Race Across the Sky by Derek Sherman

landscape.
    But the void held a tricky duality: awareness that he was inside of it made it disappear. And then he was thrust into his body’s miseries. Mack had trained them to develop an unconscious muscle memory to block them from snapping out. This time the void carried him long enough that he did not notice finishing two water bottles as he pounded against the steaming cedar floor.
    Mack tapped on the narrow Plexiglas window and held up four fingers; somehow, he was only a quarter of his way through. Abandoned in a searing agony, Caleb searched for that spot again but saw only a haze of heat. Sweat burned his eyes. Desperately his mind flailed for something to grab onto.
    During a race, he would have goals that would accomplish this: the next aid station, the next climb. Now, there was only depletion, as his sneakers slipped in puddles of his own sweat. Here he was training for anguish.
    Where was Shane? It had been three weeks, and there had been no word at all. He tried to recall his brother’s exact words: Had he said he would help, had he promised? He could not remember.
    Caleb grabbed for another bottle; the water was hot in his throat. He turned around to face the bench; there was a chance that its long slats of wood might take him on a hallucination for some length of time. But before he could slip into one, Caleb heard a tap on the glass door; Mack was holding three fingers now. He knew they signified some code, but he could not recall its meaning. His kidneys were swelling against his skin.
    If not the wood, if not the void, if not a visualization, then memory might take him from his suffering. He thought of June’s soft face, there, that felt right. He reached out a hand to feel her skin. Bluebird, he smiled. He tried to recall the first time he had seen her.
    He had been on breakfast shift on a windy March morning, simmering the grains in the kitchen, when he had heard a rare knock upon the front door. The house was two miles’ dirt drive from the nearest paved road, and visitors did not appear often. Rae had opened the front door to find a thin woman, her hair like wheat, her eyes wide and blue. She had asked for Mack. In her hands she gripped a dark blue plastic car seat, with a sleeping infant.
    Mack had been out leading a group of twelve through the chilly trails. Rae invited her to sit with them and wait.
    â€œSo cute,” Rae had exclaimed, staring at the baby. “What’s her name?”
    June had smiled shyly. “Lily.”
    â€œLily. Beautiful.”
    â€œHow old is she?” Leigh had walked over asking.
    â€œShe’s three weeks.”
    Caleb had stood in the kitchen doorway, squeezing a dishtowel, watching in the way he had watched girls from a high school classroom. The thin woman met his eyes across the expanse of the room and smiled. The energy between them felt as real to him as a rope line.
    â€œWe drove from Taos to see Mister McConnell. I hope that’s okay?”
    John walked over and sat down. “Are you a runner?”
    â€œYes. I read his book.” She looked extremely nervous.
    â€œYou want to run with us?”
    â€œOh, yeah, but . . . that’s not why we came.” She had hesitated, looking at them all. “I need healing. My daughter does. Do you hear?”
    Caleb walked across the wide room, the scent of pines pouring in through the open windows, to the long old couch. Arriving he heard a sound like a mountain train coming with her every exhaled breath. That was when he noticed how small the baby seemed.
    â€œDoes she have pneumonia or something?” Leigh asked, her eyes narrowing.
    June shook her head. “They thought it was asthma? But none of the medicine works. It just makes her heart race and race. They don’t know what all it is.”
    â€œDoctors don’t know much,” John commiserated.
    â€œBut I was watching a cable show, and Mister McConnell was on. He was talking about how you