It’s almost like when we first started running. When it was just the two of us and the track and the sky and my dragon and my lioness.
But we aren’t on the track, we’re tearing down some back alley behind Aaron’s house and I can’t see, am just chasing him blind, hoping I don’t trip on something. His shape is a shadow in front of me, until lightning lights up the sky, turning him back into a person, a person I’m pushing myself to catch, and when I do, I scream at him and I don’t care that the wind is screaming at both of us and instead of screaming back at me, the way I want him to, he takes my hand, and when he does, the touch of his skin in the dark, the sense of his fingers intertwining with mine, does something to me. He pulls me toward him, out of the rain, into a covered doorway, and then he’s holding me and letting me scream into his chest.
Scream until there is nothing left inside me.
“You all right?” he asks.
“Not really,” I say. Because it’s the truth.
“You will be,” he says. Then he hugs me tight and his hug gives me hope that he’s right, that it’ll all be OK. And it gives me hope that maybe he’ll still be hugging me when I’m all right. That he isn’t hugging me just because right now I’m a blubbering mess who happens to be his best friend’s little sister.
I stomp on that stupid balloon of hope. It is pretty darn resilient, though, and won’t pop. I can’t bring myself to puncture it, so instead I cradle it against my heart and hope Aaron can’t see it.
Three days later I come down with a cold, a real bad one that comes with shakes and shivers and a runny nose and a scratchy throat, and I can’t go to school for a week, and no matter what I tell my mom about needing to stay in shape for track, she makes me miss practice and stay in bed. Granny Dee and LaoLao fuss over me, bringing me cups and cups of tea and soup and then more tea and more soup, and when I’m sure I couldn’t swallow another drop, they bring me even more. So I drink it down, because Granny Dee and LaoLao have been looking after sick kids and sick grandkids for a long time and I trust them.
My dragon and my lioness glare at me at night, and I know they blame themselves for letting me go running that night in the rain.
But as much as I hate missing practice, and I really do, some part of me likes the attention I’m getting from Granny Dee and LaoLao.
It’s been a long time since anyone has taken care of me like this.
But still, I have to get better fast. Next weekend is our training weekend in Hilton Head, and there’s no way I’m gonna miss that.
CHAPTER 42
“You ready for this weekend?” Eliza is practically bouncing up and down next to me, grinning her mile-wide grin.
I nod and grin back at her. It’s Friday afternoon after practice. I’ve been back at school a few days after being sick. There are vans in the parking lot, ready to drive us to Hilton Head. My mom almost didn’t let me go, but yesterday Coach Kerry talked her into it. “We do it every year. It’s good for the team. It’ll be good for Wing,” she said. Mama, I wanted to say, you’ve been letting Marcus run around with his friends, with his team, since he was twelve. But maybe she was thinking that she should have been a little more careful with Marcus.
We pile all our stuff into the backs of the vans. I only brought my duffel bag and a sleeping bag. Coach Kerry provides all the tents; she got ’em donated from a local business. Whole trip has been paid for, partly from donations and partly from a fund-raiser that the rest of the team did last summer.
As we head for one of the vans, Eliza tells me how much fun we’ll have and how we’ll make a campfire every night and how Hilton Head is the most beautiful place she’s ever been, and I’m just grinning at her because I can’t wait to see it for myself.
I’m expecting Aaron to ride in the van with the rest of the guys on the track team, guys I know by face but not by name, so I’m surprised when he jogs over to our van.
“Our van is full,” he says. “Y’all got any space for me?”
“Yep, in the back next to Wing,” Eliza chirps, before I’ve even gotten in.
There are a few giggles, but if Aaron hears them, he ignores them. “Cool,” he says, and I try to look nonchalant, like it’s no big deal that we’re about to spend seven hours squished up next to each other.