Reunion
[Saturday. Before noon.]
Sam ran straight into the wind, pushing the viscous air out of the way like she had pushed through every obstacle. The difficulty was the purpose. As long as she kept moving, she didn’t need to think why. Why was she in this race? She didn’t care about winning. Why was she back in this city? Why... with her?
Too many thoughts. She needed to go faster.
Pulse way too high. This wasn’t how you did long distance running. This was how you did a factory reset. Not that it would help her. It never helped before, not for long. Emptiness, endorphins, euphoria, tiredness, sleep. Back into her life. Back into her mind. It wasn’t deep enough.
How many miles left? There were signs along the road, but she couldn’t read them anymore. Field of view was too narrow, too dark. How long could she keep it up? Like playing chicken with her own body. She’d never lost before, but there’s always a first time.
Didn’t matter. Ambulances were here for a reason. Just another way to reset.
Too many thoughts. Up a notch.
Shoes hitting the pavement like she wanted to break the slabs, their bounce jolting back up and hammering her knees. Unnatural, but the city gave her no choice. The legs would hold.
Lungs, though, those were on fire. The weakest link.
Head up, chest forward. Manual override. Inhale. Step. Step. Step. Exhale. Step. Step. Just hard enough to fill the remaining headspace.
Void.
Blood in her ears, almost louder than the wind. Pulse, almost louder than the pounding of her feet. Counting. Breathing.
Void.
There were cheers hidden in the wind noise, louder and louder. Who were they cheering for? There were none of those colorful, moving obstacles in front of her anymore. She passed all of them; they demanded too much attention. The empty road let her fully submerge. Disappear.
Void.
The sight of something yellow in front snapped her out. Was that it, already? The disappointment stopped at her neck; everything below was running on fumes. One missed breath triggered a cascade. Lungs panicking, fighting, losing against oxygen debt. Legs breaking rhythm, no longer pounding, but flailing ahead, trying to stop her from falling on her face.
She broke the line a second before everything gave out.
To her surprise, she hadn’t fallen over. Cheerful, screaming strangers swirled around her, drumming a broken pattern of congratulatory pats on her back as she stood there, panting, leaning forward, hands on knees, the painful clarity of hyperventilation trying to lift her like a lead balloon.
A deadstick landing. A fucking hoverslam. Had the race been any longer, she’d be unconscious. The deafening applause was well-earned, though they couldn’t have had a clue what she was trying to achieve. No sane person would understand.
Her eyes drifted in and out of focus, trying to lock on something familiar. Like that blond mane, bobbing, squeezing herself through the crowd. Or that mocking, crooked smile—always on, be it praise, fight, or apology. Those crow’s feet weren’t there before, but at least the smile in Cassie’s eyes was bright and honest.
Cassie pressed her forehead against Sam’s, taking advantage of their rare eye-level moment, and muttered, making sure the crowd wouldn’t hear her, “Congratulations, you fucking junkie. Got what you need? Then let’s grab that tin badge and go home. I’m getting tired.”
No sane person... So maybe that’s why Sam told her she was coming.
Should she hug her? Sam hadn’t even touched her hand since the airport. A year had passed, and she still felt uneasy.
But that’s what factory resets were for.
“Careful, gazelle, you’ll crush me,” Cassie’s muffled voice purred into her chest.
*****
Endorphins were long gone, and so was the clarity. Sam had finally slept well—nodding off in the Uber already—but when she woke up in a strange apartment, she was once again... normal. A list of things to do was already forming in her head, plans sorting themselves by importance and urgency, against a background buzz in which all emotions disappeared. Everything was back in place. That will work. For now.
Her body had paid the price, but it was business as usual. It never protested for long. Only her legs still ached, a dull, familiar soreness. She adjusted the showerhead to a focused stream and worked the stiffness from her thighs, chasing out the knots with firm pressure. The heat helped, loosening the tightness bit by bit, until the ache dulled to something manageable.
Sam got out, gently drying her hair with a towel—white, featureless, identical to all the others on the rack. So the Disney princess collection had finally given up the ghost. She wiped a clear patch in the bathroom mirror. They always took a beating during those runs, she thought, assessing the damage the salt had done to the long, dark strands. One day, she might have to choose between them and running, and she wasn’t sure what she would do. Keeping them long wasn’t her idea, but it was a good one. They softened her face. When they were wet and slicked back, she looked... a little off. Sharp. Triangular. Too much forehead, too narrow a jaw. All the jaggedness inside, finding its way to the surface, pushing on the skin.
A couple of hours of sleep had reduced the shadows under her eyes; she looked more rested than she had in weeks. She was leaner than she remembered; under the faint outline of ribs, her stomach showed the first hint of a budding six-pack. It would look cool if she’d actually been trying for one. Less gym, more food, she thought. She shifted, and the outline of muscles faded with changing shadows. It’s just me. I’m fine. Only tired.
Cassie was making noises in the living room. Sam hesitated. She had no plan for that meeting, beyond an awkwardly polite chat about their careers.
But maybe she didn’t need a plan. Maybe that was the point—to forget about everything and let herself get dragged along, like in the old days.
Sam wrapped a towel around herself and headed into the living room. It was much bigger and nicer than their old apartment, though the Cassie she remembered wouldn’t have made it look like an IKEA showroom. The air was clean and filtered—no sandalwood candle, the one Cassie used to light the moment she got home. No posters either. No stack of fashion magazines on the coffee table. The kitchen counter was clean and empty, apart from two covered plates. It was more like an Airbnb than her friend’s cozy nest. Getting all grown up and professional now? Better late than never.
Cassie was sitting on the couch in the old purple bathrobe — the replacement Sam had bought her after the bleach incident, the one Cassie had sworn she hated. Apparently, it had outlasted everything else. She was playing some video game Sam didn’t recognize. She glanced up at Sam, then the clock, and nodded with approval. “I knew you wouldn’t miss a party.”
Sam sighed. Exactly what she’d expected. She already had no clue what was going on. “What party?”
“The one I told you ’bout in the Uber?”
Sam gave her a blank look.
Cassie rolled her eyes. “Ok. Again. While you were running, and I was getting bored out of my mind, I met some guys. They told me about a new club. A secret club. With a secret password and a secret entrance in some forsaken back alley. Probably smells like cat piss. You know, all the signs of a good time—”
“Sure, sounds like the kind of good time we had when you dragged us to that weird bondage workshop thing—” Sam stopped. Not her favorite memory, and yet it had a habit of resurfacing.
“Oh, come on. It was fun.”
“So fuckin’ fun; had to cover up the rope marks for an entire week while my parents were in town. In June. At 90 degrees.”
Cassie looked away and shook her head. “Damn, roomie. We spent five years together through thick and thin, then you fucked off to God knows where for a whole year. Now you’re back for one weekend, spend half a day literally running in circles around the city, while I stand there like a moron, and all I get is a list of old grievances?”
That was a manipulation; Sam recognized that now... but it was also true. She said, “Sorry. Let me try again. So... I really appreciate you were there for me. Thank you.”
She realized she was still standing in the middle of the room, like a student called to the front of the class. But she didn’t want to sit beside Cassie, not yet. The kitchen island had barstools. She turned one around and perched on it.
Cassie tracked her movements, gaze flicking to Sam’s thigh where the towel parted before locking eyes with her again. A quick frown crossed her face, recognition of the distance, but in a beat she was back herself.
“No problem. It wasn’t that boring—you looked... alive. I liked that. Plus, I had fun betting on whether you’d faceplant before the finish line. And hey, you even got a medal — it must be worth something... unless the whole crowd was just really fucking dumb for showing up. ”
“Not much. It’s just a minor race... Still, I’m too tired for partying.”
“Like hell you are. Remember when we partied for two days straight, then took the biochem midterms and fucking passed? And then you went hiking—sorry, barefoot trail running—with that dumbass Steve? Sure, we were younger, but you only got tougher.”
Dumbass Steve never liked Cassie either. But it was all chicks before dicks back then.
“Ok... It’s just... that’s not what I came here for...” Sam trailed off. She wasn’t even sure about that.
“Well, if you wanted your head checked, you shouldn’t have booked a proctologist. You know me. You know what I do. And I know what you need. I always knew—”
Sam shot her a sideways glance, and Cassie’s grin faltered.
“Really?” Sam asked.
Cassie clicked her tongue, looking away. “Okay, scratch that. I often knew.” Yet she didn’t let herself get distracted for long. “But I definitely know what you need right now.” She got up and walked around the kitchen island, towards the part of the countertop where the plates lay.
“I haven’t even brought anything nice to wear,” Sam kept protesting, tracing her friend’s moves with slight suspicion. If she let Cassie win too easily, she’d double down, and God only knew how this weekend would end. Secret party already sounded bad enough—about as attractive as a plunge into an ice hole, given where her head was at.
But plunging into an ice hole wasn’t any dumber than what she did during the morning’s race.
“That’s how you roll now? Sportswear everywhere? After all I taught you?” Cassie shook her head dramatically, raising the cover on the plate. Some sandwich? Oh. Not just ‘some’. Bahn mi from Sam’s old favorite place, back on the other side of town.
“No worries, I got you covered,” Cassie said. “Here. Eat, and I’ll show you what I put together while you were asleep.”
“Asleep?” Sam shook her head. “Try unconscious. How’d I even get here?”
“The Uber guy carried you in. I let him feel you up in exchange,” Cassie said, sliding the plate towards Sam.
“That’s not fucking funny.”
Cassie sighed. “Fine. You walked in by yourself. Don’t remember that either?”
“No,” Sam started off harshly, then slumped. “...I don’t.”
She sighed and answered the question that was hanging between them. “I’ve been having trouble sleeping. Sometimes, when I finally crash, I forget what happened before. Or I wake up remembering nightmares like they were real.”
That was already too much information. Sam didn’t come here to complain. She wasn’t even sure what to complain about, exactly; her life was going according to plan. Whatever was wrong with it, she couldn’t quite put it into words.
“Nightmares? Fire?” Cassie asked quietly. Sam nodded with her mouth full. Yeah, Cassie remembered. Though she didn’t understand, because Sam didn’t either. “Did it start after your mom...?”
“Much earlier.” Sam waved, brushing it off. “That’s why I got back into running. I need to wear myself out first to get some rest.”
“Oh. I wasn’t aware of all that.” Because you never told me hung in there, unsaid. Cassie tilted her head. “So, this career of yours must be going great if that’s what got you this messed up.”
The sarcasm was there, but her face was serious. After some hesitation, Cassie said, “Hey, we don’t really need to do anything. I have beer in the fridge. We can order pizza and spend the night talking about old times.” Then, with a smirk, she added, “Well, maybe you could do the towel-drop thing and get us some free pizza. I can’t do it anymore—all the local delivery guys just look at my tits and shrug.”
This sounded safe, maybe even boring, apart from the towel drop thing, which was probably a joke, though with Cassie, you never knew. But Sam wasn’t sure anymore if safe and boring was what she needed.
She also wasn’t sure if sitting here alone with Cassie was actually safer than going out and doing something loud and stupid. There was just too much... stuff, just under the surface.
Maybe better to drown it out with noise.
Drowning out. That’s what you always do.
But all she said was, “No, let’s do it. I won’t be able to sleep now anyway, so why not?”
