From the park below it looks like a small bird. No, it doesn’t look like a small bird, but what else could it be? At the end of a bench, a young man holds up a running shoe. “It doesn’t weigh anything.” “That’s the thing,” Twig said. “There’s going to be nothing keeping me back except gravity. When I hit the track in these babies, I’m going to be flying!” “The heel is flat. Why doesn’t it have a heel?” I asked. “Because this shoe doesn’t want my heels touching the ground,” Twig said, smiling. “This shoe doesn’t play. This is eighty-five dollars’ worth of kick-ass running, my man.” “You paid eighty-five dollars for these shoes?” “Coach Day got them for me because I’m on the team.” “Looks good, I guess,” I said, handing the track shoe back to Twig. “Hey, Darius, my grandmother said you should come by this weekend,” Twig said. “I told her that you were really Dominican but didn’t want to admit it.” “Why did you tell her that?”
