The Shoes of Baltimore (NaNoWriMo Day 2)

Thanks for checking out Day 2.

If you want to see the premise behind my NaNoWriMo project, click here.

If you want to see Day 1, click here.

The race was to support the local high school athletic department. You paid a $10 donation to run, and they sold drinks and snacks at the race.

There wasn’t an official prize for the winner other than bragging rights.

The race was a 5k (3.1 miles).

The soccer team ran 2.5 miles at the end of every practice for the week. Charlie never felt super tired after this portion of the practice, so he felt confident he could finish the race.

Over the next two weeks, he was consumed with winning the race. He read articles on running techniques. He watched videos of races. He even used the majority of his money from cutting hi neighbor’s grass and walking pets to buy a new pair of shoes for the race.

Julie was worried Charlie was in a funk because every day when he came home from school, he just locked himself in his room.

He only emerged for dinner.

Julie normally gave Charlie his space. He didn’t have a ton of friends, but the ones who did were nice kids. They weren’t trouble makers. They would spend time going to movies, watching sports, and juts hanging out. He had never given her a reason to worry that he was in to drugs or alcohol.

But she knew something was up with him. She wanted to get to the bottom of it just incase anything was going on…

“So, what’s new?”

“Nothing really,” Charlie said as he shoveled a fork full of chicken into his mouth.

Recently, Charlie had asked Julie to make mostly chicken and rice for dinner. She didn’t know why he had an interest in chicken and rice all of a sudden. They normally ate healthy, and Charlie was slowly growing into a strong frame with broad shoulders. And because he ran so much for soccer, he didn’t have any of the baby fat some of the other kids his age still had hanging around their midsection.

But she obliged without asking.

Now, though, she wanted to find out what was going on. The locking himself in his room and the specific meal requests meant that something was going on.

“I noticed you’ve been going into your room a lot right after school. Is there anything particular you’re working on? Do you have a big school project?”

Charlie originally didn’t want to tell his mom that he was going to run in a race. She had always stressed that everything he does has to be for a purpose. The purpose of playing sports was to get exercise and stay healthy. And hopefully, he would find something he was good enough at to get a scholarship for a full ride to college. She told him she didn’t want him to make a career in sports after college, though, because his body would fail him quicker than his mind would fail him.

So he didn’t know how she would take the news. The only point of this was to beat Kevin.

But Charlie decided to just blurt out what he was doing.

“I’ve been preparing for a race.”

Julie was puzzled. That’s weird she thought. When did he start wanting to race?

“Oh,” she said. “What is the race for?”

“It’s to support the athletic department at the high school. I pay $10 to enter the race.”

Charlie was surprised that his mother looked happy.

“That’s great!”

“Really?”

“Yes,” Julie said. “With soccer being over, it’s good that you found something else to do. I know you haven’t decided on what sports you want to try out for yet, but this is a great way to stay in shape. You’ll also get to meet some other kids who are in to sports. Maybe you guy can get a pickup game of soccer going throughout the summer until tryouts start.”

Charlie felt a sense of relief that his mom wasn’t disappointed or thought he was wasting his time.

“Plus, you get to scope out the competition.”

She winked at him.

Charlie grinned.

“Do you have everything you need? When is the race?”

“It’s actually this Sunday,” Charlie replied.

“Okay. Well, if there’s anything you need or anything you need help with, just let me know. I would love to see you race! But, you know I have to work a double this Sunday.”

Charlie nodded. He was accustomed to his mom missing some of his games because she worked so much. But he gave her credit for making it to as many as the games as she did.

On the day of the race, Julie was able to drop him off.

She wanted to give him a kiss on the cheek before he got out of the car, but she didn’t want to embarrass him.

Charlie lingered in the car, though, a little longer than Julie had expected.

She could see him moving the tops of his shoes up and down. He always wiggled his feet when he was nervous.

“Did I tell you I heard one of the most craziest stories yesterday?”

Julie wanted to distract Charlie from thinking about the race.

Charlie looked at her and shook his head. “No. You didn’t tell me.”

“Okay,” Julie said. “What do you know about polar bears?”

Charlie starred at his mom, confused by the question.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, what do you know about polar bears?”

“Well, in school we learned that they live mostly in the Article Circle.”

Julie was impressed.

“That’s good! But think a little more basic.”

Charlie placed a finger on his lip and tapped it back and forth.

“Basic? Like, they are big?”

Julie smiled and nodded. She could tell that she had successfully distracted him from thinking about the race.

“Stick to that train of though,” she said.

Charlie tapped his finger on his lips a few more times.

“I dunno. The’re white?”

Julie gave him a thumbs up.

“Bingo.”

“So what does that have to do with the story you heard?”

“Okay so think about the polar bears being all white,” Julie said. “But what isn’t white on them?”

“Their noses,” Charlie said quickly.

Julie noticed Charlie had stopped tapping his toes.

“Right! Their noses are black. Okay. So apparently, some polar bears, when they wait above small holes in the ice to catch fish, they cover their noses with one of their paws. They want to completely blend in with the snow.”

Charlie took that in.

“That make sense,” he said. “It’s so the fish don’t notice them. They might be able to get one fish, but eventually, the other fish that didn’t get caught would learn to avoid the areas where they saw something black sticking out. So that makes sense. What is so crazy about that.”

“Think about it,” Julie said.

Charlie replayed the information over again in his mind.

“So they go to hunt for the fish, cover their noses to blend in with all the snow and ice, and then they are able to catch the fish.”

Charlie thought about it some more, but he didn’t get what made the story so crazy.

He looked at Julie and shrugged his shoulders.

“Okay. This is what is crazy about that. So the polar bears cover their noses because they are black. Right?

Charlie nodded.

“But, Charlie, how do the polar bears know their noses are black?”

Charlie’s jaw dropped.

“How do they know!?”

Julie shrugged his shoulders like he had at her.

“I don’t know, but isn’t that crazy?”

“Wow,” Charlie said smiling. “That is crazy!”

Julie put her hand on his shoulder.

“You ready now?”

“Yea,” Charlie said. His nervousness seemed to have completely disappear. “I’m ready.”

She gave him a hug.

“Good luck kiddo. I’m sorry I can’t stay and watch or pick you up when it’s over. I know it’s only a mile between here and the house, but rest up a little but after the race. Okay? Don’t walk back home right away. Here’s some money to grab some food after the race.”

Charlie took the $5 and put it in his shoe.

“Thanks mom.”

Charlie got out and walked over to the registration table. He filled out all the information and got a number.

He asked one of the volunteers if she know how many people were in his age bracket.

“About 50,” she said.

Geez, Charlie said to himself. Maybe this is going to be tougher than I thought.

He saw Kevin. Kevin walked over, holding out his hand.

“What’s up dude? I didn’t even know you ran.”

“Yea,” Charlie said. “Just thought it’d be a good way to stay in shape, you know?”

“Yea” Kevin said. “This one is going to be pretty tough. There’s a lot of people out here trying to impress the high school coaches. My dad tells me this is one of the best ways to make a good first impression. Gives you an advantage since they know who you are and see what you can do before you try out.”

“That makes sense,” Charlie said.

“Don’t feel bad if you don’t place. I think they give like 10 ribbons out for some reason. But there are 50 people here, so it’s going to be tough. I didn’t place anywhere near the top 10 in my first race. I pretty much can finish in the top in all of the now. But it might take you some time. Best of luck dude.”

Kevin held out his hand, and Charlie begrudgingly shook it.

Charlie didn’t like that Kevin told him not to feel bad if he didn’t place.

He also didn’t like that Kevin compared himself to Charlie.

Anyone under the age of 13 had to walk the course with a parent, so this was the first age group that actually ran.

Some of the kids were joking around with each other. Other kids had their headphones in.

Charlie just stood at the starting line, looking ahead.

After a few more minutes of standing around, the organizers were ready to begin the race.