I sat on the bleachers in the middle of the night staring blankly at the Chester county high school track. This track was where I spent most of my life before. Before I was torn from my old life of athletics and academics, equally important in my eyes. Before the accident. My sister was driving us to school the first day of my junior year, I'm younger, so I still couldn't drive. It was her senior year, she had told me the exciting year she hoped for, going out with a bang. She never got that chance. Two blocks from the school a mini van ran a red light, slamming into the driver's side of her small civic. She was killed on impact, but me? I was thrown into this new life, without the girl I went to with all my problems. But I didn't know that for the first three weeks because I was in a coma. When I woke to one less family member I wished i hadn't woken up at all, I missed her from the moment it registered in my head that she was actually gone. Then the doctors dropped the next bomb, making my recovery even harder. They told me that I probably would never run again. Running was my life. I had been on the track team since the sixth grade, as one of the top sprinters. I ran cross country when I was little, then after taking a few years off started again. I spent most of my free time running or conditioning for running. When the doctors told me I might not be able to run again I broke. I sat in my room saying nothing for hours on end only getting up to use the bathroom, and occasionally, eat. This was the first time I had left my room in a month. I shut everyone out, my three best friends, my teammates and all other people who pretended to care. Maybe they actually did care, but I didn't anymore. Looking over the track where I had run so many races and complained about so many workouts, taking them for granted, tears fell silently down my cheeks. I missed the burning in my lungs, the feeling of my sore muscles after a good workout, I even missed sweating buckets, which I used to hate.
"Hey" a voice came from behind, making me jump out of my thoughts. I turned around to see one of my best friends, jasper.
"Hi" I whispered "how did you know?"
"I was having a sleepless night and I assumed if you were too, you would have come to your favorite place."
"You know me too well sometimes." Seeing him, a large part of my old life, made tears well up, reminding me of the past and i hoped he couldn't hear the tremor in my voice.
"How have you been? I haven't seen you since you woke up."
"Shitty. Did you hear what the doctors said?" My voice broke just thinking about it.
"No, do you want to talk about it?" He said wrapping his arms around me allowing me to sob into his shoulder.
"They said I might not be able to run again." I new I was barley understandable through the tears but I didn't care. He tensed, knowing how much running meant to me.
"Key words girly," he murmured, calling me the nickname I always yelled at him for. "Might. I bet you that if you put your stubborn mind to it, you'd be able to again." I didn't answer, just sat there letting him hold me until the tears stopped streaming. "I'll help you as much as you need, and I'm sure Haley and Melissa will be willing to help too, Cassie."
" I don't know..." I trailed off.
"Go home and get some sleep. I'll call the girls in the morning to see if they'll meet with us and we can discuss getting you up and running once you aren't a sleep deprived teary mess." He always knew how to handle me at my worst, and I agreed to get some sleep and think about meeting them in the morning, mostly to make him feel better, I had no intention of meeting with them tomorrow. I limped to the car and drove home where I burrowed under my covers and fell into a deep sleep.
