So this last section I'm going to read,
is just moving forward a little bit
Jean Patrick has gotten to Butare his coach met him
and he's staying with his coach, and the first day they were
there, his coach took him--
Butare is very hilly, I've run on those hills,
and they are they're very steep.
So his coach has took him the first morning he was there,
his coach took him out and ran him on this path,
this track that he was going to train on
to do this hill repeats.
And so the next morning, Jean Patrick
is a very stubborn person, and he likes to have his own way.
He was supposed to wait for his coach,
but he decided to sneak out early just at daybreak
before the curfew to run by himself.
So this is where he's gone on his run,
and he finds himself suddenly lost,
and of course, it has to do with love because there's always
love in a novel right?
"Jean Patrick must have missed a turn.
Now he started up an unfamiliar path,
stopping beside a tree to get his bearings.
One hill is as good as another he thought.
He tied his jacket around his waist and began his intervals.
Passers by turn their heads, children chased after him,
goats scurried out of his way.
Jean Patrick did high steps and butt
kicks, forcing the cadence until he tasted tin on his tongue.
Light streamed through the eucalyptus,
melted into a luminous haze.
By his third interval, he had to grit his teeth
and half closed his eyes to reach the end.
In his wake, a chorus of dogs sounded an alarm.
The goal was in sight when a gate opened directly
in his path and startled him from his meditative state.
'Quickly Come inside' A hand pulled him into the yard.
The gate closed with a screech behind him. 'Are you hurt?'
The lilt of the woman's voice remained in the air
like the first chords of a hymn.
She locked the gate and slipped the key ring onto her wrist.
The world jolted into focus and an involuntary shudder passed
through him.
She looked as surprised as he, her eyes bright
and round as a startled bushbuck.
'Did someone hurt you?'
She asked again.
'Come in the house.
No one will search for you here.'
Her disheveled hair fell to her shoulders.
Her clothing hung slightly askew,
as if she had hastily thrown on her wrap and the shawl that
draped nearly to her feet.
'I don't understand.'
Jean Patrick felt suddenly naked.
'I thought you needed help.'
He fumbled with his jacket.
'I thought maybe your husband--
I thought maybe something bad happened.'
The woman hid her mouth with her hand.
A sound between a sneeze and a laugh escaped.
'Mana yanjye, you thought that?
And here I thought someone was chasing you.'
'No, madam.'
'You looked like you were in terrible pain.'
'No Madam.
I was running.'
'Because you wanted to?
A jogger?
Ko Mana.' She tucked a strand of hair behind her ear.
Beneath her shawl she wore a wrap pattern
with orange suns and pink-ringed planets.
Gold zigzags of lightning streaked across the fabric.
'A runner.' Jean Patrick corrected. 'Im in training.'
Outside the gate, a crowd of children chattered.
He could see the bottoms of their dirty legs,
their broken flip-flops.
'You have a fan club,' the woman said, 'I heard the dogs,
and when I saw you, I assumed some thugs were on your heels.'
She gathered her shawl around her 'It would not have been
the first time.'
'And what if I had been a thief?'
Jean Patrick said, stepping closer.
'What if you had invited me into your home and I had robbed
you?'
She motioned toward the children who dash back and forth
against the gate.
'You wouldn't have gotten far.
My neighbors are very tough.
They would have caught you and dragged you back.'
Jean Patrick couldn't guess her age.
At first he thought her 24 or 25, but in the sunlight,
her features took on a schoolgirl look.
Behind her, he glimpsed a garden and a yard
thick with fruit trees.
A heady perfume of flowers came from her skin.
He did not want to leave.
He could have rested beside her and watched her wrap ripple
about her feet until the waxed suns crossed the cloth sky.
Inside the house, dishes clatter and a radio clicked on.
A woman's voice called out, 'Bea, where are you?'
A door banged.
Two children, a girl and a boy, exploded through the opening,
skin shining with Vaseline.
Bea opened her shawl and enfolded
them like are taking her chicks beneath a wing.
Jean Patrick's heart sank.
'I'm just coming,' she called.
She took the keys from her wrist and unlocked the gate.
'Well be safe then,' she said to Jean Patrick.
She pushed the gate open, exposing a well muscled calf.
The little boy perched on her feet and rode her steps.
What could John Patrick do but thank her and walk out
into the morning through the space
the children made for him?
Bea.
Beatrice.
The blessed one.
He readjusted his jacket and jogged toward the next hill.
It was useless.
The girl called Bea had knocked the wind out of him.
For the first time since a calf cramp had felled him
on the day Rutembeza became his coach, Jean Patrick gave up.
All the way back, her face remained in front of him.
He could have placed a palm on her high cheekbones,
felt her sun warm skin, the color of strong tea,
traced the almond slant of her eyes with a finger."
And I'll stop there.
Thank you.