The Last Checkpoint

By checkpoint nine, Tobias's blisters had stopped hurting in any specific way and started hurting everywhere at once. He had read somewhere that this was either a very bad sign or simply the body giving up on being precise about it.

Pada pos pemeriksaan kesembilan, lecet di kaki Tobias sudah berhenti terasa sakit di satu titik tertentu dan mulai terasa sakit di mana-mana sekaligus. Ia pernah membaca di suatu tempat bahwa ini pertanda yang sangat buruk, atau sekadar tubuh yang menyerah untuk bersikap spesifik soal itu.

The overnight city race had twelve checkpoints scattered across neighborhoods he'd never had a reason to visit. Teams connected them by whatever route they chose: running, biking, or, in his case by this point, limping between. He had started strong, near the front of his age group, before a wrong turn near checkpoint six cost him forty minutes and something harder to name than time.

Balapan kota semalam itu memiliki dua belas pos pemeriksaan yang tersebar di lingkungan-lingkungan yang tak pernah ia punya alasan untuk datangi. Tim-tim menghubungkannya lewat rute apa pun yang mereka pilih: berlari, bersepeda, atau, dalam kasusnya pada saat ini, terpincang-pincang. Ia mulai dengan kuat, di dekat barisan depan kelompok usianya, sebelum salah belok dekat pos keenam menghabiskan empat puluh menit dan sesuatu yang lebih sulit disebut daripada waktu.

His phone showed three other teams had already finished. Two more were somewhere ahead of him, close enough that catching them felt, in his exhausted arithmetic, almost possible and completely impossible at once.

Ponselnya menunjukkan tiga tim lain sudah selesai. Dua lagi entah di mana di depannya, cukup dekat sehingga mengejar mereka terasa, dalam hitungannya yang kelelahan, hampir mungkin dan sepenuhnya mustahil sekaligus.

What kept surfacing, uninvited, with every step now, was a single unhelpful question: did finishing last still count as finishing? He had never actually asked anyone this directly, mostly because he suspected the honest answer might talk him out of the last four checkpoints entirely.

Yang terus muncul tanpa diundang, di setiap langkah sekarang, adalah satu pertanyaan yang tak membantu: apakah finis paling akhir masih dihitung sebagai finis? Ia belum pernah menanyakannya langsung kepada siapa pun, terutama karena ia curiga jawaban jujurnya mungkin akan membujuknya melepaskan empat pos terakhir sama sekali.

A volunteer at checkpoint nine, stamping his card without much ceremony, glanced at his face and seemed to read something there. "You've got four left. Most people who make it this far finish."

Seorang relawan di pos kesembilan, yang menstempel kartunya tanpa banyak upacara, melirik wajahnya dan tampak membaca sesuatu di sana. "Kamu tinggal empat lagi. Kebanyakan orang yang sampai sejauh ini akan finis."

"Most people aren't in last place."

"Kebanyakan orang tidak berada di posisi terakhir."

"Somebody has to be." She shrugged, not unkindly. "Doesn't change what four checkpoints is."

"Seseorang harus di sana." Ia mengangkat bahu, tidak dengan nada kejam. "Itu tidak mengubah arti empat pos pemeriksaan."

Tobias sat with that for exactly as long as it took to drink half a bottle of water. Had he quit at checkpoint nine, he suspected, the blisters would have healed within a week and the four unfinished checkpoints would have stayed with him considerably longer.

Tobias merenungkan itu persis selama waktu yang dibutuhkan untuk menghabiskan setengah botol air. Seandainya ia berhenti di pos kesembilan, ia menduga, lecetnya akan sembuh dalam seminggu dan empat pos yang tak terselesaikan akan menemaninya jauh lebih lama.

He got up. The last three checkpoints passed in a kind of fog he wouldn't fully remember afterward, each one blurring into the last. His pace slowed to something that could charitably be called a walk and less charitably called a stagger.

Ia bangkit. Tiga pos terakhir berlalu dalam semacam kabut yang tak akan sepenuhnya ia ingat setelahnya, masing-masing berbaur dengan yang sebelumnya. Langkahnya melambat menjadi sesuatu yang dengan murah hati bisa disebut berjalan dan dengan kurang murah hati disebut sempoyongan.

He crossed the final checkpoint two hours after the last other team, to a nearly empty finish line and one bored volunteer checking names off a list. Nobody cheered. Nobody needed to. He sat down on the curb, pulled off both shoes, and found that the number on the finishing list mattered a great deal less than he had expected it to.

Ia melewati pos terakhir dua jam setelah tim terakhir lainnya, menuju garis finis yang hampir kosong dan seorang relawan bosan yang mencoret nama-nama dari daftar. Tak ada yang bersorak. Tak ada yang perlu. Ia duduk di tepi trotoar, melepas kedua sepatunya, dan mendapati bahwa nomor di daftar finis jauh kurang penting daripada yang ia kira.