Harlan's Race

to work. I was going to outkick Them.
    Quietly, Jacques and I went to the RRCA table, where Eileen was in charge of the entry sheets. She looked like she’d cooled out.
    “Hi, guys,” she smiled, giving us our numbers. “Good luck.”
    I was boiling with energy, in good shape from a summer of running on sand and working on the water.
    The 5-K was the final event of the afternoon. At the start, 231 motley runners, women and men of all ages, crowded tensely onto the road, behind the white starting-line. Jacques and I were seeded in the front.
    My eyes followed the curve of the road ahead. The five-kilometer course followed a paved service road along an uphill loop through our 500 acres of campus woods. It was the last weekend of deer season, and the woods were a magnet for hunters. The drunks and trigger-happy among them had always made stray bullets a hazard. Campus security had already found several dead and dying deer out there. Today people would be gunning avidly for the deer they hadn’t got yet. So campus guards were posted along the course, to keep irresponsible shooters off our necks.
    I felt a brief pang, wishing Vince were running with
    us.
    “Runners ... get set,” called Mike Stella.
    At the starting gun, we sprang forward.
    It felt so good.
    Running easily together, Jacques and I sat back and let Gary South and the early leaders forge ahead. My young bird moved with the powerful, churning stride so familiar to me.
    Biding our time, we stayed in the front of the pack. I moved with the press of bodies, trading nudges of elbows. I loved this rough play. The colorful stream of runners poured into the tree-lined tunnel of woods. Humid smells of leaves filled our lungs. Shadows of tree trunks slipped across us. Falling leaves brushed us. Far off in the neighboring property, came the single echoing shot of somebody’s .3030. Here and there, silent guards watched us pass.
    Jacques glanced at his stopwatch, tracking our time.
    The field was stringing out now. Jacques and I kept a light contact with the leaders, staying in the front of the pack.
    At kilometer 3, the six leaders were starting a drive. So Jacques and I picked up our pace, starting to haul them down. We were at the top of the grade now, in the deepest woods. The road ran along the foot of a ridge — it was in bad condition, very potholed, and I made a quick note to talk to Joe about asphalting it. From nearer, somewhere on campus property, came another shot. I noticed the nearest campus guard start off in pursuit of the trespasser.
    About 50 seconds later, I heard a strange phhhhht, and a slap. It sounded like a hand smacking against flesh. A lot of confused echoes were rolling away. Jacques uttered a sharp barking cry, and stumbled.
    For a moment, I thought he’d stepped in a pot-hole, and twisted an ankle.
    But Jacques was clutching his left shoulder. His face was going pale with pain. Red liquid was springing out between his fingers. At first my brain simply refused to recognize that it was blood, but I did see the need for race safety. As I grabbed him, and swerved us to the side, the next two runners almost collided with us and fell. Then they got their balance, and kept running.
    “Jeez,” one of them yelled angrily at us.
    Jacques stood on the side of the road, groaning with pain. The whole left side of his jersey was soaking red now. Then slowly, with great dignity, he sat down on the gravel shoulder and hung his head in shock. I kneeled by him, and pulled his red slippery fingers away to see an inch-wide hole in his shoulder just below his collarbone, that was spilling dark red. A hiss of violent emotion rushed into the vacuum in my mind. In that moment, I knew.
    A campus guard was at our side.
    “I think he’s been shot,” I said.
    “Fucking hunters,” the guard said violently, grabbing his walkie.
    But I knew it wasn’t hunters. It was Billy, all over again. It was Montreal. It wasn’t ever going to end. Speeding lead had dropped a second young bird of mine. My runner, my kid, my student, who was supposed to be safe with me — so young, warm plumage, bright eyes eager for life. In that moment, I felt as close to insane as I ever did in my life. I wanted to kill, to tear my enemies limb from limb, to shout and rave and accuse, to haul down the whole dry-rotted structure of hate around my own ears and die underneath it — sacrifice my life to end the he, like Samson.
    “Harlan,” Jacques whispered shakily, “what