last night was cool but not cold, with a clear evening sky and slight breeze. perfect running weather, unfortunately, so i forced myself to go on a run with naomi. the enterprise didn't last very long -- probably about 1.5 miles, and that combined with the 2 mile run i did on saturday made for a very sore and desperately out-of-shape catherine. it's been a long time since i did that half-marathon in a little over two hours.

the last time i ran regularly, besides the month before i trained for the half-marathon, was with cynthia back in noverasco. a little past our apartment complex was a dusty loop that led through fields of corn, rice and mud to the nearby town of opera. it was about three miles long, perfect for the mornings when we could force ourselves out of bed to run before school started.

one day, when we were talking to amy and dan, a couple who taught at the school, we mentioned our regular runs on the path. amy and dan glanced at each other, and dan said, "you know, i'm not sure you should be running that so early. there have been some problems on that path."

"like what?"

"well, you know it goes through all those corn fields, and sometimes you can't see the road because the corn can grow so high. and last year some of the girls said there was a flasher."

okay. the image of an italian man in a trenchcoat, jumping out from behind some corn stalks was so ludicrous that i laughed rather than felt concern for my safety. amy and dan didn't have any specifics on the corn flasher, and no one i knew had seen him yet, so we kept running.

but then the encounters started. claire and carla went running one afternoon, and came back laughing hysterically but entirely creeped out. they said they had seen a guy on a silver vespa on the stretch of the path through the corn fields. that's not that abnormal a sight; lots of people rode their motorinos from noverasco to opera, and in the afternoon, there were always tons of people riding bikes and walking on the path. what was weird was that the guy had parked his vespa squarely in the middle of the path, where it stood, leaning defiantly alone on its kickstand. it was the seemingly abandoned vespa that claire and carla noticed first. the guy masturbating in the creek ditch next to the path was what they saw second.

this story was slightly terrifying, but claire and carla laughed about it, and cynthia and i still went running, figuring that as long as we stayed together, it wouldn't be a problem. so one afternoon, we went out on the path, joking that if we saw the masturbating man we would take him on.

for the first half of the run, nothing happened except the usual pollution-induced wheezing caused by the major highway located a few hundred feet away. but then, we saw it in the distance: a silver vespa, glinting in the sun, parked, with its unmoving rider astride the seat.

"oh, holy shit," i said. we slowed our pace to a turtle jog while weighing our options; we could turn around and run back to the apartment, but the apartment was rather far at that point, and he could ride after us; we could keep going and hope that someone else would come along the path so the guy wouldn't feel compelled to drop trou in front of us. cynthia suggested having both of us run completely full-speed at the man, push him and his vespa over, and make a break for it, but while we found that image strangely hysterical, we opted not to. finally, we decided to pick up a handful of rocks and keep running at a normal pace. if the motherfucker tried anything, we would crush his head. heart pounding, i picked up a fist-sized rock in each hand, and off we went.

we got closer and closer to the vespa and its rider, and still, it didn't move. finally, we passed it, and i saw that it was a young guy, probably no older than 18. i wasn't sure he was the masturbating vespa boy, but still, i made what i thought was threatening eye contact and menacingly waved around the rock in my hand. he did nothing, and as soon as we passed, cynthia and i broke into a sprint until we reached the town.

sightings of masturabating vespa boy were fairly common, but no one, besides the one incident with claire and carla, ever actually saw him, you know, in the act. still, he remained a vague threat, an excuse when we were too lazy to go running -- "oh, we don't want to see mvb today, so let's skip running" -- or, inversely, a reason to haul ass -- "oh crap, i think i see the silver vespa, we better go faster."

then, for a few months in late winter and early spring, no one saw masturbating vespa boy. maybe he had taken his masturbating elsewhere, like a public toilet or a local school playground. we could only hope. maybe we could finally run in peace.

one spring afternoon after school, i desperately wanted to go running; i hadn't been out in a few weeks due to poor weather and was feeling stir-crazy and completely atrophied. unfortunately, cynthia was sick and refused to come out with me. oh, fuck it, i decided. i haven't seen vespa boy in months, it'll be fine. i brought my cell phone with me just in case, and cynthia instructed me to call her if there were any sighting whatsoever.

the run was fine and i thought i was home-free until i reached the tunnel i had to pass through in order to get back to the outskirts of the apartment complex. the tunnel was dark and rather long, covered in nonsensical italian graffiti, and smelled vaguely of cat piss. i had run halfway through the tunnel when i heard a rustling in the bushes near the entrance. and then i saw it: a riderless vespa parked next to the bushes. and then i saw masturbating vespa boy himself. in the act. staring at me.

i never knew a masturbating teenage boy could be so terrifying. i broke into a breakneck sprint in the other direction while frantically dialing cynthia's number on my cell. the tunnel and mvb stood behind me, and a 2 mile stretch of empty, dusty, cornfield path stood in front. i was positive he was going to get back on his vespa, run me over and do his thing right there, and suddenly, as the phone was ringing, i heard the roar of an engine behind me. sure enough, a glance over my shoulder confirmed that he had gotten back on his vespa and was GOING TO OVERTAKE ME.

cynthia finally answered, and i yelled something nonsensical like, "THE MASTURBATOR IS GOING TO GET ME!" just then, the boy, wearing a huge white helmet decorated with multi-colored decals, whizzed past me and off into the distance. cynthia instructed me to run home as fast as i could, and i did.

we didn't go running on the path again. and whenever we talk about the masturbating vespa boy now, we laugh, realizing that he probably never would have done anything, but reading that over, that was a completely creepy experience. beware: italian teenage boys are oversexed freaks and don't stay in their bedroom with porno mags like they should.