and lost three. Even if Owen had won the three I lost and tied with me in the obstacle course, the math didn’t add up. How does the kid who loses more contests go home with the trophy? I went up to one of the teachers and told them this must be a mistake.
“Oh, don’t be a sore loser now.”
That teacher laughed me off. I went to another teacher.
“No, I’m sorry, they got it all figured out correctly. Math doesn’t lie. Some of the contests are worth more points.”
Points? What kind of funny math were they doing here?
“So shouldn’t the mile and the major races be worth more?”
I was waved along, so I went to one more teacher. When I told her how many contests I had won, she stood there with a blank expression that turned to guilt.
“Sorry, it’s too late.”
I was devastated.
When my mother asked how the day went, I told her I got ripped off. She just thought I was being a sore loser and that was the end of it. No witnesses to testify for me. No one stood up for what was right. To think parents and teachers would let such a thing happen. To think they would favor another kid, a well-off kid over the poor kid from the south shore. Of course, Owen’s mother, a teacher somewhere in the district, was one of the officials that day. I saw her give her son a big hug and they walked off with the trophy. My eyes burned.
A year or so later, Owen lost his sister in a car wreck. When I heard the news I felt terrible. And as expected, it really messed him up. All ill feelings I had about the jamboree receded and seemed insignificant in the bigger picture. Give the kid ten trophies for all I care. I wouldn’t wish that kind of loss on anyone. Despite the corruption that day, I’m glad they gave him the trophy, even if he hadn’t really won it.
16
STEVEN WAS OVER one day hanging out playing Nintendo. JP was in and out of my room jacked up on too much sugar or something in the shit food we were eating. Steven picked him up and gave him a wedgie and hung him from his underwear on a plant hook. Of course, Steven held his arms out to catch him when his underwear began to tear. JP was so wild that he both laughed and cried. My poor brother, JP.
Gene would push him around too. One day he hung JP from his feet over the stairs at my house. I didn’t appreciate that kind of stunt and scolded Gene for being irresponsible. If he had slipped, my brother surely would have been seriously injured if not dead from that kind of height. Gene was lucky. He often joked around in cruel ways when someone else had the potential to be hurt. He did other stupid things like blowing pot smoke in the face of people’s pets. None of it was funny when it was done against such defenseless victims. Steven did everything in good fun but never crossed the line like Gene.
Now