Breathe, Annie, Breathe Read online

  “Running does that for me too.”

  Liza chatters on about the case her law firm transferred her for. It’s a huge sexual harassment lawsuit filed by a bunch of women at a nationwide communications company.

  “I can’t discuss the case specifically,” she starts, “but let me tell you, Annie, I never thought I’d have to use the word penis so much.”

  She says it matter-of-factly, and it occurs to me that she wouldn’t be telling me about her job unless she thought I was mature enough to hear it. I smile.

  “Hello,” a voice says. I look over my shoulder to find Andrew, this tall, middle-aged guy on our team. Instead of wearing a fanny pack, like Liza, or a CamelBak, like me, he carries a thick, plastic water bottle in his hand. He falls into step beside us.

  “You’re gonna get in trouble with Matt for wearing those headphones,” I tease.

  “Why are all you ladies so into him? Matt says this, Matt says that,” Andrew jokes.

  “Um, have you seen him?” Liza asks.

  “He’s not my type,” Andrew says. “I’m into short, curly-haired brunettes.”

  God, is he hitting on her right in front of me? She raises her eyebrows at me, and I shrug. He’s okay looking, I guess, for somebody who could be my dad.

  Matt jogs up next to us. Andrew yanks his headphones out, hides them under his shirt, and Matt smirks and shakes his head.

  “Annie, let’s finish your run together,” Matt says. “We need to talk.”

  I gasp. Does he know I hooked up with Jeremiah last week? My body tenses.

  “You have to breathe while you’re running or you’ll pass out,” he says.

  I remember to breathe.

  “C’mon, Annie,” Matt says. “Let’s do some speed bursts. They’ll make you stronger.” He gestures for me to pass Liza and Andrew, and then he shoots off like a bottle rocket. “Let’s go!” he calls, and I sprint after him.

  He makes me run at full speed for thirty seconds. Goddamn it makes my legs burn. I’m panting when he lets me return to a jog.

  “Control your breathing,” he says.

  In through the nose, out through the mouth. Breathe. Breathe.

  “Good,” he says. “Now let’s jog for a bit and then we’ll do some more bursts.”

  I give him my I’m-totally-freaked-out face.

  “You can do this, Annie. I’m pushing you because I know you can do it.”

  After that speed-burst thing, the jogging is easier. But I can’t do another one of those bursts. It hurt!

  “Relax your arms and shoulders,” he says, shuffling beside me. “Let that stress go. It’s holding you back.”

  I roll my shoulders and shake out my arms.

  “So I wanted to talk to you—”

  And my arms and shoulders tense right back up.

  “This week, you need to do speed bursts every day when you run. And I want you to start adding more peanut butter and eggs to your diet. You’re getting too skinny and you need to eat more as we start doing longer and longer runs.”

  Is this what he wanted to talk about? Peanut butter and eggs?!

  “I can do that.”

  He gives me a smile. I’m guessing he doesn’t know.

  “Ready for another sprint?”

  I shake my head. He shakes his head back at me. “Let’s go, Annie. Pick it up.”

  I jet forward through the dogwood trees. Matt stays with me the entire sprint, urging me on. We do three more sets of bursts. They make my chest ache like crazy—my heart doesn’t like the repeated starts and stops. Somehow I make it to the finish line, and with sweat dripping down my face, I kneel to the ground.

  “C’mon, Annie,” Matt says gently. He helps me to my feet. “You did great. Seriously great.”

  I roll my shoulders and swallow. I glance around to see if Jeremiah’s here. He’s not.

  Matt squeezes my arm. “Relax. Let all that tension out.”

  Let go, I tell myself.

  Let go.

  •••

  I barely make it to the toilet before I throw up again.

  I had to stop two times on the way home to vomit by the side of the road. I kneel and clutch the toilet seat, breathing deeply. I get sick again. Then again. Why is my stomach so screwed up? Those sprints today made me feel worse than when I first tried to run around the track, when Coach Woods caught me running like a baboon. At least I took those ibuprofen. How bad would I feel if I hadn’t?

  The bathroom door creaks open to reveal Mom standing there with a towel. She squats next to me and pats my back as I get sick. The lactic acid built up under my skin makes me feel tingly, and not in the good way. If I can’t even run nine miles without feeling this awful, how in the world will I make it to twenty-six?

  “Did you finish your run?” she asks quietly, patting my face with the towel.

  “Yeah. Nine miles.”

  “Wow. He would’ve been proud of you.”

  “Mom, don’t. Not now.”

  I feel her tense up next to me, and we both look away. I hear her sniffle. I feel bad for snapping at her, I really do, but does she have to bring Kyle up now?

  “I can’t help it,” she says. “I just know he would’ve been amazed. Never talking about him isn’t healthy, sweetie. You need to let it out.”

  I lean against the toilet, resting my head on my arm.

  “I’ll call Stephanie,” Mom says quietly, brushing the hair out of my face. “I’ll tell her you won’t be at work tonight.”

  “No!” I blurt, and then I get sick again. I clutch the toilet and hate my stomach. Hate it. “I need the money.”

  “You can’t wait tables like this. People like it when their waitresses are healthy.”

  She’s right. If I show up at work all sweaty and red faced and getting sick every two minutes, Stephanie won’t let me wait tables anyway. But if I don’t go in, I’ll lose out on at least $75 in tips. This is my big moneymaker night!

  “Mom,” I cry. “I won’t be able to afford my training. I won’t be able to save money for college. I’ve only got like three hundred dollars right now.”

  She pulls me over into her arms and hugs me. “I know, baby. But you can’t go to work like this. I wish you didn’t put so much pressure on yourself…I wish I could pay for everything. You know I would if I could.”

  I know. I know.

  •••

  My alarm clock blares like a fire alarm.

  I reach over and slam the snooze button. 5:00 a.m. I got off work at midnight, and now I have to drive to Nashville to go run seven miles? Or as Matt and Jeremiah would call it, a rest day.

  The alarm goes off again. There’s no way I’ve snoozed for five minutes already! I groan into my pillow.

  The aftermath of last Saturday’s run, in which I got sick for four straight hours and missed work, was so spectacularly bad I haven’t run all week. I skipped my three short runs and didn’t ride my bike to cross-train like I was supposed to.

  If I run the seven miles this morning, will I get sick and have to call out of work again? I can’t risk missing work again this week…I won’t be able to pay for training, much less the gas to get to training. And what about supplies for college, like new sheets, towels, books, and stuff to cook with?

  My stomach hurt so bad last week…I don’t want to feel that pain again.

  When the alarm goes off for the third time, I reach over and turn it off, then burrow back under my sheets.

  The next time I wake up, it’s to my phone ringing. The clock says it’s 7:05 a.m. Matt’s name flashes on the screen. Shit. I should’ve called him.

  “Hello?” I say groggily, picking the sleep out of my eyes.

  “Where are you?” he asks in a rush. “Are you okay?”

  “Umm…I’m sorry, I fell back asleep.”

 
“Are you sick?”

  “No…”

  “Are you hurt?”

  “No.”

  “Then why aren’t you here? Everybody else is.”

  That makes me feel ashamed. “Look, I’m sorry. I woke up and wasn’t feeling up to the run.”

  “You should’ve called me.”

  I yawn into my hand. “You’re right. I will next time.”

  “There won’t be a next time if you don’t take training seriously, Annie.”

  “What?”

  “You don’t show up for my training sessions, I won’t train you. It’s simple as that.”

  “Why not? I mean, I’m paying for it.”

  A long silence. “Annie, you’re running on my team, under my name. Every single person I’ve trained who’s made it to the day of a race has finished. I’ve helped over two hundred people finish a race. If a client doesn’t take me seriously, I don’t train them. I want to keep my one hundred percent race-day success rate.”

  “I get it—”

  “Now do you want to tell me what’s wrong? If something’s wrong with the training, we can adjust. If you aren’t feeling good, we can adjust. But you have to talk to me, okay?”

  I pull a deep breath and clutch a pillow to my chest. “I’m scared about my stomach. It hurt so bad last week. I got so sick after doing those god-awful speed bursts with you. I threw up like eight times.”

  Another pause. “We’ll change up your diet then. Maybe try some toast and English muffins instead of cereal and oatmeal. Maybe we’ll stop giving you Gatorade. The sugar might be making you sick.”

  “No! I love my lemon Gatorade. I’ll give up the speed bursts.”

  He laughs. “Not a chance. Now, what are you doing tomorrow? You’ve got seven miles to make up.”

  •••

  Why can’t they just leave it be?

  “Do we really have to do this?” I ask.

  “It’s time,” Connor says quietly, looking at one of Kyle’s track trophies. How can Connor say that so matter-of-factly?

  I swallow as I scan the room. I’m kind of pissed at Kyle’s parents for wanting to box up his things. But then I remember how I boxed up the teddy bears and wind chimes he gave me, and I can’t imagine walking past this room every day either, so I kind of get how they feel. Probably the same way I do whenever I drive past the fire station.

  Kyle’s younger brother, Connor, who will be a junior at Hundred Oaks this fall, texted me a few days ago and invited me to come check out Kyle’s room, to decide if I want to keep anything.

  “I’ll be out in the living room if you need me,” Connor says. The door clicks shut.

  I haven’t been in Kyle’s room since September, since before he broke up with me. His alarm clock blinks a red 12:00 over and over. I pick up a worn Titans sweatshirt from the floor and bring it to my nose. His scent is gone. It smells like nothing. I fold the sweatshirt neatly and set it on his unmade bed.

  I wipe dust off the framed picture of us from junior prom. I set it on top of the sweatshirt, starting a pile. I pat his stuffed bear’s head. Kyle had Chuck since he was a baby, and now the bear lives on the bookshelf.

  For a while, I’d call Kyle’s cell phone just to hear his voicemail message. But then his parents shut it off. I look frantically around the room to see if there’s anything I should take in case his parents don’t recognize its value. If I had been his parents, I would’ve kept that cell phone plan forever.

  I find a red Nike headband he wore for track and slip it into my back pocket. If I make it to the marathon, maybe I’ll wear it during the race. Eighties style.

  I sit down on his bed and run my fingertips over his pillow. When I lift it to see if it still has Kyle Smell, I discover a small black velvet box. With shaking fingers I open it to find a gold ring with a small diamond. I gasp. The night at the drive-in when Kyle proposed, he didn’t hold a ring out to me. He only said, “Marry me.”

  The door creaks open and I look up to find Mrs. Crocker, decked out in her apron, the one spotted with a cherry print. Honestly, I’ve never seen her at home without an apron on—she’s always cooking something—but it doesn’t fit like it used to. It hangs around her loosely.

  “Annie, we’re ordering pizza. Do you want to join us for din—” She makes a noise when she sees what I’m holding. She brings her fingers to her mouth. “I’d wondered where he put it. That ring belonged to my grandmother.”

  “It’s beautiful.”

  “Look under the lid.”

  I carefully peel the silk lining back and fish out a delicate piece of onion paper. It’s so fine, I worry it might crumble in my hand like a Saltine. I slowly open the paper and discover a note dated 1946: “For Ellen, with all my love, Arthur.”

  “That’s great,” I say with a genuine smile, putting the note back where I found it.

  “I’m so happy you found the ring.”

  I hold the box out to her, and she takes it.

  “He would’ve wanted you to keep this,” she adds.

  I can’t. I wouldn’t take it when he was alive.

  She must sense my hesitation. “I’ll save it for Connor…maybe he’ll want to give it to a girl one day.”

  I clear my throat and nod. Mrs. Crocker opens her mouth again to say something, but she shuts it.

  Does she blame me?

  That’s when Mr. Crocker shows up, wearing a blue T-shirt that reads Williamson County Fire Department. He used to have a full head of blond hair, just like his sons, but now it’s thinned out.

  “Hi, Annie,” Mr. Crocker says. “Your mom told us you’re training to run the Country Music Marathon.”

  “To finish on Kyle’s behalf.” His mother chokes on her words.

  I nod slowly, picking at a hangnail, ripping the skin away.

  “How’s it going?” Mr. Crocker asks, smiling.

  I don’t have it in me to tell them I got sick as hell after a run, had to miss work, and nearly got dropped by my trainer. Not to mention I’m scared to death of this weekend’s eight-mile run. When Kyle was training, he rarely complained and never considered giving up. At least not that I know of.

  “I did seven miles last weekend,” I say softly. Barely. I had to walk a lot of it.

  “Need any pointers? I ran a half one time.”

  “Have any idea why my stomach hurts all the time?” Even though Matt changed my diet a little this week, I still feel pains.

  Mr. Crocker cocks his head to the side. “Never heard that one before.”

  “Did you want to join us for pizza?” Mrs. Crocker asks.

  “I would, but my training plan says I have to eat a grilled chicken salad today.”

  “I guess we’ll leave you to it, then,” Mrs. Crocker says, and then I’m alone again, with all his clothes and pictures and trophies, with his bed that hasn’t been warm in months, with only the sunlight streaming through the window to hug me.

  I curl my arms around his pillow. Make myself think about the three-mile run I’m doing tonight after the heat bleeds off. One foot after the other.

  Breathe, Annie, breathe.

  THE FOURTH CIRCLE OF HELL

  Not only does Matt train people to run races, he gives personal training sessions at the gym where he works on the side—or as I like to call it, the Fourth Circle of Hell. During my first session with him, I discovered muscles I didn’t know I had. I can’t imagine what tortures he has planned for today.

  I lean my head into Matt’s office at the gym and find him chewing and reading a magazine. He wraps his sandwich back in its baggie, stands up, and high-fives me. “Ready to work out?” he says through a mouthful.

  “Yeah.”

  He chews, studying my face. “You feeling okay? You’re all red. Did you hydrate enough?”

  “I drank five bottles of water today, l
ike you said to.”

  “Good.”

  I let out the deep breath I was holding and follow Matt over to the treadmill, where I hop on and jog to warm up.

  Ever since I fooled around with his brother a few weeks ago, I’ve been expecting Matt to drop some sort of hint that he knows, but it hasn’t happened. I mean, I didn’t think Matt would come right out and ask, “Whatever possessed you to hook up with my brother?!” But I expected some sort of reaction—a flash in his eyes or flushed cheeks. Either he has the best poker face of all time or Jeremiah kept his mouth shut.

  It’s three weeks later, and I haven’t even seen him at training. Maybe he decided to use trails where I specifically wouldn’t be? He still hasn’t called. He won’t, and that’s just fine.

  “Hey!” Matt says loudly over the sound of my feet pounding the treadmill. “Where are you?”

  “What?”

  “I’ve been trying to get your attention.”

  “Sorry, my mind’s all over the place today.”

  He increases the treadmill speed to six miles per hour. “Oh yeah? So’s mine. My big sister went into labor an hour ago.”

  “What?” I shout. “Why aren’t you at the hospital? Why are you here?”

  Matt grins. “It’s her first baby and considering my mom was in labor with all of us for, like, days, I don’t think the baby will be here anytime soon.”

  “So will this be your first niece or nephew?”

  “Yeah. It’s a boy,” he says proudly.

  I can’t help but smile at his giddiness. “Is your brother at the hospital with her?”

  He gives me a brief look, but then he’s all business again. “The whole family’s there. I’ll head over as soon as we’re finished.” He points at my face. “Don’t think you can get out of training.”

  “Darn.”

  Matt leads me through a series of lunges and squats and other horrible exercises that make my legs feel like they’ve been lit on fire.