Page 134 of I'm Gonna Get You Back
In a dry and cracked desert
We are made to mend
I REALIZE CLARA’S FALLENtoo far behind me, and I double back toward her on the trail. She’s hunched over, her breath rushing out hard.
“Could you not sprint for three miles straight?Uphill,” she emphasizes.
I grin at her. “I’m still two full minutes behind my PR.”
“I cannot wait for you to be around actual runners again,” she says. “Am I wheezing? I sound like I’m wheezing.”
Ever the dramatic, my girlfriend. “You want to stop?”
She looks longingly at the trail that would take us back down toward the parking lot. “I very much do. But they said it’s good for your conditioning, so…” She picks up her feet and sprints ahead, trying to outrun me.
Laughing, I catch up to her easily.
My dad was obviously upset about me leaving Stanford, but he allowed it in the end. Clara’s film was the convincing he needed—the support I needed. It scared off the Olympic coach, but I’m surprisingly okay with it. That was never my plan. And who knows, that doesn’t mean it won’t be in the future.
Of course, moving back home came with a list of conditions. Dad and Julianne insisted that I continue my academics at Woodhurst Community College, and that I rehab my knee correctly. He also got me to see a psychiatrist, and the antidepressants have helped me… alot. I’m sleeping again and setting my own schedule.
It’s been a shockingly good few months. Even more so with Clara.
When we reach the peak, I throw my head back. The afternoon sun beats down on my face. I gasp, grateful there’s a cool breeze up this high. As we catch our breath, she leans back against me, and we stare at the landscape around us. The snowcapped mountains across the canyon, never quite melting even in summer. The explosive greens and bursts of yellow wildflowers at our feet.
Once her breath returns, she says, “I thought that was supposed to be a casual run to prove to our lazy friends that we’re better than them?”
I think of Delaney’s, Kenji’s, and Mitchell’s comments in the group chat about how gross we are for either being so in love or running together every morning.
I grin again and pull her into a sweaty hug. “C’mon, Clara, we already know Mitchell and Kenji are better than us.”
She laughs against me. “That’s true.”
They are monstrously cute together. Once Mitchell graduates and Kenji and Delaney come back home at the end of their semesters, I justknow we’re going to have an epic summer together. Even if some drama is promised with everyone else returning, too.
Her phone pings, and we both go still.
“Is that it?” I ask.
Clara’s face is anguished as she stares at the notification.
“Open it.”
We shift to sit on the bench at the overlook, and I wait for her to tap on the icon, but her thumb hovers. She looks at me, her green eyes wide. “I can’t do it.”
No matter that she enteredLEGACYinto that Young Filmmakers’ Contest andwon—earning her a massive scholarship in the process—she still thinks it’s possible that she didn’t get in again to CAFA.
Whereas I’m convinced she could teach at the school at this point, but what do I know?
I look at her intently. “Yes, you can.”
She lets out a pathetic little whine. “What if they reject me this time?”
“Then you go to one of the five other schools that already accepted you and fold in an eloquent fuck-you to them in your Oscar speech.”
She laughs, and I smile into her shoulder.
“Okay.” She lets out a nervy breath.
