Chapter 2

The next morning, I met Marty and Bobby at the pool. Marty and I planned to do half the distance of the Savannah half-Ironman. If an Ironman distance was two-point-four-mile swim, one hundred-twelve-mile bike, and a marathon at the end of it, what would you call half that distance? Was it a tin man? Maybe we were doing a plastic man distance. Marty and I would each do the same distances but we weren’t going to try to stick together. Bobby was there to pull lifeguard duties for Marty, who was a considerably slower swimmer.

We set up our little transition area, just outside the pool and went back in to get ready. The whole thing should take less than three hours, I thought. We used the restroom.

“Got yourself some Lycra shorts, I see,” Marty said.

“I have it on good authority that they will make me look faster.”

“What’s with the banana?” I asked, pointing to one he had taped to the top tube of his bike.

“Instant potassium if I need it. I probably won’t but I want to try it out,” he said.

“I read about the guys that do the Tour de France,” I told him, as we did windmills to warm up.

“Those guys are nuts,” Marty said and Bobby audibly rolled his eyes. I guess we were nuts too.

“Thanks, Bobby.”

“As soon as you get out of the water, I’m going back to bed. High school students,” he huffed with great disdain. He had been a high school student until the previous week.

“Somebody say, ‘one, two, three, go’ and we’ll start,” I said, looking at Bobby.

In his best Sundance Kid voice, he said “One, two, three, go,” and we were off.

We weren’t supposed to be racing. This was just to get a feel for the transitions and doing all three. It wasn’t supposed to be a race. We were racing. I took off at a good pace, remembering Coach Miller’s advice to sort of drag my legs behind me to save them for the bike and run. Instead, I let them gently kick, just to keep them from dropping too low in the water and becoming a drag.

I pushed up out of the pool, pushed the button on my watch to indicate a change, then jogged barefoot to my bike. I dropped my goggles, pulled on my helmet and slipped into my fancy shoes, and was gone. I turned right out of the parking lot and sprinted up to the Highway 17 intersection. I caught the green light and made my turn. My goal was to stay at or above twenty miles per hour for the entire route. I’d lost a little time on the turn, so I picked up the pace until I felt good and checked my speedometer. It hovered between twenty and twenty-one.

I played with the gears a little bit until I settled into one that would allow me to pedal in circles. Most new bikers simply alternate pushing down on the pedals. Good clyclists know to push down, pull back, lift up, then push forward. You could only do that with shoes that clipped to the pedals. I had those but it was a new thing for me. The article I’d read said that beginners tended to pedal slower. I wanted to keep my cadence at eighty-five revolutions per minute or better and I was right there. Traffic wasn’t bad but I knew all it took was one crazy person to kill you. I kept my head on a swivel, watching for crazies, as Marty had suggested.

I worked on keeping good posture, which is weird to think about when your butt, hands, and feet are all locked into position. I crossed over the Stono River and knew I had just four miles to the turnaround point. Marty was still behind me. I wasn’t going to look back.

Highway 17 is nice and wide, with little traffic, once you got that far out of town. There was a turn lane into Caw Caw Interpretive Center for people coming from the other direction. That was my turnaround point. I caught another break, with no traffic in either direction and made the U turn across four lanes and the wide center divider. I pushed another button on my watch so I could check my split later. I also wanted to see how far ahead of Marty I was.

About a minute or two later, I saw him. When we got close enough to see each other, I started whistling, as though I was taking a nice, relaxing spin. We came even and I smiled and waved. As soon as we passed each other, I sprinted to bring my speed up to twenty-one. He was six minutes behind me. Either he wasn’t holding twenty-two or he’d had a slow swim. Either way, I was just a little further ahead of him than I expected. I held my speed to a solid twenty-one, hoping I could hold that for the second half.

About the time I passed over the Stono River a second time, it dawned on me that he might have hit both lights. I’d sailed through on a green each time. I held my pace until I turned right on Albemarle Road. Following Coach Miller’s advice, I stood up and stretched out my calves, one at a time. A half mile from the school, I loosened the Velcro on my shoes and eased my feet back so I could wiggle my toes.

It hadn’t been that long since I’d discounted the importance of a quick transition. I was rethinking that. I stepped off the bike and into my running shoes, without tightening the lace locks. I’d wait a half mile to do that. I barely remembered to get rid of my helmet and take a big drink of water before setting out on the run. I took off, running the same route as before. This time, I’d make my turn at Wappoo Road. The first half mile or so, was painfully uncomfortable as my legs tried to get used to running rather than pedaling in circles. I didn’t need to remember to start with short strides. My legs simply didn’t want to do long ones. They gradually allowed me to lengthen them out.

I had just made it out to Highway 17, when Marty went flying by. I still had him by three or four minutes, meaning I’d had a great ride. I’d settled into a sub-seven pace. I had no real idea if that was good or bad since it was the first time I’d tried to run right after biking. It was definitely a lot more challenging. Riding for twice that distance would probably make it a lot more difficult.

I didn’t like running on Highway 17. There was too much traffic and the surface was uneven. I ran on the sidewalk but there were driveways every few feet. After complaining for a full mile, I switched my attention to keeping my posture and form right. Once I straightened up and relaxed my arms, my breathing improved and I picked up the pace, but not by much.

I passed the last of the major car lots and reached Wappoo Road. I hit the ‘walk’ button for no good reason and turned around to run back. It wasn’t long before I saw Marty. He looked like he had a much better stride than me and he was undoubtedly gaining on me. I had a little less than three miles to go and still had about a two-minute lead.

“I’m going to stop at Waffle House for breakfast,” I hollered as we approached each other. He didn’t even smile. All business. Huh. I picked up the pace again, probably shaving a whopping two seconds off my mile time. I turned right on Albemarle Road and resisted the temptation to look back. We weren’t really racing, after all.

I saw the front gate to the school and stretched it out. Everyone has at least a little kick, right? I didn’t hear him breathing behind me yet. I held the pace and turned the corner. When I did, I snuck a look back and saw him really working. I beat him back to the pool and our bikes, took a couple of deep breaths and sat down and leaned back, as though I’d just enjoyed a leisurely walk in the park. Since my heart was racing and I still hadn’t caught my breath, this was some serious acting on my part.

“Time?” he asked as he arrived.

I looked at my watch. “Two-ten.”

“Asshole.”

“What?”

“You beat me by a minute. One stinking minute. Before we do this again, I’m going to learn how to swim,” he boasted.

“What you need is a coach.”

“What I need is a good coach,” he countered.

“Ouch. That wasn’t easy. Swimming was easy. Biking wasn’t bad. But trying to get into a good running rhythm was tough.”

“That’s a fact. You did great on the bike.”

“Thanks. I caught both green lights and my turnaround was easy.”

“I caught red both times and there was a burst of traffic trying to get into Caw Caw.”

“I had a hunch about that. How often should we do that?”

“Not tomorrow, that’s for sure,” he said and we both laughed. “Next week would be good. I think I’ll try a short ride, maybe five miles, and then run a couple of times during the week to prepare. My swim sucks.”

We talked for a few more minutes, then packed up and left. Two hours of non-stop effort will wear you out. At least I had something to go by. Doubling the distance would more than double the time, I thought. If I could do a half Ironman in four and a half hours, I’d be happy.

Back home, I showered and changed, then grabbed all my school records and the stack of letters from colleges. I set up shop at the kitchen table.

“What are you up to, Buddy?” Mom asked.

“Getting ready to make some phone calls. You know, learn what I can about getting into Georgia Tech.”

“Do you have a game plan?”

“I think so. What have I got to lose?” I dialed the number.

“Georgia Tech admissions, how can I direct your call?” Oh, oh. I had no idea.

“I’m not exactly sure. I received a letter and I want to ensure I respond to it correctly.”

“Of course,” she said with a wonderful Georgia drawl. “At the top right corner of the letter should be your name and an ID number. Do you have that handy?”

“Yes, ma’am.” I read the ID number and I could hear her typing.

“Okay, that would be Miss Rosencranz. Let me transfer you. Hold one moment, please.”

I listened to Ray Charles sing Georgia on My Mind while on hold for a moment before I was connected. “Miss Rosencranz. How can I make your day better?”

“Wow. That’s a great way to answer. I’m Jack Pierce. I received a letter from Georgia Tech and I just wanted to...”

“Do you have that letter handy? I need the ID number you’ll find at the top of the page, right under your name.”

I read it to her, then listened to typing again. She must have been reading a file or something because I could hear her ‘um, humming’ a couple of times.

“You expect to graduate from Porter-Gaud next Spring, is that correct?”

“Yes, ma’am. I’m graduating in three years.”

“Do you know your most recent SAT score and your cumulative GPA?”

“Yes, ma’am. My weighted GPA is four point eight, and my most recent SAT score was fifteen-eighty.”

“Those are very respectable numbers. Congratulations on a job well done. I actually saw you on It’s Academic. You were the only boy on the team and went undefeated. Very impressive, Mr. Pierce.”

“Thank you. We had a great team.”

“Yes, you did. We reached out to the rest of the team as well.”

“Really?” I asked, a little surprised.

“Oh, yes. If I remember correctly, two of the girls were graduating seniors. Do you know where they chose to go?” I told her. “The Sorbonne. Interesting but somehow not surprising. I don’t feel badly now.”

“Marci is special.”

“I’m sure she is. All of you are. What are your big questions? Let me try to answer them and we’ll see how best to proceed.”

We talked for another twenty minutes and by the time we got done, I felt pretty good about the whole deal. Mom had been right there but she’d only heard half the conversation. “Well?”

“I need to apply and send official transcripts and my SAT scores. She’ll plug me into what they call a deferred enrollment status. She said that normally isn’t a good thing, but they can use that with cases like mine, meaning I could attend CofC for a year, then transfer. She said she would classify my application as Fasttrack and said there’s a good chance I’d qualify for an academic scholarship, even if I don’t swim or play baseball, and that’s it.”

“I don’t see a downside to it,” she said.

“Yeah. Neither do I.”

“Jack, if they accept you on a, what did you call it, Fasttrack deferred enrollment, you won’t have to worry about it. You can just focus on school.”

“That’s what it sounds like to me. I wonder if Kim could do that.” It was a great question. I didn’t have the answer. “It’s Academic is the reason Tech sent me a note. Unfortunately, Kim doesn’t have that going for her.”

“That doesn’t mean she can’t contact Emory about a deferred enrollment. She could be proactive,” Mom suggested and I thought it was a great idea.

The phone rang, Mom picked up, then, after a few words, handed it to me. “Tis thy betrothed,” she said.

“Hey. You have plans for tonight,” she said.

“Not really.”

“I wasn’t asking, silly. I’m telling you, you do. It’s Friday night in River City and we’re going for a ghost walk.”

“You’re kidding.” I’d been on a ghost walk before, when I was about seven.

“Nope. There’s a bunch of us going. It will be fun.”

“That is seriously the most touristy thing I can think of. Whose idea was this? Wait, let me guess. Mel?”

“Of course, Mel, and that’s why we’re doing it. It’s the summer of being a tourist at home. Bunch of us. Fun.”

“I’m afraid of ghosts,” I said. A ghost walk? Only Mel.

“Pick me up at eight. Boo,” she laughed and hung up.

“Well, Buddy, you guys wanted to know what you could do this summer. Ghost walk. You should take Dane.”

It was unavoidable. That night, we stood inside the oh, so spooky Unitarian Church Cemetery, hearing our guide, Nathan, tell us all about the ghost of Annabel Lee, made famous by Edgar Allen Poe. Kim and I were standing behind everyone else with Bobby and Mel, Vince and Lani, Cherry and Mei in front of us and our chaperone for the night, Dane, off to the side. Kim had brought props with her but I had no idea why. I was sworn to silence. I was silent.

As Nathan told the story, Kim pulled a small feather duster out of her hip pocket. The handle was long but it had been plucked and there were only a handful of feathers on it. When she pulled it out, Nathan noticed and she put her finger to her lips. Nathan practically whispered the next part. Everyone sort of leaned forward. Kim reached forward and brushed the feathers against Mel’s neck.

“EEEEEEEEK!!!”

What a scream! It was all I could do to keep from laughing. “What is it, Mel?” I asked, choking back my laughter.

“Annabel Lee was breathing down my neck. Didn’t you see anything? Criminy!”

Everyone looked at her as she brushed her neck and looked around. Kim managed not only a straight face but a concerned face. Nathan restarted his story, now fully aware of what was going on. He had to work to keep from looking at Kim. He stretched out the story and whispered again. Kim brushed the feathers across Mel’s ear and she screamed again. This time she spun around in a circle, waving at her hair and stomping her feet, desperately trying to shoo away the ghost of Annabel Lee.

“Stop it,” a middle-aged woman said. “There aren’t any ghosts and you’re just making a fuss.” Mel glared at her.

We walked to a new location in the cemetery and Nathan continued, this time telling us about the ghost of Lavinia Fisher, the first female serial killer in America. Some people claim to have seen her walking through the cemetery, dressed in white. When we moved to the new location, we ended up behind the lady who had complained. I stepped forward and Kim moved around to the left of me, deep in the shadows. When Nathan got to a scary part, Kim reached out and brushed the lady’s ear with the feather duster.

“Shriek! What the hell was that?” she screamed as she did a pretty fair impression of Mel’s jump out of your skin routine.

“I’m sorry, ma’am,” Nathan said, with a kind, apologetic voice. “I would have warned you but Lavinia rarely bothers women.”

“Well, tell her to stop. This isn’t one bit funny.”

“Ma’am, this is a ghost tour. They aren’t on a schedule. They do what they please.”

Bobby had spotted what was going on but he kept a straight face. No one could keep a straight face like Bobby. I saw him nod toward Lani. I whispered encouragement to Kim and she had no problem moving into position.

“Mary Whitridge is buried here but her husband, who died the same day, is not. He was in Baltimore, seeking medical attention. He died in Baltimore. On that same day, Mary Whitridge passed away, here in Charleston. Many people believe they’ve seen her ghost, searching for the grave of her husband.” He looked around, as if to see if Mary Whitridge was listening in, and whispered, “Just two weeks ago, on this tour...”

“Oh, oh, oh. Dammit, Vince. Don’t do that,” Lani screamed.

“Baby, I didn’t do a thing.”

“You did too.”

“How could I? You’re holding my right hand and I have your bag in my left,” Vince said, holding the bag up.

“Okay, this is just plain creepy,” Lani said, brushing her hair and looking around.

“See how you like it when the spooks come for you,” the lady said, with a strange indignant voice.

“I didn’t do anything, Baby. Honest.”

I looked over and saw Dane with his hand over his mouth, trying to keep from laughing. Our guide was amazing, and acted as if this sort of thing happened all the time. “The next stop on our tour is Circular Graveyard. Many people believe it is more haunted than the Unitarian Church Cemetery. Is everyone still okay to continue?” He asked.

“No such thing as ghosts,” Bobby said, enjoying the fun in his own unique way.

Nathan led the way up Archibald Street to Clifford Street. Clifford turns into Horlbeck Alley, which is really dark. As we walked along Horlbeck Alley, I made some sounds that were supposed to be creepy but they were actually funny. No one laughed. Nathan told us that no one had ever reported seeing a ghost on Horlbeck Alley. He was good. We turned right on Meeting Street and walked half a block to the Circular Congregational Church. The church itself is round and one of the most easily recognizable landmarks in Charleston.

“The Circular Church Cemetery holds 500 graves. It used to hold over 700. Where did the other 200 go? No one really knows. Some people say the ghosts of the people buried there, walked off to a quieter resting place.”

Meeting Street was a pretty busy street but late on a Friday night traffic was light. Ghosts probably didn’t mind when it got that late.

“I don’t know if this is going to work,” Kim whispered to me. “Susan loaned it to me. It’s one of those weird props they use in drama.” She showed me what looked a little like a siphon pump and a small, long tube. She pointed the end of the tube at me and gave it a squeeze. I felt a tiny blast of cool air.

“Who?” I asked, quietly. She looked around, and I looked around and we both settled on the same victim. I motioned that she should give it to me and I moved into position while she moved toward Dane.

“There have been many reports of ghosts at the Circular Cemetery. The most recent sighting was a month ago, when one of the most frequent ghosts, a Revolutionary War soldier walked through the graveyard.” He turned and pointed to where the ghost had been spotted and when he did, and all eyes were on the far side of the cemetery, I gave Cherry a cool blast of ghost breath.

He practically jumped five or six steps forward and spun around. I barely had time to hide the gadget. “This isn’t funny. This is crazy. Did anybody else feel that?”

“You’re imagining things, Cherry,” Mei said in her quiet voice.

“I’m not. Who wants some 200-year-old ghost breathing down their neck? Dang, that was creepy. You didn’t feel it?” She shook her head.

Nathan continued. I waited a few moments, checked to make sure no one was watching and gave Mei a dose of ghost breath. She didn’t jump or scream. Instead, she turned to face the ghost. My hand was back at my side.

“Egui, I am not your enemy. Search for your ancestors somewhere else.” That caught everyone off guard. Maybe Chinese people deal with ghosts on a more regular basis.

Amazingly, we managed to finish the rest of the tour without any more ghostly visits. I gave the siphon pump and tube back to Kim and she stashed it in her bag. I think we both thought that we’d eventually get caught if we kept messing around. We ended the tour back where we started and agreed to meet at Tony’s on Savannah Highway for a late-night snack.