Sports Day Accident

It was sports day once more. For Mr. Rains’ class this would be the last time that they ever took part since it was their last year that the school allowed them to. The boys and girls were split up into two groups and separate events were being held for each. These events were being held in the gym hall and in the playground. At that moment the boys were preparing the 100-metre sprint final, while the girls were finding out the results for their gymnastics event.

In the final there was Myles Hallman, who was the favourite, there was Elliot Archer, who had removed his glasses for this race in case they fell off, there was Will Platt, who had a good chance of winning this race due to his tall stature, and there were 3 other boys but Myles, Elliot and Will were the ones that people were cheering on.

The race started. All the boys were giving it their all. However, towards the end of the race, a boy from the year below was holding out his leg, as a joke, for someone to trip over. The unsuspecting Elliot, who was on the outside lane, ran into it and tripped over it landing between his and Will’s lane. This caused Will to trip up as well. Now both boys were on the floor watching the others passing the finishing line and claiming their long awaited medals. They had scrapes and bruises all over their arms and legs. As soon as the race had finished, people rushed over to them and they were shipped off to the infirmary tent that was pitched in the playground. They sat in the tent on opposite side while Mrs. Collins, who acted as a nurse, was tending to a girl at the back of the tent. Will glared at Elliot:

“Why did you trip me up? I had a chance of winning that race. I even trained for this. The final race of the year,” he said trying to keep calm.

Elliot shot a glare back in his direction. He was obviously irritated by these false accusations.

“Maybe, I didn’t purposely trip you up. Maybe, I was the one who was tripped up. Some damned little bastard thought it would have been funny,” he snapped back.

The argument continued to rise until they were shouting, throwing fist at each other and almost ready to get down on the floor to wrestle with each other. It was then that Mrs. Collins came and grabbed Elliot by the ear. He gave out a short gasp and tried to stand up enough to release the pressure on his ear. She gave both of them a good scolding before dragging the boy she had a firm grip on down to the end of the tent. She sat him down and went to find all of the items she needed to patch him up. While she was bustling around in her corner Elliot surveyed the tent. There was nothing much to boast about, just a few chairs a bench and a table. The walls were just a plain green material.

Mrs. Collins returned with all the necessary items and started to disinfect the wounds. On a few occasions she had to pull out pieces of gravel.

“What am I to do with you boys always bickering away? Always fighting and getting hurt,” she sighed

Elliot shrugged. He didn’t really know how many boys she had treated in the years and he didn’t really care.

“And of course,” she continued. “You all come either crying out in pain or being so stubborn that you had to be dragged here.

He winced slightly as she started to work on his right arm. So far she had done his legs and they were both covered in plasters. He was trying to be tough and ignore the pain. But it was starting to be too much; after all down at heart he was still a young 14-year-old boy. He could feel the tears pricking at the sides of his eyes. He tensed and tried to concentrate on something else, he could not break down here.

Meanwhile, at the other side of the tent, Will was starting to get bored. He had tried to pace up and down the half of the tent he was on but that was proven hard, as there was a shooting pain in his legs every time he took a step. He was sat on one of the benches and thought of what had happened. He had respected Elliot, that was putting it lightly, Elliot was his best friend. The scene from the race replayed in his head. He not really seen anything happen really; all that he saw was the finishing line then the floor rushing towards him.

Elliot left the tent limping. He had plasters and scrapes all over. He ignored Will on his exit. How dare he blame Elliot about this. Elliot trusted him, he knew what Will had said during the argument about hate was not really true. Slowly but surely, he made his way back to the playground. He swore to himself that he would make that younger boy pay. One, for hurting him, and two, for breaking up his friendship with Will. Arriving back to where the main crowd was in the playground and where the events were being held, it seemed to hi that everyone had forgotten about the previous events. Elliot sat down, on the floor, next to a wall and leant against it. A few of the other boys from the class came over to see how he was and tried to engage him in a conversation, without much avail. After a while Will came a joined him:

“Look, I’m really sorry for getting annoyed. I just…” he said, looking just as defeated as Elliot. “I just kinda lost it. You’d of done the same, right?”

Elliot just ignored him. He got up and left to go home, there was not much more point of him staying any longer.

For the next few weeks Elliot and Will did not talk with each other, or even acknowledge each other’s existence. Mr. Rains thought that this was really odd. Usually they would do everything together and they would always hang out together. As an attempt to get them to make up he organised some sort of teamwork exercise. He pretended that the partners were randomly chosen, which they were, except he purposely put Will and Elliot together. They would not be able to complete the exercise unless they made up and actually worked together. Much to his relief they made up and were now friends again thanks to that exercise.