The Running Dream by Wendelin Van Draanen Read Free Book Online

idea!
    “I’ll get them!” Mom offers in an overly hyper way, and she’s already speed-dialing my dad as she exits the bathroom.
    “Hey!” I call, hopping over and leaning out into the hallway. “No sweats, okay? I’m going out to lunch with Fiona.”
    “What?” She stops in her tracks and whispers to my dad, “She’s going out to lunch with Fiona!”
    I smile and hop back into the bathroom wondering when I decided that, and how in the world I can be feeling this good.

 
    F IONA SHOWS UP a little before one o’clock. Mom’s anxious because I want to take the crutches, not the wheelchair.
    “What if you fall?” she asks.
    Her lack of confidence annoys me. “I know how to fall, Mom. They taught me, remember?”
    “But what if you
really
fall? What if—”
    “Stop it! I’ll be fine.”
    She bites back her worry and watches from the family-room window as I hop, swing, and hobble out to the curb and into Fiona’s hand-me-down Subaru Outback.
    “Phew,” I say when I’m situated inside.
    Fiona puts the key in the ignition but doesn’t start the car. “We’re really going out to lunch,” she says, smiling at me like she can’t quite believe I’m finally back in her passenger seat. “And you look great! What did you do to your hair? It’s so shiny!”
    I laugh. “I washed it.”
    She laughs too, and turns the key. “That’s all?”
    “Yup. I guess it’s happy with me, huh?”
    She pulls away from the curb. “More like ecstatic.”
    I roll down the window and wave at my mom, who’s still watching from inside. She waves back, but even from the curb I can feel her worry, and I suddenly realize that it has nothing to do with the wheelchair or with me falling.
    The last time Fiona drove me away in her Subaru, it took me more than a week to come home.
    And not all of me made it.
    “Can I borrow your phone?” I ask Fiona.
    Mine was a casualty of the wreck.
    She hands it over, and I dial the house.
    “I’m fine,” I tell my mother when she picks up. “Don’t worry, okay? You keep telling me I should get up and out, and now I am, so you should be happy.”
    “I am,” she says, but her voice is choked.
    “Mom,” I say softly, “you want me to do this.”
    “I know I do,” she says, and she’s trying hard not to, but I can tell she’s crying.
    “I’ll call you from Angelo’s, okay?”
    “Thanks,” she says, then gives me a cheery “Have fun, all right?”
    “I don’t know about
that
, but I do plan to eat a lot of lasagna.”
    She laughs and we hang up, and after I’ve closed Fiona’s phone, I stare at it and try to sort through what I’m feeling.
    Mom’s been so strong through all this.
    So positive.
    I, on the other hand, have been stormy and dark and defeated.
    And now suddenly she’s falling apart, and
I’m
telling
her
everything’s okay.
    It’s like she’s reached the end of her leg of the relay.
    She gave it her all.
    She’s exhausted.
    Collapsing.
    I know what that feels like, and I know what this means.
    It’s my turn to hold the baton.

 
    S OMEHOW I WIND UP STANDING in Angelo’s crowded foyer for nearly twenty minutes while half a dozen two-legged people sit.
    “Unbelievable,” Fiona whispers as we finally follow the hostess to a table. “What is wrong with people?”
    “It’s okay,” I tell her, but I’m relieved to be seated. Relieved to have left the foyer and the awkward glances of a mom who wouldn’t actually look at me, and her kid who wouldn’t stop.
    We open our menus, but it’s just a formality.
    I’m getting the lasagna.
    She’s getting the eggplant parmesan.
    “Oh!” she says, snapping her menu closed. “They’ve added mandarin chicken salad to the lunch menu.”
    “They have?” I ask, searching the menu.
    She laughs. “Not here; at school!”
    The waiter returns shortly to take our orders, and when he’s gone, I sip my water and ask, “So what else is new at school?”
    Fiona’s eyes get wide.
    I never ask about school.
    I