my story for bridgits flame
There it goes. Gone. Forever.
“You are the number two alternate”
The words sliced through me, carving out sections of my soul. I stared at my golf coach in disbelief struggling to maintain my composure as my world crashed down all around me, leaving nothing unscathed in its destruction. Those six words. Who knew they had so much power?
My golf bag suddenly seemed heavier, carrying all my burdens on my shoulders weighing me down, my stomach tightened up, a ball of tension squeezing at my insides, making them as disfigured as I felt. I embraced it, I couldn’t deal with what my mind was telling me. There had to be a mistake. For just one minute I locked everything away, clung to the small piece of hope I still had left. An addition error, yeah that’s it! Wrong scores, misplaced numbers! A whole plethora of things that she could have overlooked.
I walked slowly up to her, she was still figuring the numbers out with the winner, the thief that had stolen my destiny. I talked to her, we went over the numbers. The judging wasn’t of the entire season, but only of certain matches, and at those matches I did not play well. Of Course. I was the better player overall I kept on telling myself that, but the numbers don’t lie. These do. If we did a whole seasons worth of numbers then I would emerge victorious. A fluke. The fickle hand of fate, the only reason I did not win. The unjustness of it all made my sight haze over red with anger.
My voice cracked several times, clueing her in on the fact that I was not okay. I leaned over and gripped the cart my knuckles turning bone white. I tipped my hat down, casting my eyes in shadow hiding my pain from the world. My coach sensing my distress, patted me on the back, her hand brushing up and down on my shoulder blade and said “You have improved so much this year, I know it’s no consolation….” I stopped her right there, responding. “Yeah I know”
So there it was my entire future flying past my eyes. It was over. Gone. Forever
But there is always next year.