Chapter 8 - Ocean - Battle Against St. Reece’s Part 2

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Ocean

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The crowd was cheering. The energy levels were high. Everyone was excited because Jasper High was winning. And all I could feel was a crushing defeat.

I was swimming at my best. Pushing myself as hard as I could. Yet it still wasn't enough. For so long I had thought of myself as the best. I had thought that no one could ever come close to beating me.

Was this my punishment for being prideful? Was this what I got for thinking that I had it all? Is the universe telling me that I was taking everything that it had given me for granted?

I didn't know right now. I didn't have the time nor the energy to contemplate that right now. I needed to focus. I still had three races to do before the day was over.

First was the two hundred meter freestyle. I was once again paired with Makai for the race. He swam in the lane next to mine like before. I did my best to not focus on him. To think that everything was back to normal and it was just me racing at practice against my best friends.

I pushed myself hard, driving myself forward with all that I had. The feeling of the water was always like home to me. It was my safe haven. There was nothing that could possibly bother me while I was in the water.

I let those calming feelings wash over me and I pushed myself to do the best that I could. When I finished my fourth lap and looked up to see my time I saw that it was one minute and forty-four seconds on the nose. A good time. The St. Reece swimmers had finished at about one minute forty-seven second. Makai Rivers finished in one minute forty-three and a half seconds.

I had lost again.

The next race was the two hundred meter breaststroke. I blocked out all sound from the surrounding area except the whistle that would tell us to start. As I waited in position for the race to start I noticed that the water looked blurry. I probably just had too much run off on my goggles, it was clouding my vision.

When the whistle blew and it was time to start swimming I jumped and swam immediately. And so did Makai who was once again in the lane next to me. As I swam this time I felt a sort of hollow pit form in the center of my stomach. It was like I was letting these nerves eat away at me.

After pushing myself as hard as I could I came up at the end of my four laps to see I had not beaten my record nor had I beaten Makai. My time was two minutes nine and three quarter seconds. Makai finished it in a quarter of a second faster than I did. It was such a close race that I knew that many people were unclear at first. But nope, Makai had beaten me again.

My last race was also the last race of the day. It was the two hundred meter butterfly. This was one of my best races. I was close to beating the world record on this, just like the other styles. I felt confident as I walked toward the podium.

I hadn't noticed anything was off at all until Makai grabbed my shoulder and steadied me, but apparently I had been a little wobbly and about to fall over.

"Hey, Ocean, are you alright?" I couldn't tell if the tone of his voice was worried or condescending. All I heard were the words themselves.

"I'm fine."

"You don't look fine, dude. You look like you're about to keel over." He still had his hand on my shoulder so I pulled myself away from him.

"I said I'm fine." I snapped the words at him and hurried away.

There were no more issues as I made my way to the podium. I refused to give up now. It was the last race of the day. There was no way that I was handing over my last chance to beat Makai today. I was going to do my best like I always did.

The water looked blurry just like it did before. It was probably just the run off on my goggles again. I was in position now and any second the whistle would blow.

My heart was pounding. The thumping was so loud that I didn't have to block out the sound of the crowd around us. All of that was already drowned out by the drumming of my heart.

I hadn't been this nervous about a race in my entire life. Not the first one back in middle school and not a single one since. I didn't know why I was always so nervous lately, I just was.

When the whistle blew I soared into the water. I pushed myself hard. Faster and faster. I needed to go faster. I had to push myself more and more.

I didn't notice anything wrong during the first lap. All was fine. My vision was clear. The second lap was just as smooth. On the third lap I noticed just a little bit of clouding at the edge of my vision. It was slowly darkening just a tiny bit.

On my last lap I noticed that my vision was darkening more and more. When I got to the edge of the pool I barely noticed that I was there. I almost slammed into the side, thankfully my fingers brushed the edge and I was able to catch myself before anything bad happened.

The race had seemed like it was happening in slow motion for me. It was like time was almost standing still and I was moving on a separate plane of existence.

When I came up for air and looked at my time I was appalled. I had gone slower than I did during practice recently. One minute fifty-five seconds flat. How could I have done worse? How could I have let myself do so poorly?

Then I turned to look at Makai's time. He finished at one minute fifty-four and three tenths of a second. If I had done my time that I had done last week.. If I had done the best that I know I am capable of, then I would have beaten him. How? How did it come to this?