Running

I have just started this piece and although it is still unfinished I thought I would share it to see what you all think. I would be very interested in any/all your comments.

Paul

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Running doesn’t come naturally to me, nor was it something that I would elect to do if another means of travel were available. But it wasn’t. And why should there be for a person who had just left a jewellery shop with a Yachmaster strapped to his wrist by an oyster solid stainless steel bracelet, impromptu, that hadn’t been paid for, to the annoyance of the Salesman, who is also travelling, by the same means, and in the same direction as me: albeit it some yards behind, and at a top speed with which he was unable to close the distance? He is furious.

We travel down Lord Street. It is heavily populated with office staff moving from office to office; you know the sort, suited, coifed, laptops in bags, mobiles to ears, heads aslant or dripping with cables from in-ear speakers, and mouthing positive jargon with factual expressions cut into their brows, concealing mortgages, gym subscriptions, skiing holidays, credit card minimum payments: There are glancing at me, annoyed. There are modern mums moving from women’s collections to coffee, complexions made over natural and young, self-portrait expressions, concealing their dread of old age, of weight, of fat, cellulite, of the state of the intimate bits of their figure, the rash in their groin, the mole on the nipple of, of hair of the younger woman; some are pushing manoeuvrable strollers, multi-directional, re-constructible, a travelling system allied with four by four or exec estates, bearing prince, princess or both, timetabled to knap at two, tripping with bags and logos. There are pensioners moving from bus stop to market, immobilised on electrified scooters or ambulating with stiff, tottering gaits on aluminium extendable sticks, brittle, with a propensity to fall. There were van men, couriers, window cleaners; even a door-fixing man on the corner where I turn into Serf Street, at which I pause for breath to choose the best direction, heart beating like fists, sucking in air but it’s not enough, I have pains in my chest and my eyes feel a rising pressure that changes my sight to tunnel vision. He is discussing with the Mcdonalds manager the need to stop people passing through the door way, because in order to fix the automatic door he had to remove the controlling mechanisms and in the process it would “present a trip hazard”, health and safety. But the manager was unhappy because it was the only door to his café and he could not afford for the footfall to fall, for his targets to be missed, for his performance measures to be poor, for his profits to be down: Doors are so important the value of which is only understood when they are blocked. The voices from inside the café chatter a noise of words that can’t be untangled and one customer exits with “’Scuse me mate……Cheers mate” and joins the flow of people

I turn and see the Salesman closing in so I set off down Serf Street then immediately turned right and crossed at the lights, they are on red and all three lanes are occupied with stationary cars. I run pass the vehicles, a mini coupe driven by a twenty something girl, a blonde; a Japanese hybrid driven by a teacher looking type, a free of greenhouse gas guilt look in his eyes, his mind in the clouds; a cyclist, freer still slotted between the two, no helmet, small rucksack clinging to his back like a small monkey clinging to its bigger monkey mother. The outside lane boasts a Bentley stopped as equally as the rest of the lower orders before the omnipotent highways rules, chauffeur driven. No. Driven by the owner with an intense reminiscence over his face .

I reach the pavement and continue up Serf Street, dodging, evading, avoiding and weaving through the street crowd. My muscles are burning and rigourmortis stiffening of my thighs reduces my speed. The Salesman is half way across the road as the lights turn amber. He is closing the gap, skimming past bodies, clipping bags jolting shoulders as he cuts his way through the crowd. I put more effort into my run in an attempt to increase speed or at least guard against slowing down. My breathing is laboured, I can’t feel the air coming in and my lungs won’t work quick enough. The pressure in my eyes increases and I can’t seem to see, everything is over exposed; my running form has become more ragged. Another quick look back confirms that the distance had stabilised. The Salesman’s form also looks ragged he seems to have forgotten how to run.

I take another sharp right into Cottager Road, it is less populated and I am able to gather speed in a more efficient straight line. My energy levels have been expended and I know I can’t continue. I have to find some way of duping the Salesman.