By: Kyle Xu

James clutched onto his checkered blanket as the wind raged outside, creating a small hurricane of leaves. His heart thumped against his chest with worry. As he tossed and turned, wrapped up in dusty blankets that weren’t his, the willow tree in the house’s backyard swayed this way and that, almost as if it were waving, taunting him. A scarecrow that wouldn’t let him rest. James couldn’t sleep for the third night in a row. He kept thinking about the track meet on Sunday: the national track meet in which he’d compete against the fastest 14-year-olds in the U.S.

I shouldn’t have qualified, James told himself. It was a fluke. James felt as if he had sneaked into the meet on accident. The top 5 in each event throughout the state qualified for the meet. In the 100-meter-dash, he was ranked 5th in California. But that was only because the person ranked ahead of him was banned for slugging the kid ranked third, and the third place kid decided to take the season off because of the injuries. Another kid moved to Italy for the summer. And that was how James came from being ranked 8th to being ranked 5th.

Although he kept on telling himself that he wasn’t good enough, James still wanted to win. The winner of each event got a 10,000 dollar award from the sponsors; money, he thought, that he could use to help his family. The thought of his family’s desperate situation only made him even more desperate. Sweat began to form on James’ palms, scalp, and everywhere else.

Ever since his parents had been laid off a month ago, they’d had very little money. They had to move into his friend Jordan’s house, but James was sure that Jordan’s parents wouldn’t let them live there forever. After all, the deal was that James and his parents could stay with Jordan for a week. It had now been four weeks, and tension was growing. He had to win that event, and Jordan had been practicing fiercely after school and before school everyday. He couldn’t shake off the feeling, though, that something–a technique? an exercise? – was still eluding him.

Suddenly, a blur of color outside caught his eye and snapped him out of his thoughts. James instantly dove under the covers. Just in case. What could it be? James thought. But James couldn’t help thinking that he had imagined it. Not like knowing would do him any good. Still, the curiosity drew him, pulling him closer like a giant magnet. He moved closer to the edge of the bed.

What he saw almost shocked him out of his life. A cheetah, a muscular, black-spotted yellow cat was standing under the branches of the willow tree. James wanted to scream, but he couldn’t. His voice was trapped. His body was frozen. He could only watch as the cheetah suddenly bounded from one side of the yard to another in a single leap. The cheetah was an animal representation of smooth, fluid, grace. Also, he remembered from a library book as he began to think again, the fastest land animal ever at sprinting speed.

Image Credit by Chris G