Page 11 of See You at the Finish Line

“Nah, I looked too.”

“Oh, you did, did you?” I don’t know how to feel about that.

“Hell yeah. If you don’t want to make a move, then I’m definitely going to.”

The idea leaves a bad taste in my mouth. It’s not like you can call dibs on a person, I know that, but come on. I kind of have dibs. I talked to her first, I’m her stalker. I cringe inwardly, probably best not to say that thought out loud. This inside joke could get me into some serious trouble if I’m not careful.

Talking becomes more difficult as we start our next ascent, breaking out our poles to climb over large boulders along the face of a towering red cliff. The view becomes increasingly beautiful as the sun continues to rise.

When Caleb’s foot slips a little up ahead, my heart starts to race. He recovers quickly, but I’m snapped out of my daydream of a perfect ass and my hand wrapped around a ponytail, attention now back on the literal death trap we call a trail.

He doesn’t seem to be hurt, but just to make sure, I ask, “Are you okay?”

“Yeah, I’m fine. Just watch the loose rock.”

“Thanks for the warning, I was planning not to look where I’m going and just hope for the best,” I say, sarcasm dripping from my tone.

“Asshole.”

We begin our careful descent and revel in the downhill that leads to the first big open stretch of land on the course. We’ve trained the most for the hard portions of the race, which essentially involves rock climbing as quickly as possible in the dark with little to no sleep.

It’s hard to recreate race conditions, but we managed. I’m already grateful I won’t have to wake up at 2:00 a.m. to run a double marathon up the mountains ever again.

Footsteps sound from behind me, and I turn to greet the approaching runner when a ponytail and the scent of salt and coconut pull up next to me.

“Fancy seeing you here,” she says with a smile.

I look behind me again at the open trail and back to the woman at my side, amazed.

“How did you catch up to us so fast?” I ask by way of greeting.

“Let me guess, you focused more on uphill and downhill training than open trail?”

“You’d be correct.”

“I’ve been running track my whole life. This is where I make up some of the extra time I lose on the rough terrain,” she explains.

Caleb turns to see that our new friend has joined us.

“Hey, good lookin’!” He winks at her, and she starts to laugh but immediately begins to cough.

“You okay?” I ask.

“Yeah, it’s super dusty here. You’d think I’d be used to it, but it still gets me sometimes.”

“Are you from around here?”

“You’re a pretty terrible stalker if you don’t know where I live,” she teases.

“I hate to think what you’d say about my abilities once you realize I still don’t even know your name.”

“You should go back to stalker training, sounds like you need it.”

“What’re you two chatting about back there?” Caleb calls. I can see that he wants to slow down to join us, but he’s too competitive to give up the minute lead he currently has on me.

“Come back here and find out!” I yell, probably using more enthusiasm than I should. The day is starting to heat up and I need to be careful. Conserving every ounce of energy is crucial.

“You wish!” He gives me the finger and picks up his pace, meaning his light shuffle scuffs up a bit more dust than it did a second ago. Pacing in an ultra-race is so important—only the elite like Mateo are really hammering the course.

---