I walk into the locker room behind my team. Trey and Alex high five me. "Nice free throughs! Dang, you face does look bad!"
"Shut up!" I playfully punch Alex in the arm.
"Uh, coach? Linds needs to be cleaned up."
Coach comes towards me with a wet rag, an ice pack, and a cleanex. I attempt at cleaning my face. It only smears the blood everywhere. When pressure is put on my nose, I feel like crying out in pain. Some boys on my team keep sneaking a glance at it and cringing. I force a lopsided smile. Coach comes back in after talking to the refs.
"They said that you can still play. If, of course, you are up to it." He explains
"Yup." I say. "I am up for it."
"Good. We need you." Coach says.
He give us our "pep talk" and we began walking out of the locker room. "Sorry to break it to you Linds, but I think it's broken." Alex says.
"My nose?" I reach up to feel it. Sure enough. It's croked and slightly bent. "Crap!" my voice echoes in the dark hallway. "Maybe I can't play!" I am practically yelling.
"Chill sister!" Trey says. "Hopefully coach doesn't notice."
"My mom will!"I yell and coach turns around. I am screwed.
"Your nose doesn't look good. At all!" coach studies it. "Does it hurt really badly?" He runs his hand over it and I try not to wince.
"Uh... no. Not at all."
"I am sure she's fine coach." Alex jumps to my rescue.
"Yeah. Just fine." Trey joins too.
"Well... if it starts hurting, you let me know." He says.
"Will do!" I force another painful smile.
We warm up for about seven minutes. Then the ref blows his shiny black whistle three short times. They start with the ball because we won the tip. They inbound. Alex, Trey, and I triple team the ball. Trey's tan arm nails me in the face. Small black dots blur my vision. I fight through the pain. Alex ends up snatching the ball and passing to Trey for a left hand layup. We pretty much dominate the second half. Halfway through however. My vision is really blurry. My eyes roll back into my head.
"Coach! Linds needs out no-" a voice says.
I black out.
YOU ARE READING
HARDER THAN IT LOOKS
AcakI am a girl. So what? Almost all of my friends are boys. Big deal. We are all friends, brought together by the game. My strength: ball handling. My weakness: I am small. Tall, but very skinny. Size really matters in this game. I am playing better th...
