There were a million small things about Sebastian that I didn't expect. Like the richness of his laugh, when he beat me at our next race, or the flush of colour that came over his cheeks, dark and pink, from the run. Like the little shake of his knees that he tried to hide, that disappeared as his muscles warmed. Like the kindness of his touch, as he ruffled my hair again, bemused, before straightening up on his feet.

"You held back," he said, and it sounded sincere, the way he said it. Even breathless, he had the kind of confidence that drew people's attention, easy and understated. It was like he didn't know how beautiful he was, when he was running. "We'll have to go again."

I was lying on my back in the grass, heaving under the strain of sprinting as fast as I could. I'd been a bit delusional, maybe, to think I was better than him, when our times were always so close. Three races in, and he'd taken the best of three, leaving us tied at two and two.

We were equals, it seemed. Which was altogether a scarier thought.

Looking up at him, the sunrise finally casting shadows on his face, his hair a muddy orange in the early morning glow, we couldn't have been more different. Where I was out of breath, he seemed hardly winded; where I was sweaty, my t-shirt sticking to my skin, he looked hardly tired at all.

But then the sky filled with gold, glorious and bright, and Sebastian became something more, illuminated fully by the glow.

"I think that's Harrison's car," I said, suddenly desperate to fill the silence as I looked away, turning towards the sound of a car pulling into the parking lot. If I stared at Sebastian any longer, he'd know what I was thinking, and that thought mortified me. "They're early too."

Nodding, Sebastian twisted on his heels, following my gaze, and I took that moment to compose myself. It wasn't even eight o'clock yet and I was exhausted, my heart hammering, my palms clammy, my dark hair a mess that stuck to the corners of my eyes. I tied to blow away the strands, but soon gave up and hauled myself to my feet.

As I did, two figures appeared on the far edge of the field, the sound of a car door locking piercing the stillness of the air. Sebastian waved, and the two figures waved back.

"Did you bring water?" he asked, over his shoulder. He had one hand on his hip, the other dangling by his side, his voice perfectly even, like he hadn't just sprinted at top speed three times in a row back and forth across the grass. "I have an extra bottle in my backpack, if you need one."

"I'm good," I said, and reached for my own, the metal stamped with the coat of arms for the school. Everything we wore carried the same emblem, from our dark blue shorts to our white t-shirts to our striped, monogrammed socks. It felt like having a sponsor, only we paid them.

As Harrison and Laurie got closer, I tried to guess what positions they ran in, on the team. Sebastian was obviously the anchor, running last and carrying the baton over the finish line. But Laurie was a harder guess; he was taller than Harrison, but not by much, with slimmer shoulders and a longer gait. Perhaps he ran second, covering the most ground on the track, where Harrison ran third, passing the baton to Sebastian. Which would place me at the starting line—my weakest position.

"Jack!" Harrison said, when he realized it was me. He was shouting across the field, even though he didn't have to, and the empty bleachers seemed to ring with the echo of his voice. "Where was this outfit yesterday? You look like a proper Brentwood boy now."

I assumed he'd meant that as a joke, but my cheeks still burned at the scrutiny. In truth, my mother had lost my gym uniform in the house somewhere, in some container or bag or under some mountain of stuff. I'd made the mistake of putting it down on a corner of the living room couch, and when I'd gone back to get it, she'd already misplaced it. It can't have gone far, she'd said. Even now, I had no idea where or how she'd found it again.

"My mom had it dry-cleaned," I said lamely. Thankfully, though, that seemed believable, based on Laurie's nod. "I only have the one set. And Sebastian wasn't in uniform yesterday either."

"Yeah," Harrison said, elbowing Sebastian in the ribs. "That's true, isn't it? Show off."

"I don't blame you," Laurie said, elbowing his brother right back, his mouth full of granola bar, his words a bit garbled. "Harry's only got one too. He keeps losing them."

That brought on a bit of an elbowing match between the brothers, and it was only then, when Laurie turned his head to the right, as he was facing me, that I realized he had a hearing aid. Pale and plastic, it was easy to miss under his hair, but it snaked along the side of his head and ran down behind his ear.

Sebastian, seeing me staring, gave me a heavy look, but didn't say anything.

Feeling a bit embarrassed, I waited until Harrison and Laurie had headed off for the gym locker rooms to change before letting out the breath I hadn't realized I'd been holding. "Does Laurie need to read lips?" I asked Sebastian, trying to gauge his reaction. But he was impassive again, distant. Untouchable. "He drove me home yesterday, and I didn't really face him much. That's on me, for not noticing."

There was a lull in the conversation, long and drawn out, before Sebastian finally nodded. The shift in his face was subtle, but enough. The heat left his eyes, and his shoulders relaxed. "Yeah, he does," he said. "It helps, anyway. We can teach you some sign language too, since he doesn't run with his implant in. You'll pick it up pretty quick."

Impasse crossed, I held out my water bottle, and Sebastian took it, splashing some of the water onto his hand and rubbing the back of his neck. I could better understand it, now, the fear some of my classmates had described in the lead up to Sports Day. If I had been a dick just then, about Laurie, Sebastian would've murdered me.

Turning, I waved at the brothers again when they reappeared, and they took in the sweat staining the front of my shirt for the first time. "How long have you guys been out here?" Harrison asked, jogging back up to our makeshift starting line in the grass, the straps on our backpacks fanning out to mark the spot. "We would've come earlier."

"Just setting the record straight," Sebastian said, his fingers pushing back his bangs. "That's allowed, isn't it?"

Harrison, smiling again, beamed at me like a proud mother hen. "Did you let him win?" he asked playfully. "He hasn't kicked you off the team already, so you must have."

"Am I on the team? Officially?" I asked in reply, trying not to sound too nervous. That hadn't seemed real, when Sebastian had said it yesterday, off-hand, after the race. "What if I'm terrible at it?"

I wasn't actually afraid of that, but I wanted someone to say, Nah, you'll do great. But the three boys just looked at each other.

Then, after a pause, Sebastian nodded.

"Looks like it to me!" Harrison said, and with his arm over my shoulder, he turned me to face the stretch of the track that was getting redone. "That should all be finished by Monday, so we can practice for real. I'm first, and Sebastian is the closer. So you're third, right behind him. After Laurie."

"Okay," I said, a bit dizzy with the thrill of it. "Yeah, makes sense."

"So, you know to say 'stick' when you do the hand-off, right? You've run relays before?"

I decided to lie. "For sure," I said. "Tons."

"Cool," Harrison said, and spun me back around. "We'll practise the full run together, obviously, but the toughest part with someone new is the hand-off, so we'll probably focus on that for a few weeks."

"Cool."

"Yeah."

In truth, that was the least helpful explanation of the sport I'd ever heard. I knew the gist, of course, but I'd never actually seen a baton in person before, and I'd never done a handoff. At my old school, the rules were a lot looser, and relays were run by passing a distance marker rather than physically handing something to someone else. Since it's easier, had been the reasoning.

Now, watching as Sebastian pulled a baton out of his bag, the plastic tube sitting oddly in my hands, I wished I'd thought to practise a bit more. Even just running with it would be a bit weird at first.

"Let's see your technique," Sebastian cut in, gesturing at the field again. "I'll wait up ahead. Laurie can jog up and hand it to you."

Nodding, I eased myself out from under Harrison's arm, trying to give off the sense I knew what I was doing. Trying not to seem nervous, even as Laurie carefully pulled off his cochlear implant, signing something to Harrison, signalling he was ready to start.

But on the inside, a small part of me finally started to panic.