I won the race

I remember it vividly. I was in class 8, well it was my 2nd time ins class 8 but that’s a story for another time. Well we had this PT teacher—-we called him Baba. Baba was unnaturally tall and he has this typical personality which every PT teacher has.

We were called on the grounds. Apparently he was taking practical an exam to evaluate us in 200 meters race. The race was on the cricket ground and the ground had solid rocks as well as a cement pitch in the middle. I remember he made a group of 5 people to race and he was raking top 3 from each group. I still don’t understand the logic behind it was it was how he did it.

So I was placed on a group where there were couple of known runners and I knew I did not have any chance to win at them, and neither I had a confidence to beat them. When our group’s turn came, I remember us posing in standard racing positions. As soon as I hear Go! I ran like hell, I felt my legs were getting ahead of me. I ran barefoot. The ground was so hot, and at starting I felt the heat of ground burning my feel and after few seconds that feeling stopped and at some point I stopped feeling my foot. The race must have lasted about 30 seconds and when I came back to the base, I saw that I was the first. I won the race. I freaking won the race! Suddenly I was feeling se tingling in my foot and after few seconds the pain started to hit and then I saw my foot and noticed that the skin on both toes were completely was gone and I was literally seeing the flash. It looked so bad.

Someone noticed and get got me to the office of Bhatt sir. He was the principal of high school. He was also surprised to see it. If I remember his expression, he was more surprised by the fact that nerd personality like me caught in a sporting accident. He did not even scold me. He asked someone to fetch the first aid kit and they taped my foot. I was barely able to walk.

It was only half day. I had to spend the rest of the day in classroom attending classes. I walked without shoes and I used to sit in the aisle and other side was the girls sitting. When I was caressing my wound I noticed some of the girls looking at me like a wounded warrior. They must have seen me racing. It was a good feeling.

When I got home, my parents were preparing to go to ████████ for funeral. They did not have any idea what happened with me at school. My mother saw the wound and cleaned it again, she did not have time to hear my story and only thing I told her at the time was “I won the race”. I think somehow it was the justification to avoid the scolding.

My parents went away that day and I stayed at my aunt’s home for couple of days. I still remember my sister taking care of me. Packing my lunchbox for the school.

That is all I remember of that incident and the victory I felt still has power to give me goosebumps whenever I recall it.