Sea Foam

Chapter One

"And in first place for the 100m Butterfly Dash, with 1 minute and 50.78 seconds  . . . Arielle Blue!"

Arielle slapped the water with her fist, then raised it up to the cheering crowd, who cheered even louder. There was a huge grin on her face even as she got out of the water. No matter how times she won, she still loved the first few minutes of it.

"Great job, Arielle," her coach said with an even bigger smile than hers. "Keep this up, and you'll get a swimming scholarship for sure. Now go to your family; they're waiting for you over there."

Following her coach's arm, she ran to her grandmother, father, and two older sisters jumping and screaming on the bleachers, making sure not to slip on the water.

"Congratulations, Ari!" Her sisters, Andrea and Alanis, squealed behind the banister. "It won't be long before you end up like us!"

Arielle's dad laughed as he reached over to pat Arielle on her head. "You're making me proud, kid," he told her as his eyes shined. "You're following your old man's footsteps even better than I did!"

"Don't you mean swimming even faster than you did?" Arielle joked, although her smile turned a little fake.

"Just get back to your coach and team!"

Forcing a laugh, Arielle made her way back to the others.

- _ - _ - _ - _ - _ -

"It's not fair how the coach only favors Arielle."

"Right? I mean, if she did what she was supposed to do, everyone would be as good as Arielle, or even better. She's not even bothering with the rest of us."

Arielle stayed silent on the other side of the lockers as she listened to her teammates talk. The exhilaration from winning had now disappeared completely. Although she didn't like being talked about in that way, there was nothing she could do. They weren't lying, after all.

"And Arielle is such a bitch. She thinks she's better than everyone else just because she's the best swimmer on the team."

And Arielle's patience stopped there.

"Hi, Ingrid, Octavia." Arielle stepped out from her position, an insincere smile on her face. She didn't comment on what her teammates were talking about, but it was obvious that she knew.

"Um, hi," the girls squeaked before quickly grabbing their belongings and running out of the locker room.

As soon as the echo of their steps faded away, Arielle dropped her smile and also walked out of the locker room. She was sick of people thinking she liked being good at swimming, and even more when people acted like she bragged about it. The only reason why she hadn't quit was because of what the Blue family was known for. 

Her widowed grandmother was the first of their family to participate in the Summer Olympics for Swimming. She had received second place medal in 1980, with only a 0.9 second difference with the gold medalist. She was now retired, but many people still knew who she was, and some even asked for her autograph. Her father had also gone to the Olympics, but in 1996, and had brought home the gold medal. In the following Olympics, he had broken the world record by 2.3 seconds. It was now a little hard to tell that he had once been a swimmer, but he was still considered the living legend. 

And then there were her sisters, both as talented, if not even more, as their father and grandmother. Andrea was on the USA National Swimming Team, a small step below the Olympics team. Alanis was currently a junior at Koral Sports University on a full swimming scholarship. Both had been well-known swimmers at Larson High School of Sports and Arts, leaving Arielle to uphold their family name.