Ghost (Track #1)(21)

The door closed behind me. I dropped the box and used my feet to slide it across the room over to the other boxes. Then I stopped and, for the first time, had a look around.

I can’t tell you that I remember anything about what the stockroom looked like when me and my mom hid in it. But I know we were in the corner, a corner where there was now a coatrack. I remember that me and Ma huddled right there, up against the wall, her holding me by the face, her hands covering my ears. Now when I think about it, I think she did that so that I wouldn’t hear her crying or breathing hard, even though I could feel her chest rising and falling at the exact same pace of my own thumping heart. But I don’t remember there being any boxes. I don’t remember the desk and file drawers, the clock on the wall or the five-dollar bill hanging in a frame. It all might’ve been there, but I just don’t remember seeing it. And looking at it then, gazing around the room, I didn’t really feel nothing. Like, no emotions. Until . . . I tried . . . to open . . . the door.

It wouldn’t budge.

I tried again.

The knob turned, but the door wouldn’t come loose. I knocked lightly, trying not to panic. But of course, Mr. Charles couldn’t hear me. He was probably deep into his cowboy flick. And he was on the other side of the store. And on top of all that, he was practically deaf. So I banged. Still nothing. Then I started trippin’. Like how when you at the swimming pool on the hottest day of summer, and you jump in and it’s cool, and then you take one step too far and suddenly you’re in the deep end, and things ain’t so cool no more. Because you can’t swim. That’s how I felt. Like I was drowning. Like I was filling up with water. Like this place, this weird little room that had saved my life, now felt like it was gonna take it.

I looked at that corner again, my mind boomeranging back to me and my mom crouching and crying, wondering if my dad would corner us. My heart began to hammer just like it did back then. The clock on the wall suddenly seemed to tick louder. I turned back around and beat on the door again. Tried to beat a hole through it. Balled my hand into a fist and pounded and pounded and pounded, yelling Mr. Charles’s name until at last, after what seemed like forever, I could hear him on the other side of the door.

“Castle! I’m here,” his voice came through, muffled. Mr. Charles yanked it a few times, each time letting out a weird grunt, until finally the door swung open. He stumbled back into the chip display, before finally catching his balance. I shot out of the room.

“Stupid thing gets stuck,” he tried explaining, but I couldn’t wait around to hear about it. One more minute and I would melt in the aisle between the chips and the sodas, so I grabbed my backpack and ran straight for the door.





6


WORLD RECORD FOR THE LONGEST RUN AFTER THE MOST RUNAWAYS IN A SINGLE DAY


I RAN NONSTOP to my next stop, which was the track. But not only because I was buggin’ about being trapped in a stockroom—that stockroom—and trust me, I was buggin’, but also because that creepy clock reminded me that I was also late for practice. I ran through the streets until I finally made it to the park, where everyone was already warming up.

“So nice of you to finally join us, Mr. Cranshaw,” Coach said as I threw my bag down. I wanted to tell him that I’d basically been trapped in a teleportation thingy that zapped me back to the scariest moment of my life, but I didn’t because I knew no one would believe me. So I just sat down on the bench, kicked my half shoes off—thankfully, everybody else was focused on stretching, and not on my feet—and rolled my pant legs up.

“Sorry, sorry,” I said, unzipping my bag, but Coach had already turned his attention back to the other runners. I looked to my left and right, then over my shoulder, then quickly scanned the other side of the track to make sure there were no extra guests dressed in undersized navy-blue uniforms with badges and handcuffs checking out practice. Once I knew the place was clear of cops, I pulled the silver shoes out and slipped them on my feet, lacing them up tight. Then I threw the beat-up sneakers in the bag and hit the track.

“So today is Thursday,” Coach said as I sat down to join in on the much . . . much-needed stretching. After spending the day with fire in my legs, stretching made so much more sense now. It took maybe two seconds for Patty to notice my shoes. She smiled and slapped Sunny on the arm to get his attention. Then he saw them and gave me a thumbs-up. So corny. I looked over at Lu. He was staring at them and fixed his mouth in the way people do when they’re thinking, Not bad. And that was good enough for me.

Coach continued, “And Mikey, tell ’em . . . uh . . .” Now Coach caught a glimpse of the diamonds on my feet and got stuck. He looked both surprised and confused. It was the same expression he had when I told him to call me Ghost. “Um . . .” He caught himself and continued, “Mikey, tell the newbies what we do on Thursdays.”

Mikey said in his usual grunty way, “Long run.”

“That’s right. Long run,” Coach said. “This is about conditioning. Not speed. And everybody has to do it.”

Let me tell you, when he said, “Long run,” there were a few things I hadn’t thought about. The first was that I hadn’t had lunch because of the whole running-out-of-school thing, and I was starving and wouldn’t be able to eat until after practice. And the second was just how much I needed food to give me energy, because what Coach meant by long run was run a million miles. Especially since I’d just run about a million miles. From the school to the store, and the store to the track. Then a crazy thought hit me—was he punishing me for stealing even though he didn’t even know? Or did he? Nah, he didn’t. He couldn’t . . . he didn’t. This was just a coincidence. A bad, bad coincidence.