Counting her steps to clear her mind, she ran. If you asked her how long she had been running, she wouldn't be able to tell you. She began counting again at one-twenty. If you asked her how many times she'd made twenty, she wouldn't be able to tell you that, either.

What she could tell you, is that she wanted to run until the physical pain made the emotional pain go away. She could tell you that it hurt just to be herself. That it hurt to sit there and quietly smile while swallowing the screams she wanted to turn on the ones commenting. She could tell you exactly how many nights she cried herself to sleep.

She couldn't tell you how far she had run, but he could. He sat in the old abandoned Commentators' Box, and watched her. Counting her trips around the quarter-mile track as her nearly 6-foot frame loped over and over in a seemingly unending beat.

Eventually, she ran until she staggered, and slowed to a jog and then a walk, with her hands interlaced above her head, chest heaving with the effort of a cool down. He scrambled down out of the Box and grabbed a lukewarm water bottle for her.

"Rob," he called out, jogging across the field on the inside of the track, "Rob! Hey, you need some water. Hydrate." He made to toss the bottle to his slowly walking friend, then realized she was 'zoned' and got close enough to speak more quietly. "Robyn."

"Huh?" came the confused reply, the unfocusing eyes trying to make sense of the shape approaching across the field, calling her by her secret name. "Oh, thanks, Fischer."

He handed the bottle over and the pace slowed even further as the plastic binding that 'sealed in freshness' presented its feeble challenge. A pause while a very parched throat was wet, and then the two walked together for a time.

After awhile, the two were sitting on the benches of the bleachers, her moaning with relief as the shoulder rub being administered by Fischer was loosening muscles that wanted to tighten after the long run.

Rob(yn) breathed deeply and then asked the seemingly innocent and simple question, "Why?"

"Because, you've been my best friend since we were like... two. You say you're a chick, you're a chick."

"You know I've never -- a little lower on the left, there -- I've never even worn anything remotely feminine, let alone female, all you have to go on is my confession that I feel -- ohhhh, yeah, right there -- feel like I should be a girl, despite the fact that I'm a lanky and an embarrassingly-horrible-at-basketball tall track runner, and yet you don't have a problem with me?"

"You saying I should have, chica? I mean, I could stop with the shoulder rub and --"

"Nooo, pleeeaaase don't do thaaat," she whined as he chuckled, never even pausing in his task.

"Yeah. It was just SO hard to believe."

She reached back and swatted ineffectively at him as they both laughed. "Sarcastic jerk. Just keep rubbing. I'll be okay in a few minutes."

He laughed again as he pushed his thumbs together between his best friend's shoulderblades.

"What?"

"You."

"What about me?"

"You're just -- you're such a girl sometimes!"

Focusing her attention to keep from getting dizzy, she danced. If you asked her why she danced, she couldn't explain it -- she just did it. Moving with the music, an instinct almost as primal as laughter. She smoothly transitioned from one song to the next, one style to the next, without a definite idea of where exactly the seam between the two were. If you asked her what dancing meant to her, she wouldn't be able to tell you that, either... it simply filled her with motion, like a light that shined on the inside.

What she could tell you, is that when she danced the world went away, that running was a type of dance, and that she could lose herself in the floor, the music, the sound gently buffeting against her skin as sweat lightly beaded her face, her arms, her chest, her back. She could tell you that she only truly felt alive and free when carried away by her rhythmic motions. That joy in the feeling flooded her so completely that it caused an ecstasy bordering on pain, her emotions draining into movement, expressive and obscure at the same time. She could tell you exactly what to do with your suggestion that she stop, or even, "take a break."

She couldn't tell you why, or what it meant in terms that you could understand it fully, but he would tell you to shut the hell up and just watch her. He sat behind a card table watching the tracks on the digital mixer jump around randomly and her still never missing a step, or faltering where it would seem as these musics didn't belong together, and watched her. He absorbed the grace with which she floated before him upon the worn-smooth boards of the hardwood floor. He admired the lines of each turn and pause as her nearly 6-foot frame traveled through the tenuous territory of tonality so seamlessly she satisfied a hunger for the eyes.

The end came with a finality that was almost painful for both of the two in the room, she so absorbed in feeling it, and he in the grace of it. She paused, her chest heaving with the effort below the light tank top she wore, but the grin staking claim to her face made it quite clear that had she the energy, she would have continued indefinitely. She raised her hands above her head and interlaced them, as she did with running, and began to pace in a small circle to allow her body time to come to a resting spot. He startled and lifted the softest and fuzziest towel from the table for her.

"Robyn," was all he said before she glanced up at him, her lashes parting the curtain of her damp unruly haystack of hair. He smiled in return and tossed the towel to her, which she deftly snagged from the air and wiped across her face with a moan at how soaked with perspiration she was. From beneath the towel came a muffled, "fmhrannx."

He laughed lightly as he replied to the blissful companion, "You're quite welcome. Thanks for the show." He was rewarded by a laugh from her as she repeated clearly (and clear of the towel this time), "Thanks, Fischer."

"Yeah, yeah, you're welcome already," was his almost embarrassed reply as he now tried to find something to do with his now-empty hands.

They walked over to the bench at the sidelines next to the card table in silence. Comfortable with each other to the point that there weren't any 'uncomfortable silences' like with most people, so used to each other that they could very nearly carry on conversations without doing more than being in vaguely the same room as each other. They sat for moments that seemed like hours, and he tapped her on the shoulders so that he could rub the forming tension out before it could settle.

With a happy little sigh, Rob(yn) let him rub her shoulders before carrying on with the conversation they started before the music began.

"There. That's what I do when I come here. I dance. I float. I fly. I lose myself in my passion."

"It was -- wow, you're tightening up -- it was amazing, beautiful, downright graceful -- can you lean back a bit? -- and frankly... *mumble mumble mumble* anyway."

She leaned forward away from his hands. "What was that?"

He sighed and even blushed a bit before answering.

"I said, anyone who could see you move like that and still think you should be a guy needed a CAT Scan, anyway."

She giggled.

"Aww, offering to subject people to random costly medical procedures for my well-being. I don't know what to say... I'm touched. It's just such a warm gesture --"

"Oh, stop it, chica... no need to tease me. Sarcastic wench! I should just let you deal with your own shoulder rub... "

"Nooo, pleeeaaase... I'll be good," she half-moaned and half-whined as he swallowed his chuckle, never even pausing in his task.

She was very nearly purring as he went about his kneading.

"So, have you told them yet?" he asked.

She tensed up again sightly and then sighed heavily.

"I tried, but it just never seemed... right... to tell them, y'know?"

"No, actually," came his reply, "I wouldn't have any idea of how to approach that."

She let another weary laugh come out and then swatted him on the arm.

"I'll tell them tonight. I promise. Hmph. With best friends like you..."