The Midnight Run

Maya's legs burned as she kept running, the rhythmic thud of her sneakers against pavement the only sound in the predawn darkness. Three weeks until regionals, and Coach said she had to drop four seconds off her 1600 time if she wanted a scholarship. Easy, right.

"Zombie mode activated," her best friend Chloe had texted at 11 PM, when Maya finally finished her AP Euro essay and five other assignments. Some days she felt like the walking dead, surviving on caffeine and anxiety.

The streetlights flickered as she rounded the corner toward the old Henderson estate. In the overgrown garden, that weird stone sphinx statue Mr. Henderson's grandfather imported from Egypt watched her with its cracked face. Local legend said it cursed anyone who touched it, but Maya thought it was just creepy.

Her phone buzzed. A text from Tyler.

"Hey running from something or running toward something?"

Maya rolled her eyes. Tyler, the senior who sat behind her in calc, who'd been flirting with her for weeks while she tried to focus on derivatives and not his stupid perfect jawline.

She typed back: "Running away from your terrible texts lol"

"Ouch. For real though, why are you up at 4 AM?"

"Training. Unlike some people I have goals."

"Goals like beating McKenna at regionals?" McKenna, the sophomore who'd transferred from Chicago and immediately started dominating every track meet, who Maya had hated on sight for no reason other than insecurity.

"Maybe."

"Cool. Think you got this."

Maya slowed to a walk, chest heaving. The sphinx stared at her impassively.

Home at 5 AM, her mom was awake. "Spinach smoothie on the table," she called from her home office. "You need iron."

"Thanks Mom," Maya called back, grabbing the murky green drink that looked like something you'd mop up with a paper towel.

Her dad shuffled out of the bedroom. "How was the run?"

"Good." She downed the smoothie in three gulps, gagging slightly. "Why are you up?"

"Got that presentation today. The bull from corporate is flying in to evaluate the merger." He ran a hand through his thinning hair. "If this goes south, I might need to look for a new job."

Maya's stomach twisted. Her dad, the guy who'd worked eighteen years at the same company, who'd taught her to ride a bike and drive a car and never give up.

"You're gonna crush it, Dad."

"Yeah?" He smiled tiredly. "That's my girl."

She went to her room, set three alarms, and collapsed on her bed. Tyler had texted back.

"For what it's worth, you're not a zombie when you run. You're alive. That's something."

Maya stared at the message, then typed: "You're surprisingly deep for someone who makes terrible puns."

"It's a gift. Sleep now, running zombie."

She didn't delete the message. She didn't delete Tyler from her contacts, even though she should've been studying or sleeping instead of texting some senior boy at dawn.

Some days she felt like everyone expected her to be perfect—the grades, the times, the college applications, the future that loomed closer every day. But at 4:37 AM, texting back and forth with someone who made her laugh when she should've been sleeping...

Maybe being a little imperfect was okay. Maybe sometimes you just had to keep running toward something, even if you didn't know what it was yet.