Free All Night Long by Melody Mayer Page A

care,” Kiley heard Zona mutter as she laconically walked past the finish line and joined the group.
    “Well, I don't know that I'm interested,” Lydia replied, quite honestly. “However, if I was going to be interested, you'd have to actually ask me,” she added sweetly.
    Instead of taking offense, Coach Shelton just handed Lydia a clean towel, which Lydia simply slung around her neck because she wasn't sweating.
    “I hope you will consider going out for track and field, Miss Chandler,” the coach said. “It would mean a lot to me and your student-athlete classmates if you'd try out for the track team. I assure you that we've got a spot for you. Any event you want to run.”
    “That is just so sweet of you,” Lydia gushed. “I'll think about it.”
    Mr. Shelton smiled. “Great! Fantastic! I know you'll decide to go ahead with this. Just think about how it will look on your college—”
    Lydia held up a hand. “Excuse me, but I'm done thinking. I'm afraid the answer is no. When I run, I like to run for a reason, not a ribbon. My idea of outdoor aerobic activity is shopping at the Grove.”
    All around her, girls giggled and cast admiring glances her way. Meanwhile, Coach Shelton's beefy face turned tomato red.
    “B-but you could get an athletic scholarship with your talent. You could go to Stanford!”
    “Well, see, I'm not even sure I want to go to college. But thanks for the encouragement.”
    With that declaration, Lydia nodded politely and then started walking away, to applause from the crowd. No one was objecting; no one was imploring Lydia to run track because the whole school would be oh-so-proud. Clearly, athletics here at Bel Air High School were nothing like at La Crosse, where the guy athletes were venerated and even the girls got a lot of attention, especially if they were swimmers or volleyball players. Getting another big championship banner up in the gym, or a trophy for the trophy case, was a reason for a school assembly. Here in Bel Air, it seemed like an anti-achievement.
    “Come on, Kiley,” Lydia told her. “Walk with me. We can't leave until we're officially dismissed, I think. Lord, they've got some dumb-ass rules.”
    Kiley stepped alongside her friend; they headed across the track and toward the bleachers. These seats were padded, justlike the ones in the basketball arena, and had the additional benefit of an overhang that protected fans from the sun. It was a remarkably pleasant place to hang out, so different from the harsh cold steel bleachers in the football stadium at La Crosse East High School. Kiley remembered how, one year, the annual Thanksgiving Day football game against Eau Claire was played in fifteen-below weather and several fans were taken to the hospital with frostbite. “That was amazing. How you ran before.”
    Lydia brushed off the accolades with a wave of her hand. “What I said about the wild boar? This one time, one of them got so close I could feel him breathing on me. I jumped up, grabbed a vine, and swung into a tree.”
    “How Tarzan of you,” Kiley remarked. “So then what happened?”
    “Eventually Snout Boy lumbered away. But it took quite a while. I'd read an article that week in
Complete Woman
about how running makes your butt real perky—it was the only magazine I had. The Amas liked to steal them. And then there was that pesky problem with no toilet paper, and pages of magazines work real well, so—”
    “The wild boar?” Kiley prompted.
    “Right, the boar. Like I said, the boar got bored. But right then, I decided I'd have to be a complete woman without running around some little track. Running to save your life from a rabid boar—that's a different story. And I like my ass just the way it is.”
    Kiley laughed. That was just so Lydia.
    Lydia blocked the sun with a hand to her forehead and peered around the field. “Have you seen Esme?”
    Kiley motioned toward the far end of the field. Though many of the hundreds of seniors who'd come to