Faster.

I am replaced.

Practice. Who are the new kids? Tall, well muscled, good-looking. Their suits and caps and goggles, all brand new and shiny in the bright morning sun. Next to them, I feel so small and ugly. Where was the pride I felt three days ago, at the meet? My stomach turns just looking at them, for I know what they mean. Coach promised we were the final generation, that no one would ever replace us. She lied. These are part of the new generation, the ones who are stronger, faster, sleeker, cooler, better than us.

I keep up with them during practice, though by the end I'm exhausted to the point of crying. The best among them, a brown haired blue eyed boy, smirks at me from his position among his peers. I feel so terrible, as if I am the worst person ever to walk the planet. Is that how they feel around me? I think this, watching as the rest of my generation shakily pulls themselves out of the pool. Am I as bad as they are?

It's another fun day, Coach says. Newcomers against the veterans, meaning new generation against old. She's picking and choosing who she's going to keep around with the new generation. Suddenly, SHE doesn't seem so bad. Coach was only giving her a second chance. I feel slightly ashamed when I think it, but I want to be the next SHE. I don't want to leave like this, bumped out by the new generation. So I swim hard and fast, faster than ever before. I lose. We all do, to them. Coach talks to each of us privately after practice, letting each one of us go until all of us have been told to pack our bags.

All of us except me.