Face Your Demons

Part 16

"What's happening here?" I worriedly whispered to her as soon as she arrived.

"I heard about it while we were playing kickball. Apparently, she's been after Aiden, and, do you remember the whole dashing off to the sunset with Mr. Hunky on his motorcycle incident? Well, almost half of the school saw you on that day and it has left a deep impression. I think she feels threatened by you. This is her way of undermining you," she reported to me while she fixed my hair in a ponytail. On a side note, Eve talks a mile a minute without catching a single breath; you can barely catch up with what she is uttering when she is stressed or jolly or so enraged she is about seconds before murdering someone.

"There's nothing going on between me and Aiden," I asserted, "The exact opposite actually, things just went Antarctic cold after that." That last sentence rolled off my tongue with a hidden feeling of grumpiness and disappointment.

"Are you going to challenge her?" I should have clearly answered 'no' but my little proud tiger within me had woken up and felt the need to roar. I nodded affirmatively to Eve and began marching boldly back to the others. My heart beat began to rise rapidly, why? Was I nervous? I didn't feel stressed at all. It was a peculiar sensation, a feeling of raging energy and confidence. Ms. Bree came running, rather belatedly, towards us. She interrogated us about what exactly was going on.

"Ms. Bree? Can you please time us? Chloe and I are doing a match," she looked surprised as I explained the situation to her.

"Are you sure, Sophie?" Why was everyone undermining me? Especially right now, when I was feeling immensely powerful. Something inside me assured me that I was going to win with an impressive victory.

Ms. Bree held her stopwatch and watched us both as we took our mark. With a firm tone she loudly voiced: "On my mark. Ready. Set..." Every sense of rationality was gone and all that controlled me was a beast fighting to be unleashed. "GO!" she shouted from the end of the track and I immediately felt my body dashing forward as if an unnaturally intense force was pushing me and driving me to the finish line at great speeds. My hair was blown back and the air slid across my forehead and cheekbones. Before I knew it and before I could understand what had just happened, I had finished.

However, there were no cheers. The field was completely and utterly silent, making me feel as if I was the only one there. Did I lose? I turned around and glanced at the shocked Chloe who came to a quick halt at just the first twenty metres. Everyone was gaping at me in shock; some with their jaw dropping open as well. All of them were acting as if I had broken the world record or something. They were all so surprised that I won – that kind of pissed me off. I knew Chloe was a great athlete, but it seemed that everyone around here was underestimating my talent in sprinting.

"YEAH!" my victorious scream broke the awkward quietness. "Take that!" I mockingly said the first random thing that came to my mind while pointing at the proud-defeated Queen. Then I heard a clap. And another one. And then a wave of claps came gushing at me. Cheers, whistles and congratulating shouts. I felt great! No, I felt awesome! I was grinning so widely, my cheek muscles hurt, but I still couldn't stop smiling. I was drenched in bliss. Each deep breath I took felt like an award, a medal. I felt...alive!

"Sophia Steel. In my office. Now! The rest of you can have a five-minute break, I'll be back." Ms. Bree's face was burning red and she was strongly clenching her stopwatch. She strode past the fields and into the building. As I followed her, many of my classmates gathered around me and shook my hand or gave me a loving hug; patted my head, shoulders, back while they all talked with admiration about how unbelievably fast I had run.