On the Run

The day I was followed was like any other Thanksgiving Day – until it wasn’t. As was my ritual, I was out for a run. I never did the local turkey trot. I don’t run to make friends. I run for the quiet. For the meditative act of deep breaths. In through the nose, out through the mouth. For the puff of air in front of my face, like a personal storm, pent-up emotions melted to mist. For the crunch of leaves beneath the rubber soles of my sneakers. The bite of winter’s first frost on the tip of my nose. The dampness that gathers beneath my shirt, the wet sweat at my hairline. The steady heat from my heartbeat glowing in my chest. I never felt as alive as I did when I was on a trail, with pine trees around me like tall green sentinels and light slanting through branches as if the sun itself was sentient.

When I left that morning, my husband said, “I really wish you wouldn’t run on Broken Rock Trail. You know how I feel about that place.”

“That was a year ago,” I replied, sighing as I pulled my ponytail through the back of my baseball cap. “Nothing has happened since. Relax.”

“They never caught the guy,” my husband reminded me, leaning against the kitchen counter in his boxer shorts, a steaming cup of coffee in his right hand.

“No one ever proved there was a guy. Maybe it wasn’t a kidnapping.” I bent down to tie my shoes. A new pair, with fresh soles. They felt bouncy, ready to break in. “Perhaps she decided to disappear because her husband was driving her nuts.”

“The family said that she ran that trail every day. Why on earth would she suddenly get lost?” 

“You’re overthinking it. Broken Rock has the best running trails in the area. I’m not staying home because there might be a lunatic,” I said, kissing him on the cheek. He smelled like toothpaste with a hint of spice, which I knew was the faint scent of his cologne left over from our date night. He put a muscled arm around my shoulders, pulled me into his chest. For a moment, I wanted to stay there. I could break in my new shoes another day and instead tumble back in bed, fall asleep after loving him, wake up with enough time to shower and fix my hair and pack the cooler with the pumpkin pies.

“I love you,” he whispered. “And I love how strong you are. I know you can take care of yourself. But call me when you’re done, okay?”

“You can always track me on Find my iPhone,” I point out. “If you’re that worried for no reason.”

He smiled, kissed my forehead, pushed me away gently. “Have a good run, baby. I’ll be here when you get back.”

***

I had planned on an hour of running, which was enough time to take me to Broken Rock, where I could pause, take a sip of water, and look at the view. For a while, I was completely alone, no one in the forest but chipmunks and sparrows and a single deer watching me with wide, black eyes from a copse of trees.

I was surprised by another runner coming towards me on the trail, moving at a pace much faster than mine. He was tall and very lean, wearing a pair of polarized glasses, loose neon yellow shorts, and a gray quarter-zip jacket. He dipped his bald head, giving me the runner’s nod when he passed, recognition of a kindred spirit, a bolster of, “Hey, good job, we’re both out here doing a hard thing”. At least, that is what the runner’s nod usually means. It was hard to read him because of his big sunglasses, which I found odd. The morning was dappled and gray, and the sun was coming out only sparingly, teasing us. Not a day for running in sunglasses. To each their own, I guess, I thought, and pressed on, but there was a niggle in my mind. An unsettling. A change in the mood of the wood, like the man had shifted a piece of the peace. Even the wind paused, and maybe that was God, silencing the space so I could hear.

But I didn’t need to hear the man’s footfalls to know he was following me. A woman doesn’t need to see danger to feel it. I wonder, sometimes, if we are born with this ability, or if the world builds it into us. Do our mothers teach us that we must be vigilant, or do we come out knowing that? Do we automatically understand that instinct can save us, but only if we are strong enough to listen to it? Fear taps like a finger on our backs, and it is only when you become a woman that you understand it is not to be shirked from. Look fear in the face, and she will help you.

I turned around and saw the flash of neon yellow and the bright rainbow lenses of the polarized glasses. He was behind me, but not close, and that didn’t make any sense. My pace per mile was 11 minutes, 28 seconds. This man – this tall, lean man with light feet and sinewy legs – had been running much faster just minutes ago and going in the direction of the parking lot. Now, he was going in the direction of me, controlled and slow. Strategic. A hunter if I had ever seen one.

Not safe not safe not safe. The words flooded my mind like a gush of water, a gush of panic that went cold and then hot, my body kicking on the adrenaline like it knew I needed gas. Deep breaths, in through the nose, out through the mouth. I must not look afraid. Predators like easy prey.

I dared to take another glance back. He was keeping his distance, still. He wasn’t ready to pounce. Not yet. We were likely too close to the trailhead, or not near enough to where he wanted me.

I would never be able to outrun this man. God gave women bodies capable of miracles, but speed is not one of them, not when matched with the biology of a male. So, if we cannot be faster, we must be smarter. Stronger of mind. 

I love how strong you are. My husband was waiting for me. I remembered this, and something clicked inside. I would not die in these woods. I would not let this man take me, as he probably did to the woman a year ago, the woman I did not want to believe went missing. How absurd of me to think she ever got lost. Women don’t lose themselves. Men take us.

In through the nose, out through the mouth.

He was getting closer.

***

I slid my phone from my pocket to make the call to Emergency Services. But terror bloomed in my chest as I looked at the black screen and realized my error, my possibly fatal error. Last night, when I fell asleep – I was tired and forgot to plug it in, my husband’s pet peeve. I had noticed the low battery in the car, but because I wasn’t running with music, and I knew this trail by heart, it didn’t matter. The phone was only there just in case.

You idiot, my brain tells me, but I shout back, Not now. There will be time for self-deprecation later, if we survive this. Right now, you need to think. Think.

I was now at the bottom of the small, steep incline leading to Broken Rock. If I could just get up there before him – even by seconds – I would have the advantage. It was an uneven and rocky climb, but I knew I could do it quickly if I pushed myself. If I called on that thing we call Grit, the deep and powerful strength that lies dormant until we are faced with a challenge that requires us to reach down inside ourselves with a claw and scrape at the edges of our limits.

He was now close enough so I could hear his steps and breaths. Still running slower than he could, because I was apparently not worth the energy.

Good. Let him think me slow and weak. I wouldn’t be surprised if Broken Rock was the place he planned to break me.

I waited until I was halfway up the incline to make my move, to give him the least amount of time to outpace me. A look back told me that he was near the bottom, just starting the climb. I took my chance and sprinted, which I knew meant he would sprint, too – prey runs when it is afraid. My lungs burned and every tendon in my legs screamed as I ran, dodging slippery leaves and thick roots and hidden stones. But I knew where all the holes were, so I made it without tripping, and then I made a sharp left to conceal myself behind the bush at the top of the trail, where the path turned into nothing but a smooth boulder. I did not have time to catch my breath, only time to reach down for a rock. 

The man emerged from the trees a second later, a disturbing sense of urgency emanating from him. There was a small, expectant smile on his lips as he scanned the boulder, looking for me. My guts twisted as I realized how right my instinct was.

I slammed the rock against the side of his head just as he found me. The force knocked him to the ground, and I hit him again for good measure, blood pooling along his skull and dripping into his ear. His glasses fell and their perfect, clean lenses cracked.

He moaned and moved. Not dead.

And neither was I.

I didn’t think about the possibility of him standing up as I sprinted back down the hill. I ran as fast as I could to the parking lot, my muscles crying out and my breath short, my body more tired, I think, from the fear than from the run. The adrenaline kept me going until I got to the parking lot.

My car was still in its spot, next to a blue Toyota Prius. The rest of the lot was empty, so I took a pen from my glove compartment and scribbled the license plate number on the back of an old receipt.

I turned my car on and drove home with shaking hands. It was there that I collapsed on the kitchen floor, causing my husband to drop his breakfast plate. The white ceramic shattered, the shards mixing with remnants of runny bright eggs and golden hash browns and thick ketchup so red that I vomited. He bent down and cradled me. What happened what happened what happened?

“Call the police,” I gasped through tears. “You were right, baby. Call them and send them to Broken Rock.”

***

They found the blood but not the man. At least, not that day. They tracked the license plate to an owner, and then the owner to an address, and when they visited the house, a man with a bandage across the left side of his head answered the door. He said he fell in the shower.

They showed me his picture, and when I confirmed it was him, they got a warrant and searched the property. I wish it had all happened faster because locked in the guest room they found her. Alyssa Evans, age 26, missing for one year. Alive.

In the spring, she wrote me a letter. Asked to meet for coffee. In person, she looked better than the photos the media had used, which had shown a pale, fragile, bony woman with sunken gray eyes and thin hair pulled into a ponytail. Her face had filled out, there was color in her cheeks, and her blonde hair was bright again. It had looked white in the news.

“I admit that I don’t really know what to say,” she said when I sat down across from her. She pushed a latte towards me, plus a blueberry muffin, a chocolate croissant, and a sausage egg sandwich. “I didn’t know what you like, so I just… I bought everything. I know that breakfast food is not enough, but I don’t know how else to say thank you.” She smiled softly, sweetly, and I saw the open, young girl she was before Broken Rock. Saw that her eyes were blue, not gray. “Food is my love language,” she added.

“Mine, too,” I said and accepted it all.

We ate in silence for a few moments. I had decided to let her talk when she was ready. I certainly didn’t know what to say. I’ve had nightmares every night since Thanksgiving didn’t seem helpful or appropriate. I use drugs to sleep because when I close my eyes I see his face seemed even worse.

When she finished her muffin, she looked out the window. “I haven’t gone running since he took me,” she whispered.

“Neither have I.”

We met eyes, and I reached my hand across the table to cover hers.

“Run with me?” she whispered, her face pleading and grieving, and I understood the desperation, because without running I am a shell, too. 

We met the next day at the trailhead. We took the first step together. We ran slow and steady and strong until we stood on Broken Rock.

In through the nose, out through the mouth.