Winning

He tore through the woods, skipping tree roots, his gait uneven as he dodged rocks made nearly invisible by the dappled morning light. He moved through cold and warm patches of air, like swimming in the sea. He breathed in for three, out for three, freewheeling downhill then regaining gear as the ground levelled out.

The main problem at this point was that he was winning. He knew up ahead there were people and after that he could not stop. Had anyone seen him yet? He thought: I must slow down. I must walk. But his legs were fuelled with a strength he could not suppress. The village was only a few miles away. The forest ended before him. He thought, I must stop, I must stop, but as he breached the shade his heart stretched and sung and his pace quickened. The mountain was ahead of him in sharp relief against a blue sky. He thought, we were meant to run around you, embrace you.

He had tagged himself at the checkpoint last night at dusk, but once the light went, as quick as a bulb in autumn, he had melted into the boulders instead of following the narrow track up and east. He had watched the headtorches snaking up to the Col, blurred with rain, made himself small, and waited.

Had he intended in advance to stop? It had rained and rained from the starting line, making his thighs red and numb. The rain had hardened to hail as they ascended, then become snow, covering him in damp kisses. Had he run the first leg too fast? At first the stop was a rest, or a retirement, he wasn’t sure. He backed into a gap in the boulders, wanting to crouch away from the bright lights at the checkpoint and the loud voices of the officials. He said to himself it was a toilet break, but he hadn’t gone to the toilet. He took some water, not wanting it in the wet. He waited for the rain to ease. Then time seemed to shift. He looked at his feet and thought, there are some lies I have told that I don’t even remember as lies.

The rain stopped but he did not start running. The sky cleared and crackled with freezing vapour. It became colder. He moved through the rocks and slowly down a steep slope, allowing his feet to slide, approaching the sound of water. The river looked shinier than normal water in the moonlight, so cold it was barely liquid. He lowered himself onto a stone in the water. The rocks in the riverbed click-clacked like a train on ancient tracks. From here he could see beyond to one of the villages, every window dark and closed, and in the suddenly strong moonlight he thought, the world is inside out.

They had changed the course at the last minute, prompted by a storm that had deposited snow down to two thousand metres and made some of the passes intractable. The other racers followed the red markers on trees or boulders, followed each other. They were visitors from other countries, New Zealand and America, they knew mountains but not this mountain. They put one foot in front of each other on the tenuous paths and tracked their mileage and altitude on their watches. He wore no watch but he knew this mountain. The original course was one huge loop, snaking around the base of the mountain, but now they had changed it there was a switchback. There had to be. Either you went around the mountain or you went along the valley and back.

He calculated, lazily, that the run out and back would take the rest of the night. The very best athletes would pass a mile to the north of here around dawn.

He looked down at his number and thought, if I don’t finish will they look for me? The difference between first and last was the best part of a day. For that day he would be still in the race, still running. Then what?

He had missed the last checkpoint though, the furthest checkpoint. They would check. He smiled. Wasn’t that the point?

He thought, will he be at the finish, waiting?

When he thought of him, he couldn’t call up the image of his face, not really. He kept thinking of someone’s face from the TV. He wasn’t even sure of a resemblance, but the image kept coming back. Nathan was so much younger, his face so much finer than all the others milling in his head. But this - he looked at his red thighs and sodden feet - this was one thing Nathan could not do. It was one race where youth did not count. He had looked around at the start line and seen men all around him like himself, middle-aged, gaunt, legs slightly bowed from excessive mileage. Lined faces from grimacing into sun as well as snow. None of these men looked like talent. This was never about talent. This was something that Nathan couldn’t do. In fact he cringed at the idea of that beautiful body suffering, his bones jarring against rock. His feet were still soft underneath like a baby’s. How were they? But he glowed at the thought he would be at the finish line, amazed, slightly sorry for him, admiring him. Wondering at how he could endure so much. He knew that Nathan did not expect him to finish. What difference would it make, if he did?

He remembered the first time he had cheated, in a test at school. There had been panic and guilt that night in bed, and dreams of policemen coming to take him away. In the morning, he had realised that nobody knew, or cared. The lie had slipped away like a false knot in a rope, unnoticed, barely remembered even by him. Were there many other lies? He had told Nathan one.

His feet were numb but he knew it would take a couple of hours of ascent to reach an altitude at which he would really start to freeze to death. He took off his trainers and socks and put one foot into the scalding water, feeling the strangeness of it but knowing it would warm him. He thought about lying in the bath and putting his toe into the tap and not being sure if the water that came out was cold or hot. His foot came out of the water livid and he put it back into his sock, feeling it suddenly suffused with warmth. He loosened the chip from the laces of his shoe, removed it and let it fall into the river.

He looked up at the mountain. There would be people rolling out of sleeping bags now, fumbling with gear, starting for the summit. It crossed his mind to walk up. But his gear was far too insubstantial, and there was no honour in that, dying of exposure in August.

When the early light came it was so bright it shone misty, steam rising from the snow above. He moved back up into the boulder field and saw men inching down the moraine, smaller than you would expect, the vastness of the perspective deceiving him. He let three men pass, taking an age to reach him, one far ahead of the other two. They moved with purpose but not quickly now, barely more than walking. One breathed in moans, his feet ruined. All three looked without seeing. Once there was no other athlete in sight behind, almost without a conscious thought, he had dropped in, legs creaking. He ran steadily, warming up.

As he ran he dried. There were still at least six hours to go. His mind was empty, he was nothing but feet and lungs. One thought, sudden as a punch: fuck, I have gone too soon. I cannot come fourth. I must let others pass and finish in the mid section, anonymous. Then I have a chance. Why would anyone validate a nobody’s splits? He calmed himself. Even if they check, it will take time. And they could not be sure. He would never admit to it, no matter what. He would not remember it.

But after two hours no one had passed him, in fact he had not encountered anyone at all. He ran with long strides, as though trying to keep a slower companion in conversation, almost tripping himself. To his right the path, known as the balcony, fell away into dense forest to the valley floor. People had fallen from the path and not been found for days. When he saw the two runners crouching ahead of him, he did not stop, he ran on past them, looking back and babbling offers of help.

He ran on. How long for? A man appeared, perched awkwardly on the slope above him, and shouted, “Go, go! You can catch him!” He wondered who the man was and what he was talking about. His reactions were so dulled he turned to look behind him, uncomprehending, and nearly fell. Then he turned back and saw him ahead, the race leader, running awkwardly, like something had snapped between his hip and his knee.

Now he was in bright light and people dotted the track. Someone shouted, “There’s no one near you!” He ran through faces, smiling, clapping. He looked for Nathan’s face. He thought: he won’t be here, I’m too early. I started too early. He slowed to a walk, kept looking, suddenly crushed, tasting the salt of tears or sweat. I’m too early. He walked to the crowd on his right, then over to the left, searching, then turned around and walked uncertainly back the way he had come. A race official in a bright vest moved under the barrier and shepherded him towards the finish.

“You’ve won!” he said. “You’ve won!”