Ultra Read Free Page B

it tells me that my clothes look stupid, or that everyone hates my guts.
    But that’s nothing compared to what happens at night. My brain gets really noisy then. I’ll be lying in bed, thinking I want a glass of water. But then my brain will tell me that if I open my bedroom door, my mom will disappear and I won’t see her again. I know it’s crazy, since I can hear my mom watching TV. Still, for some reason, I can’t open my bedroom door.
    But when I run, my brain quiets down. The longer I run, the quieter it gets.
    SYDNEY WATSON WALTERS: It’s like taking a vacation from yourself?
    QUINN: Yeah, it can be pretty exhausting, being me.
    Anyway, the race. I was still running behind those phlegmy old guys. After a while they started talking about interest rates and mortgages, so I thought, Screw this, I’m outta here!
    I put on some speed and left them in the dust. By the time I hit the Mile 2 signpost, I was running on my own.
    Kneecap’s phone vibrated. I pulled it out of my fanny pack as I ran. Ollie had texted me: GO QUINN GO!
    Suddenly, I heard footsteps. “On your left!” a voice called out. A skinny man with wispy grey hair flew by.
    “Nice pace,” he said out of the side of his mouth. It sounded like a sneer.
    He was wearing a black T-shirt with the words
Eat My
Dirt!
on the back. And striped neon-green socks pulled up to his knees. The socks looked ridiculous, and I was about to laugh, but then the guy stopped running and turned around.
    “Hey, you,” he said. “What’s your name?”
    “Quinn,” I said.
    He had hollow cheeks and porridgy legs. He looked as though he’d drunk a mouthful of sour milk.
    “You shouldn’t be out here,” he said. “You’re just a kid.”
    I stared at him and said nothing. He stared back. He was serious.
    “Your parents must be crazy,” he said. “This race is too dangerous for someone your age.”
    I crossed my arms over my chest.
    Mr. Eat My Dirt scowled. “Do yourself a favour and drop out at Silver Valley,” he muttered.
    Silver Valley, at Mile 22, was the first rest stop. No way was I going to drop out there.
    “Take my advice,” he said. “You’re not cut out for this race.” Then he spun around and started running again.
    I hate being passed, especially by crusty old men, so I chased Mr. Dirt Eater down the ravine. My heart was hammering, partly from the running, but mostly because I was really mad! What kind of creep would tell me to drop out?
    Unfortunately, as hard as I tried to hold the pace, Mr. Dirt Eater was just too fast. For a while I could see him ahead of me, but then his neon socks disappeared around a bend in the trail.
    Break time, I thought. I slowed to a walk and pulled outmy bottle. It held 750 millilitres of water, plus I had 3 litres more in my hydration pack. Hopefully, that would last me until Silver Valley.
    The sun was really coming up now. The ground was a mess of dead leaves and pine needles, which had dried up and turned the colour of rust.
    I stuffed my water bottle back into its holster and started running again. The trail bobbed up and down like a roller coaster, and I figured I was headed north, since the sun was to my right. The sun followed me sideways as I ran, until it disappeared behind Chimney Top Mountain. A little stream ran beside the trail, and I figured it was taking me to Hither Lake. Hither Lake was huge — almost 50 kilometres long — and over the next 24 hours, I was going to run all the way around it.
    Hopefully.
    Another signpost: Mile 3. Around this time I started to sing. I sang one of the first songs I ever wrote, a song called “Run Baby Run.”
    What he’s running from —
    To himself he doesn’t show.
    And what he’s running to
    Even he doesn’t know.
    Suddenly I heard a jingling sound. I spun around and saw a woman in a baseball cap. Her skin was walnut brown, and her face was freckled. She was as thin as a cedar sapling.
    “Hey there,” she said. “How’s it going?”
    “Not bad,” I