Running for Home: A Novel by Edward McClelland

Author:Edward McClelland [McClelland, Edward]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Bottom Dog Press
Published: 2021-04-18T20:00:00+00:00

Twelve

Nothing Sara did or said could get me excited about the Elvis Costello concert in Auburn. Sara owned every Elvis Costello album. The week before the show, we listened to one every day, in chronological order: My Aim Is True, This Year’s Model, Armed Forces, Get Happy!!, Trust, Almost Blue, and Imperial Bedroom. It was a seven-part symphony of cynicism and sadness. I listened because I wanted anything that important to her to be important to me, but I also wanted something important to me—OK, the only thing important to me—to be important to her, too.

“After we go to the concert, will you start running again?” I asked her, after the needle had risen on the last track of the terribly misnamed Get Happy!!

Sara had quit running after the cross-country season, when Camelot rehearsals consumed the dwindling daylight hours between the end of school and sunset. Since then, she had filled out a little bit, as housebound Northerners do in winter. I could barely squeeze my fingers between her belly and the waistband of her jeans. (“You maybe better unbutton them,” she’d said, the first time I’d tried. That was something I could hear her say over and over again, even if I didn’t exactly like the reason she’d said it.)

“You’re going out for cross country again this fall, aren’t you?” I asked, after she’d buttoned her jeans again.

“Yyyeeeaaah,” Sara said. Had she been planning to skip this season, because cross country was already on her college application? Did she now feel trapped by my expectations?

“You need to start running before practice starts. I showed up out of shape when I was a sophomore. Every day after practice, I came home and sat on the toilet for an hour.”

Sara made another of her faces. Her eyes narrowed. Her lips drew back in disgust.

“That’s nice to think about, Mr. Ward.”

It was an embarrassing revelation, but worth it for a Sara Face.

“It’s hot and humid in August.”

“August is still two months away.”

“How about if I come over on the nights you’re not working at the library?”

Sara had a summer job shelving books and setting up chairs for author talks.

“Don’t you already run in the mornings?”

“I’ll do doubles. All the studs do two workouts a day.”

Sara realized she wasn’t going to get out of running cross country any more than I was going to get out of the Elvis Costello concert.

“We can start on Thursday,” I suggested. “Do you work on Thursday?”

Sara’s brow drew close to her eyes. Her lips thinned. I had said something wrong. I was about to find out what. Her face held its expression for an extra beat, just to build the suspense.

“The concert is on Thursday,” she said.

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