Sydne Aguilar

Revision
5/8/18
Short Story: Reflection

I witnessed a miracle in the summer of 2008.

I was twelve years old at the time, with most of my life revolving around swimming. The
senior team I was a part of was small, maybe ten or eleven of us at any given moment.
Summers were particularly brutal for us, our three-a-day practices only leaving time to sleep
and eat. All of us were skinny, abnormally tan kids, with ripped abs and bleached hair that
constantly smelled of chlorine. In all honesty, we were a raggedy-looking bunch.
Our last tournament of that summer was the Junior Olympics, held in Fresno over four
days. It happened to coincide with the real Olympics, where Michael Phelps would be
attempting to win eight gold medals.
On the afternoon of the third day, my team and I were all piled listlessly in Rachel’s
hotel room, the air conditioning on as high as it could go. We felt sluggish, and the bedsheets
were white and cool. Only our hands occasionally reached up to nudge someone’s foot out of
their face, or fan themselves with a pillow. We were like cows out in a field, whose tails
twitched only when necessary to shoo away flies.
The Olympics were on the television. Phelps and the USA 4x100 relay was scheduled
that day. Phelps had been smashing records left and right. Our tournament, on the other hand,
wasn’t going so great. Whether we were tired, or had subconsciously given up at this point in
the season, we didn’t really know.
“I want ice cream,” Eric piped up suddenly. “Doesn’t that sound amazing right now?”
Kendall groaned, a blissful expression on her face. “I would literally murder one of you
for some vanilla soft serve.”
The room echoed with our sudden flavor daydreams. Robert wanted mint chip, two
scoops in a waffle cone. Jesse want Ben and Jerry’s Cherry Garcia. Clare wanted froyo.
“Guys, come on,” Rachel said, scowling. “Coach would literally kill us for ruining our diet
plan.”
“Chill out, Rachel. You know we aren’t being serious,” said Teagan, ever the
peacemaker.
But the fantasy was ruined. We lapsed into humid silence once more, each silently
cursing the fact that Rachel was right.
Diet plans were just one facet of our rigorous summer schedule. A typical day for us
started at 5am, when we would roll out of bed for a 530 to 8am practice. We would hang out
and eat on the pool deck afterwards, waiting for our dryland workout from 11-1pm. Go home,
take a nap, and then come back at 4 for more pool work until 7pm. Rinse and repeat.
I think we were the only kids who celebrated the start of the school year, because it
meant double practices instead of triple.
To be so devoted to a sport as a young teenager was not common, and caused a lot of
our classmates and friends to question why we put ourselves through it. And on those days
where we would fall asleep at our desks, or have to miss birthday parties for weekend
tournaments, or skip out on drinking soda or eating sweets, we often questioned our decisions
as well.
Today, we were just excited to watch Phelps succeed again. He was a hero for many of
us, and we felt that as long as he was doing well, we would be happy. He alone would save us
from our slump, our indifference. We almost had to believe that.
We watched the race start. Phelps dove off the blocks to the roar of the crowd, swam
his laps fast, and touched the wall in the lead. We were winning! But as the race progressed, we
were passed by the French, and then the Australians. By the time Jason Lezak, our anchor,
jumped off, team USA was in third place by quite a large margin.
The arena had become hushed. Back in our Fresno hotel room, we sat equally stunned.
They were going to lose. We were seeing a dream die before our eyes, and suddenly, we were
angry. How dare Phelps let us believe he could do it.
One of our teammates, Dustin, was obsessed with Greek mythology. He used to recite
the myths to us during car rides, before inevitably one of us would bean him with a pillow. Was
Phelps our Icarus? It certainly felt like it, at that moment. Phelps had aimed too close to the
sun, and we were the horrified townspeople witnessing the fall. To see him failing now was a
horrible, ugly reality that none of us were prepared to deal with.
And then the really miraculous thing happened. Look! My teammate Eric yelled. We
looked. Lezak had started to catch up.
We were all up in a flash, some crowding on the carpet around the television, as
physically close to the screen as possible. The rest of us stood on the bed to see above their
heads. We were screaming, cheering, digging our nails into each other’s arms tightly as we
watched Lezak slowly close the gap.
The American announcers were yelling along with us, sounding like they were losing
their minds.

Can Jason Lezak do it?! Will it be enough to get Phelps that gold?
Not a chance, Bob. It’s too late.
I think he could do it, Rowdy!
I don’t think so, Bob. I really…wait! Wait, he’s doing it! I can’t believe what I’m seeing,
Bob!

Until finally…

HE DID IT! JASON LEZAK! PHELPS’ DREAM IS STILL ALIVE!

We threw our hands in the air in victory, jumping up and down. At that point, it felt like
our victory as well. The entire corridor outside was coming to life; we could hear our fellow
swimmers’ muffled celebrations through the walls.
We continued watching, Phelps screaming and running around and crying like a little
kid. Lezak grinning up from the water and pointing at him, yelling That was for you! over and
over. The entire stadium on their feet. I imagined that the rafters were shaking just as much as
that Fresno hotel floor.
 Did you see? was whispered up and down our pool deck later that afternoon. Did you
see what they did? But really, we were asking Did you see what they did for us?
Because that’s what it felt like: that somehow, all the way in Beijing, they knew we
needed to see them win. That relay inspired hope. It ignited a fire underneath all those young
swimmers, both in the moment and for years afterward.
We went out for our races that night with a new pep in our step. The pool deck, just that
morning humid and lethargic, seemed to reflect our new outlook back at us, a cool wind
blowing as the late afternoon turned to dusk. There were shouts and splashes and joyous yells
for each race, the sound of people’s teammates lining up behind their lane to cheer.
Our spirit was revived. We had been reminded of our love for the sport. We had seen
ourselves, all the hard work we put in and suffered through, reflected on the television screen
earlier. For us, Lezak and Phelps had achieved the ultimate dream: not of winning an Olympic
medal, necessarily, but of finishing a race knowing that every moment leading up to it had not
been in vain.
The image of that relay team celebrating what had seemed impossible, unattainable,
has never really left my mind since.
Phelps went on to win his eight gold medals, gracing the cover of Sports Illustrated a
few weeks later. I carefully tore it out and taped it in a place of honor on my childhood
bedroom wall, where it remains to this day.
One of the greatest moments of my young life wasn’t even mine, technically. But it felt
like it.