Kari is a compassionate girl on the geeky side with budding culinary talents. After her family had to move halfway across the country, Kari is unable to adjust in her new high school where she is an outcast. Repeatedly forced to do group assignments...
The FitnessGram™ Pacer Test is a multistage aerobic capacity test that progressively gets more difficult as it continues. The twenty meter pacer test will begin in thirty seconds. Line up at the start. The running speed starts slowly, but gets faster each minute after you hear this signal:
-beep-
A single lap should be completed each time you hear this sound:
-ding-
Remember to run in a straight line, and run as long as possible. The second time you fail to complete a lap before the sound, your test is over.
The gym teacher paused the CD.
"So, all youse guys got that?"
On this seemingly-nondescript March Wednesday in gym class, Kari, Milo, and their classmates sat up on the bleachers, gazing down at the teacher and the arrangement of cones on the gym floor, listening to his and that CD's instructions. It was that day that all non-athletes everywhere dread — the day everyone is forced through the wringer to measure their V̇O2 max for a grade, scored not by effort, but by how good or poorly they performed. The teacher went on to explain that for adolescents of their age, girls are expected to run around thirty-two laps, while boys are expected to do forty-seven. Twenty meters a lap; that's about sixty-six feet, that many times.
Kari is not the most athletic person in the world. So she, like every year, even back in Illinois, wasn't thrilled. She never failed the pacer, but never did spectacular either. Endurance beyond being on her feet for a long time was not her thing. But Milo... oh god, Milo. He made her look like an olympic track star. He made anyone look like one. And he had to do forty-seven laps just because he's a boy! She didn't have to imagine how he was feeling because his face said it all.
What about grading this crap on performance is fair for anyone but the select few accustomed to distance running!? This was inhumane. But the thing that bothered her most of all was that they didn't make anything in cooking class that day, so she was unable to sneak Milo anything. So Milo had to do this not having eaten today. She thought. Maybe he ate lunch, maybe not. He never talked about lunch. But he was acting hungry so probably not.
Kari leaned toward Milo, speaking softly in his ear.
"Just try your best. Okay?"
"Doesn't matter how hard I try!" he growled, covering his soaked face. "I'm about to be humiliated again! Every time I did this, I failed, and everyone watched me be the first to fail... I don't hear the end of it from anyone for weeks... oh, 'Stylo', your— your double-D-man-tits bouncing could've powered the entire goddamn town during that STUPID. PACER! You'll be the next— what's his face, Something Bolt guy. He runs fast, was the 'joke' I think, I don't know shit about sports OR CARE!!"
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He devolved into incoherence. Kari tried to console him. But to not much success — there wasn't nearly enough time. Milo, whose surname begins with 'B'; Bernard, was in the first half of students called up to take the test. Kari's beginning with 'N' made her in the second half, so she still had time to mentally prepare for her own attempt.
