Chapter One
Sara
Central Park at five o'clock in the morning was my favorite time and place. New York was known as the city that never slept, but when running in the park so early, it was easy to pretend that I was the only one for miles.
I wasn't a native New Yorker, but I'd loved the city from the moment I moved here. It'd been six years now, and I'd never once considered going back to San Francisco. I'd only gone back to visit my uncle twice, but he never made me feel guilty. Uncle Takeshi was great that way. I missed him, but my life was here.
Skirting some rocks as I rounded a corner, I let my mind drift again. I'd run this particular circuit at least twice a week for the last three years, three times when the weather was good. I knew it by heart. It’s one of the things I always loved about running. As my feet found their rhythm, I didn't have to think about things.
I'd always been one of those people who'd thought too much, analyzed everything, even when I was young. After my parents died, it got worse. I was only eight when it happened. Sometimes I wasn't even sure I really remembered them, or if what I thought were memories were actually a combination of pictures and stories. Uncle Takeshi had done his best to help me cope, and in the end, the only thing that worked was physical activity. I'd never played well with others, so instead of enrolling me in organized sports, he taught me martial arts. I'd joined track in junior high and found that running helped too.
It also directed me to the field of sports management. I graduated with my Masters from Columbia last year but hadn't been able to find a job in my field. While in college, I worked part-time as a yoga instructor. Now, I had an additional job that wasn't even close to what I wanted to do with my life.
I would've sighed if I hadn't been running. I didn't want to think about work, not when I had to be there in less than an hour. I just wanted to concentrate on the process of running, the simple physical exertion of it. Nothing complicated or emotional. Nothing that required decisions or contemplation.
I managed to fall into that rhythm, into that place where nothing else existed but me and the path in front of me, the shoes on my feet. It was a beautiful morning in the middle of May, and I wanted to enjoy it. One of the things that losing my parents at such a young age taught me was to make the most of every moment.
Then, just as I rounded the next bend, the one that took me almost back to the beginning, I caught movement out of the corner of my eye. A tall, older man was in the grass doing what appeared to be tai chi, or something similar. Even as my brain was processing his movements, the man collapsed.
I didn't think twice as I veered off the path and headed straight for the man. As I went to my knees next to him, I pulled my phone out of my pocket and quickly dialed 911. I put it on speaker as I checked the man's vitals.
“This is 911, do you have an emergency?” A woman's voice came through just as I was trying to find a pulse.
“Yes,” I said. I was out of breath, but calm. “I'm in Central Park and there's a man who just collapsed. He has no pulse and isn't breathing.” Before she could ask, I continued, “I'm starting CPR.”
“Where in the park are you located?” she asked.
I looked around as I began chest compressions, trying to find some sort of description to give the ambulance a reference point. I felt the cartilage beneath my palms crack as I shouted my relative location. The emergency operator was still talking, but I'd more or less tuned her out as the muscles in my arms started to burn. I knew what I was doing and I didn't need her to keep me calm. I wasn't exactly trained for this, but I didn't panic easily.
I lost track of time, aware only of the little physical things that told me minutes were ticking by. My shirt sticking to me, soaked with sweat. Losing all feeling in my arms but still forcing myself to continue chest compressions. The wind whipping my ponytail around to sting my cheeks.
And then I finally heard it. Ambulance sirens. When I raised my head to see how close they were, I saw that a small crowd had gathered. It was nice of them to have offered to help me.
Uncle Takeshi had also taught me the fine art of sarcasm, though that might have been unintentional.
“You're the one who found him?” A paramedic knelt on the other side of the body and held up his hands.
I sat back, heaving a sigh of relief as the paramedic took over compressions. I shook my arms, wincing as the blood flowed back into my fingers. Another paramedic approached and I pushed myself up to my feet. My knees popped and my legs almost buckled. I'd been so focused on how badly my arms were affected that I hadn't even felt the pain in my knees, or the way my feet had almost fallen asleep.
“Miss?”
I turned to see a police officer walking toward me. He glanced at the unconscious man who was now being transferred over to a gurney.