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Alley Cat

It’s dark outside. We’re terrified. Or maybe petrified. Whichever’s worse is what we are. Riding your bike at night is an odd feeling. Everything seems slower somehow, which compensates for the fact that we’re all riding harder than we have in our lives.

Bike messenger races are like that. Even after all my years as a top amateur racer I have never ridden harder than when I’m racing an Alleycat. It’s the fear, I guess. It hangs over all of us like a chandelier made of nails waiting to drop. But we’re too fast.

The only light is from the cars we’re passing at 45 kph. Drivers see the reflection off our spokes as we blow by them. There are about thirty of us tonight. We ride through traffic like water, taking the path of least resistance, no matter what the cost. I squeeze between two lanes of cars that are coming towards me. I’m breathing heavy. The drivers mistake the fear in my eyes for lunacy, but I’m far from it. This is simply the fastest way.

I see four or five others hauling down the sidewalk like a pack of dogs. All chasing me. Any one of us could die tonight, I think. The thought gets lost as I turn left; more pressing issues are at hand. I’m pretty sure I’m winning but I have no way of knowing. At any moment someone could come out of an alleyway ahead and defeat me. Panic starts to invade my body. To lose to a stranger is one thing, but to lose to your peers is unacceptable. My legs and my head are in the battle of their lives. “Just two more minutes”, my head says. My legs reluctantly agree and I start to fly.

Everything is in perfect symmetry. I am functioning the way God has intended me to function. There are no more alleys ahead. I can taste the victory. There won’t be any zipping up of the jersey here, though. For all I know someone could blast out of one the last building’s windows, nipping me at the line. The panic comes again. I’ve waited too long for this moment. A previous second place has caused me enough sleepless nights. Twenty feet from the line and the crowd is screaming for me but all I can hear are my prayers asking to be not struck by lightening even though there isn’t a cloud in the sky. I must win…

The first thing we do is wait to make sure everyone makes it in all right. We’re like a family at the hospital with more members coming in every minute to wait for the dreadful words of a doctor. The last one arrives to the greatest applause of the night. We could hear his gasping from a block away. He plays the part of a two-wheeled grinning grim reaper.

Relief sets upon us like a cool mist and the talking begins. Horror stories and close calls are traded like sports cards. It’s the same feeling, too. Like being a kid again. Someone tells of how they ran over some guy’s foot. That unwilling spectator will probably talk about his foot for the rest of his life. We’ll only hear the story a few more times before it’s forgotten: a casualty to more exciting events. People come over and congratulate me. Others keep their distance, unsure of what to say.

I know, however, that it is the last place rider who is the true champion. There was no blessing bestowed upon him of athletic genes at birth. The agony on his face was proof of that. His lung capacity holds only asthma and cigarette smoke.

It is him that we all came to see.