all the smiles that i wear
author: aj
codes: miranda
notes: all thanks to cheapmetaphor. miranda and the marathon. the rest is just fodder.
She doesn't remember why she decided this was a good idea, but it's a Tuesday morning in June and she's just won the lottery.
"I never expected to actually get in," she cries, hands in her lap. They stare back at her, stunned.
"How far is this exactly?" Charlotte asks, the note of concern in her voice almost frightening.
"Twenty-six point two miles. Five boroughs. Tens of thousands of people. I have a better chance of turning into road kill at the start line than I do actually surviving this thing."
Carrie reaches across the table. "You can always decline, sweetie. But you've been running, you really wanted to do this. Won't it feel good to actually finish?"
"Easy for you to say. You're not the one running for five hours straight!"
"I had sex once for hours. The guy had the most amazing stamina, I haven't seen anything like it since. I was actually tired before he was, can you imagine?"
"Running a marathon is a lot harder than having sex, Samantha!" Charlotte's indignation is almost touching. She taps Miranda's plate. "We'll meet you at the finish line."
"Just think," Samantha says, "You'll have the best ass and thighs out of any of us!"
"I don't know," she says, hesitating. "I don't know if I can actually do it. It's a fucking long way to run. I mean, isn't this why we domesticated horses? Or invented taxis?"
Carrie looks her in the eye, her best faux-shocked face present. "You mean my friend Miranda Hobbes is admitting a weakness? Someone grab me my coat, I think hell just froze over."
"I prefer to think of this as a form of self-preservation." They aren't buying it, she can tell. She sighs. "You'd better be at the finish line to scrap my battered body off the sidewalk."
"We'll have a martini waiting, don't worry." Samantha says, raising her coffee mug.
Miranda laughs and butters her toast.
Training lasts for hours, weeks, months, but she will never admit defeat.
In July, Miranda joins the New York Road Runners Club and does her once a week long runs through Central Park with a pack of people running her pace. She meets a cute guy, and she takes him home, but she doesn't want to lick his ass and so that ends.
Everything in Miranda's life ends sooner or later.
Six days a week Miranda wakes up, pulls on her running shoes, walks to Central Park and begins the six mile loop. She counts miles by landmarks – Tavern on the Green, the carousel with its age old music. Then the obelisk, looming out of nowhere, the back of the Met, the 86th street entrance to the park, the softball fields. The Lasker swimming pool that has been drained by now and up up up the Great Hill. Then there's the reservoir, named for the illustrious Jackie O., and the boathouse where the same man sings Simon and Garfunkel every Sunday, and then she's out of the park at 72nd.
This is her routine. She likes things in order. She ticks the landmarks off in her head.
Her feet fall regular. Some old man passes her but Miranda reminds herself to keep running her own pace, and anyway, he might just be running four miles. Competitiveness is in Miranda's skin. She fights to keep herself on rhythm. There's a man entering the park ahead of her; he runs like he was born to run. Stride smooth and even, his calves stretching and tightening, like a gazelle she thinks, and knows she will never look like that.
But she will meet her goal. That is what she does. Miranda Hobbes never fails.
It's August and the humidity is killing her. She's memorized where all the water fountains in the park are and these are her landmarks now, stopping at everyone. Miranda has a bandana tied around her head to try and keep some sweat away from something, it seemed like a good idea at the time but now it's just giving her a headache.
Work was hell that week, a ninety-hour week, and still Miranda's briefs are the best in the firm. And she makes time for her friends, brunch in the mornings, drinks at night, and she tumbles into bed alone, always alone.
She feels dizzy and off balance, but it's Sunday in Central Park and there are people everywhere. She jogs off the road onto the bridal path and keeps going until she finds a tree that doesn't have a devastatingly cute couple lounging underneath it.
Miranda bends over, her hands holding her short hair back, and retches into the bushes. It keeps coming and coming, all the water she's worked hard to drink in order to stay hydrated, all disappearing out of her. She looks around to make sure no one has seen, and uses her bandana to wipe her face. Puts her knee in the air and pretends to be stretching.
Waiting outside for Charlotte and Carrie, Miranda rubs her hands over her arms. It's September now, and nights aren't made for spaghetti straps and sandals. It's been so long since she had time to look out the window that she forgot about dressing for the weather. She adjusts her feet from left to right, trying to give her calves some relief.
She wonders where the hell they are, because the restaurant won't seat her until the entire table has arrived. She ran her first fifteen miles today and her body hates her, and she hates her friends for being continually late. She thinks about sitting down on the concrete, but her dress is too short and her common sense too present. Miranda rubs her hands over her eyes and stifles a yawn.
She doesn't know how people do this, day in and day out, this marathon thing and keeping up with all the other parts of your life. The Golson case was assigned to her yesterday and she hasn't even started to read the depositions but she has to meet with the client tomorrow at nine. And when she tried to cancel dinner, Carrie pleaded, and Miranda said yes because she did have to eat after all.
Charlotte and Carrie tumble out of cab, laughing at something, and immediately spot Miranda. They wave and smile and Miranda smiles back and says, "Come on, I'm starving."
One of her toenails is threatening to fall off, so Miranda wears closed toed shoes to the party that night. She wears a short dress because her legs look fantastic despite the pain, and Samantha says, "Miranda, you are one hot lawyer," and Miranda laughs because that's all she can do.
The party lasts longer than she wants it to, and the four of them spill onto the sidewalk laughing at the stuffy women inside. Carrie's shoes sparkle in the moonlight. "Let's get coffee," Charlotte says, linking her arm through Miranda's, and Miranda thinks of the pile of legal pads and blue folders, but there's no way she can say no, because these are her three best friends and nights like these don't last forever.
The first leaves begin to fall. She runs in long sleeves and tights, gloves on her hands. It's an unusually cold October, and this morning Miranda remembered to wear her hat. She has all the right gear because she went down to Paragon and spent a bundle, figuring if she was really going to do this, she had better do it right. So there were the running tights and the windbreaker jacket that weighed nothing, the right socks and little packets of some scary looking thing called Goo.
She buys an MP3 player and listens to Madonna and Bruce Springsteen as she runs laps around the Park. She is careful to keep her hands loose and watches her shadow to critique her form. Miranda went to a lecture about running the marathon and took copious notes; if she really is going to do this, she is going to do this right. There's a month left, which means two eighteen-mile runs, a 10K race, and then an easy twelve. She never thought she'd get to the point where twelve miles would be easy.
Today it's Tuesday, so it's six am and she's running her six miles before work. She's running on four hours of sleep, which is nothing unusual these days, and the Park is dark and quiet. Miranda turns her music off and listens to herself breathing, listens to her feet fall regular on the pavement. She runs through the darkness quietly, softly, and it's easy this morning, it seems so easy.
And Miranda runs. She runs and she runs and she runs.
It was a Saturday night in November, the first one of the year. They take her out for dinner the night before the marathon, despite all her protesting.
"I have to get rest! Bulk up on carbs!" but they wouldn't hear anything of it. They knew, of course, how terrified she was of dying somewhere around mile twenty.
"You wouldn't sleep anyway," Samantha says, and Miranda laughs because Sam knows nothing about running, but she knows Miranda.
"I shouldn't have any alcohol, it dehydrates you. And I don't want to hit the wall –"
"You have to hit a wall?" Charlotte asks.
"No, silly, it's a, it's figure of speech. Runner's talk. You know. Things only Miranda knows." Carrie's bubbly tonight, all curls and pink gossamer, and sometimes Miranda thinks she hasn't been paying attention.
They all toasted to her, Samantha, Carrie, Charlotte, her three best friends. And it was a New York November night, all dark skies and falling leaves, and she was in the best shape of her life.
The race starts and Miranda feels like a sheep in a herd, everyone pushing around her as she tries to make her way across the Verazzano bridge.
Eventually the pack gives way and Miranda has room to run. She turns on her music, makes a conscious effort to keep her shoulders loose, and begins to run the New York City Marathon.
It's mile twelve and she's feeling great. There are people everywhere she looks, telling her she looks great, someone even whistles and yells, "You go get 'em, Redhead!" Twelve miles she's done a thousand times before and this seems easy, even fun, and Miranda ignores the pain in her knees.
She is three avenues over from Carrie's apartment and it suddenly occurs to her how much farther she has to run.
She looks around, because maybe they walked over, maybe they are there – she slows down a bit, runs backward and someone yells, "The finish line is the other way, sweetheart!"
Miranda smiles and waves, careful to keep her balance while she's turning around. She bends her knees a little more, tries to ignore the fact that her friends aren't there, and keeps on running.
She sees the sign for mile twenty and feels a big rush of relief. First Ave seems like forever, you can see the end bridge but the distance – Miranda feels like she's running on a treadmill. But she's running well and she's breathing correctly and now it's mile twenty and there's no wall in sight. So it's one more bridge, then Fifth Avenue, and then the Park, and finally Tavern on the Green. She can see the finish line in her head, she's running strong and her pace is perfect because Miranda has trained for this, she has prepared for this, she knew ahead of time what this would be like.
Carrie, Charlotte and Samantha will be waiting, she just has to get to them. Then there will be sweaty hugs and this will all be worth something.
She continues to ignore the pain in her knees. Miranda Hobbes is going to finish this race, because it is a race after all, and she is going to finish right on time.
She crosses the finish line. Tavern on the Green to her left, the hell she just endured to her right. Someone takes her chip, hands her a medal from a huge box and a bottle of water, they yell at her to keep moving, keep moving . . . all she wants to do is curl up and die, preferably in a dark corner somewhere.
"Keep walking, you don't want your muscles to tighten," a guy tells her, breezing by. She hates him instantly, hates that he assumes she doesn't know what she is doing. She was just stretching her calf! She has read the books, done the training, logged the hours. She finished, didn't she? Four hours and twelve minutes, she finished and he's trying to tell her what to do.
Someone hands her a silver sheet of foil. It takes her a minute to realize it's a blanket, and she knows she will get cold fast, she doesn't need some know-it-all asshole to tell her that. Miranda keeps walking because she's in a sort of chute, she can't get out. She's supposed to meet her friends here, they're supposed to be here and tell her all the things that friends are supposed to say when someone finishes a marathon.
She walks in circles, waiting. First clockwise, then counter, she stretches and says congratulations. Miranda even smiles, though she thinks every muscle in her body is about to fall off the bone, whither and die. She thinks perhaps they got lost, and tries to move back down toward the finish line, but it's worse than a salmon swimming upstream, and she gives up. The medal thumps against her chest, impossibly heavy.
She walks north. The Park is closed off all sorts of places, she finally finds her way out around 86nd. It's only a couple blocks to her apartment, but her legs are about to fall off, or collapse, she isn't sure which. Soon it's clear that there are no taxis to be found anywhere. Miranda wants to cry. She wants to cry, and then die in her sleep. It would be easier and far less painful than dragging her pathetic ass down the eight blocks, one avenue, and two flights of stairs to her apartment.
But Miranda isn't that sort of girl, isn't the sort of girl that expects to be rescued. She's made it this far, and she can make it home, and then die quietly in the privacy of her own room.
People passing her on all directions, she's dizzy and "congratulations" and she thinks she's smiling, she thinks this is where she turns, she thinks she sees, no, and she might be going up stairs she might –
She doesn't have her keys. Carrie was supposed to meet her, Carrie has keys to her apartment, and Miranda left everything of importance inside, locked. Everything is inside safe and sound, and Miranda is locked out.
Breathing, gripping the handrail, she slowly moves down the stairs. Her landlord tells her she looks like hell, she somehow makes it back upstairs. As she lets herself in she trips over her briefcase and depositions and briefs spill all around her. Miranda's knee is aching, but she collects the papers and puts them back, making sure everything is in its proper place. She moves the briefcase under the coffee table.
She climbs into the shower. Her knees give out, her thighs are screaming. She collapses, giving in to gravity, giving into the pain. The water is searing, hot and heavy, and Miranda rests her head against the tile, her legs akimbo.
Time passes, her body has pruned. She's suddenly afraid she fell asleep, that she could have passed out and no one would have known. She reaches to turn the water off and hears voices outside the bathroom.
"Where's our marathoner?" Charlotte sounds too perky to be alive.
"We couldn't find you, we looked everywhere! They have barricades all over, Fifth Avenue is completely closed, did you know that?"
"And they don't let you through the park. Really, the Upper West Side is totally overrated." Samantha's voice is almost grating. "Anyway, Charlotte here had this genius idea to try to find a taxi, so we walked all the way to Fifth, but seriously, you should see the mess out there! How did we never notice this before?"
"Come on out, Miranda! We have alcohol and movies and Chinese food. And stuff for pedicures! To celebrate!" That's Charlotte, Miranda thinks, always a solution to every problem. "Oh look! You got a medal! That's so cute!"
"Yeah, Charlotte brought Steel Magnolias. I tried to tell her that you were going to be too tired to listen to Dolly Parton, but –"
"Where are you, Miranda? Come on out of that bathroom and enjoy yourself! Let us pamper you! You ran a marathon!" Carrie sounds so proud.
She grabs a towel and looks at her reflection in the foggy mirror. Her eyes are wet and her hair is a mess. She wipes her face and smiles. It almost looks believable.
"I ran the marathon, girls, can you believe it?" she shouts through the door.
She doesn't cry. She isn't that sort of girl.