The Running Man
by Stephen King
Contents
…Minus 073 and COUNTING… The Boston Y.M.C.A. stood on upper H
Overview
Richards reaches the Boston Y.M.C.A. and successfully checks in under another false identity, John Deegan, without needing identification. The lobby scene exposes the cruelty and racism of ordinary society, reinforcing the corrupt world Richards is navigating while he tries to stay hidden from the Network.
The chapter is brief but important as a transitional moment: Richards secures temporary shelter in Boston while the setting emphasizes the decay, suspicion, and dehumanization surrounding him.
Summary
Richards arrives at the Boston Y.M.C.A. on upper Huntington Avenue, using the shabby, anonymous building as a practical hideout after leaving New York. The place appears decayed and out of time, matching Richards’s need for a low-profile refuge where no one will ask too many questions.
In the lobby, Richards sees the desk clerk arguing with a small Black boy in an oversized killball jersey. The boy says the gum machine took his only nickel, but the clerk refuses to help, threatens to call the house detective, and treats the boy with open contempt. The boy kicks the machine and runs out, hurt and furious.
The clerk then speaks to Richards with casual racism, assuming Richards will share the prejudice. Richards, registering under the false name John Deegan from Michigan, plays along only enough to complete the transaction and avoid suspicion. The clerk gives him Room 512 for cash without asking for identification, confirming that the Y.M.C.A. is useful precisely because of its lax procedures.
As Richards goes toward the elevator, he notices a dim Christian Lending Library and an old man laboriously reading a tract, an image that fills Richards with sorrow and horror. The elevator arrives, and the clerk repeats his desire to imprison Black people, no longer even seeming to address Richards. Richards enters an atmosphere of emptiness, silence, and social rot.
Who Appears
- Ben RichardsFugitive contestant hiding in Boston under the false name John Deegan.
- Y.M.C.A. desk clerkRacist clerk who rents Richards a room without asking for identification.
- Black boyChild whose lost nickel sparks a cruel confrontation with the desk clerk.
- Old man in the lending libraryFrail reader whose presence adds to Richards’s sense of sorrow and decay.