The Midnight Club_ A Novel - James Patterson [18]
The starter’s pistol suddenly exploded, and the fifteen men in wheelchairs accelerated off the line with surprising quickness and agility.
18
THIS WAS HIS first really top-drawer competitive race, and he wanted to do respectably. Certainly, the torture sessions at his gym had given him a body that looked as if it could compete with the others. He’d know soon enough.
The lead racer for the first quarter-mile was a black guy in a fireplug-red T-shirt and white visor. He was burning up the track. Stefanovitch wondered if he could last at that pace. He doubted it, and he was right.
In the second quarter, the black racer dropped back to second. Then to third. Stefanovitch stayed in his position, about halfway back in the pack.
The new leader was in a low-slung racer that looked like a soapbox-derby special.
Pierce Oates was in third place now, stroking beautifully. Pierce looked as if he could race at that speed all day.
The third quarter was physically and mentally tougher, even in the middle of the cruising pack. Stefanovitch’s arms began to tense up, becoming hard as rock, petrified from the biceps down into the finger joints.
He started to panic. He was losing steam, noticeably so. He wondered about the others. He was jerking the chair instead of stroking. The other racers all looked smooth and relaxed.
Another racer passed him, a balding, willowy man with “Stokes-Manville Games” emblazoned in bright blue on his shirt. Stokes-Manville was the important international race held in England every year. If the willowy guy had competed there, he had to be good, and dedicated, too.
Stefanovitch didn’t feel like he was gliding now. His arms were almost rock-hard; the pain was spreading like fire into his upper shoulders.
If he had anything left, he had to make a serious move soon. If he had anything left.
He went for it at the start of the fourth quarter. A strong shot of adrenaline kicked in. Second-wind time. Pride, fear, one or the other was working on him. Fingers of some powerful unseen hand were making him stroke.
He passed Stokes-Manville.
Then the bullet-headed black guy who had led the race in the beginning.
Pierce Oates was moving into the lead now. Pierce looked invincible. He was stroking, really stroking!
A fast final quarter would take about fifty-five seconds in a top wheelchair race. He’d done that well in practice. The average mile time might be anywhere from three minutes and forty-five seconds to four minutes.
The pain in his arms was excruciating—his biceps were numb. His chest was on fire.
The crowd was screaming at all the racers. They were really into it. That part of the feeling was great, exhilarating and completely unexpected.
Each breath Stefanovitch took roared through his lungs. He felt as if his chest were being torn apart.
He had to make his move. He had no idea what he had left inside, how much of the second wind remained.
He kept his eyes on Pierce Oates’s golden yellow shirt, the sheath of his back muscles.
The stroke is everything, he reminded himself one more time. Nothing but the stroke mattered.
Faces flashed by, cheering wildly on either side. His eyes were glazed now, fixed on the golden shirt weaving a few yards in front of him.
Someone threw water all over him and the wetness felt wonderful. The dousing relieved the fire inside. Only for a few seconds, but that was okay. He still had his wind.
It was like he’d said to his father—he was coming back now. That was why the race was important. Stefanovitch was coming back from the dead.
Both his arms were petrified stone, but the lightweight chair was flying. His stroke couldn’t have been better.
His arms and his stroke were one fluid motion. All the torturous sessions at the Sports Center were finally paying a dividend.
He had almost caught Pierce. Almost, but not quite.
It was exactly the way he’d dreamed about this race while he trained every night in New York. Except that he couldn’t pull away from the other man.
He and Pierce were streaking