Chapter 265 - Makai – The Tournament Part 1

~~

Makai

~~

The entire day that I went sightseeing with Ocean and the others, it seemed to me that Ocean had been upset about something. I don't really know what it was, but I knew that something was wrong. I wanted to talk to him about it, but I didn't want to do it with everyone else around.

After the sightseeing, we all had dinner together, the twelve members of the swim team and the coach. We had made reservations at the restaurant for us all to enjoy the meal together. And it was going so well, that we ended up staying for several hours talking and ordering different items to keep eating. It was very nice, all in all. However, when we made it back to the room, it was late, and Ocean said he just wanted to shower and get ready for bed. I could understand that too. We did have a busy few days ahead of us so we were going to need our rest. But I did vow to myself that I was going to talk to him soon. Probably after the tournament so that I didn't mess him up before he had to swim.

In the morning, we got up, packed our athletic bags for the event, and went down to breakfast. Ben, Ryan, Charlie and Toby were the first to join us. Coach came next. And almost like they all planned it, the girls all came down in one big group when we barely had time left to eat. 

"You ladies need to hurry up." The coach scolded them. "We don't have long before we need to leave."

"Yeah, yeah, OK." Cassie, who was not a morning person, sounded very annoyed. "We will eat as quickly as we can." She said that while simultaneously shoving a piece of bacon into her mouth. It definitely was not very lady like, but it was exactly like Cassie.

"Just hurry up, and without the attitude, please." The coach reiterated and adjusted his comment from earlier.

"By the way, Coach, how are we getting to the center today?" Toby asked him, obviously thinking about what we needed to do to get to the pool that we would be swimming at this weekend.

"Well, I plan on calling a few cabs to take us over." He shrugged like that was no big deal at all. It's a good thing that my parents and I usurped this whole trip. I don't know what the coach was planning here, but he was out of his element.

"Yeah, that would take a long time. It's a good thing that my parents chartered a bus to take us to and from the event center all weekend long." I didn't look up just then. I didn't want to see the look in the coach's eyes. He was either going to be so grateful that he was on the edge of tears, or he would look so annoyed at my continued interruption. I would just wait for his words to figure it out.

"Th..that's amazing, Makai. Your parents sure thought of everything. And the food here in the hotel, even the restaurants in the hotel, is fully covered. This is saving the school so much money. I..I don't know what to say. Thank you. Thank you so much."

"It's fine, coach. Don't worry about it. You should use the extra funds to upgrade something in the school. I am sure that there is something that it could be put towards." I was doing my best to make it sound like it wasn't that big of a deal. I mean, it wasn't really. It was just that my parents wanted to spoil their four boys. I couldn't help it that they did this for the team.

"Your parents truly are amazing." Alexis shook her head in disbelief.

Thankfully there wasn't much talking after that. We ended up just eating as quickly as we could without actually choking on the food. By the time that we were all done eating, it was time for us to go.

The bus that my parents got for us was here and all we had to do was get on it and leave. It was a spacious bus for just the thirteen of us. The seats were comfortable and luxurious with a nice chill atmosphere. However, we didn't get to enjoy it for too long, since it was only a half an hour's drive to the event center.

This sports complex was bigger than the one we had gone to before. It had a lot more pools available to use at once and we were going to be using them all. There were three dozen different locker rooms, but even that wasn't enough.

There were teams here from forty-eight different states. Those different states needed the top three individual men and the top three individual women. They also had the winning men's and the winning women's team. Not all of those people were from the same school. For example, Katie was here as the new third place women's individual swimmer from California. But the other two women were from a different school. And Ocean and I were the first and second place men from California, but there was a different man from a different school that was here as well. Basically what I am saying here, is that not every school was able to get their own locker room. Most of the schools had to mix them up. Since half of those locker rooms were for men and the other half were for the women.

We did luck out though and our locker rooms were next to each other. I also think that we were one of the only schools here that had so many people from the same school. I think that the winning Florida team was the only other one that was as populated as us. Most of the other groups only had between two and six people that had come to the competition.

This time, it took a lot longer to get registered than it did at the previous competition. That was mostly because there were people from all over the country instead of just from all over the state. As far as teams went, there were ninety-six teams, which was less than last time. But if you couple that with all of the individual swimmers here that weren't on a team then it definitely seemed like more people. At least in my opinion.

After we finally made it through registration and went to our locker rooms to change, I could feel the excitement growing within me. This competition was something that I had been working towards for a long time. And not only was I here, but Ocean was too. We both loved this sport and we wanted to be able to do this one last thing before we went off to college with Ben and Ryan.

The six guys from our team took out the locks that we had brought for the locker room and chose a spot to put our stuff. We changed into our speedos as quickly as possible and then put on the school uniforms over the top of them. Once we were ready, we were able to go into the pool area.

The moment that we entered that space, we saw just how crazy full and hectic it was in there. Each team, individual swimmers, and coach were trying to find their designated space to wait until it was their time to swim. Thankfully, there were eight pools here instead of just the four that were at the location of the last tournament. We would still need to do more than one set of heats for each type of swim that there was, but it would still go a lot quicker than the last time.

And just like last time, they were dividing up the days into different events. Today was the teams preliminary. Tomorrow would be the individual preliminaries. And, on Sunday, we would have the finals for all of the races. That meant that people like me, Ocean and Katie, who were here for both teams and individuals, we would have to swim all three days and double on Sunday.

It was going to be a busy weekend for all of us. I was betting that we would be tired and just want to collapse at the end of the day. However, I was also certain that each and every one of us, not just on my team or from my school but with all of the teams from all of the schools, we were all excited and ready to get started. True swimmers, those that train to make it to these competitions, they are always ready for something like this. They are always ready to show what they are made of. Well, at least the swimmers that I knew were. 

We found our designated area located very close to the pool. Apparently, since we had so many people in the tournament from our school, we were receiving some preferential treatment. The two schools that had their men's and women's team and at least one individual swimmer here were going to be seated side by side. I thought that was a little bit odd, but who was I to question it?

I admit that I wasn't paying attention to any of the schools around us. All I wanted to do was make it to my seat and sit down so that we could be ready when this whole event got started. That was probably why I hadn't noticed at first when someone was calling out to me.

"Makai!"