C.D. Bell

She ran as the first maples started to change color, then the oak.She jumped over roots, she sidestepped brambles, her footfalls echoing off plank bridges traversing streams.She was the first person at practice. The last to go home.She ran for speed. She ran for distance. She stretched carefully first thing in the morning and last thing before bed.

Everything was glowing and shining, and she herself was flying inside that glow. She could do anything. Be anything.

The familiar (if loud) churn of the engine made it hard to talk, especially with the windows open (the air-conditioning didn__ work), but the day was warm and they blasted the music and sang along. Nessa loved singing at full volume. She couldn__ carry a tune, but with Bree it didn__ matter.

She wasn__ going to back down. She knew that. She communicated that. She was here until the death.

People live inside the stories they tell themselves. Others see about you the things that you believe.

Nessa had never really felt truly beautiful before, but tonight she not only understood that she was beautiful, she understood that everyone was. That for all the competition and fear and knowing that the next runner was coming up behind you, she had been missing out on how beautiful life could be. She should have been watching and appreciating others instead of waiting inside herself for the right time to shine. The time was now.