Higher, Faster, Stronger

"Sarah."

"Sarah…"

"SARAH!"

"What!?" I was just woken from a very nice daydream about making out with Derek.

It was Neil, who like everyone else was in their swimsuit and a t shirt.

Now, I bet you're all a bit confused. I'll rewind a bit. Now, after our nice long kiss, Derek let go and left with a small smile on his face. I went back inside very happy to prepare for another day. Then I promptly freaked out. I didn't know what this made us. Friends with benefits? Girlfriend boyfriend? Captain and peon?

GRAAAAARGGH!!

So of course I obsessed over this for a weekend and finally opted to ask him the next game. And we had three coming up. (all of which are going to be covered in this chapter.)

Now, Coach had asked us to bring a swimsuit and a t-shirt. And I was really wary about it. I swim in the off season, I know some of the drills. I wore a simple black one piece and pulled the t-shirt on.

As I was waiting for the rest of the team to show, I laid down on the bleachers and thought back to the previous night. For a while. Until Neil broke me out of my reverie.

Note to self: kill him later.

A loud whistle interrupted us. It was Coach who promptly told all of us to get a flipper from the side wall and jump in. I knew what he was going to do. He had us line up in the deep end, raise the flipper over our heads and tread water. Easy enough. For me at least, I was used to it. Nate, who didn't really have swim legs, looked like he was drowning. I was sandwiched between Neil, Derek and Nate. The point of the t-shirt was for extra drag in the water, just to make it harder. Then he moved onto endurance drills. I knew this one too, it was my least favorite. Knock out is having everyone line up on one side of the pool, and when the whistle is blown, having us dive in and swim to the other side.

We use it in football too, as a running drill. If they couldn't make it to the other side before a certain time was reached, then they were out. He had us take off our wet t-shirts for this one. With whistle in one hand and stop watch in another, we dove in and swam. Now, let me give you an insider's view on this.

Each time we got the other side, time was knocked off. The water would be turbulent, the sides are slippery to get up onto and you get tired and out of breath after a while. If the coach is drilling you fast, you can get dizzy too.

Never let it be said that swimming, like football is a sport for wusses.

The point of these drills was to bulk us up on endurance. He could easily do some of these drills running on land but Coach had two goals in mind for this practice session:

Have fun, and work us under foreign conditions. Lots of other sports use cross training (training with another sport) but I think this day was just mostly for us to have fun.

Back to Knock out.

The first few rounds he took it easy on us. Then about the fourth, people started to get out of the time limits and where therefore told to get out. I stayed in, as with the rest of my friends. For all of his inability to stay in one place, Nate proved to like Knock out. I think it was the challenger in him. In the last round, it was Nate and I. I had the advantage but he wouldn't give up. After a while, the coach stopped both of us and led us on into a half hour of free swim.

The next game was certain to be a killer. Our opposing team was rivaled to be in the top 5 in the country. Their coach never went down without a fight but luckily neither did ours. In fact, there's speculation that our coach is descended from the spawn of Satan but I'm pretty sure Cameron started that because of that one time Coach made him cry. If you ask him, he'll blame eye allergies. Wuss.

The name of the team was the Falcons. From their reputation, their best players were their Tight End, their Defensive Ends, and their receivers. The tight end can either be a blocker or receiver in a play depending on necessity. The defensive ends try to kill the quarterback. The receivers catch the balls in order to gain yards and points. We proceeded from the coin toss to the first period.

I'll recap who we have playing what. There are the 5 or so guys in the line up. Keegan is in front of Derek. I'm a couple of feet back from Derek. There's another guy: our halfback, in back of me.

Defense: Nate (linebacker), Cameron (defensive end) Sheamus (cornerback)

Offense: Derek (QB), Me (staying on as fullback), Neil (wide receiver), Keeg (center), Crash bros (left and right tackle)

Special Teams: Kael (kicker)

Shea's job is to cover receivers on the opposite team. If people get through the first line of defense, linebackers like Nate and the two others we have, make life not pretty for them. Case in point, our current game.

"Nathan!"

"Yes coach!"

"Go make their tight end miserable. He's been nice enough to return the favor."

He was only too happy to oblige because that meant slamming a "star player" straight into the grass. Which can be amusing. Don't get me wrong, it can hurt. But seeing a guy with a face full of grass spitting out dirt is a perk. Especially if it helps you score in the process. Which it did by the way. Now, as a fullback, I don't score very often. In fact, it's downright extraordinary to have me get the ball and run into the end zone. I'm a blocker, a runner, and having something else to worry about, like the ball isn't a huge part of my training. I have to make sure people don't die. In addition, I'm the QB's last line of defense.

Because if everyone else is busy and I have to block for someone else and him, then, well, we're screwed.

Like our current game: the way the play was going we were doing all we could to keep our receivers open and our boys who handle the ball from being mauled. One of the boy who blocks for Derek left his post. It was stupid and I knew coach was going to kill him later for it, but there was a decision to make. Either I could block for the current person, who seemed to be fine on his own or block for Derek who was wide open?

It took a split second. I saw it and started running. There were two men coming for him, and I could only get one. He could handle one on his own. My shoulder collided with the runner and we both went down. That was the first game. We ended up winning, though very narrowly.

What had happened was that Steve happened to see the team's weak spot in time for us to score ahead of them. Their free safety in the back field was their weak spot. He roams around trying to get anyone who got past the defense-he's their last chance to stop the scoring. We faked the ball up the middle of field and plowed through, as hard as that was. It took most of the downs to do it.

Our second game in this set of three was equally as horrendous. What made it bad was the conditions. The weather was really windy and from previous rain, the ground was muddy and slick. The wind was beating against us constantly and throwing off the passes that our team was making. The mud was slippery and when the play was called, it was a strength battle; being pushed back and forth in the sludge. A couple of guys got nailed down straight into the mud and came up looking like a yeti took a crap on them.

There wasn't a person among us who didn't go home and show their uniform in the washing machine.

But it wasn't easy. Nate was getting pretty beat up from these games. He was playing at the expense of his bodily functions. Keeg, our center was always bandaging his chest from the few times he was flattened into lawn pizza.

The season was trudging on slowly but surely. By a mixture of sheer dumb luck, fortunate circumstances, hard work and a lot of testosterone. I kid you not. We've had games that the other team has promised to us that they would make us eat the football we're trying to carry down field. We in turn try to wipe the spittle off it when the game is done and remind that although their comments weren't appreciated, the next time you mess with our team, you're going home with the undertaker on speed-dial.

Of course with half of the big tackles that we get, ½ of the crowd winces and prays, and the other half smiles like a crazed lion and hopes that their deity of choice will smite the opposing player down.

We've had mascot fights of course. Back against the Falcons, their giant bird kept trying to maul our man in the crimson and gold leaf costume. It's not very intimidating, a leaf as our mascot, but like to let our record stand for ourselves.

The problem with any team is that at the end of the season, you start to get tired of competing. You lose your vigor usually and because of the way that the season is set, you still have to worry about the first months of school. It was only mid October. Some people make careless mistakes. But in crunch time, the time before the semi finals and the champions, everyone works with renewed energy. Otherwise it just doesn't seem worth it.

Our season works on an elimination schedule. We're randomly selected to play teams. If we win, we advance in standings. The two teams on top at the end of the year battle for the championship to determine places 1 and 2 in the overall standing. That's the championships. The top four battle at the semifinals one team versus another and then the other team versus the remaining team. The two winners of that go to the championships.

The last game before the semifinals was a decent and yet bad for me. Second quarter right before the break, I was head butted in the ribs. A big collective 'ow' was heard in the stands. It wasn't even that the guy meant to do it, it was a domino effect and I was the end point. It knocked the wind straight out of me and left me in pain.

Keeg helped me off the field and Iz took over. She took off my outer layers of pads and gear on the benches. My entire right side was in pain. I couldn't drive home either; at break coach phoned mom who promptly freaked out and drove me to a hospital. I didn't hear a crunch so I didn't think anything was broken but after x rays and a stern talking from the doctor, I was released and taken home.

Luckily it was a Friday game so the weekend was rest time. I was in still pain and I couldn't go to practice until Wednesday. Friday was the semifinals-they were giving us a week after our last game.

On Sunday, I heard doorbell rang and gingerly got up to answer it. Mom was visiting a friend. It was about 3 and I said I wanted to rest anyway. It was true, I was gonna pop in a video with some popcorn or read a book or anything that didn't require to much exercise.

I opened the door to find Nate and Derek. Nate rushed forward to presumably hug me. I put up a guard in front of my body and closed my eyes but nothing happened. When I opened them, Derek was holding Nate by the collar.

"Idiot, use your head. If you hugged her, you'd hurt her ribs worse."

"Sorry Sarah." He looked solemn.

"What's wrong kiddo?" He looked worried.

"I wasn't there to protect you from getting hurt." I blanched. "Nate. I'm on offense and you're on defense. There is no physical way you could have protected me. Besides, I knew it was rough when I signed up for it. I'll be fine, you knucklehead." I ruffled his hair.

He smiled. "Heh, I just don't like my precious people getting hurt. Even that bastard. Even if that means I have to beat him into the ground to stop him from being stupid, I'll do it."

"Hurting someone to protect them…that's a new one." I answered. He looked up at his watch and his eyes went wide.

"Now what's wrong?"

"I gotta go meet Ian! See you tomorrow!"

He dashed out of there running like a chicken with his head cut off. That kid is as weird as they come. Kind of the equivalent of a giant teddy bear holding a shank.

3-1 = 2. Me and him left.

He crossed the threshold and followed me into the kitchen. I turned to him and asked hesitantly, "Does he do that often?"

He nodded. "It's normal."

"So, what brings you to my humble home on this lovely Sunday?"

"Checking up on you. Seeing how the pain was. Etc."

"I'm fine. I get a little winded now and then but otherwise I'm good. No painkillers unless I need them." I motioned for us to sit down.

A few awkward moments passed between us. I decided to ask what was on my mind.

"Question."

"Shoot."

"Why did you kiss me?"