Healing ||mileven||

Take that frown and turn it upside-down

El could never put into words how grateful she was to Mike. He'd managed to find the one thing that she could do to help control her anxiety, and it truly did work. Whenever she felt overwhelmed, or in danger of feeling out of control, she put on her running shoes and just ran. It didn't matter where she ran, as long as there was space to run she did. Sometimes a short burst was enough, other times she'd run for over an hour. One particularly bad day, Hopper had to go out and look for her as she'd been gone over 4 hours and Joyce was beside herself with worry. Turns out she'd managed to run to the next town, over 15 miles away, and Hopper found her by the side of the road walking slowly home. After that El had agreed to run set routes, just to put everyone's minds at ease.

An unintended consequence of El's coping strategy was that she was suddenly brought to the attention of the track and field coach. He'd never paid much attention to the quiet, slightly built girl before, until one afternoon after school. While his current track stars were racing a 1500m, he looked and saw something incredible. El had inadvertently joined the race from the start, wearing her normal everyday clothes and chucks, and was beating them all by a country mile. Not only that, once the others had finished their race she just kept going, and going, and going. By the time she finished, the other students had gone inside. "Byers!" he shouted, to get her attention.

El looked over, afraid that she was in trouble. "Yes?"

"Over here" he said, beckoning her over to him. She complied, looking worried he noted.

"I'm sorry, I tried to stay ahead, out of the way of the race...next time I'll run faster, would that be ok?"

With that last statement he burst out laughing, "you can run that distance faster?!"

She didn't really understand what he was laughing at so just nodded awkwardly at his question. At that moment Mike turned up, he'd been waiting for her by the bikes, but hadn't been surprised that she wasn't there as she'd had another run in with Troy. "Hey El, everything ok?" he asked, noting her confused expression.

"Byers, why haven't you tried out for the team?" asked coach, ignoring Mike, another geek, useless at sports. "I know you're new but we've had at least one try-out since you joined. You're an amazing runner, we need you on the team" he stated.

She went red in the face, embarrassed at his compliment. So, she just shrugged, not really knowing what to say. "Wow, that'd be awesome, El, you should go for it" said Mike, encouragingly. He knew what an honor it was to represent the school at sport and the instant respect it would afford her. He also thought what an achievement it would be for her personally, but he could say those things to her in private, if she wanted to talk to him about it.

"Listen to Wheeler, for once he knows what he's talking about with sports" said the coach, trying to make a joke.

Unfortunately, he'd chosen the wrong subject to joke about. El didn't like it if anyone said negative things about Mike, and knew that he was embarrassed about his lack of sporting prowess. "No" she said simply and walked away, leaving the coach with his mouth open in shock.

"Uhh, I'll talk to her coach, don't worry" said Mike, who went after El.

...........................

"El, come on, you should totally do it" said Will, after Mike had told him what happened.

"No" she said, resolutely. "I don't like him."

"Why, what happened?" asked Dustin.

"He impl...imply...he said Mike was bad at sport" said El, annoyed that she couldn't get the word.

"El" said Lucas, laughing, "Mike is bad at sports, all of them, he's terrible!"

"Thanks Lucas" said Mike, whacking him across his stomach but chuckling. "Come on El, please give it a try, I think you'd be great at it" he said sincerely.

"Really?"

"Yeah, you'd really be amazing...I'd be so proud of you" he added.

That last comment was really all that was needed for El to change her mind, if she could make Mike proud she would be so happy. She smiled at him, "ok then, maybe I can try."

...........................

She blew the other athletes away during her try-out. "You're a natural" said coach, shaking his head in disbelief. "So, you are officially in the track team, well done."

"Er, ok...what do I have to do now?" asked El. She'd never paid any attention to the school sports teams before, other than hearing their results read out in the school assemblies, so had no idea what it entailed.

"2 hours of practice every Tuesday and Thursdays after school, every week" he answered, "and, obviously, any meets, competitions, etc. that we take part in, usually Saturdays."

"Oh...I can't come to practice, sorry" said El, shrugging her shoulders and starting to walk off.

"Wait! What?" said coach. "Why can't you come?"

"I have...um...I'm busy Tuesdays and Thursdays after school" she said, not wanting to tell him about her therapy sessions.

"You can't change those plans?" She shook her head in answer, "but..."

"Can't I just race without practicing?" she asked. It was his turn to shake his head no. "But I never practice anyway, and I am good" she stated.

"I...I guess so..." he said, perplexed at her attitude. Most kids would do anything to get on one of the sports teams, especially a kid who only hung out with the geeks.

"Tell you what, let me race at the next meet and if I don't win then I'll practice after school" she proposed, and with that she turned and walked away without waiting for an answer.

The coach stood for a few seconds, mouth open, before shaking himself out of it, "er, ok then."

...........................