RE: Trailer Trash, 66 pt 2 (Patreon)

    “H-hold on,” Elena begged. “I need to—I need to stop. Side stitch. Side stitch.”

    “Don’t completely stop, let’s slow to a walk,” Tabitha advised. “Change your breathing—deep, deep breaths. Breathe in, push out, breathe in, push out. Try raising both hands up above your head. Like this.”

    “I—” Elena gasped. “That—does that… help?”

    The raven-haired teen looked absolutely mortified to be striding next to her redhead friend while said friend was demonstrating a jogging posture with both arms straight up in the air. Elena started to mimic her friend and put her arms up, but after a moment she simply wasn’t able to do it. The stretch of suburban sidewalk they chose for their run was mostly empty this early in the morning but there were still occasional cars passing by. If she was forced to choose between dignity and personal comfort, she would choose to continue nursing this wretched pain folding into her side forever and ever.

    “Maybe?” Tabitha grinned. “Even in the future, there was a lot of mystery and superstition around side stitches. What they are exactly, what causes them, why some people are more susceptible than others. The theory I liked was—”

    “H-how,” Elena struggled to breathe. “How are you even talking? You’re, you’re not even like winded at all—I—I can’t—”

    “Breathe, breathe,” Tabitha took Elena by the arm and slowed their pace another notch. “The theory is, that a side stitch is just upper abdominal cramping. Your diaphragm is getting slightly pinched on one side by all the sudden impacts of your footfalls as you’re running. Stitch on your right side, or left side?”

    “Right,” Elena reported with a frown.

    “Okay,” Tabitha said. “Your body isn’t used to running, just yet. It’s feeling the pinch in weird places, I think a bit of stretching—arms up—or, changing your breathing pattern might help. There are a number of factors that all play into this, of course. Your shoes, your body posture as you run, how much you had for breakfast.”

    As their running shoes ate up pavement Elena couldn’t help but reflect on how different they each were. Elena wore brand new athletic wear—black track pants with a white racing stripe up the sides, a rather chic black top, she’d put on a bit of makeup and even tied her black hair into a ponytail with a skulls bandana in a way that looked especially stylish. Tabitha by comparison looked unkempt—she’d thrown on plain old sweatpants and was wearing a boring sweatshirt.

    Yet, one of them made this early morning run look easy and effortless, and one of them was struggling along in a total mess.

    It made Elena feel absolutely pretentious, like she was a total pretender, some wannabe superstar learning the ins and outs of exercise as her much more down to earth personal trainer ran along from the side. It was humbling and deeply instructional—Elena already wanted to reassess her outfit for next time. Comfort was going to trump fashion here, and there was nobody out here she needed to peacock for. The branded athletic wear she’d agonized over for so long while shopping already felt fake compared to the sweats Tabitha was wearing, and Elena imagined that it chafed more, slowed her down somehow, was holding her back from some deeper level of authenticity she needed to achieve here.

    “They say,” Elena panted. “They say don’t eat. Before you get into a pool. That’s the uh. The fifteen minute rule? Don’t swim. Or, you’ll cramp.”

    “I think it’s similar, yeah,” Tabitha agreed. “Unusual activity your body’s not used to, and how that affects your breathing. Guess it’d be weird if your body didn’t protest some strange new abuse, right? Is it getting any better?”

    “A, a little,” Elena said. “It just. It hurts.”

    “I’m struggling, too,” Tabitha admitted. “A lot more than I thought.”

    “Bullshit,” Elena managed to huff. “Just—bullshit. Fuck off. Don’t bullshit me.”

    “No, for real,” Tabitha said. “You’re taller than me, and you’ve got stupidly long legs. I had to run my little ass off just to try to keep pace with you right there when we started off, hah! I was like, damn, look at her go. I was like, no way am I gonna be keeping this up. I was afraid it was gonna be like, two minutes, tops, ‘til you were just leaving me in the dust. It seems shitty of me, but I was actually super relieved when you uh, when you ran out of steam.”

    “Hah,” Elena laughed.

    “Honestly, once you do build up your stamina some more?” Tabitha sighed. “You are just going to be leaving me behind. The length of our stride is too different. I already know from the future that I’m not going to get much taller than this.”

    “The future,” Elena scoffed. “That’s where you’re, you’re going to say you learned all your running stuff? The future?”

    “Some,” Tabitha nodded. “Most. I was never like an expert, or anything. And—whew man, it is so much fucking better running here when you’re young. Like, young and pliant. I can push myself to my limits just about every day and just—bounce back. Lemme tell ya, that does not happen when you’re older. Nothing but aches and pains. Could give myself a semi-serious injury just sleeping on my pillow wrong, mess up my neck somehow. I’d get a good run in, and be feeling it the whole next week. Bones all rattling around, joints all swollen. Feeling beaten and bruised inside and out. Not like here. Nothing like this. I love it.”

    “Uh-huh,” Elena said. “I think the side stitch is, uh. Mostly gone. I still feel it a little bit, and. I don’t know. Maybe I’m all jogged out for today, already? I can maybe like, power walk a bit.”

    “Sure,” Tabitha agreed. “Mind your breathing, yeah, see if that helps some.”

    They marched onward together with a purpose, crossing another street and passing by house after house in companionable silence. Running… sort of sucked, in Elena’s opinion. The actual process of it was a lot less pleasant than she had been imagining in her head. It was all just so damn strenuous, and to her dismay her mind was already immediately trying to find excuses to give up and never put herself through this again. She was going to keep trying anyways, however.

    Because I’m stubborn, Elena decided. Because Tabitha can do it, so I should be able to, too. I always wanted to be the athletic sort of SPORTY girl who can do things like this. I guess in the back of my mind I always COULD. Like, some part of me just assumed I would be able to, easily, even when other girls can’t.

    Then, she actually tried out running again and remembered why she never did this.

    Her mother used to run, occasionally, and Elena had joined her for a 5K event, once. She remembered boasting about it afterwards whenever the subject of running came up—somehow neglecting to ever mention to anyone that the 5K had been back when she was eleven, and that she hadn’t actually ran the full five kilometer distance. Just a part of it. Actually, looking back on it—Elena had maybe only ever completed a small fraction of it.

    Nothing seemed to bruise quite so easily as her pride, however. Realizing the actual difficulty of this commitment she’d made for herself simply became a sobering experience. Her stubborn nature would get her out here every morning that Tabitha did, and things would get easier once she’d trained a bit more in this.

    Those cheerleader twats can all do this, Elena motivated herself. Imagine them running on ahead of me, not even out of breath. Leaving me behind. Hustling on past me, still with enough breath to spare to make snide comments as they go on by.

    She suddenly felt like breaking into a full run again.

    In all honesty, it was difficult to picture the pretty and popular crowd there actually exercising or putting in work towards something. Perhaps that was just part of the image—a game of putting on the appearance that everything they did was perfect and easy and effortless. It made sense that a cheer team would actually have to have stamina to perform. The testing requirements for cheer were printed in black and white on a sheet Coach Baylor had given her, and Elena had read and reread the thing until she could recite it all from memory.

    The physical aspect of all of this was supposed to be the easy part!

    It didn’t seem fair that after a brief glowing first few honeymoon minutes of running, her body seemed to reject exercise and try to cave in on itself. Those first couple minutes had been beautiful, amazing—why couldn’t all of running be just like that? Why did it quickly devolve into hideous sweaty torture where it felt like she was gasping and gulping to even get any air in her chest at all? Her legs felt leaden, awkward, and clunky now, and Tabitha’s word about footfall impacts seemed to reverberate the whole way up her body now with each jolting step until it felt like she was trying to wince away from the very ground she strode upon.

    She was dying. The vibrance and vitality from those first few minutes of bounding forward had all bled out of her body and now she was shambling forward, a corpse, an absolute wreck of—

    “Hey—we’re done,” Tabitha announced, taking Elena by the arm and pulling her to a slow walk. “We’re done.”

    “We—” Elena croaked, looking around in confusion. “We’re not done.”

    They had already planned out the route they were going to take around the neighborhood. Elena had been tracking their progress in her mind, and the tedious progress had begun driving her into despair, because they were nowhere near done. The girls were barely halfway through the circuit around these streets they intended to make.

    “Okay, but we’re done,” Tabitha said with a firm voice. “A big big part of getting into this, is knowing when and where to stop. Not pushing yourself too far. Okay? Elena, you are out of steam. If we try to do the whole way around the neighborhood, you are going to hurt yourself, and need actual days of recovery. And then never want to do this again! So, no. We’re done.”

    “I—” Elena choked on her own obstinate refusal to accept this—because stubborn pride or not, her body really was done. “I’m sorry…”

    “Don’t be!” Tabitha insisted with good cheer. “We did great. You did great, especially. First day is always hardest. Okay? S’all easier from here. I promise. It gets easier! Like, think back on those first few blocks we ran, and how great that was? Pretty soon, it’ll be like that all the time. The whole way through. We just have to get you there slow and steady and not try to bite off more than we can chew. Okay?”

    “I’m not a child,” Elena grunted. “You don’t have to coddle me.”

    “You are a child,” Tabitha refuted. “I am a child. We are children. Very young teenagers. Practically babies. This is not me looking down on you, either—my mental situation is in a weird place because of my circumstances, but I will already freely admit that you are in many many ways much more mature than I ever was, even in my past life. Big parts of me just never grew up.”

    Elena didn’t know what to say to that, and she was discovering she was already out of energy to formulate a response. She was struggling to keep bearing forward and even continue walking, actually, and so right now she just wanted to quietly accept Tabitha’s superior wisdom, because Tabitha at least knew when it was time for them to fucking stop.

    “But, I’m really trying! To grow up,” Tabitha continued. “I guess I’m finally learning to exercise uh, social muscles, for the first time, and figure all of that out. Finally. And, just like with this—it sucks at first. But, it gets easier after that, better and better each time you keep at it. So, I also want to say, thank you. For uh, for sticking with me. I don’t think I could have ever even gotten anywhere, if not for you and Alicia. So. It just means a lot to me. Fuck, I’m like, babbling, aren’t I? Sorry, I’m all lightheaded. Been way too long since I ran like this in the morning. S’not just me saying you’re done, I’m done too. Phew.”

    “Yeah,” Elena said. “Sorry. I don’t mean to be like. Weird and quiet. When you say all that. But, you’re right, I really am done. I uh. I want to just flop down and never get up. I’m dead. Let’s never do this ever again.”

    “Tomorrow off, then we run next Monday morning before school,” Tabitha said. “Same exact distance we did today. We can do this.”

    “Fuck,” Elena swore. “Fuuuuck.”

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/// To anyone about to comment on how melodramatic or overexaggerating Elena is in this bit, I challenge you to immediately try out a long run through your neighborhood! Go on, it's fun and super easy! You won't feel like your body is dying all around you, I promise!

Make sure you bring your phone with you just in case you need to call for help, or uhhhh I guess carry your Life Alert with you, if you're over the seasoned age of 28 or so. At that point you should probably just leave stuff like sudden unplanned exercise to your kids and grandkids though probably. Haha, I kid, I kid.

Seriously though.