Blind Ambition | ✓

12 | Destruction

People say your life flashes before your eyes when you die. My life flashed before me every time I took a snap, and I truly existed in those moments  - suspended between creation and destruction, toeing a fine line between my existence and my demise. Nothing more than a dance with the devil.

But with the glaring white of the stadium lights beating down on me, I almost wondered if this was the moment that I finally faltered, and my flirtationship with destruction was about to become a permanent marriage. But then Chris stepped into the light, his shock of red hair the most welcome sight I'd ever seen. I wasn't dying, but holy fuck it sure felt like it.

"Dallas? Dallas! Come on man, get up." There was a pause. "Please, get up."

The distress in Chris's voice was so apparent, I could hear it over the blood pumping through my ears. The glare of the lights forced my eyes shut, desperate to soothe the jackhammering in my skull. The air around me was too close and too quiet, too much of everything that made the adrenaline in my body skyrocket. I hoped that maybe when I opened my eyes again, I'd be dreaming. I felt my body being moved, pain shooting through me in waves like I was being electrocuted over and over again. I couldn't catch my breath, gasping like a dead fish in the hot, sticky night air.

I felt like a helpless child. I want my dad. Take me home.

When I finally pried my eyes open, I was staring at the glossy, pale blue linoleum floors of the locker room. Commotion swirled around me as I was brought to the back and laid face down onto one of the plastic cushioned tables in the trainer's room. Sweat trickled in little rivers down my temples and cheeks, clinging to my eyelashes the way drops of rain clung to tree branches after a summer storm. I shut my eyes again and pressed my face down into the towel, desperate to tune into the array of hushed voices that talked about me as if I was already dead on the operating table.

"I couldn't see, he got hit so fast."

Coach Knox, but in a tone so unfamiliar it took me a moment to place his voice. It was panic. Sheer panic.

"It was a nasty chop block, he landed awkwardly on his shoulder."

I immediately recognized the gravelly voice of our athletic trainer, Coach Spencer, which only fueled the panic.

"God damn it I'm right here you know," I managed to sputter out, but even talking was a labor.

Lying on my stomach, it was awkward to try and look up at anyone, and the more I tried, the more my head pounded and ached.

Coach Spencer knelt down to my eye level and shined a little flashlight in my eyes. "You know your name?"

"Dallas Gunther," I replied through clenched teeth.

"Do you know where you are?"

"Football game." My breath was so sharp that every word that came up was like a knife to the inside of my throat. "I...did we win?"

"Doesn't seem to have a concussion." Coach Spencer stood back up and addressed the rest of the coaching staff, again as if I was just a lifeless corpse in front of them.

"Can someone just tell me what the hell is going on?" I moaned.

The door of the locker room slammed, and as I gingerly glanced around as best as I could, I caught sight of the gold of my father's Cornell class ring as he strode in.

"Hey." He knelt down in front of me and put his hand on my cheek. "You're going to be okay, alright? Alright?"

For a moment I wasn't sure if he was reassuring me, or himself. I sucked in a sharp breath and put my face back down in the towel. I heard Coach Spencer's voice again.