Run from it

Alex set her keys on the table and opened her fridge. She was thankful for Hello Fresh. By the end of the day, she was done making decisions and following the directions on the card made things so much easier.

            Dinner would be chicken piccata. She read the card and began to arrange things when she heard the thump. It made her jump. She knew it had to be one of the kids in the hall coming back from basketball or softball practice, but when she tried to return to cutting chicken her hand shook. 

            She slapped her hands on the table and tried to take a deep breath. It didn't help. It never helped. 

            She went to her front door and listened. The sound was gone, the image in the peep hole showed the same empty grey hallway. She paused with her hand on the door. She knew it was ok. She knew she was ok, as ok as she got these days anyway, but that didn't stop her from opening the door and looking into the hallway. 

            Empty.

            She cursed herself. Went to her bedroom and slid on her Under Armor leggings, sports bra, and Nike’s. Before, when she ran, she ran to keep her chocolate addiction at bay, she tracked every mile and logged every step. She used AirPods and strapped her phone to her arm. Now she didn't need any of that; the only thing she needed was a bottle of pepper spray.

She set her phone on her dresser and saw that Stephanie messaged her again. Again, she ignored the message and headed out. 

             Outside she caught movement at the corner of her eye and flinched. Saw it was just a squirrel winding up a tree and cursed the old lady that lived across the street that insisted on feeding the infernal things.

The running cleared her mind. The first mile was always the hardest. It was the mile where she hadn't found her breathing yet, her pace erratic; her mind and eyes still jerking about. By the time she hit South Shore Drive her breathing and pace evened out and the drone of her feet replaced her thoughts.

            Back, before that night, she seldom made it to down the first hill and when she did, she only climbed back up with the idea that she earned a pint of Cherry Garcia. That hill passed and she didn't even slow down. She passed the corner grocery where before she would have driven to get the ice cream. Passed where 32nd street connected to South Shore, where she normally looped back and kept going. Slipped past the guard station that kept visitors from bothering the out-of-town residents that inhabited the cottages beyond. Didn't stop until she hit the sand and the only thing before her was Lake Michigan and the rapidly setting sun.

            She watched a pair of children laugh as they smacked each other with pool noodles, a parent buried in their phone nearby, then dropped to her knees. Her forehead sank into sand. An onlooker might have thought she was doing a yoga child’s pose. They would be wrong.

            The sounds of the children and waves drowned her weeping. She only gave herself a few moments to feel it before biting it off and heading back.

            Stephanie messaged again while she was out, asking if she wanted to try a Latin dance class. She messaged back, said thank you for the offer but I don't think I am going to have time, work has been brutal lately. 

            She walked back into the kitchen saw the uncooked chicken piccata, flared her nose, and stuffed it back into the refrigerator and grabbed a cold bottle of water, then went to take a shower.

The next morning when she went to step out of bed her knee gave way and she fell to the ground. At first, the fall confused her more than anything, but when she tried to find her feet again, she found she couldn't put any weight on it. She cursed, but managed to hobble her way into the kitchen where she took a handful of ibuprofen tablets from the large bottle she kept on the counter and ice for her knee. 

    She turned on the tv and waited for the drugs to kick in. A half hour later, she tried the knee again, but it refused. In the past when the knee flared up it just took a bit of negotiation to get it moving. This time, it set it's heels and no amount of argument would persuade it. 

            God, she had a thousand things to get done at work. The last thing she wanted to do was sit around all day. After an hour, she knew she had no choice. She called the clinic and told them she wouldn't be in today then called her doctor.

            "How many days a week are you running?" The physician's assistant asked. 

             "I run every day."

            "That is probably the problem, you are overdoing it. Your body needs rest."

            "I've been running every day for over a year."

            He swiveled his chair around to the computer, pushed some keys and said, "You've lost a lot of weight, over forty pounds."

            "Thank you for noticing." 

            "What I mean is that when you started to run you probably didn't run as far or train as hard as you are now. When you start to approach higher fitness levels you must be more mindful about making sure you get enough rest and water. “How have you been sleeping?"

            "Fine." she lied. Running was the only thing that kept her from tossing and turning.

            "We could do an MRI, but I don't think it's a tear, my guess is it could be a bursitis, that is where the gliding points of your muscles and tendons is a bit inflamed.”

            Alex wondered if she wasn't sitting in here with a physician's assistant instead of an actual physician if he would know, but only asked, "I just need to know when I can get back to running."

"I think for right now the best thing for you is rest. If after a couple of weeks the problem hasn't gone away then we can look at physical therapy or maybe an MRI. Could just be a muscle imbalance."

            "A couple of weeks?"

            "A couple of weeks at least. There is a medical rental company I can refer you to, and you could get a knee cart. Do you know if your insurance covers that?"

            Alex wadded the referral and tossed in into the passenger side floorboard. Again, she wanted to cry. She wanted to walk back into the office and scream at the whole lot of them. The only thing they cared about was getting their fucking copay.

            She drove to Walgreens where she purchased a knee brace. Back in the car she tore open the package and strapped on the device. She tried her feet again and grimaced with pain. It hadn't helped.

            The thought of sitting at home resting left her with only one option. She drove to the Cove and grabbed a fifth of bourbon. It would have to do for now.

            She choked back the first one before leaving the kitchen. Paired the second with ice and went to the tv. She couldn’t remember the last time she had it on. It remembered she was halfway through an episode of Friends. 

Joey was patting his belly and waiting for Thanksgiving dinner. She smiled and the familiar wave of lightness washed over her. Why had she given this option up? Six hours later, her head pounded, and she remembered why.

            Her head had pounded the same way that night. The night that had started this whole thing. She had met Stephane at the bar. Normally she stuck to whatever fruity concoction the bar had on special, but that guy had been cute, and she said she would have whatever he was having.

            He laughed at her when she tasted the scotch. 

            "You don't have to have it neat." He called over to the bartender and asked for a couple of cubes of ice.

            She didn't think ice was going to help. Whatever the hell was in this cup tasted like it had been spooned out of an Irish bog, but something about the way the laughed made her determined.

            "I can handle it."

            He was good. Asked her all the right questions and seemed interested in the answers. Then out of nowhere his hand was on her leg and it made her jump.

            "Sorry, I didn't mean to startle you."

            He smiled and tried to shake off the whole thing as a misunderstanding. They both knew he was making a move and normally she would've invited that sort of thing but there was something behind his eyes that she didn't like. 

            "Sorry, I'm sorry what did you say your name was again?"

            "James."

            "Right James." It was a name she would forever hate. "You see my friend and I really just came in here to visit. I'm not really into getting anything started just this moment. Thanks for the drink."

            She turned and his hand on her wrist stopped her. A ripple of fear ran up her arm and she froze.

            Stephanie stepped in by shoving the guy, "Excuse you fuck-o."

            He said, "Sorry, I just wanted to say it was a pleasure." That look was back behind the smile.

            "Feel free to pleasure yourself, dude."

            "I meant no offense."

            Alex didn't want to think about it anymore. The whole thing made her feel dirty. She stood up and the room spun. It appeared her tolerance had returned to human levels. She sunk back onto the couch. Netflix asked if she was still watching. The remote had fallen out of reach when she had tried to stand and didn't care enough to crawl over. "Fuck you," she shouted at the screen. "Just fucking play."

            Why had she accepted that drink? Why the hell else would he have bought it for her if not to get into her pants? Hadn't she touched him first? She couldn’t remember for sure, but she remembered smiling at him and laughing at his jokes. She had to have touched him. Had to have told him it was ok to touch her. Maybe he was a good guy. Why did it all feel like her fault?

            The tv turned off.

She closed her eyes and all she saw were his and the look he had given her right before Stephanie pushed him off her.

            Stephanie. This all started the moment Stephanie left. Stephanie. She started to cry. She wanted to reach out to her, but nothing felt the same. She had pushed her away. She wanted to call her the right after it happened, but her throat closed and refused to cooperate. The same thing happened later the next time they went out; the last time they went out. She thought about how upset it would make Stephanie and didn’t want to upset her.

This all started when Stephanie left. She needed her to come back She opened one eye and wiped dewy mucus from it and spotted her purse.

            She wormed her way toward it and fished out her phone. Stephanie answered on the second ring. Twenty minutes later she was at her door and in her arms. 

            "Alex it's ok." She said and wiped the snot from her nose.

            "Do you remember that James guy?"

            "James guy?"

            "Yeah, the guy that grabbed my arm and you pushed him off me?"

            "Yeah.”

"Well." She paused trying to gather her words. For a moment she thought Stephanie was going to scold her for talking to him, but she just continued to stroke her hair and tell her that it's ok. Eventually the tightness in her throat went away and she spoke.

She reminded her how they waited at least an hour after they thought he had left before leaving themselves. How, after they said goodnight to each other, she discovered they had been wrong. He had been waiting for her in the parking lot. Followed her to her car, covered her mouth and said how she owed him a drink.

            "You didn't owe him a thing."

            "He ripped my shirt, the one you helped me pick out."

            "It's not your fault Alex."

            "I froze. I should've-"

            "It's not your fault Alex."

            "But-"

            "But nothing, It's not your fault Alex. You didn't owe him anything."

            "I didn't stop him; I didn’t even call out."

            "It's not your fault Alex."

            Alex sobbed.

"Alex, I'm proud of you."

            "Proud?" She focused on her friend, "How on earth can you be proud?"

            "Because talking about it is the first step to healing, everything is going to be ok."