Ultra (18 page)

“You know about my dad?” I said.

“Of course,” said Kara. “The guy is a legend.”

And then, somehow, I broke into a run. It wasn’t pretty; in fact, it was downright ugly, since my legs felt like they’d
been dipped in cement.

The crowd cheered. “You can do it!” someone shouted.

I thought: Next person who tells me I can do it gets this cellphone straight in the head.

Suddenly I noticed someone running beside me. It was Ollie. He was running faster than me.

“Use your superpowers!” he shouted.

“What?” I said.

“Your superpowers!” Ollie screamed. “Your heart! Use your heart!”

Right — my big heart! I’d forgotten about that!

Then I saw Kneecap. “C’mon, Quinn!” she hollered. “KICK SOME SHINS!”

When I saw her there, something snapped. Electricity sizzled through my body and my legs felt full of juice. I leaned forward and remembered what my dad had said: “Your heart is stronger than you think.”

I shot down the road, my legs spinning like pinwheels. The world blurred past me — trees, puddles, mud.

I could hear myself laughing and I heard the blood in my veins, and the volunteers were screaming, “Go! Go! Go!”

A strange feeling came over me then. For one moment, all my pain and anger were gone. Nothing hurt. Everything was peaceful. I couldn’t even hear any voices in my head. For a moment, it felt like my heart had stopped beating. I even had this strange feeling that I’d become invisible.

Twenty metres from the finish, I sprinted past my mom, who was standing at the side of the road, clapping. Her cheeks were shiny and wet. Not far ahead, the Dirt Eater was slowing down — he thought he’d won the race already.

The finish line was 10 metres away. Then 5, then only 3. I flew past the Dirt Eater like he was standing still!

Me — Quinn Scheurmann. I won the Shin-Kicker 100.

I raised my arms as I crossed the line.

Time: 23 hours, 59 minutes, 32 seconds.

SYDNEY WATSON WALTERS:
And Kneecap was filming the whole thing?

QUINN:
Yeah. She uploaded the video later that afternoon. It went viral two days later, after Michelle Obama posted it on her blog. Six million people viewed it in three days.

SYDNEY WATSON WALTERS:
And then you started getting invited to appear on TV shows like mine.

QUINN:
Yeah. Life got a bit more colourful then.

The volunteers clapped for 10 or 15 seconds, and someone stuffed a bottle of water into my hands. Behind me, I could hear the Dirt Eater cursing. People clapped for him too, though not as much.

Mom wrapped her arms around me and wouldn’t let me go. She didn’t seem to care that I was covered in mud.

“What are you doing winning?” she said. “You promised me you’d take it easy.”

“I tried to!” I said. “But the tornado messed everything up!”

The Dirt Eater threw his water bottle at the ground so hard it bounced. I thought he was going to say something mean, but instead he just stomped off toward the toilets.

A few seconds later, Kara staggered across the line. People whooped and hollered as she knelt down in the road. I thought that she was going to throw up, but instead she bent her head to the ground and kissed the dirt.

“What time is it?” she said, looking up.

We all looked at the clock. It said 23:59:59.

“Yesss!” said Kara.

Somewhere in the valley, a chainsaw roared to life. I leaned over and started to cough.

“Hands above your head,” said Mom. “Breathe deep.”

I raised my arms and coughed some more. When the coughing fit ended, I leaned over and stretched out my back.

“What do you need?” Mom said. “Something to eat? Warm clothes?” Her eyes looked bruised, as if she hadn’t slept.

“I could use some dry shoes and socks,” I said.

Mom looked at my feet. My shoes were caked with mud, and the toes were bright red from the blood that had seeped through.

Mom took a deep breath. “I’ll get the first-aid kit,” she said. “Give me two minutes. I’ll be back.”

She dashed off. Kneecap and Ollie rushed over. “Way to go!” Ollie said. “That was EPIC!”

The camera was still rolling. “What happened to your head?” Kneecap asked.

“That’s nothing,” I said. “Wait till you see my feet.”

Behind me, two volunteers helped Kara to the medical tent. She could barely walk, even with their support.

Ollie high-fived me. “I knew you could do it,” he said. “You know that I was only kidding before, right?”

“I know,” I said. “You did exactly the right thing.”

He was still holding that bowl of cereal. That’s when it hit me — it really was six in the morning. I really had been running for 24 hours. Not only that, I’d somehow won the race.

As if to confirm this, Bruce exploded out of the gatehouse. He splashed through a puddle and held out his hand. “Congratulations!” he said. “Incredible effort.”

“Thanks,” I said.

He fished into his pocket and pulled out a silver belt buckle. A black bear leered at me from the centre of the medallion.

“Don’t lose that,” said Bruce. “Those things aren’t easy to come by. I’m only handing out two of them this year.”

“Don’t you mean three?” I said. “Kara finished one second before the cut-off.”

“Oh, she’ll get one for sure,” Bruce said. “But I’m not so sure about Ted Parker. There are some irregularities with his times.”

Kneecap’s face lit up. “Good!” she squealed. “That guy’s a total cheater.” She ran her finger over the engraving of the bear. “Kara was right,” she said. “That thing is gorge-E-ous!”

“Hey, that reminds me,” I said, “I need to give you this.” I handed over her phone.

“Does it still work after all that rain?”

“It works perfect,” I said. “It actually saved my life.”

She handed back my belt buckle. It weighed a quarter kilo, easy. I pulled a muddy shoelace out of one of my trainers, slung it through the clasps and tied the loop around my neck. At that moment, as far as I was concerned, that buckle was the most valuable piece of metal in the world.

“Sorry about that tornado,” Bruce said.

“No probs,” I said. “I’ve lived through worse.”

Kneecap pulled her headphones down over her ears and lay down on a log.

“Your dad would be proud of you,” Bruce said.

“You knew him?” Ollie asked.

“Of course,” said Bruce. “Your old man paced me in this race, one time. He never set any speed records, but he was
a great pacer. An awesome storyteller too, but you already know that.”

I rubbed a sleeve across my nose.

“I heard about what happened,” Bruce went on. “It didn’t surprise me that he was serving his country. He was always looking out for others, that guy. He was one of the good ones. He left an awfully long shadow.”

The sun was up now, turning the treetops gold, and the wet grass glinted at the edge of the road. Somewhere in the trees, a crow was screeching. I ran my tongue across the roof of my mouth. I had terrible breath. Ultra bad breath.

“Want a mug of hot chocolate?” Bruce asked.

“Yes please!” said Kneecap, jolting upright.

Bruce grinned and walked off toward the gatehouse.

“I’ll help!” said Ollie, running after him.

A pair of toads, grim and ancient-looking, hopped across the silvery grass. I watched their progress and then noticed Kneecap’s fingers, which were tapping out a rhythm against the side of her leg.

I went over and poked her in the ribs. “Hey,” I said.

Her eyes opened a crack. “Hey, yourself,” she said.

“Thanks for coming out,” I mumbled.

Kneecap yawned and took off her headphones. “What was that?” she said.

“I said, Thanks.”

“What for?” she asked.

“For running with me yesterday,” I said. “And thanks for … I don’t know … for everything else.” I looked up at the sky. A pair of red-tailed hawks was circling. “I know I haven’t been much of a friend this year …” I stopped. A
mitten was stuck in my throat.

“Go on,” Kneecap said. “I’m listening.”

“What I wanted to say is … I’m sorry about that joke I told. At the Hallowe’en dance last year. It was so stupid. I meant to apologize …”

Kneecap yawned. “Forget it,” she said. “We all say stupid things. Besides, we were just kids back then. And you had other stuff on your mind.”

I lifted the belt buckle from around my neck. “Here,” I said. “This belongs to you.”

Kneecap’s eyes bulged. “I can’t take that,” she said.

“Sure you can,” I said.

I placed the buckle over her head. She grinned, and I could feel my heart speeding up.

Kneecap turned the buckle over in her hand. “But it’s your keepsake,” she said. “To remind you of the race.”

“I don’t need a reminder,” I said. “This is one day I’ll never forget.”

Bruce and Ollie came out of the gatehouse carrying two mugs of hot chocolate each. It was the creamiest, most delicious hot chocolate I’d ever tasted. “Thanks,” I said, giving Ollie a hug.

He squirmed free. “I did a good job as your pacer, right?”

“You sure did,” I said. “I wouldn’t have finished without you.”

“What about me?” a voice called out.

I turned around. Mom was coming up the path. She had a bundle of clean clothes tucked under her arm.

“Thanks for your amazing genes, Mom!” I said. I stood up to hug her but — “YOW!” I shouted.

“Oh, my poor baby,” Mom said. “Time to stretch out your quadriceps. You just ran a hundred miles, remember?”

She handed the clothes to Ollie and took my hand. “Come on,” she said. “Try a lunge.”

She lunged forward with one leg and then lowered the other leg down to the ground. “Your father swore by this one,” she said.

“No way can I do that,” I said.

“If you can run a hundred miles, you can do a simple stretch,” said Mom. “Come on, Kneecap, help us out.”

Kneecap jumped up and took my other hand. The three of us did a few lunges together.

“Hurts, doesn’t it?” said Mom.

“A lot,” I groaned.

“Good,” said Mom. “Maybe that’ll teach you to not run any more of these crazy races.”

I sat back down in the chair. Mom smiled at me. Kneecap lay down on the log and put her headphones back on.

“I’m sorry I worried you,” I said.

Mom shook her head. “It’s okay,” she said.

“No it’s not,” I said. “There was a
tornado
.”

Mom dug around in the first-aid kit. The trees around us swayed in the wind and made a fizzing sound like root-beer foam rising up in a glass. Mom cleaned the cut on my forehead with a cotton ball and used her finger to rub ointment into the wound. She didn’t talk.

“You should’ve
stopped
me,” I told her. “Why didn’t you stop me?”

She counted to ten under her breath. Then she began cleaning another cut — on my neck.

“I’m serious,” I said. “You should have stopped me!”

I was shouting now, I couldn’t help it. It felt like a whale was swimming up my throat.

“It’s okay, Quinn,” said Mom. “Remember to breathe.”

“Why didn’t you
stop
me?” I yelled. “You heard what Bruce said about the bears. You could have stopped me from running, but you didn’t.”

Mom peeled off my T-shirts, towelled my chest dry and then dropped a clean sweatshirt over my head. “You’re a runner, Quinn,” she said. “It’s what you love to do. And nobody, not even me, should stop you from doing what you love.”

My shoes came off. “Ow!” I shouted. “Take it easy!”

Mom looked at my feet and drew in her breath, but didn’t say anything.

“But I could have been
hurt
,” I went on, my heart pounding now. “I could have been hurt like
Dad
!”

The whale in my throat was thrashing its tail. Kneecap got up from the log where she was lying and walked away.

Mom took a pair of scissors from her purse. The duct tape was stuck to my feet pretty good.

“You should have stopped him from leaving,” I cried. “All you had to do was tell him NO.”

Mom sawed away at the tape with the scissors. “Your father was a soldier,” she said. “He went because he needed to help others. That’s who he was, that’s why we loved him. That’s not something I had the power to stop.”

The tape came off, bit by bit. Mom finished one foot and started on the other.

“I miss him,” I mumbled into her hair.

“Me too,” she said. “More than anything.”

When she said that, I felt burning in my eyes and I knew that I was going to cry. When Dad died, I wasn’t the only one who got hurt. Mom lost him too, but I hadn’t really thought too much about that. I suddenly felt ashamed that I’d added to her pain. She’d been worried about this race, and I’d signed up for it anyway. I’d only been thinking about myself.

The whale was swimming out through my eyes, and suddenly I was crying like a baby. My body folded like a sheet of paper, and I cried silently, like a little kid, with my mouth wide open.

“I never said goodbye to him,” I sobbed.

“That’s all right,” said Mom. “You’re doing it now.”

I cried so hard I could barely breathe. Mom wrapped her arms around me and kissed the top of my head.

“I hid one of my songs in his pocket,” I said. “A nasty song, about how much I hated the war.”

“We all hated the war,” Mom said.

“I know,” I said, “but we weren’t supposed to say it.”

I felt like I was falling from a terrible height. Like I was on top of the CN Tower and it was crumbling to the ground.

“We’ll never be happy again,” I snuffled.

“Yes we will,” said Mom. “Some day we will.”

My body clenched and rocked back and forth. This crying business was harder than running.

“You’ll figure this out,” Mom whispered in my ear. “But you can’t keep locking yourself away in your room, Quinn. Ollie and I miss your father too. The three of us need to talk about him
together
.”

She pulled some tissues out of her purse and wiped a bunch of crud off of my face. I cried until they were all used up. Mom found another packet, and I went through that one too.