The next few days passed by, and I continued to run with the girl, who I became familiar with as time went on. I was delighted, too, to find that rather than run past my house like she used to, she would wait in front of my house for me, and once I joined her, we would begin our daily stretching. I felt myself improve, and despite the constant nagging worry, I began to notice that it was as if I could develop a resistance to it. The more time I spent dwelling on that particular matter, it was on one such occasion that I felt the need to ask her something, almost on an impulse. "Say..." she looked up at me with her blue eyes, head tilted inquisitively. "Do you want you come into my house for a cup of tea?" I asked her, and instantly hating myself for it. Her head tilted in it's usual fashion as she regarded me with a rather bemused, yet puzzled, look.

"What prompted you to invite me?" she asked. I sheepishly rubbed the back of my head, trying to laugh it off. "Well I, er, figured that since you're jogging before you come to my place, you could use a nice cold drink or something...I don't really see you run with a canteen or water bottle..." She slowly nodded, while I sighed internally in relief. "Hm....how about this~?" she asked me in a sly voice. "If you run with me for longer than you usually do, I'll accept your request!" she told me with a grin.

"What?" I asked her, stunned. She leaned forward playfully, looking at me. "Well, having me over at your place would be a reward, and rewards should be earned, yeah? It's an incentive!" I closed my eyes, definitely not expecting this outcome. Whatever. I could do this. I would do this, although I had no idea why I was willing to go so far just for this. I mean, I had Alex and Sam over all the time, so what was so special about this girl? I put these thoughts to the back of my mind as we began to stretch. Once we were done we started off at a light jog, slowly working our way up to a steady run. By this point I had stopped initiating conversation, as I had learned early on that talking was a waste of breath.

Besides, I couldn't help but feel that words weren't needed when running with her. It was good enough just to run. As we moved around the corner, perhaps around 7 minutes in, I felt the pleasure of realizing that neither my legs nor lungs burned - now that I was actively exercising my body, it was quite easy to improve physically. Still, I continued to observe the houses around us, marveling at the scenery. Despite our running, time seemed to slow, allowing me to perfectly take in the emotions of people as we ran. Indeed, I noticed the same effect as always: no one noticed us, it was as if we were nothing but ghosts.

Eventually as we jogged, I began to notice the familiar burning in my lungs. I reckoned around 15 minutes had passed, and we were still running forward. However, a second feeling had affected me, a feeling of abstract uneasiness, as if I should not keep running forward. The sun too, was lower than it had been, instead just now hiding behind the trees rather than peeking above them. I could tell the girl obviously could run faster, but was making sure to keep match with me. "Don't worry about the bad feeling, just keep running~!" she told me, finally breaking the silence between us. I looked towards her quizzically, my sense of unease growing. My lungs were burning right now and honestly, I wasn't sure I could run for much longer.

But how far was "farther", exactly? What if I hadn't done good enough? I tried to push forward, but eventually, I slowed to a walk, breathing heavily. At this point, the uneasy feeling still remained, but seemed to be fading away now that I had stopped. The girl beside me stopped and laughed brilliantly. "Wow! That was farther than I thought we'd get! You did amazing, Smith!" she told me, her eyes alight with joy. I, for one, did not feel so joyful. Had I continued, it felt like the sensation would have gotten worse. Even now, looking down the road, which seemed to get darker the farther down, I did not want to go down it. This went beyond a simple lack of physical capability- I had come to think that there was a greater thing going on here.

"Hey, you mentioned a bad feeling, right?" I told her in between my breaths. "How did you know...?" The girl looked like she'd just been slapped, indicating that perhaps she had made a mistake, though what type of mistake, I had no idea. "Oh, that. Well, I, uh, figured that you probably wouldn't be very comfortable leaving your comfort zone. This is the edge of your neighborhood, so the next few blocks over will be unknown to you," she told me. I, of course, knew she was hiding something, but honestly, her explanation was good enough that I could find no fault with it. I smiled inwardly, remembering my own spiel to cover up my fumble of asking her over to my house. I decided to drop it, instead asking her if I had made it or not. She smiled, obviously grateful for the subject change. "Yeah, to be honest I'm pretty thirsty myself; I'm looking forward to that tea..." As we walked back up the road, I realized that the terrible feeling I had felt before diminished, and eventually disappeared as we went back around the corner.

This road...I hated going down it. The farther I went, and the faster I went, that feeling grew tihin me.. And the moment I slowed, stopped, or walked back up it, that feeling would go away. Why was it like this? It was like sandpaper upon my nerves, as if you were leaning forward watching a horror movie, waiting to see if something would jump out from the closet. Whatever it was, I was glad it was gone.

I opened the door to my house and invited her in. Her eyes instantly scanned the area. "It's about as neat as I expected," she said with a warm smile. I frowned. "What, did you think it'd be messy?" I asked her. She giggled. "No, someone as methodical as you wouldn't be messy. I'd be surprised if that were the case..." she made her way to the kitchen, me following her. I quickly pulled out two glasses and placed them on the counter, then pulled out the pitcher from the fridge, staring at the murky brown liquid inside. The pitcher itself was plastic, bearing a simplistic design and having a simple blue lid.

"Parents not home?" she asked me. I smiled awkwardly as I tipped the pitcher, filling the glass with the chilled liquid, then moved onto the other one. "No, they aren't. Some business trip, maybe. They're really busy and rarely home..." I looked up, studying her. "What about your parents?" I asked her. She shrugged dismissively. "They don't really care what I do." I thought on that. "Well, what about your house? Where do you live, exactly?" I asked her.

"Up the street a ways," she told me, again in that dismissive tone. I decided to leave it at that, trying to figure out what to say next. I was stunned at the surprising awkwardness, although it seemed to be only mostly me; the girl before me was completely unperturbed, quietly taking a drink from her glass. "Mm, the tea is good. Not as good as home made, though." she said. I nodded, agreeing. "So...uh, what is at the end of that road?" I asked her. She thought for a moment. "Why don't you find out?" she asked me. As she drank the rest of the tea, I broached a subject to her. "Hey...you've got a phone, right?" I asked her. The girl looked at me with a weird look. "...yeah, why?" I hesitated, aware of how it might sound. "Well, uh, I was-"

"You want my number, right?" she asked, cutting to the point with brutal haste. I winced, nodding. The girl leaned forward on the counter after putting her empty glass down, resting her head on her hands with a mock look of offense on her face. "....does your audacity know no bounds? First inviting a girl to your house and then asking for her number? Sheesh, what other demands do you have?" I sighed, prepared for her inevitable 'no'. So, it came as a total shock to me when she answered.

"....alright." My head shot up, and I couldn't help but look at her with shock. The girl laughed at my expression. "Settle down there. I rarely use the phone, so its not like you have a good chance of actually reaching me. Still, it's a good idea to have some medium of communication between us..." I nodded in agreement, and then wrote down her number as she told me. "Don't get any weird ideas, alright?" I shot her a hurt look. "As if." The girl flashed a grin as she slid the glass towards me. "Thanks. See you tomorrow, alright?" I slowly nodded as she began walking for the door. "W-wait!" I called to her. She stopped, turning to look at me.

"What now?"

"I'm, uh..." I was going to say I was glad to have met her. but it was too hard. The words fell flat in my mouth, refusing to come out. "Thanks for the encouragement," I told her. She smiled and waved, leaving. As she left, I still realized that I did not know any more about her than I had before, and that I wanted to know more about her. And, in addition to that...

I wanted to know more about this feeling in my head, like the crackling of television static. I decided that I'd figure it out sooner or later.