I thought we were running but quickly find I was mistaken. Our stride lengthens, and we hurtle forward. The air rushes past our ears, and our vision to either side blurs. We look only ahead, down the track. Our feet striking the ground create a pattern of repeating sound.
I notice that our heart begins to beat faster, our lungs draw more air, and our skin warms. As we round a bend in the track, we see a few other humans ahead of us. Chloe increases our speed, and seconds later we catch up to them and pass them.
One of them calls out, “You go, girl.” Chloe responds by raising a hand. Then we go faster yet. We fly past the gate where we entered and keep going. We’re halfway around the track again when a light rain begins to fall, misting us with cooling moisture. It’s a startling sensation, but almost at once I realize it feels…wondrous.
I have a sudden urge to laugh, and something strange starts happening to my thoughts. They no longer seem separate from our body. It’s almost as if I am the body, and it is me. We are a marvelous unit in perfect harmony. The only thing that exists is this moment.
I’d like to keep going like this, but by the time we approach the gate once more, our body is tiring. It’s becoming difficult to breathe, and our leg muscles are burning. Still, Chloe doesn’t slow down until we pass that point.
I don’t notice the Dork-Doran standing alongside the track until it yells, “Excellent time on that lap, Chloe. Your personal best.”
Chloe doesn’t reply as we move past, but then our mouth smiles. We continue at a jog, and she stays quiet as our breathing and heart rate gradually slow.
“That was a superb physical experience,” I tell her. “When can we do it again?”
“It was good, wasn’t it?” she murmurs.
“I think you should disregard the Dork-Doran dilemma and run all the time.”
“I can’t run all the time, Welks,” Chloe says. “But I’d forgotten how good it feels to go hard. That rush you get.”
Rush. A word that means to hurry. Also, a form of tall grass.
“Also,” Chloe laughs, “a type of thrill.”
“Ah. I understand.”
“This time,” she says, “I think you do.”
“So when can we do it again?” I ask.
She shrugs our shoulders. “I don’t know. I have a lot of other things to do, you know.”
“Like what?” I hope she doesn’t mean the boring task of adjusting the hair mass.
“Omigod.” She slows to a walk and puts a hand to our head. “My hair. It’s getting soaked.”
I shouldn’t have thought about the hair. I attempt to distract her by asking, “What does omigod mean?”
“It’s an expression. Like saying, ‘Oh. My. God.’ Only fast.”
Ah. God. One of the names for the supreme deity. “So when you say that, you’re speaking to your God?”
“Um,” Chloe says, “I guess I just say it. It’s a habit.”
Habit. An acquired behavior pattern regularly followed until it becomes almost involuntary.
“Yeah, that would be it,” Chloe says. We are nearing the gate once more, and she scans the grassy area between us and the building. All the other humans, including the Dork-Doran, have departed. The rain is falling harder, and our skin feels chilled.
“Our body is becoming uncomfortable,” I say.
“Too right, Welks. We should go in. But since we’re already wet…” She sets us jogging again, but we don’t go toward the door. Instead, we jog alongside the building until we round a corner. We continue following the building to the next corner, where we find a sheltered area. From there we can observe a large rectangle of grass with tall metal posts at either end. We also find a pack of juvenile humans in bulky garb. They are engaged in battle.
“It’s not a battle,” Chloe says.
“They’re bashing and knocking each other around,” I point out.
“It’s a game called football. See? They’re playing with a ball.”
I glimpse the ball as one of the humans throws it into the air. It’s deformed.
“It’s supposed to look like that,” Chloe says. “Now watch. I want to see if Noah’s playing.”
I thought play was intended to be enjoyable, but these humans are hurting one another. I hear them grunting as their bodies slam together. It doesn’t look like play. Yet, when one of them catches the deformed ball and runs it through a pair of posts, some of them are delighted. They caper about, raise their fists in the air and cheer.
“Guys don’t caper, Welks.”
“They appear to be capering,” I say.
“That sounds wrong,” Chloe says. “Look! There he is. He’s so hot.”
It is possible that Chloe can tell the Noah human has become heated during exercise. But I don’t know how she can distinguish him from the others. Between the helmets on their heads, the padding on their bodies and the smears of mud, they’re almost identical.
“It’s his walk,” Chloe tells me. “I recognize the way he moves.”
Fascinating. “Shall we greet him?” I ask.
“No way,” Chloe says. We turn around and begin jogging again, back the way we came. “I don’t want him to think I’m stalking him.”
“Stalking him? Is he your prey?”
Her only reply is a giggle.