Dr. Fontanella, my AP Lit teacher, was definitely at Woodstock in the 70s. She wore way too much colorful swirly printed clothes, and I was sure I smelled pot in her desk once. But she liked me - like most teachers did - and gave me a warm smile as I handed her my summer reading pop quiz before leaving class.

"So which book did you enjoy the most?" she asked, casually reading through my quiz.

None of them. Our whole summer reading list was inundated with dystopian-themed fiction, and if I was actually interested in any of that depressing shit I would have just watched the Hunger Games or something.

"I'm gonna say Never Let Me Go." I rocked on the heels of my loafers. "It didn't feel so...outdated as some of the other ones."

"Quite sad." Dr. Fontanella purposefully nodded, marking a big red 92 on my quiz. "Most love triangles in fiction are abysmal, but this one was done artfully."

"Eh, I wouldn't know," I shrugged.

"I noticed your name was absent from the student tutors list this semester." She looked up at me over the frames of her large, tortoise-shell glasses.

I let out a sigh. "Yeah uh...I just don't think I have time in my schedule for that now. Between football, college stuff, and uh...other extracurriculars."

"Oh nonsense," she gave me a chuckle. "Just put your name down, I'm sure you can squeeze in once a week. Besides you only need to sign up for one subject, you don't need to do them all. You know it looks great on all your applications."

She produced the sign up sheet from her desk and fluttered it in my face. I worked my jaw so hard I felt the little veins in my forehead pulse. I was sure Clemson, Georgia Tech, and Florida State did not give one single fuck that I was a student tutor this year, but I took the sheet from her anyway and scribbled down my name in barely legible chicken scratch. Dallas was game. Dallas was king. Dallas could handle anything thrown at him.

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I must have done something seriously shitty in a past life to end up with Kaia in my last period gym class. I mentally kicked myself at my total lack of foresight - most athletes had gym the last period of the day so we could all just scatter to our respective practices afterwards, so the probability of being with her was higher than usual. Thankfully I also had Chris, who nudged me as Kaia walked out of the girls' locker room with two of her field hockey groupies in tow.

"Look, I hate to do this to you guys so early in the year, but I figured we'll get it out of the way and then go back to pretending to jog around the track for 45 minutes, alright?"

Mr. Baxter, in his outdated 80s track pants, paced in front of the 12 of us, identical in our grey NLDS t-shirts and black shorts, like dominos lined up and ready to tumble.

Early September in Connecticut was still warm enough to hold P.E. outside on the turf. The problem was that turf was naturally 10 degrees hotter than the outside air, so despite the tepid afternoon, I was sweating my balls off. I should have felt more at home here than any other place in school, standing tall between the two uprights on the football field, but Kaia's presence made my sacred space unholy. I glanced over the row of heads to my left at her, eyes forward and chin up, her dark hair pulled back away from her sweat-slicked forehead. Discomfort was never Kaia's style. She'd walk through hell in long strides with her head up, like she owned the fucking place.

"You all know how the pacer test works, I don't need to explain it. Blame the state of Connecticut, not me."

A collective groan came from the class. Chris and I pretended to do some semblance of stretching as Mr. Baxter set a row of bright orange cones up on the 15 yard line, then another row at the back of the end zone. Chris jabbed me in the side.

"What's your over/under for laps? 50?" He grinned.

"I'll take the over." I shrugged. "What's your over/under? The minimum?" I jabbed him back.

"Probably."

Everything about Chris Thompson was effortless, almost to a fault. For someone who was a future Division I wide receiver at a Power 5 school, Chris was never a gym class hero. That mantle had been mine since the seventh grade.

"Alright," Mr. Baxter sighed out as he returned to our group on the sideline. "Line up and get ready."

Just as I glanced over at Kaia from the corner of my eye, she did the same. Glancing turned into eyes narrowed, searing, white hot glaring, until the beep signaling the start propelled us forward.

I jogged at first, my strides long enough to get me 20 yards well before the seven second interval. I kicked around the little orange cone with my sneaker as I waited for the next beep.

As time went on, and the time between the beeps dwindled, so did the students running it.

In true Chris fashion, he did the minimum without breaking a sweat and plopped down on the sideline, arms back and head up to the sky.

I easily hit 50 laps, giving Chris a sly grin as he shook his head at me.

The beeping was at about 6 seconds intervals, and I was just about ready to stop when I saw a flash of Kaia's crisp white sneakers against the dark green of the turf. It beeped again. She kept going. So did I.

I was a runner by nature. I was good at it. After all, that's the embodiment of dual threat quarterback - the ability to throw, scramble, and run run run. But something about seeing Kaia and the subtle smugness on her as she dashed beside fueled me with an aggression I didn't normally apply to gym class. So I threw it into overdrive.

"Not winded yet?" She asked casually.

"No," I shook my head. "You?"

Beep.

Turf pellets kicked up behind us as we quickened our pace to the cones.

"Really?" She asked. "Because I can smell the carbon dioxide on your breath from here."

Beep.

"Yeah take a deep breath, cause it's the closest you'll ever get," I grinned back at her.

Beep.

By that point, some sort of crowd had formed. I darted past blurry faces under the glare of the afternoon sun.

"Alright guys, I think you've proven your point." I could hear Mr. Baxter, but the blood pumping through my ears made him sound far, far away.

Beep.

Five second intervals. Sweat dripped in my eyes, and the afternoon sun burned the back of my neck. I needed oxygen and a cold shower, but I needed to beat Kaia more.

Beep.

Four seconds. Sprinting. Sweating. Searing. Stop me.

"Give up," I groaned at her.

Beep.

"You give up first," she shot back.

Beep.

"In your fucking dreams, Greene."

Beep.

"I only see you in my nightmares, Gunther."

The ear-shattering screech of a whistle stopped us all in our tracks so quickly, I almost stumbled over my own feet. I glanced over at Kaia, her freckled cheeks red and the front of her gray t-shirt stained with sweat.

"Dallas Gunther!"

The grating sound of my name out of Coach Knox's mouth was something that would haunt me well after I left high school. He stood on the far sideline, arms folded over his too-tight blue Nike polo shirt. I felt the heat of his glare from across the field, and it pulled me toward him like a wayward comet caught in a planet's orbit. I swallowed the dry lump that had formed in my throat and jogged over to him.

"What's up?" I didn't realize how out of breath I was until I tried to speak, my words like knives dragging up and down my throat.

"Why in the hell is my star quarterback overexerting himself in gym class?" he asked. "On the first god damn day of school, no less."

"Overexerting myself?" I echoed with a forced chuckle. "I'm not overexerting myself, I'm just...proving a point."

Coach Knox glanced over my shoulder as our gym class dispersed, and I followed his line of sight to Mr. Baxter, who could only cower under the heat of Coach Knox's gaze. If I was a king among my peers, Coach Knox lorded over all the faculty - an executioner for athletic director Kane to unleash at will. Football ruled all, and everyone knew it.

"Son, I need you to understand something." Coach Knox clamped his hand down on my shoulder. "Rivalries aren't healthy. Someone always takes it a touch too far, and it never ends well. You're a lion, Dallas Gunther. A lion doesn't need to let anybody know he's a lion, he just shows up and people already know what he's capable of."

The imagery wasn't lost on me - our god damn mascot was a lion.

"I got it." I nodded.

I caught a glimpse of my reflection in the mirrored lenses of Coach Knox's aviators, my hair a sweaty mess and my cheeks so red it looked like someone smacked me.

"Well that's good to hear, Now get yourself suited for practice and I'll see you out here in 30."

"Yes sir."

School. Practice. Study. Tutor. Party. Be great. Be invincible. Try not to collapse. One day down. 179 to go.

we're doing alright, we'll be fine
everything's okay
that's what we tell ourselves all the time
we can't make the pain go away
we can't slow down, we can't stop now, but we all turn around

running / a r i z o n a

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Raise your hand if you've ever been personally victimized by the pacer test in high school.

I am absolutely living for Dallas and Kaia's dynamic, but also I think Dallas and Chris's friendship may be one of my favorite friend duos I've ever written. Let me know your thoughts, predictions, etc!

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