#Did anyone else think that it was spelled “breastroke” or was that just me. Because I'm really mad that's not how it's spelled

[the-down-upside-finch]

The Time I Broke My Foot By Jumping Into a Swimming Pool

{"Eleven Truths and a Lie" Series}

For the context behind these stories: [X]

I was ten years old, or maybe twelve. My mom says I was probably eleven. Maybe it's a good thing I don't really remember when it happened—that the memory itself is vague and distant. Having a low pain tolerance usually makes these sorts of things more vivid in my brain, but not this time. (I wonder why that is.) The local rec center had two swim teams. I was a devil ray, having earned my spot after showing that I was faster than the dolphins that I had initially been grouped with. I had strong lungs, so I didn't have to breathe as often. I was made for the water—or so they said.

Sometimes the meets were every weekend, sometimes they weren't. I always had to go because I'd made a commitment, and they wanted me doing breaststroke for the IM race. We weren't allowed to have cell phones with us anywhere near "the deck" (as my coach called it), since it would be a risk to have electronics anywhere near the water. And so I handed my phone to my parents and left to go warm up. The team had been to this pool before—and we all knew the water was much colder than we were used to. It was lucky that they had a separate pool for the swimmers to warm up in. This particular place also had bleachers up on a balcony, making it feel more official than having the spectators crowded around the outer perimeter of the pool. I guess that's why they always held the local "championship" meets at this particular pool—because there was enough room for the thirty-and-something teams that attended. Eventually, it was time for my first event of the day. Had it been anything other than backstroke, I might have been all right. But it was backstroke, and you don't start on the diving block for a backstroke race. You start in the water.

At the ref's signal, I jumped in the water along with the nine other swimmers that had made it to the finals. I had forgotten that we weren't in the deep end. Instead of plunging into the nine-foot-deep water that I had been expecting to be beneath me, my legs buckled as I hit the bottom of the three-foot-deep shallow end. An entire foot of my height was still above the water. It hurt, but that was expected. I didn't have time to think about anything other than grabbing the handles on the diving block and pressing my toes against the side of the pool so I could launch myself backwards with as much power as I possibly could.

The garbled voice of the ref blared through his megaphone. "Set." We all pulled ourselves into position. The signal—which was kind of like a mix between the honk of a clown car, an angry goose, and an airhorn, all being played through an old intercom speaker—was given, and we all dove back into the water, dolphin-kicking with our whole bodies until we surfaced. I was always underwater the longest. The coach said that's what makes you faster. The longer you can stay underwater, the farther ahead you'll be when you get to the surface. When you see the flags, you start counting. I was short in height, but my arms were long—and I reached the wall in four strokes. It was a short race, so I didn't have to worry about flipping over and turning around. I just had to touch the wall. As everyone does if they care about times or scores, the first thing I looked at was the board with my name listed on it.

Third place. I didn't have much time to celebrate. The meet was running behind schedule, so they made us get out of the pool as soon as we slapped the wall. I grabbed the edge of the diving block and hoisted myself out of the water, exactly the way I had done a thousand times before. The pain that shot through my entire body when I tried to put weight on my foot was enough to take me to the ground. I couldn't walk. I couldn't even stand. Managing to half-hobble, half-drag myself to the corner where my team had set up camp, I collapsed on the slick stone floor and clutched my duffle bag, trying not to cry. I still had three more races that day—but my foot had been fine in the water, so it would all be okay. Right?

My parents were in the bleachers up on the balcony, completely unaware that their daughter had done something so bad to her foot that she couldn't even put weight on it. I wondered if my dad had gotten my collapse on video, since he recorded all of my races. My phone was safely away from the water, tucked in my mom's purse—completely useless. I was ten—or maybe eleven or twelve—and I had come face-to-face with a decision that I didn't have the mental capacity for: either tough it out for the team, or see to the needs of my own well-being. I was sobbing as I started trying to flag down my parents. I was so far away from the balcony, on the complete other side of the massive pool, unable to get any closer. I couldn't yell for help—couldn't make a scene bigger than the one I was already making. I had never felt so helpless.

Eventually, someone noticed. In a blur, I was suddenly in my dad's arms, being carried as fast as he could safely run to the car in the parking lot while my mom carried my bag. They put a towel on the seat, set me on top of it, buckled me in, and then we were off. I cried the whole way to InstaCare. "Does it hurt when I do this?" asked the doctor (or whoever was seeing to me), lightly turning my foot to rotate my ankle. She asked that same question several more times, doing something different to my foot each time she asked. I answered yes more than I answered no. Broken, was the verdict—more of a fracture, really, but still broken. I just didn't need a cast. We already had a pair of crutches at home for some reason, so that saved us an investment. There was no need to decorate my foot in brightly-colored bandage wrap—which we also already had a ton of, leftover from that time I ran over my own toe with a heavy metal door at school.

On the bright side, I got to wear a super cool boot to school—meaning I was the one kid that was allowed to wear something that wasn't a closed-toe shoe. And now I can tell people that yes, I once broke my foot by jumping into a swimming pool. I just thought it was going to be deeper than it was.

Taglist (please let me know if you want to be added or taken off): @my-cursed-prince, @athenswrites

#ZootaWrites #Did anyone else think that it was spelled “breastroke” or was that just me. Because I'm really mad that's not how it's spelled #cw injury #cw: injury #Content warning. just in case. even though I don't go into a ton of detail #Writeblr #Writers on Tumblr #Writers of Tumblr #Short Story #Long Post #Eleven Truths and a Lie Series #Sorry for the weird formatting. The OCD dictates that I indent (I'm not even kidding) so I had to format weird to make it work #Writing #Creative Writing #Some of these will be written stylistically different but I wanted to write this one in this style