Bear minimum

I stared at my reflection, finger-combing my hair for the tenth time. The junior varsity cross country meet was in two hours, and my curls were already rebelling against the humidity. Mom had stuffed my gym bag with those nasty gummy vitamins—'for stamina,' she'd said, like gummy bears could somehow transform me into a state champion.

'They're not gonna help,' I muttered, shoving them to the bottom.

The whole team was gathered near the starting line when I arrived. Zoe was hyping everyone up, bouncing on her toes like she'd mainlined an energy drink. 'We got this! North High's gonna eat our dust!'

I swallowed the knot in my stomach. Cross country was supposed to be my thing—my escape from geometry tests and college applications and the weight of everyone's expectations. But lately, running felt less like freedom and more like—well, bearing a burden I couldn't put down.

'You good?' Marcus asked, stretching his hamstrings beside me. 'You look like you're about to barf.'

'Just nervous,' I lied.

The gun went off. We took off like our lives depended on it, and for the first mile, I could almost pretend everything was fine. But by mile two, my legs were screaming. The guy from North High—some sophomore with impossibly perfect hair—pulled ahead of me. I could hear Coach yelling something about pace, but my brain was too foggy to process it.

I thought about those vitamins. About Mom's face when I made varsity. About how everyone assumed this was easy for me.

I finished seventh. Not terrible, but not me either.

Zoe found me sitting on the grass afterward, tying and untying my shoes. 'Hey, you still crushed it,' she said, dropping beside me. 'Want to get boba after? My treat.'

I looked at my frizzy hair in my phone camera, then at Zoe waiting for my answer. Whatever. The hair could wait.

'Sure,' I said, 'but you're carrying the vitamins.'