Living with the Swaylers

Chapter 4: What's going on here?

"Oh, I'm sorry. That sounds painful. But I also get what you're saying, how people expect that just because you're fast, you're automatically going to do great every single time," I said. 

"Yeah... exactly like that."

"And that was enough to make you quit?" I asked. Jordan doesn't seem like the type to fold under pressure and give up. 

"I guess so, but mostly I think it's just that track isn't my sport, basketball and football are, and track is yet another thing to do," he explained. 

"Oh ok, that's a better excuse," I said, looked at him and gave him a small smile. He returned it. 

"So why do you like to run? Why not any other sports? You seemed not bad at basketball," he said. I took that as a compliment. 

"Well, I'm not entirely sure, but I know that when I run, I feel so free. I feel like I can go anywhere, take any corner, any hill, any course and finish it no matter how painful, you get over it. And eventually you start to feel like nothing can stop you, except bad shin splints of course."

Jordan laughed. "Yeah, that's true."

"I used to play basketball though, and it was lots of fun! But the basketball girls at my old school..." Jordan looked at me waiting for me to continue. "Well, they were quite toxic. They treated me as if I wasn't worth much just because they were better than me."

Jordan scoffed. "That's stupid." I agreed. 

We continued to talk the entire run about all kinds of things, his life, my life, things we loved to do as a kid. Running with him made the four mile run seem like one mile. When we turned the corner back onto the street in sight of the base, I started to speed up since we were almost there. In the process, Jordan started speeding up. When he sped up, I did even more so I was slightly ahead of him then before I knew it, we were sprinting, racing each other back. I ran as fast as I could knowing guys are naturally faster, but I stayed up with Jordan. 

We made it to the pathway up to the front door before finally starting to walk, and Jordan had beat me by just a few steps. "Ha! Loser!" he said. I punched his shoulder then tried to catch my breath. 

"Barely!" I said defending myself. 

"Uh, huh okay, whatever," he said and laughed. "Come on, let's go inside. It's getting hot out here." We walked around the side of the house into the garage which was already open. Ash was inside the garage getting one of his old cars ready to sell. 

"Hey Ash, mind handing us some water bottles from behind you?" Jordan asked him. 

Ash looked at us, me, and reached into the fridge behind him and pulled out two water bottles who he then tossed to Jordan and me as we walked into the garage where he was. "How far'd you run?" he asked us. 

"Only 4 miles," I said. Ash looked at me. 

"Gosh, how easy," he said sarcastically which made me smile. Honestly it was, but I guess it is kind of a lot for others. Jordan started to head inside but I still wanted to catch my breath outside, so I stayed in the garage a little longer. 

I tried to open my water bottle, but not only was it already super hard to open, but my hands were a little sweaty. I tried so hard to open it that my hand hurt. Ash looked at me and showed a small smile. "Need help with that?" he asked. I tried once more but failed, and then handed him my water bottle. He easily opened it up right away and my jaw dropped. 

"How? But- I'm not weak!" I said defensively and in shock. Ash laughed now and handed it back to me.  "Thanks," I mumbled. "So is this the car you're selling today?" I asked referring to the old Catilake we were standing near.