by Laura Sanger Kelly

Seven minutes! There was no way he was ever going to lose so much time in a race again. Seven long minutes while he sat and poured water over his hot scalp and watched the other runners run pass him by. He had a sudden headache and let the wave of nausea pass over him.

He had a horrible finish in that race.

Not this race! He had spent his life living in the shadow of physical inadequacy, hearing the snickers behind his back. There goes Tubby, the kids had said, all of his childhood. That was when they were that kind. He had finished college, graduating with honors, a guy all the girls "just wanted as a friend."

He was large, nicknamed "Whale," considered unattractive even by comrades who wore pocket protectors.

Now he had lost the weight, dramatically starving himself. His skin boasted loose rolls, marred by enormous stretch marks.

But he was in shape, beneath the debris. And now he could prove it to all those people who had taunted him with remarks about his weight. Fatso. Lard butt.

He was going to run his first marathon.

He had intended to run a few long distance races in preparation - some half-marathons, a few others delineated by kilometer length, rather than miles. 10K. 20K. 25 K. 30 K. He had never really mastered the metric system, so the numbers were meaningless. 6 miles. 12 miles. 15 miles. 18 miles. That Ty understood.

But he hadn't run much since the horrible 10K, the race with the headache and the nausea, six weeks ago. Still, he was in the best shape of his life and committed to the ideal of 26.2 miles. He had been training himself, just as he had supervised his own dramatic weight loss. Eighty pounds banished in the last three months. That was when he started training for this Marathon, when it had taxed him to walk around the block a year ago. Since then his work demands had eaten into his self-devised training schedule.

Ty looked the crowd over. There were men and women of all ages. They all fitted themselves along the asphalt road, according to what they seemed to think their time per mile was. An older woman, about fifty eight, stood confidently in the ten minute mile group. A young man, hair as black as a raven's, with a crooked arm stood in the ten-and-a-half minute mile group.

Ty was preparing his speech for his approaching five-year college reunion, crafting it in his mind.

Where's Whale? They would ask.

Dead! Ty would smile, I lost the weight, and I haven't eaten hardly a carbohydrate in the last twelve weeks! I even ran a marathon. How about that?

He had determined to stand at the ten minute per mile starting position. It was faster than he had ever run, even for short three-mile races.
In reality, it boiled down to that was the speed he wanted to be.

An older man, perhaps in his late forties, stood beside him, stretching muscles carefully. He inwardly questioned if the older man should be in that time designation, or if he was just trying to get a better starting position.

The chatter in the line died down. People committed themselves to a last stretch, or checked their race numbers, carefully pinned to clothing. A few made sure that their time recording chips were securely attached to their shoes. A quick, ecumenical prayer was offered, inaudible over the murmured din of runners. Then they stood at attention, anticipating.

The starting gun fired with a sharp crackle. A cacophony of chirps and buzzes emanated from the mat, as the elite athletes and the quickest amateurs broke out across the starting line.

It took a few moments for movement to ripple back towards him. The crowd around him was like a solid animal, energy flowing through its body. They briskly walked at first, as if a pleasant mob out to march with no particular message. The chip on his shoe buzzed as he crossed the mat. His time was slipping away and he was still walking! It infuriated him. He needed a good finish, to show them all that he was a new man.
Then the pace quickened. He began to run, uncomfortably close to his cohorts.

It was a beautiful day. Too beautiful. The sun was out. It was humid, which made it harder to breathe. The humid Houston air moved like soup.

The crowd had quickly dispersed, some advancing, some falling back. The forty-something man ran with his feet turned out.

Ty ran a little quicker, just to pass him. To get away from the disturbing view of the man's supination.

Ty felt good. He was dedicated to the ideal of a superb finish. No seven minutes for dizziness, his fingertips tingling. There was shame in doing less than he expected of himself.

He passed by the first mile marker, then the second. He was aiming for brisk marathon, something he considered respectable. Four hours, twenty-one minutes for the 26.2-mile course. Perfect ten-minute miles, easy to keep track of in his head. He had worked out the numbers on his computer's calculator the night before.

At mile three he heard the pace-keeper check a stopwatch and holler "31:54!" at him. He was a behind. It had taken too long to reach the starting mat, he grumbled inwardly. He determined he had to shave off a few seconds a mile. He could skip some water stations, which would help make up the time.

The crowds cheered him on. Hoopla. Flags waved and tables were out with electrolyte drinks and small pieces of fruit - bananas, apple slices, and orange sections. The run would take him around the city and form a large loop. The Wall, that quasi-mythical stretch where body and heart felt they could give no more, would occur on a city street in an affluent neighborhood. Oil money, real estate money.

There was a well maintained lawn on the right of way on the stretch most people agreed the Wall would be at, and people flocked there to sit there and cheer on the runners. He expected a few old college buddies and a couple of people from work to be there. They had told him to look for them at mile 20. He had to look good then. This was the inauguration of the new Ty.

By mile 13.1 - halfway -- his official time was 2 hours, 26 minutes. He did the math quickly. He was running worse than eleven-minute miles! His heart sank. How had he lost so much time?

By mile fifteen, he had improved slightly. His body burned. His head was hot and dry. He cursed his legs, for their lack of swiftness. He had never run this far before.

Both the old lady and the boy with the spastic arm passed him. The old lady sipped contently on a water pack she carried on her back.

There was no way an old lady and a partly crippled boy were passing him! He was lean now and in far better shape! His excess weight was gone, along with all its complications. He was going to live better, live longer. There was no stopping him. He had been promised so much for losing the fat!

He noted that his mouth was dry, his forehead hot. He would stop at the next water station, then skip the next two. That would make up for the time he was losing.

At the water station he drank half a cup of water while jogging, and threw a cup over his head. It was getting hotter, and the humidity irritated his lungs. His leg muscles were beginning to feel like concrete and a sharp pain periodically jabbed in his side. His arms, he despaired, were tiring of their constant rhythmic swinging back and forth.

At mile 17 he began to search the crowd. There was a sea of faces, and he thought he saw someone wave at him. It was a hand, raised at the back of the cheering mass. He heard his name. "Ty!" It drifted towards him. He searched the faces. None were familiar, although the lilting voice challenged his memory.

There were clouds beginning to drift into the sky, their dark bellies full of rain. A little rain would be nice, Ty thought. Cool me off a little. It's hotter than they said it'd be.

As he hit mile 19, his time was holding steady, perhaps a little improved. The pace-keepers with their stop watches and pace books had called it out, along with words of encouragement like "You're doing great! Way to go! Only a little way to go!" Ty disregarded them. His time was still off, and there was over seven miles before him. His skin was hot and dry. His knees ached and his jaw was sore from the repetitive rattling of bone on asphalt and concrete.

He stopped running, his lungs aching too much. He walked, despairing as each jogger passed him. That was one more person who would finish ahead of him! He watched them, even unhappier that quite a few seemed to be heavier than him. How could they command more speed, when he had so much to prove? He had to finish well, to be able to say with confidence that he had outrun people who had always been thinner. Those who had called him Fatso and Whale.

He saw the mile 20 banner in the distance. And he smelled an offensive odor. Cigarette smoke. What idiot is smoking at a marathon? He thought.

It was a strikingly strong odor, but the other runners didn't seem affected by it. Ty looked around, and followed the scent. It led his sight to an aging man, sitting by a tree in the back of the crowd.
Shit! He thought, as he ran past, barely catching the old man's features. The man looked exactly like his Uncle Jim. What a coincidence, he thought. Uncle Jim was the type who would have congratulated Ty on anything successful he did. Uncle Jim had been like that, straight up and full of the right words, be they of encouragement or admonishment.

Except that Ty knew it wasn't Uncle Jim, just a guy who looked like him. Uncle Jim had lost a battle to lung cancer, his wasted body buried five years ago.

There was a light sprinkle of rain. Not enough to cool anything off, just enough to raise the humidity. Sheets of mist evaporated off the hot black topped road. Not only did the rain fail to alleviate the heat, but it mingled with the residual oil on the roads, making slippery ribbons on the track

There was a water table at mile 21, but Ty passed it by. He was already behind schedule.

He looked at the faces of the volunteers passing out electrolyte drinks and water as he passed. They all seemed vaguely familiar. Perhaps his alma mater had sponsored a table. They were familiar in that way. Like people he had passed by, but never gotten to know. The last girl in line plaintively held out an extra large cup of electrolyte drink. He shook his head, and passed her by. He could have sworn she whispered his name as he passed. He looked back, a few moments later, but the rotation at the table had changed, as volunteers relayed with each other to get more refreshments for the runners. He could not see her.

He ran a few moments, before having to walk again. His mind was temporarily distracted from the pain that was wrecking his body, trying to remember the girl. Vicki? He thought, suddenly recollecting her face. Vicki had been a lithe little freshman in the English 101 class he'd taken, a monstrosity of a course with 400 students poured into an auditorium and lectured by teaching assistants. But she had buckled under pressures unknown to him and committed suicide over Spring Break.

This city's full of doppelgangers, he thought.

Ty's vision was blurred.

His fingers tingled, feeling heavy and hot. He patted the residual raindrops off his face with the tuft of his shirt. It was becoming uncomfortably warm, and his lungs rattled. There was a searing headache beginning between his eyes. It was making him feel dizzy, nauseous.
Not again! He cursed. The fire in the pit of his belly spurred him on, and he forced his legs to run again.

Mile 22 passed, and he picked up pace. About four miles to go. A 5K is 3.1 miles, he rationalized, and four miles is just over that. And I've run a 5K or two. His optimism cut through the pain. He passed the older woman and the young man with the crooked arm.

So much for passing me! He chuckled to himself, inwardly. Not that he could have said the words. His breathing was far too labored for speech. His pulse was rapid, weak. His vision blurred to black, his skin on fire. He felt his legs buckle, his feet stumble; His vision faded for a moment. He blinked, then opened his eyes to regained purpose.

The water stations were now at every mile, but he passed them by.

He was nearing the finish line, and his time at mile 22 had indicated that his efforts to run faster were paying off. He just needed to concentrate on the goal and pour on the speed.

He felt oddly refreshed.

He looked for his friends from work. They had said they would be here, and he had not seen them. As he looked around, he saw so many people who looked like people he had known.

At mile 23 there was a scrawny little kid, playing ball on the sidelines who looked just like Danny Duggan, who had died in a car accident when Ty was eight.

There was an old lady at mile 24, who was the spitting image of his old neighbor, Mrs. Guillen, who had passed away of complications due to diabetes and kidney failure when she was eighty.

And at Mile 25 he heard himself being cheered on by a handsome young man in sporty clothes. The man was the spitting image of Rex Illione, who had worked out at the same gym Ty did. Rex had died of AIDS related complex a few years ago, emaciated and riddled with the purple blotches all over his handsome, chiseled features.

Ty shook his head. Perhaps all the jogging of his brain had made him see the faces of phantoms projected onto the figures in the crowd.
Still, he was annoyed that his buddies weren't there, especially as he was picking up speed.

Since mile 23 he had been doing great. He had found a hidden font of energy and speed, and the pace keepers were confirming his joy. He had been running the last three miles at a swift pace.

He flew past the other runners, hearing the cheers of the crowd in his ears. He occasionally heard his name, but did not slow down to survey the yelping throng. His buddies must have taken their seats at later mileage markers than they intended, he thought. His body felt a jolt of energy rush through it, like electricity fueling him. He was weightless and determined to stay the course.

He just looked straight ahead.

He saw the prize he had worked so hard for. The Finish Line. This is what he had pushed himself through pain and delirium for.

He applied every ounce of energy and ran like he had never run before. He crossed under the large digital clock: 4 hours, 24 minutes, and a handful of seconds. Elation welled up inside of him. His body felt free and light.

The runners funneled into lines at the end of the race. Cups of water and bananas were handed out. Race numbers on the bibs were marked with a bright pink marker, indicating they had finished and were entitled to the finisher's goodies. The lines emptied into a large convention hall for the post race party.

Ty was directed into an empty chute, and walked through the doors to the building.

There was nothing inside. It was empty, a searing white light blazing in an impossibly large, vacant room. There were no fellow runners, no volunteers, no band on stage. There were no boxes of raisins on the tables, no carts of free bagels to replenish the body with.

He could hear whispers, coming towards him.

Then shadows began to fill the room, people arriving. With bananas, drinks, and a crystal glass etched with the word "Finisher." Ty stood in stunned silence. Here was Uncle Jim, and the girl from English 101. And Danny, and Mrs. Guillen, and good old Rex. They circled around him and patted him on the back.

"Goodness, what speed." Mrs. Guillen beamed.

"You really broke all out. Didn't stop for anything!" Rex acknowledged. He smelled fresh and just showered, like he always had.

"You thought of nothing but running," Vicki said, duly impressed.

Ty silently took the offerings. Uncle Jim, smelling of his favorite brand of tobacco, started to walk him towards a distant door in the large empty building. The group moved him along with them, chattering about old times, about Ty's race, about things that didn't make any sense to Ty.

He could hear other whispers in the background as he left.

"Did you hear about the guy at Mile 22?"

"Yeah! What happened?" A mature man, a man who supinated when he ran, replied.

"Heat stroke. He didn't make it past Mile 23. Kind of scary, when you think about it."

There was an older woman's voice. "I was running right behind him. He'd just passed me. He just dropped! A young man - he looked so in shape! But I guess he just pushed it too hard. It was horrible!"

"Yes," a young man's voice agreed. Ty could hear the man beginning to massage his sore, hard worked, disabled arm. He, too, had just been passed by Ty. "They say the race is to the quick. And I guess, the dead."

Ty was still perplexed, as he was guided ever farther away.

Mile 23 had been his best mile ever.

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