SYDNEY WATSON WALTERS: So how were you feeling, after that experience?
QUINN: Pretty freaked out, I have to say! I kept reminding myself that the bear and turtle were just hallucinations. By the time I got back to the main trail, I’d calmed down a bit.
SYDNEY WATSON WALTERS: And what about your superpowers? How were they holding up?
QUINN: My muscles were sore, but I wasn’t out of breath. And I was still running pretty fast. I knocked off the next 10 miles in 2 hours.
SYDNEY WATSON WALTERS: Is that what they call being “in the zone”?
QUINN: Yeah. Everything felt perfect. But it didn’t last long.
I rolled into the Ratjaw rest stop sooner than I expected. It’s near the tip of Catfish Point, at Mile 61. I crossed the highway and picked up the trail on the other side. I could see the parked cars and picnic tables at Ratjaw, a hundred metres down the path.
An eighteen-wheeler was cruising down the highway. The driver geared down as he rounded the curve. I thought the truck would keep going, but it didn’t. Instead, it slowed down and pulled over to the shoulder. The driver stuck his arm out of the window and waved. “You’re not running in the hundred-miler, are you?” he shouted.
I nodded.
He shook his head. “How far have you come?”
“Sixty-one miles,” I called back.
The passenger door opened and clapped shut. Someone hopped out on the other side.
The truck driver grinned. “You’re awesome!” he said. “I can’t even run to the corner store!”
He waved again and threw the truck into gear. The tires kicked up a cloud of dust.
As the truck pulled away, I saw someone standing in the dust. He was wearing a black T-shirt and neon socks.
The Dirt Eater! He was back in the race! But he hadn’t run here; he’d hitched a ride!
He crossed the highway, acting totally innocent. No way was I going to let that happen!
“Hey there!” I called out. “How’s it going?”
His eyes were flamethrowers. “Going fine,” he sneered.
He walked right past me, limping slightly.
“Have fun, riding in that truck?” I asked. “Was there a sleeper in the cab? Did you take a nap?”
I was being what my mom would call a brat. The Dirt Eater didn’t answer. What could he say?
“I’d love to take a nap,” I went on. “Oh, wait — I can’t — I’ve still got thirty-nine miles to run.”
The Dirt Eater spun around. “Do me a favour,” he snarled, “and shut your yap.”
He glared at me for about 30 seconds. Then he said, “You’ve got more lip than sense.”
While I tried to figure out what to say next, the Dirt Eater loosened the drawstring on his shorts.
Whoa! Time out! Very bad form!
You do not pee in the middle of the trail! Not when another runner is right behind you! You walk a few metres into the forest to do it. If that’s not an official rule in ultra running, then it should be, starting now.
I was about to say something especially snotty, but I figured I’d already made him mad enough. So I ploughed through a patch of waist-high grass, making a wide arc around the Dirt Eater and his pee.
“That’s right, Monkey Boy,” he said. “Leave the angry old man alone.”
Creepy, I thought. And I started to jog. I wanted to get far, far away from that guy.
The volunteers cheered when they saw me coming. “Number Thirteen!” someone shouted. “Way to go!”
A thin woman led me to a folding chair.
“Sixty-one miles in fourteen hours,” she said. “Not too shabby.”
I sat down and sipped from my hydration pack. I thought about reporting the Dirt Eater, telling the volunteers how I’d seen him climb out of a truck, but I decided to keep my mouth shut. I was here to run a race, not to be a rat. If he wanted to cheat, then that was his problem. Besides, the volunteers were writing down when each runner came and went from every rest stop. If anyone checked, they’d see that the Dirt Eater’s times didn’t add up. You didn’t have to be a math genius to figure that one out.
“You look good,” the woman said. “How are you feeling?”
“Not so good, to be honest.”
I hadn’t noticed any pain while I’d been running, but now that I’d stopped, I could feel it kicking in.
“What hurts?” the woman asked.
“Everything,” I said. “My stomach sort of sucks. My shoulders are brutal. And my feet are really giving me hell.”
“They’re giving you what?”
I looked up at the woman. Realized who she was. “Heck,” I said. “They’re giving me heck.”
“That’s better,” said Mom.
I teetered forward and gave her a hug. A stinky, sweaty hug that no one else would have taken.
“Let me see those feet,” she said.
“Nah, they’re okay,” I said. “I was just kidding.”
A total lie. My feet felt like they’d been dipped in gasoline and set on fire. I hated to think what they must look like.
“It wasn’t a request,” said Mom. “Let me see them — now.”
Just then the Dirt Eater jogged into the rest stop. The same people who’d cheered for me now cheered for him.
“Where’s Ollie?” I asked, changing the subject.
“Down at the lake with Kneecap,” said Mom.
She was still looking at my feet. I needed to distract her.
“I want to thank you,” I said.
“For what?” she said.
“For your genes,” I said.
“My genes?”
Mosquitoes dive-bombed my ankles and shins. I rifled through my pack for the bug dope I’d packed. “I inherited your good bones,” I said. “I wouldn’t still be standing after sixty-one miles if I didn’t.”
“Is that so?” said Mom.
“That’s so,” I said.
I was laying it on thick, but I didn’t care. She seemed to have forgotten about my feet.
“You got some of your dad’s genes too,” she said. “You definitely inherited his determination. But he was a plodder — terrible form. You’re different. You run with such grace — like a springbok.”
A springbok is an African version of a deer. I didn’t know that then, but I pretended that I did.
“You’re doing very well, you know,” Mom said. “At this rate, you might even beat your dad’s record.”
The bald guy in the kilt was walking toward us. I had to think hard to remember his name.
“Hey, Quinn!” he said. “How’s that bladder working?”
Bruce. That was his name — Bruce.
“It’s great,” I said. “I’m drinking a ton! My pee is so clear! Want to see?”
That made him grin. “No thanks,” he said. “Come on over. It’s time for your weigh-in. You know the drill.”
I climbed up on the scale. The screen lit up.
“You’ve dropped two more pounds,” Bruce said.
“Two more?” said my mom.
Bruce shrugged. “He’s only lost three, which is average. There was a fella in here earlier who was down eleven. I had to pull him out of the race.”
I thought to myself: I was in sixth place before. But if Bruce pulled one of the leaders, that meant I was …
FIFTH!
“Still,” said Mom. “Three pounds, that can’t be good.”
The volunteers began clapping. The Dirt Eater started running down the trail. Now he was ahead of me, in fifth place, and I was back to being sixth.
“Wow,” said Bruce. “He made a good recovery.”
I stepped down off the scale and said nothing. I’d show them who owned fifth place.
* * *
You probably think you’ve seen some nice sunsets. But this sunset was amazing. This sunset was on steroids!
Half of the sky was the colour of ripe watermelon, and the rest blazed orange, like a melting scoop of sherbet.
On the downside, the bugs were launching an attack. The volunteers pulled on hoodies and long pants and lit citronella candles.
I walked down to the lake, stinking of bug dope. Kneecap was skipping stones. Ollie knelt beside a bush.
“Hey there,” I said.
“Shhhh,” said Ollie.
Kneecap smiled at me. “He’s frog hunting,” she whispered.
A blood-red sunbeam shot through the clouds and stained the cedar trees a dark shade of purple.
“Is it a bullfrog?” I asked Kneecap.
“A leopard frog, I think.”
“No,” said Ollie, “it’s a Bufo americanus. And if you don’t keep quiet, he’ll never come back up.”
The three of us stared at the black water. A light breeze blew across the lake.
“They’re calling for rain tonight,” Kneecap said.
“Great,” I said. “Bring it on.”
Kneecap looked at the clouds on the horizon. Then she said, “I bet the Dirt Eater is in bed by now.”
“No, he’s not,” I said. “He just ran through here.”
“Not possible,” she said. “He was hours behind you.”
I told her about the truck on the highway. Her eyes went wide. She had dog-dish eyes.
“WHAT?” she said. “You saw him climb out of a truck? He must’ve hitchhiked from Silver Valley. What is wrong with that guy?”
Two eyeballs appeared on the water’s surface. Then a tiny nose and two webbed feet. The frog paddled slowly toward the shore. All at once, Ollie sprang into action.
“Gotcha!” he cried, dropping his hands over the frog. He lifted it up so we could take a look.
“He doesn’t look too happy,” I said, peeking between my brother’s thumbs.
“I’ll let him go in a minute,” said Ollie.
The frog scowled like an indignant king, angry at having his schedule interrupted.
Kneecap slapped a mosquito on my neck. “How do you feel about running in the dark now?” she asked.
“I’m a bit spooked,” I said. I was terrified, actually.
“Me and Quinn ran in the dark together once,” Ollie said.
“Really?” said Kneecap.
“You bet,” I said, winking at Ollie. “We’re a team.”
The sun dipped below the horizon. The sky looked as if it had been smudged with charcoal. Ollie set the frog down on a mossy rock. It hopped back into the water with a splash.
“I wrote another verse for the UHL anthem,” I told Kneecap.
Kneecap’s face lit up. “Sing it for me!”
“Okay,” I said.
Our school is proud and strong
Especially the second-floor john
That’s where we belong.
Our teams are bold and free!
With streams so extraordinary!
Number one and unsanitary!
God save our league!
Kneecap’s smile broadened and then slowly collapsed. “It’s great,” she said. “But the UHL’s dead.”
“I know,” I said. “But maybe we can revive it.”
She considered this. Then she said, “Nah, it’s had its day. It was a childish game, anyway.”
We followed the sound of laughter back to the rest stop. At the picnic table I found my drop bag among the others and yanked on a fresh shirt and my nylon jacket. I strapped my headlamp to my forehead. I also loaded up on banana-flavoured gels, jelly beans and a small spool of duct tape.
“What’s the tape for?” Ollie asked.
“In case my shoes get ripped,” I said.
Kneecap ran over. “I just talked to Bruce,” she said. “I asked him how the Dirt Eater could possibly be beating you.”
“What did he say?” I asked.
“He said that Ted — that’s the Dirt Eater’s name — is an experienced runner. And they rely on the honour system in this race.”
“What’s the honour system?” Ollie asked.
“It seems to mean that you can cheat all you want and not get caught,” muttered Kneecap.
Why would anyone cheat like that? It’s not like he had a real shot at winning the race. The fastest runners were probably hours ahead of us by now. They might even be close to the finish line.
Ollie helped himself to a handful of pretzels. “When will you pass the Shrine?” he asked.
“Soon,” I said. “A little over thirty miles.”
Ribbons of campfire smoke wafted through the trees. The glow of an mp3 player lit up Kneecap’s face.
“It’s my bedtime soon,” Ollie said. “I won’t be able to tell you any more stories.”
“Then tell me one right now,” I said.
Ollie knelt down to tie his shoelace. “What kind of story?” he asked.
“A true story,” I suggested.
Ollie pressed some pretzels into his mouth and sucked the salt off them. I clipped on my hydration pack and took a squirt of water.
“One time, last summer, I had a toad,” Ollie began. “I caught him under the climbing tree behind our house.”
I remembered this. “You named him Tony,” I said.
“Yeah, Tony. I kept him in my aquarium. I put grass and leaves in there. Fed him bugs. Sometimes a cricket.”
“One day I took him out of the aquarium and let him hop around the backyard. River was there.”
River’s our neighbour’s dog. He’s big and sleepy-eyed and he has incredibly bad breath.
“Anyway,” said Ollie, “Tony was hopping around on the grass, and River was lying close by, sort of watching, but not really. Then Tony decided to hop between River’s front paws. River leaned forward to sniff him. Tony took another hop forward. River went to lick Tony, and then Tony hopped right inside River’s mouth!”
Ollie scratched a mosquito bite on his leg.
“Why was River’s mouth open?” I asked.
“Because he was sticking out his tongue! And Tony just hopped into the hole!”
It was a horrifying story, but it was also kind of funny. “What happened then?” I asked.
“River looked surprised, like he was going to throw up. Toads don’t taste very good, you know. He shook his head and Tony popped out of his mouth and rolled across the grass. He was shiny from River’s slobber, but aside from that he was okay. I scooped him up really fast, and he peed all over my hand.”
I stared at the blue light fading over the lake.
“So what happened to Tony?” Kneecap asked. She’d taken off her headphones and was sitting up on the bench.
“I set him free,” Ollie said. “He wanted to get home to his family.”
A burst of laughter erupted behind us. The volunteers were drinking beer and telling stories around the fire. Mom was standing apart from the other people. I glanced at our car, the silver hatchback, and for a moment I imagined myself sliding into the passenger seat. I’d ease the seat back and rest my head against the window. I’d probably turn on the fan, and warm air would blow in my face as I slept …
Kneecap saw what I was looking at. “Don’t even think about it,” she growled.
I took a deep breath. “Right,” I said. And then I ran into the forest before I had a chance to change my mind.
“Don’t forget to keep singing!” Ollie shouted after me.
“Scare away the bears!” Kneecap added.