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I did.
And I lost.
Tommy also found something extra that day and beat me by at least five yards.
I was eleven.
He was ten.
Nearly a decade later, here I am again, still chasing someone faster, stronger, and better.
After nearly a kilometer, my breathing collapses.
He looks back.
My legs buckle.
I stop.
It's over.
A laugh breaks from his lips, maybe twenty meters ahead.
"Bad luck, Ed," and he turns away again. He's gone.
Watching his legs disappear into the darkness, I stand there, climbing memory.
A dark wind makes its way through the trees.
The sky is nervous. Black and blue.
My heart applauds inside my ears, first like a roaring crowd, then slows and slows until it's a solitary person, clapping with unbridled sarcasm.
Clap. Clap.
Clap.
Well done, Ed.
Well given up.
I stand in long grass and hear the river now for the first time. It sounds like it's drinking. When I look toward it, I see the stars in it. They look like they're painted to the surface of the water.
The cab, I think. It's open. The keys are also still in it, which is the number one sin any cabdriver can make in pursuit of a run
ner. A cardinal sin, in fact. You always take the keys. You always lock up. Except me.
I see the cab in my mind.
On the road, alone.
Both doors are open.
"I have to go back," I whisper, but I don't.
I remain still until first light shows up, and I see my brother and me racing.
Myself, failing.
