Orange Slices and Papaya Dreams

The orange jersey hung in my locker like a neon sign announcing: MARTA GARCIA IS TRYING TOO HARD.

"You joining track?" Chloe asked, leaning against the lockers with her perfectly curled hair and judgment raised eyebrows. "Since when do you run?"

"Since now," I said, my voice coming out smaller than I'd intended.

Truth was, I'd been **running** from my feelings for Leo since seventh grade, and I figured maybe literally running would help. Spoiler: it didn't.

Practice was humiliation in motion. I was dead last in everything, my lungs burning, my face probably the same color as my jersey. Coach Miller kept saying "trust the process" but the only thing I trusted was that I was going to puke.

The worst part? Leo was there.

Leo, with his stupid perfect form and his stupid encouraging smiles and his stupid ability to make my brain malfunction with a simple "good job, Marta."

Friday after practice, my grandma picked me up. "Mijita, you look like death," she said, which is how she tells me she loves me.

She took me to this hole-in-the-wall market she swore by. "You need real fuel," she insisted, thrusting a weird oblong fruit at me. "**Papaya**. It'll change your life."

"It looks like a melon that gave up," I said.

"Try it. With lime and chili. Your abuelo ate this every morning before his runs."

I tried it. And okay, I didn't hate it. Actually, I kind of loved it – the sweetness, the kick of chili, the way it felt like something I'd never experienced before.

"See?" Grandma winked. "Sometimes the things that seem weird at first end up being exactly what you need."

The next day at the meet, I didn't win. I didn't even place. But when Leo handed me an orange slice at the finish line and our fingers touched and he smiled and said "you're getting faster, Marta," I realized something.

I wasn't running away from my feelings anymore. I was running toward them.

And maybe that's worth looking a little ridiculous in orange.