I pull back on my laces. Gotta keep those shoes snug.

The morning sun is still beyond the horizon as I stand on the front steps of my porch, and stretch it out. The air is chill with dew, and hangs humid against my bare legs, exposed below my running shorts. It’s five in the morning, and it’s time to get moving. There’s a moment of hesitation, a flash of cold night and warm bed, but that’s not really an option. Not today.

I push off the steps and I’m on. My shoes build a slow rhythm as I turn onto the sidewalk toward the end of the street. There’s nothing like a good morning run. Wind cuts across my cheeks, and my legs are stiff from the night’s rest. My street is a quiet street, with tall maples and raucous, well-trimmed gardens, painted in nocturnal relief. It’s only a block or so to the park, and soon, I jog down a path of cement cuts, stamped with spraypaint signatures from long ago.

Joey loves Jenny. Peter was here. Eat me.

I round the ring at the centre of the park. It opens up, a deep circle of blackened shrubs and dark paths nestled around a silent fountain. Something about the scene is positively Gothic, as though Dracula might chase his virgin bride from the darkness at any moment. I refocus.

Pick up the pace. Warmup’s over.

I will my body faster and it responds with ease, a smooth shift into second gear. My legs chug, one after the other, right, left, right, left. I love this time. There’s a meditative quality building. The city, ever so still in the early morning, echoes back my footfalls. But this isn’t time to spectate. It’s time for focus. Left, right, left, right.

I cross the small bridge on the far side of the park, past the cenotaph with its bronze soldiers and red-tainted poppies, and turn onto the vacant streets of the downtown core. The slap of my feet is beyond me as breath fills my ears and my mind. In, out. Deep, out. Past silent stores I run, legs pumping. I’m just getting started.

I cross the deserted street and into a back alley behind a theatre long out of use. The alley is cold, but my blood rushes, and a battle ensues between the air and the hot veins beneath my skin. Past a coffee shop, a police station, a liquor store, a dentist’s office. Down into a residential area, replete with old houses of colonial trim and heavy wooden doors. Past sculpted yards and side streets I run, down to an angled intersection that banks onto a main thoroughfare.

I take a left this time, ignoring the Don’t Walk sign in the early, early morn. There’s no cars out yet. No police. Even junkies aren’t awake at this hour.

My feet pound against the sidewalk in steady rhythm. One count, two count. One count, two count. And so it goes. It’s not even five-thirty yet, but the horizon starts to light up the east. Soon, traffic will be everywhere, and I’ll be forced to back streets and stationary jogs at stoplights. I risk a look at my pedometer and smile. Good pace.

I feel good. I contemplate a longer than usual run. It’s not a workday. The wife worked late. She won’t be up for hours. The kids are at Grandma’s. Why not?

I can’t help but smile.

The excitement of a marathon run gears me up and I go a little faster, sprinting for a few blocks before I decide to set a more even pace, if I expect to pull twenty-six-point-two miles.

I take a right on another main thoroughfare. I work on this road, and if I go far enough, I can make it there. This seems to be a good target for now, so I push it a little harder. It’s a long, straight stretch wehere I can focus on pace and breath, breath and pace. My mind sets on autopilot and all I know is the pendulum of my thighs and the low, deep breaths pulled down my throat, drove low into my belly. There’s flow here, simple ruminant energy as I slide through the air, focused, determined, and happy.

Passing the office, I laugh. Fools. They don’t know I’ve been here. How strong I am. How joyful. In the windows out front, I catch a glimpse of my silhouette. Lean, tightly muscled, strong legs and calves, a fine specimen of physicality. They don’t know what they’re missing.

I turn my attention back toward the road, and catch something out of the corner of my eye. A shadow in the window. Was it real? It ran with me. Behind me. A momentary flash, a few yards behind. I catch myself slowing.

Don’t. Don’t stop. You slow, you stop. You know this.

I push back up to my previous pace but the damage is done. The burn in my legs begins. I look down at the pedometer. Not even halfway.

Push on.

I take it down a notch, though not enough for my legs to feel like I’m no longer pressing. That rings a death knell. This race, this run, would be over. Behind me, the sun breaks the horizon. I’m just getting started.

Five more, I think. Five more miles to the far end of town.

I take a left on a trucking route and throw my arm up as the headlights of a passing semi blinds me. The wind whips and dust gets in my eyes as it passes, but still, I push on. The street rises, up over some train tracks.

Yes.

I can feel the rhythm settling back in my thighs. The incline, however small, provided cure.

Slap.

Slap.

Slap.

Slap.

My feet beat their own drum, hammering the pavement with authority. The muscles uncoil in my arms, my shoulders, my chest.

Another window. Another flash.

The shadow is back, clearer now. Ten feet behind me.

Another semi comes up behind me, its wind propelling me forward.

Ignore it. Focus on the run.

My mind slips into overdrive, and I push my limit. I’m locked in, focused. Zen.

Arms pump. Knees bend. My legs muscles flex and tear, ready to rebuild into something new. The shadow again. Every window now. My silent companion. It’s gaining on me.

Orange paint splashes the sky as we reach full dawn, and the air heats up around me. My shadow grows longer. Taller. Its elongated legs move in rhythm with my own. Left, right. Left, right. Slap. Slap.

I’m near the edge of town. An overpass rises before me. This is a busy highway and a dangerous one, so me and my shadow duck down a gravel road that leads back toward town. It will come out near my parents’ place, but they won’t be home. They spend this time of year south, with the other retired veterans of the working world’s war. Gravel digs into the sole of my shoe and pushes up into the ball of my foot.

Maybe this wasn’t such a good idea.

The sun is full bore over the horizon, and its white luminescence sprays pale light through the tall ash groves that line the country road. Lights appear in the windows of small farm houses, but they don’t notice me.

My shadow is closer. I can feel it.

Fatigue sets into my legs. I know I’ve slowed down. I’m not sure if it’s the gravel road or the morning sun, but my focused meditation has fallen into apathy. Hope bleeds in a slow trickle. This is a spirit I need to break.

One more mile. That’s it. You’ve come so far. Such a long way. I tell myself to focus on what I’ve done, not how much is left.

It doesn’t work. I push it, but my body still slows.

Okay. Don’t worry about the past. You’re fresh. You’re new. All you have is one more mile. Don’t worry about the rest, or how much farther than that you are from home. One more mile. That’s it. You can do that. You’ve enough left in the tank. It’s no big deal.

There, better. Not as fast, but steady. Not slow. Legs pendulum. There’s a tight, hot burn in the thighs, an alternating pull across my lower back. My heart pounds. I breathe slower. Deep, not fast. Fast will wear you out.

Another turn, left and then right.

I should have taped my nipples. They’re getting raw. Should have stretched more. Better.

But then, I didn’t know. Gravel stabs up through the soles of my shoes. It rolls and slips beneath my feet. I didn’t know this was the path I’d chosen.

It seems so long. Still so far. So much left to go before it’s over.

The shadow is right behind me.

The rawness of my nipples has expanded. It’s a tight burn in my chest. An acid reflux localized in the centre of my ribcage.

Did I choose this? Is this my choice?

The sun sprays bullets over the horizon, ricochets off the tin roof of a local junkyard, the shattered glass of a dead car.

I chose this.

I didn’t know it would be so long.

A pickup truck screams past. Lost in thought, in obsession, in the numb feeling in my feet and the genetly squeezing fist in my chest, I didn’t hear it. It sprays gravel, striking my shins and knee. I might be bleeding. I don’t have time to check.

The run goes on, me and my shadow, right behind me now, almost part of me, its ethereal teeth clattering at the back of my neck.

Another truck screams by, and another. I stumble sideways, the last one too close. I dangle perilously on the edge of a drainage ditch, and catch myself on a wagon wheel mounted in the ground.

Gotta get off this road. I stagger forward, nearly fall, but don’t stop. Can’t stop.

To stop is death.

The shadow with its hand on my shoulders agrees. It hisses in my ears, and I swear, I can feel its tongue just behind the line of my slackened jaw.

The pain in my chest gets worse.

Blood seeps through the front of my shirt, at the nipples.

The sun breaks free of the tree line. Gravel transitions to pavement and my feet sigh with relief. A bee buzzes past my eyeball, collides with my temple. It chases me a while, adding a flailing, waving component to my run. The shadow grins. It’s on top of me now.

I turn, the last turn, the straight shot to my own neighbourhood. I can’t check my miles. Don’t check my speed. All I know is this is the path I’ve chosen, the race I’ve elected to run, in sudden spontaneity, without really thinking it through. All I wanted was the joy of movement, the runner’s high, the meditative bliss of steady forward movement. Of accomplishment. What I found is tunnel vision, a creeping black blur that surrounds my vision, the shadow with its jaws around my head, its teeth creating a shrinking black ring.

The pain in my chest has taken on tightness, a bed of nails, mounted to a carpet, being wrapped around my heart, pointed side in. Every exertion, every pulse, every beat and pump and breath, tightens the iron maiden.

The shadow’s teeth are in my face now.

I’ve lost track of where I am. There’s a building. A box store? A Legion hall?

Something old. Something new, I’ve seen a thousand times.

And something saying softly, relax.

Easy.

Take a deep breath and lie down.

And then I know.

I’m on the pavement. I’m on the sidewalk, my face on the hard concrete.

Prone.

Stopped. Fallen.

Nearly there.

So close.

The path I chose.

So close.

And yet, not far enough.

Target: 1400 words
Written: 4483 words, short story: Jane Says

Read: Plot & Structure, James Scott Bell
Comics: Fables 93-94, Cinderella: From Fabletown With Love 5, Jack Of Fables 44
Music: 1985 Demo Tape, They Might Be Giants