Page 9 of A Class of Her Own

She smiled. “Good thing I brought my listening ears this morning,” she said as the flag was raised. “Think you can talk and keep up with me at the same time?”

I grinned and nodded as the flag dropped. “I’m thinking burgers for lunch.”

“Just pour the water over my head. Pour it,” I said less than an hour later as I bent over at the waist, chest heaving, slick hands braced on my thighs.

“Excuse me?” A woman’s hesitant voice answered me.

I gestured, making a wide circle over my head. “Dump it all here.”

“Are you talking to me?” The voice sounded even more hesitant, if possible.

I stood straight, and a lock of my thick, black hair fell out of my bobby-pinned hairstyle and into my eyes. “Are you the water lady at the finish line?” I asked. She nodded. “Then I’m asking you to drench me from head to toe with that cold water you’re holding.”

She looked at her cup and then back at me. I reached for the cup, but before I could grab it, another hand with bright blue fingernails snagged it and splashed the whole thing towards me, hitting partially on my face. The sound of Aryn’s laughter accompanied me wiping my eyes. When I opened them, she was standing in front of me with a giant smile on her face. She was as sweaty as I was, her cheeks nearly matching her red hair.

“Why do you always have to scare the water people?” she asked, reaching for a second glass of water and tipping it over the top of my head.

I closed my eyes and sighed as it ran down my neck and into my exercise clothes. “Why do they always have scaredy cats at the finish line? If someone says, ‘drench me,’ then for heaven’s sake, drench the person.”

“You are literally the only person who makes that request. It takes a minute to process.”

I glanced around and spotted a blond man pouring water over his own head a few yards away and pointed. “He’s got the same idea.”

“He’s doing it to himself, though. It isn’t that you want water poured over you, it’s that you’re requesting a stranger do it for you.”

I shrugged. “No difference in my mind.”

The blond man turned with a smile on his face for whomever was approaching him in the distance, and I recognized Ford Whittaker, our friend Hailey’s boyfriend. Sure enough, a quick scan of the area showed Hailey walking toward him, holding hands with his daughter, Hillary, while his son, Henry, walked alongside them. Hailey looked as polished as ever, her platinum blonde bob swaying against her jaw as she walked. She was wearing athletic clothes, but seeing as she was a devotee of yoga, I doubted she’d run any of the races. Then again, she had a knack for remaining sweat- and dirt-free at all times regardless of the activity. When we’d gone on our river rafting adventure this past summer, she’d always looked ready for a photo shoot, even without make-up or having had a real shower for days.

“It’s Ford,” I said to Aryn. “I always knew I liked him.”

I nodded in their direction, and Aryn and I fell into step, heading their way.

“You like Ford because he pours water over his head?”

“Among other, more important reasons. But that clinched it, yes.”

“You have a strange way of vetting people.”

I slid a glance at her. “I vetted you, you know.”

“I’ve always wondered what the deciding factor was for letting me into your world,” Aryn smiled down at me, her eyes alight with humor.

“The fact that I’ve won every race we’ve ever run,” I smirked, bumping her arm with my shoulder.

She laughed out loud, and Hailey and Ford turned to watch us walk the last few steps.

“Let me guess, Meredith won?” Hailey dimpled.

“I can’t figure out how she does it,” Aryn playfully sighed, reaching up with a cloth she’d produced out of her own running bag to wipe sweat from her face. “She does that terrible spin class a few times a week, which has nothing to do with running, and suddenly on race day she’s an Olympian. Meanwhile I’m playing sports and jogging the entire city every week, and I can’t keep up with her tiny legs.”

Ford chuckled. “Spin class isn’t for pansies.”

“One spin class is the equivalent of running 6.2 miles. So, this was like a regular Tuesday to me,” I stated, and Hailey laughed.

“She took me to one a few months ago,” Hailey nodded. “It almost killed me.”

“I remember,” Ford said, looking down at her and sharing a moment that brought color to Hailey’s face.

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