Ghost

At the restaurant, Coach takes their utensils when the food arrives. They can’t have them back until each team member tells the others a secret. Lu says that he wishes he had a brother so that he could see what he would look like if he weren’t albino. Sunny tells them that his mother died while giving birth to him. She had been training for a marathon before the pregnancy, and his father made him start running. Sunny believes it is to punish him for his mother’s death. Patty tells them that she is adopted but knows her biological mother, who has diabetes and had her legs amputated as a result. She gave Patty up because she didn’t think she could take care of her. Patty sees her every week and runs because her mother can’t.

Castle says, “My dad’s in jail for trying to shoot me and my mother” (132). The others are silent, and Castle enjoys the fact that his story has shocked them. Coach admits that he won a gold medal in the Olympics, and that is what they talk about for the rest of the dinner. Castle feels as if he belongs to the group and has never felt anything like it.

For several weeks, Castle improves at practice, and the team continues to bond. On the Tuesday before their first meet, Coach distributes their uniforms but does not give one to Castle. Instead, he gives Castle a folded piece of paper. When Castle unfolds it, he finds a picture of him, in close-up, running from the sporting goods store. Coach visited the store for supplies, and the photo was taped on the window with the word SHOPLIFTER written on it. He makes Castle sit on the bench during practice and tells the rest of the team not to ask what is happening.

After practice, Coach drives Castle home and gets out of the car to tell Castle’s mother what Castle did. Castle begs Coach not to tell her and add to her problems. Coach wants to know why Castle didn’t tell him he needed shoes, and Castle asks why he cares about him.

Coach pulls down the neck of his shirt to show Castle a tattoo of his gold medal. He explains that his father stole his gold medal from him and sold it for $20 to buy drugs. He then overdosed and died. It all happened a few houses away; Coach also grew up in Glass Manor. Coach also reveals that he has a chipped tooth from a day when he was 15. His father told him to turn off the TV while he was watching an Olympic track race. When Coach protested, his father hit him. Coach tells Castle he wants to “Show you that you can’t run away from who you are, but what you can do is run towards who you want to be” (155). He says that he will let Castle run again, but he must do it in his old shoes, and he has to clean the taxi on Friday.

When Castle cleans the cab on Friday, he finds a duffel bag with the name Otis on it and learns that that’s Coach’s name. In the bag is a picture of a young Coach with his father. Coach thanks Castle for finding it, and Castle can tell that he misses his father.

Afterward, Coach takes him to the sporting goods store, where Castle apologizes to Tia, the cashier. Then, Coach buys the silver bullet shoes for him.

Castle’s Aunt Sophie and his cousin, King, come to his apartment before the race. Castle’s mother starts to cry when she sees him in his uniform. They walk to the park but stop at Mr. Charles’s store to show him the uniform. Mr. Charles gives Castle a bag of sunflower seeds and wishes him luck.

At the track, Coach gives the teammates their assignments. Lu and Castle will both be running the 100-meter race. Castle meets Margo, Coach’s wife, and his infant son, Tyrone.

When Castle takes the starting line, he sees that Brandon is also there, racing for a team called the Bolts. They stare at each other, each unaware that the other runs. Castle remembers running down the hall, sprinting away from his father. Finally, the starting gun fires.