CRUTCH RUN

walter rafael garcia

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     Candy fell from the piñata as Rory swung his crutch. He played a losing game for the little league Mets the day before. Imitation imitates life. “Feel better kid,” is what heavy-accented locals said to Rory as they checked their beepers. He broke his foot playing tag in a stairwell with his friend Georgie. Being in a completely different situation excited him. No school for a month, and the best pizza around was not a punishment. Rory’s doctor told him his cast had become soft since he last saw him. Rory told Dr. Dwarka his cast could never stay hard because adventure rummaged his being.
    Rory broke his heel twenty years later. He’d read a book about barefoot running. “A mile over the train yard bridge” is what he told his girlfriend. He didn’t think running barefoot over cobblestone would do him any harm. People passed him by, but stayed on their phones. No “get well" wishes were given. Dr. Sierra told Rory he’d be out of work for two weeks. “I’m still paying off this Alaskan vacation,” Rory muttered. Joe Rogan and coffee is what he filled his days with.
    At some point paranoia set in. His girlfriend Shannon often went drinking à la Eddie Murphy. He’d ask her why she’d be out until 4:00 AM every night. She’d get mad at him for asking as if he were living in the past with those types of questions. Once, he crutched on over to a spot Shannon frequented at night. Rory expected a hunky man over her, but she was just dancing with friends visiting from Arizona. At home, he wondered where his life had gone. Living on credit with a broken heel, losing his mind, sipping Nigerian pour-over given to him by his friend Nigel as a consolation. Shannon had left for Sedona one week into his crutch run. His cast had become so soft he teared it off with her orchid shears. He started hearing his roller blades laughing at him. He forced them on and rolled into town painfully but gleefully. He thought the Percocet he’d taken earlier had kicked in on account of the lack of pain after a few blocks. Unbeknownst to him, Rory ran out of pills two nights before. As he rolled down Museum Mile, his breath smelled of peppermint. Rory held onto a passing car that pulled him into Columbus Circle. A gang of long-boarders passed by, and he blended into the stampede. Before he could look around, he was near the Cyclone rollercoaster on Coney Island. He’d apparently participated in a Warriors Longboard Race. This twenty-seven mile race imitates “The Warriors" film, where said Coney Island gang gets chased back home from The Bronx. A fortune-teller tried to sell Rory a rock that would fix things. He thought that was preposterous, though one of the long-boarders purchased one. Fireworks spread through Coney as Rory got sleepy.
    He woke up the next morning  next to a Devil Springs bottle back at Columbus Circle, his foot throbbing. A missed call from Shannon alerted Rory to phone her. She told Rory of homes she wanted to purchase with him. After a while, her talks of cabins and square feet faded as he reminisced about eating sausage and runny eggs with Georgie and his parents. Georgie’s parents would call him Rory Storm after an English singer who allegedly died in a double suicide with his mother. Though the story didn’t make Rory nauseous, the runny eggs sure did. That first time his foot broke was filled with priceless memories that could only be expressed through songs or paintings. Rory used to draw on the windowsill as a child. Everyone thought he’d be an artist later in life, but life got in the way. The minute Rory would get his paint brush wet, he’d be called in for a double at his job to make maps for upstate farmers. Helping people literally enjoy the fruits of their labor would be nice if Rory could have his fruit and eat it too.
    Rory snapped out of a daydream and told Shannon he missed her though he didn’t mean it. He missed not having to worry about things. It didn’t stress him too much because he knew everyone had to grow up eventually. He stood awake that night wondering what steps he’d need to take in the near future to be happy—truly. He remembered one of the long-boarders from the Warriors race told him he wanted to skate to Savannah, Georgia. Rory told Ronaldo he’d join him in a week. Dr. Sierra didn’t even feel like asking Rory what had happened to his cast because he had treated patients “disrespectful to the craft” before. Rory felt the vibe in the air and apologized along with telling Dr. Sierra he was destined to go on adventures regardless of barriers.    
    The night before Ronaldo and Rory were to set off on their east coast escapade, Shannon told Rory as much as she wanted Rory to enjoy his life, she felt a balance in priorities was needed. Rory thought just then how Georgie’s mother had told his father not to hike up Mount Foraker because of his asthma. Georgie’s father never returned from that trip and Rory could see the effect it had on the rest of his friend’s life. Georgie had grown up to be a normal, well-respected man working at a construction company in Sedalia, Missouri. Georgie’s mind became opaque, though, as if an iron rod went through his head like Phineas Gage. Rory chose to follow his intuition after that thought.
    Some time later while at work, Rory had learned through a local Savannah newspaper that a long-boarder, mistaken for a burglar, had been shot and killed at night. Rory knew there and then to buy the cabin Shannon wanted; A place way north in the Midwest where their future son or daughter could roam free. A place Rory could roam free.