Patina (Track #2)
Jason Reynolds
For those who’ve been
passed the baton
too young
TO DO: Everything (including forgetting about the race and braiding my sister’s hair)
AIN’T NO SUCH thing as a false start. Because false means fake, and ain’t no fake starts in track. Either you start or you don’t. Either you run or you don’t. No in-between. Now, there can be a wrong start. That makes more sense to me. Means you just start at the wrong time. Just jump early and break out running with no one there running with you. No competition except for your own brain that swears there’s other people on your heels. But ain’t nobody there. Not for real. Ain’t no chaser. That’s what they really mean when they say false start. A real start at the wrong time. And at the first meet of the season, nobody knew this more than Ghost.
Before the race, me and everybody else stood on the sidelines, clapping and hyping Ghost and Lu up as they took their marks. This was of course after they had already gassed each other up, talking to each other like there was no one else on the track but them. Funny how they went from mean-muggin’ each other when they first met, to becoming all buddy-buddy like they their own two-man gang or something. Lu and Ghost—sticking together like glue. Ha! Glue! Ghost and Lu, Glue. Get it? That could be their corny crew name. Lost would also work. Matter fact, there was a moment where I thought that name might even be more fitting. Especially after what Ghost did.
See, at first, I thought he’d timed it perfectly. I thought Ghost pushed off from the line at the exact moment the gun went off, as if he just knew when it was coming. Like he could feel it on the inside of him or something. But he didn’t hear the second shot. Well, I take that back. Of course he heard it. It was a loud boom. It was impossible not to hear it. But he didn’t know it meant that he’d jumped too early, that he’d false started. I mean, this was his first race, so he had no clue that that second shot meant to stop running, and start over. So . . . he didn’t.
He ran the entire hundred meters. Didn’t know that people weren’t cheering him on, but were yelling for him to pull up, to go back to the starting line. So when he got to the finish line, he threw his hands up in victory and turned around with one of them million-toothed smiles until he noticed all the other runners—his competition—were still up at the top of the track. He looked out into the crowd. Everybody, laughing. Pointing. Shaking their heads, while Ghost dropped his. Stared at the black tar, his chest like someone blowing up a balloon inside him, then letting the air out, then blowing it back up, then letting the air out. I was afraid that balloon was gonna bust. That Ghost would burst open like he used to do when he first joined the team. And I could tell by the way he was chewing on the side of his jaw that he wanted to, or maybe just keep running, off the track, out of the park, all the way home.
Coach walked over to him, whispered something in his ear. I don’t know what it was. But it was probably something like, “It’s okay, it’s okay, settle down, you’re still in it. But if you do it again, you’re disqualified.” Nah, knowing Coach, it was probably something a little more deep, like . . . I don’t know. I can’t even think of nothing right now, but Coach was full of deep. Whatever it was, Ghost lifted his head and trotted back to the line, where Lu was waiting with his hand out for a five. Ghost was still out of breath, but there was no time for him to catch it. He had to get back down on his mark. Get ready to run it all over.
The starter held the gun in the air again. My stomach flipped over again. The man pulled the trigger again. Boom! again. And Ghost took off. Again. It was almost like his legs were sticks of dynamite, and the first run was just the fuse being lit, and now, the tiny fire had gotten to the blowup part. And let me tell you, Ghost . . . blew up. Busted wide open in the best way. I mean, the dude exploded down the line in a blur, even faster this time, his silver shoes like sparks flicking up off the track.
First race. First place.
Even after a false start.
And if a false start means a real start at the wrong time—the wrong time being too early—then I must’ve had a false finish, which also ain’t a fake finish, but a real finish, just . . . too late. Make sense?
Just in case it don’t, let me explain.
My race was up next. And here’s the thing, I’ve been running the eight hundred for three years straight. It’s my race. I have a system, a way of running it. I come off the block strong and low and by the time I’m straight up, my stride is steady, but I always allow myself to drop back a little. You know, keeping it cool for the first lap. Pace. That’s where eight-hundred runners blow it. They start out too fast and be rigged by the second lap. I seen a lot of girls get roasted out there, showboatin’ on that first four hundred. But I knew better. I knew the second four hundred was the kicker. What I didn’t know, though, was just how fast the girls in this new league were. What kinda shape they were in. So when the gun blew, and we took off, I realized that the pace I had to keep just to stay with the pack was faster than I was used to. But, of course, I’m thinking, these girls are stupid and are gonna be tired in twenty seconds.
In thirty seconds.
In forty seconds.
Never happened, and instead it ended up being me saying to myself, Oh God, I’m tired. How am I tired? And as we rounded into the final two hundred meters, I had to dig deep and step it up. So I turned on the jets.
Here’s how it went.