Moonglass

Friday. You’ll take a break over the weekend, then our kickoff meet will be at the end of the first week of school. This morning we’ll be running Poles.” He pointed to the ridge behind him.
    Stifled groans rippled through the group. “You’ll go out together on the first mile, but once you get to the hill, I want to see what you can do. It’s your chance to make the first impression of the year. All of you.” His eyes flicked to me and Ashley, and I felt his challenge knot up in my stomach. Clearly, he (and the rest of them) thought we were a joke. I willed the knot down, like I always had, breathed deeply, and resolved to prove him wrong. He gulped his coffee.
    “Now get stretched out. You have five minutes.”
    Everyone backed into a large circle, and Jillian led us through a series of stretches that I did without focus as I eyed the hill that loomed above us. I had actually always liked hill runs, because you had to run up them hard and fast or else the hill beat you. Those were short, steep hill s. Poles was a monster of a hill, though. All the way up, no flats or switchbacks or anything. A pure guts run. I breathed deeply through my nose, then bent to touch the ground, stretching my hamstrings.
    “All right, that’s it.” Jillian stood and shook out her legs. “Let’s go.”
    I set my jaw. Ashley gave me a nudge and a confident nod. Coach Martin blew his whistle, and we were off. The pack started at a slow, casual jog, but nobody spoke. Except for Ashley, who was on my right.
    “So.” She took a breath as our feet pounded the dirt road. “Where did you move here from anyway?” I kept my eyes on Jillian, who was a few runners ahead of us. “Pismo Beach. North of here.”
    “Oh,” she breathed. The pace was picking up already. Nobody had said anything, but I could definitely feel it and it was obvious that Ashley could too. “Why?” It was all she could manage at this point.
    “Dad’s job.” I looked sideways at her. She was already leaning forward, hard. Lurching actually. I continued, comfortable with our cadence. “Lifeguard supervisor. Runs crystal Cove now. It’s why I was down there.”
    “Oh. And … what about … your mom? What … does … she do?”
    I coughed and picked up the pace, hoping to just leave the question behind. I didn’t want to explain it here, now, to someone I barely knew.
    Ashley was breathing heavily now and had started to slump her shoulders forward and tilt her chin up. I looked from her to Jillian, who looked as comfortable as I felt. We neared the base of the hill, and the incline increased with every foot strike. I felt my legs want to speed up into it.
    “So?” Ashley huffed.
    “So what?” I replied.
    “What about … your mom? What’s … she do?” When she looked over at me, I saw her carefully applied makeup beginning to melt.
    “She’s away a lot. Hey, you mind if I pick it up? I need some momentum for this hill.” Ashley looked relieved and immediately stopped running. “Yeah. I think I’m going to save my momentum for the top.” She fanned herself. “I’ll catch up.” She smiled. “In a few hours.”
    I nodded and accelerated, then felt the bite of the hill as it rose upward steeply. The majority of the group had done the same, and we all shifted into work mode. I looked at the peak of the hill, then put my head down and let my eyes follow the dirt trail. It wasn’t often that I ran somewhere other than the beach, with its familiar sound of the waves rolling into the shore. Here, on this hill, I could only hear the crunch of our shoes on dirt and my breathing, which had become hard and steady.
    My legs and chest burned, and I thought about why I had lied to Ashley. It was a normal enough question. It just happened to be that the answer was one that would inevitably lead to shock, then pity, and then awkward moments as she tried to figure out where to go from that point in the conversation. It was nobody’s fault. That’s just how it was. It was a relief to be able to brush it off and not go there. It dawned on me as another advantage of starting over. I didn’t need to have those moments if I didn’t want to. I could say whatever, and nobody would be the wiser. A surge of energy pushed me forward, and I approached Jillian, who had pulled ahead of the group.
    She heard my feet and looked over her shoulder. She dug in a little more, despite our hard uphill pace. I matched it. When we were shoulder to shoulder, I looked