The Million Dollar Race Read online

  For Georgia

  1

  Once in every lifetime, they say, if everything goes just right—if you eat just the right combination of foods, if you get just the right amount of sleep, if you’ve worked hard and given absolutely everything of yourself—it can happen. You can do it. You can close your hand around the dream you’ve been chasing your whole life.

  You can catch the lightning.

  It’s not just a myth. I’ve seen it. I watched in 2009 as Usain Bolt set the 100-meter world record—9.58 seconds. Granted, I was only a baby, plopped in front of the TV. But I like to think experiences, even if we don’t remember them, leave little seeds in us.

  For years I’ve been nurturing this seed, shaping the weather of my life so that, under the brightest lights, it’ll activate and burst up through the soil.

  Today feels like the day.

  I, Grant Falloon, am about to make history.

  It’s the Penn Relays. Biggest track meet of the year. The bleachers are packed beneath the triangular flags atop Franklin Field. I’m in lane four. I shake my legs. Roll my neck. On the announcer’s cue, I kneel and press my spikes into the blocks.

  “Runners on your marks.”

  I close my eyes. My mind is a glowing computer screen. One by one I drag the cluttered files into the trash. Everything must go. Thoughts are heavy. I need to be light. I need to be fast. The boys’ record (U-13) is 10.73 seconds.

  “Runners set.”

  My head drops. My hips lift.

  Beep!

  I explode out of the blocks, head down.

  I drive my legs. Elbows in. Fingers fully extended.

  It’s happening. I feel myself pulling ahead. Not only ahead of the pack but also—this is hard to explain—of myself. Reaching top speed, I feel myself edging out of the me-shaped outline I was born into.

  Just a half step.

  And it’s the best feeling in the world.

  I’m feeling so invincible that, twenty meters from the line, I forget the number one rule of sprinting. KEEP. YOUR. EYES. ON. THE. PRIZE.

  I peek into the crowd. My family’s in section 102. There’s Mom: fierce, wild-eyed, yelling, “Goooooo!” Dad’s peeking between his fingers like he’s watching a horror movie. Franny’s holding his phone up, filming.

  That’s all it takes. A fraction of a second. A glance. And my toe catches. It’s like I’ve tripped on an invisible root. Suddenly I’m stumbling. Flailing. Arms wheeling.

  And yet…

  I’m so close!

  I spill forward, arms extended Superman style. The finish line is flying toward me. All I have to do is wait, and it’s going to cross me.

  But then gravity.

  My chest hits first. I bounce. My hips crash down. My legs fly up. My chin scrapes along the track one, two, three times.

  I skid, arms outstretched.

  Reaching desperately.

  But no.

  No.

  I lie facedown on the track, a literal inch from the finish line. It’s eerily silent, probably because all ten thousand people have their hands over their mouths.

  I can’t look. If I look, then it’s real. What if I just lie here for a while? What if I just lie here till the stadium empties? Then I can tiptoe home and put a Band-Aid on my bleeding chin, and it’ll be like nothing happened.

  Right?

  Or, just to be safe, I’ll lie here till school lets out and everyone forgets. I’ll lie here till the birds fly south, till the autumn leaves twirl down on top of me.

  I’ll lie here till the whole human race dies out and the grass pushes up through the track and the squirrels build a new civilization in the ruins.

  2

  six weeks have passed since my epic spill at the Penn Relays. The video—posted by my brother—now has 8.4 million views. In slow motion you can actually see me mouthing Noooooooooooo as I go down.

  Within hours, people edited the video so I was tumbling into the Grand Canyon, a wormhole in space, etc.

  The meme became such a sensation that the producers of The Midnight Show! with Jaime Freeman even invited me to New York to joke about it.

  I said thanks, but no thanks.

  Last thing I need is for more people to see what happened…

  I’m over at Jay’s house now. That’s my best friend and number one rival. He was in second place when I tripped. He would’ve won if he hadn’t stopped to peel me off the track. He didn’t mean to stop, he said, almost apologizing. He just did.

  We crossed the line together, tying for dead-last place.

  His mom got an aboveground pool last week so she can do her exercises, her “pool-lates,” as she calls them (cracks herself up every time). I’m draped over a bright pink pool noodle, floating in slow, hypnotic circles. I have no idea what day of the week it is, or what time. It’s summer break. Sometime between meals.

  “You see the one of the ape with the cell phone?” Jay says, using his finger to sign his autograph on the surface of the water.

  “Remind me,” I say.

  “So you see this ape. Someone gives him an iPhone to see what he’ll do. He holds it up, squinting like, What’s this? Is it food? He sniffs it. Then, swear to god, he just sits down and starts taking all these selfies. They couldn’t get it away from him.”

  “That’s awesome. What’d they do?”

  “Nothin’. They couldn’t get it back. Finally he just typed a bunch of poop emojis and chucked it against the wall.”

  I dunk myself in the water and wipe my face with a quick downward swipe. The sunglasses on top of Jay’s head are his newest accessory. If you visualized us as video game characters, spinning in the character select screen, his Style and Coolness would be maxed out. My Speed would be slightly higher, but everything else would be super low.

  “I was thinkin’,” he says, reaching for his store-brand soda on the edge of the pool. “We should do a little project this summer, like the old days.”

  “What? Like gluing buttons onto construction paper?”

  “Nah. Let’s take it up a level.”

  “Popsicle sticks?”

  “We should make a reality TV show.”

  “Ha. About what?”

  “Your family.”

  “Stop.”

  “I’m serious!” he says. “I’ll film it on my phone. We can set up a confessional in the garage, and you’ll be like, And then I got a four-pound organic carrot in my Easter basket! People will eat that mess up. We’ll be so rich.”

  When we talk about getting rich—our favorite topic—it’s always we, something we’ll do together, our destinies joined like the lanes of a track meeting at the horizon.

  “What’s a confessional?” I say.

  “It’s, like, where you talk directly to the camera and spill your guts and say lots of backstabby stuff.”

  I lie back and float on the foam noodle. High above, a plane draws a white line on the sky. “Cool,” I say. “We’ll have to blur my face, though. I’ve had enough infamy for one lifetime.”

  Infamy, the way I understand it, is when you’re famous for the wrong reasons.

  Like, say, falling on your face in the biggest race of your life.

  Jay leans back, frowning. “You’re still sweatin’ that?”

  Before I can answer, his mom comes out. She’s in a one-piece bathing suit and a bathing cap. “Out,” she says, swatting the air. “You slobs are messin’ up my pool.”

  “It’s not a pool,” Jay says. “It’s an oversized dunk tank.”

  “Out!”

  3

  Mrs. Fa’atasi—Jay’s mom—is obsessed with seashells. Last summer, when she and Jay visited family in Samoa, she brought back a whole suitcase full. She keeps them
on a bookshelf in the living room. She says that, if you listen close, each one whispers a different story. I try to listen sometimes, but I only hear my own echoing thoughts.

  Coming in from the backyard, I open a fresh box of parmesan Cheez-Its without asking (see Rights of a Best Friend, subsection 9, clause 4), and we sit at the kitchen table in our dripping-wet bathing suits. A picture of Jay’s older brother glints on the fridge. He’s in his Marine blues, holding a sword. “You hear from Tua?” I ask.

  “Nah.”

  “Everything cool?”

  “Yeah. Said he’d call again in a few weeks.”

  “You think that means some crazy-secret mission?”

  Jay shrugs. I wish I hadn’t brought it up.

  “So about our show,” he says, reaching across the table for the Cheez-Its. “I’m thinkin’ we’ll call it Last Family on Earth.”

  I laugh. “Why?”

  “That’s how we’ll pitch it. Like you, the wacky Falloons, are the last family on earth. We’ll follow you around and see what you do.”

  “What about, like, all the other people in the world? Won’t they ruin the premise? Walking around in the background and stuff?”

  “We can edit them out in post.”

  “I thought you said this was a reality show.”

  “It is.”

  “I don’t think you understand what a reality show is,” I say.

  “I don’t think you understand what a reality show is.”

  Fair point since my family doesn’t own a TV. But I watch plenty of it here. Since the summer began, I’ve spent way more time at Jay’s house than my own. Sometimes I pretend that Mrs. Fa’atasi has adopted me and Jay is my brother for real.

  “So what’s the deal?” Jay says. “Can we do it? The show?”

  “Sorry,” I say, lacing my fingers behind my head like a fat-cat TV executive. “It’s just not for me. But I wish you the best of luck, kid.”

  Jay leans forward, studying me. “Can I tell you something about yourself, bro? For real? It’s like you were born in a gold mine—”

  “Ha. Right.”

  “A gold mine, but the little light on your helmet doesn’t work. Your family is hilarious. You just can’t see it. You’re too close.”

  I squirm. The cold air-conditioning is clinging to my wet skin.

  “I’m not making fun of you,” he says. “I’m saying your family is weird and awesome and you can’t see it. Can we please just film one episode? Please?”

  “I’m sorry,” I say. “I do not consent.”

  4

  My family doesn’t own a car. We used to, but last year Mom sold it and bought us all new street bikes and matching helmets. That’s why we’re riding to the Food Palace in our usual “peloton”—a single-file line of bikes. It’s how we get everywhere.

  “Pothole!” Mom yells. “Incoming!”

  I regrip my handlebars and swerve around the puddle-filled crater. Ahead in the bike lane, Mom, Dad, and Franny pump their legs in unison, orange construction vests glinting in the morning sun. “Let’s go!” Franny yells, peeking back. “Push it!”

  Soaring downhill, our bikes sound like unspooling fishing lines. Zzzzzz.

  We glide around a moving van with its flashers on. A mail truck. A street sweeper. There’s a heavy, satisfying clunk as I stand on my pedals and switch gears. Back uphill now. Row houses on both sides, pressed beneath the summer sky.

  My helmet is tightly buckled beneath my chin. I smear my forearm across my sweaty face. Sunscreen burns in my—

  “Red light!”

  I skid to a stop. Soles down.

  “You okay?” Dad asks.

  “I’m fine,” I say, blinking hard.

  “You—”

  “I’m fine.”

  As we lock up in the parking lot, my little brother—only a year younger than me—unclips his helmet. He shakes out his shoulder-length black hair and says, “Good ride, team!” He tries to give me a high five, but I just shake my head.

  “Remind me to get the stuff for the shrimp,” Mom says, reknotting her bandanna.

  “It’s not shrimp,” I say. “It’s tofu that you cut into shrimplike shapes.”

  “I think it’s de-li-cious,” Franny says, rubbing his belly. He waits till Mom and Dad look away… then makes a devil face and sticks his tongue out at me.

  Inside the grocery store, I linger in front of the produce section, eyes closed, letting the cool mist soak my hot face. Some families go to church on Sunday mornings. I have this.

  “Come on,” Dad says. “I need help with the yogurt.”

  He has a special deal with the manager. We get all their just-expired yogurt for half off. An expiration date, Dad says, is “just an arbitrary line drawn for legal reasons.”

  Which is true, I guess. Most just-expired food is still perfectly edible and would end up in a landfill if we didn’t eat it. Mom jokes Dad’s gravestone will say:

  DAVE FALLOON

  1986–20XX

  LET’S JUST GET THE CHEAPER ONE

  A little girl’s in the checkout lane beside us. Pigtails. Sippy cup. Legs dangling from the shopping cart.

  Her eyes widen, taking us in: Dad in his purple velvet coat and his thick, bristly mustache. Mom—the public defender—aka the Lawyer You Get If You Can’t Afford a Lawyer—in her paint-splattered overalls from Second Time Around. Franny—the YouTube star—smoothing his thick eyebrows, mugging into his phone camera.

  And me, of course, the gangly, freckle-faced track star in mesh shorts, standing as far from them as I can physically get, hunched like a lowercase r.

  It’s true: I stare at the floor so much it’s actually wrecked my posture.

  “Thanks!” Dad says to the checkout lady. “Have a fantastic day!”

  Biking home—laden with heavy bags—I can’t stop thinking about that little girl in the checkout aisle. Crazy as it sounds… I can still feel it.

  Her stare.

  It’s just like when I walk down the hall at school. I could take a weeklong bath in bleach, and they’d still be there—the stares.

  No amount of scrubbing can wash them off.

  It’s part of why I love running so much. Why I’m so addicted to the racing life. If I’m moving fast enough, people can’t really see me.

  The stares don’t stick.

  5

  When we get back from the Food Palace, I have a text from Jay:

  J: yooooooooo u hear??????

  G: am i where

  J: not here

  J: smh

  J: HEAR

  G: oh

  G: shut up

  J: (typing…)

  G: if i recall

  G: UR the one who failed english…

  J: not true

  J: i failed that ONE book report…

  G: lol

  G: u told mr johnson books are just “really long twitter threads u scroll sideways instead of down”

  J: i stand by that!!!

  G: lol

  G: did I HEAR what?

  J: check it!!

  J: [web link]

  Youth Competition Announced

  Rock View, CA—Kids around the world are invited to compete in what’s being called the Million Dollar Race. The winners—one boy and one girl, aged 11–13—will receive a trust fund worth one million dollars and a lifetime sponsorship deal from the Babblemoney Sneaker Company.

  “As I’m getting older, I’ve been thinking a lot about my own childhood, and how it shaped my whole life,” said Esther Babblemoney, the so-called Sneaker Queen worth over $50 billion. “I want to inspire the next generation of champions to chase their dreams and not let anything or anyone stand in their way.”

  Local qualifiers will be held on July 7. National qualifiers on July 27. The finals will be August 12 at the famed Babblemoney Estate in California.

  G: ahhhhhhhh!!!!!

  G: bro this is amazing!!!!

  G: im literally jumping on my bed

  J: i know!!!!!
>
  J: it’s awesome

  J: everyone’s talking about it

  G: (typing…)

  J: i hate to even ask…

  J: but uh…

  J: ur parents gonna let u sign up???

  6

  When I have to explain our Family Council to people, I say, Imagine our family as its own, very tiny country.

  THE REPUBLIC OF FALLOON, POPULATION: 4. We’re a self-governing democracy. Any decision affecting the family must be approved by a majority vote of its citizens.

  That’s why I’ve called everyone here to the living room. This current “ballot measure” (thing we’re voting on) is pretty minor—I need Mom and Dad’s permission to register for the Million Dollar Race.

  As with any government, there are backroom dealings and secret alliances. The most powerful group is the Anti-Dad Caucus. At least once per week me, Mom, and Franny have to shoot down one of his harebrained ideas. Most recently he proposed we sell our house, move to El Salvador, and become bean farmers.

  The three of them are on the lime-green couch we’ve had for as long as I can remember. Dad’s in the middle, in his “workout clothes,” a spindly white tank top and thigh-revealing bike shorts that, with his mustache, make him look like one of those old-timey boxers that say “put up your dukes.”

  Mom’s still in her wrinkled lawyer suit, sipping an extra-fizzy club soda. We have one of those carbonate-your-own-water machines, and she’s obsessed. I hear it tssssting through the night.

  Franny’s slouched in the corner, making fish lips at his phone camera.

  Getting our phones was the only legislation me and Franny have ever cosponsored. Neither of us liked working together, but being trapped in this house without a connection to the outside world was becoming suffocating.

  We had to get it done.

  Right when I’m about to start talking, Franny pans the camera across the three of us, gathering raw footage for his next vlog. His YouTube channel, The Franny Files, has 350,000 subscribers. He releases a new episode every Friday, each more ridiculous than the last. Last week it was just a montage of all his burps from the week. At the end he layered them together like a symphony.