What if Sara didn't have to quit badminton
Sara sat in a dressing room head resting against the wall. This was her biggest tournament ever. The Olympic games. The Olympic games of 2020.
Almost everyone Sara loved was there. Everyone but a few. Those few she had blocked out of her life in August 2019.
Anthoine's death had destroyed Sara. She had broken contact with every link to formula one and any motor racing. She couldn't go through it all again, so the best way was to ensure there was not even a little chance of having to do so. She didn't talk to Pierre anymore. She unfollowed everyone that could post anything about racing and banned anyone she knew of talking about it when she could hear it.
Even the old scrapbooks she had with photos of Pierre, Anthoine and Juliette had been thrown in the attic of her parental home, to be never touched again by Sara.
There was still a part of Sara that would sometimes sneak past the iron gates she had created to hide all her memories and feelings behind. This was one of those moments. A moment in which she was forced to look back. She had just been asked about the years leading up to this. The years of training while going to school. The years connecting with fellow youth, training to be the best in their sport.
The years with Anthoine, Pierre and Juliette.
But she couldn't right now. She needed to focus. This was the most important match of her life. This match would decide whether she would become an Olympian champion or not.
But her brain refused to turn off. It kept going and going down the rabbit hole of locked-off emotions and memories.
She blinked rapidly, hoping the years she had been holding for so long wouldn't spill out now. If she would start crying now, she wouldn't stop.
"Sara?" Someone knocked on the door of the dressing room. "It's time." It was Fabienne, her trainer. It was time to step out of the dressing room and put her game face on. One deep breath and she would be ready. One deep breath and she needed to be ready.
It was time. She got up, decreased her skirt and left the dressing room. She needed to forget them.
xxx
"Fuck!" Sara fell to the floor. That was it. She had lost her gold. The tears started flowing. The stress of the past year came flooding out. The disappointment of not being enough. The pain of losing everything and everyone important to her.
She sobbed loudly, unable to care about the cameras pointed at her. Her entire world kept unravelling, piece by piece. Winning the Olympics had been her one steady point for the future. Now that had failed as well, what was left but a deep black hole?
Arms wrapped around her as she was lifted off the ground and escorted off the field and out of sight of the cameras.
"Hey, shh. It's going to be fine. There is always the next Olympics." Sara shook her head. "Yes, yes there is."
"You don't know that!" She yelled, Fabienne took a step back in surprise at Sara's sudden outbreak. "You don't know what will happen in those four years. And don't even give me that 'you were born to become an Olympic champion' crap. You don't know. We all thought Anthoine was born to become a Formula One champion and that did nothing for him when he got into that fatal crash. Fate wasn't like, 'oh shit, he still has to become a champion, we have to let him live', now was it?"
Melissa had watched her daughter from a couple of feet away. She had seen her outburst and couldn't help but feel somewhat relieved, no matter how strange that sounded. She had been watching her daughter bottle all of her feelings about Anthoine's death up and was glad Sara was just throwing it all out.
But when the words left Sara's lips and she returned to sobbing, Melissa stepped in and wrapped her arms around her daughter. Sara gladly leaned into the embrace, needing her mother now more than ever.
"I can't do this any more mum. What is the use?"
"He would be proud of you, you do know that, right?" Sara looked up at her mother. "But he would be sad to see how you are no longer in touch with anyone. It broke his heart to see you and Juliette falling out, let stand how he would feel knowing you pushed Pierre away as well."
Sara bit the inside of her cheek. Anthoine would have killed her for the coping mechanisms she had used. Or rather, for the lack of coping mechanisms she had been using.
"But how were we supposed to stay together without our glue?" Melissa lifted Sara's head so she would look her in the eye.
"Your glue never left because the memories of Anthoine never did, no matter how much you wanted them to. You still know how the times were, the four of you. You still know Anthoine wanted nothing more but for you to reconnect with Juliette."
"I'm pretty sure she will never want to see me again now. I did the same exact thing I have been mad about for so long. I'm a hypocrite." Melissa pushed a strand of hair behind Sara's ear.
"And I am sure you two will be able to forgive each other. I know Pierre will at least." Sara shook her head.
"How can you know."
"Because he is here." Sara frowned as her eyes started darting around. Pierre was there? "He told me there was not going to be one thing in this entire world that was going to keep him from coming to see you here. He has been here for all your matches." Sara's heart snapped. After everything she had done. He was here?
"Where is he?"
"He'll be waiting for you in his hotel." Melissa gave her daughter the address of the hotel the Frenchman was staying at and watched how she shot away to the dressing rooms to get changed. The interviews would come later, right now she needed to do this.
It was crazy that all that had to happen was for Sara to fall face down and be unable to set one more step forward to admit she had been making mistake after mistake since Anthoine's death.
Perhaps it wasn't as crazy as Sara believed it to be. She needed to run into the figurative wall she had created for herself as the wall kept her from seeing what the people around her had been trying to tell her. She needed to run against it and break it down a little to realise it had been there all along and how stupid it was that it was there in the first place.
Her heartbeat increased rapidly as she stepped out of the cab she had hauled and looked at the hotel. If she would go inside, go to the fifth floor and knock on door 54 there was no going back again. Pierre would open the door as he would be waiting for her and she would have to face the music. She would have to apologise and ask Pierre whether he wanted to let her back into his life as a friend and whether he would give her a chance to win back his trust.
Now she was there, she wasn't sure anymore, but her mother's words made her put one foot in front of the other over and over again. 'Your glue never left because your memories of Anthoine never did.'
And so she went up the stairs - that way she could control the speed at which she was going up - level by level until she reached the fifth floor. One by one she passed the rooms.
51
52
53
She took a deep breath and closed her eyes.
54
This was it. This was Pierre's room. This had been the room he was staying in since at least the first day of her tournament. He had been there for everything. He hadn't given up on her as she had done on him.
Sara raised her hand and let her knuckles hit the door three times.
No going back.
It took no time before Pierre was there, standing right in front of him. The look in his eyes seemed to be relieved, but the soft gloss over his eyes as tears pooled in them confirmed it. He hadn't expected Sara to be there.
Before Sara could say anything, Pierre wrapped her up in one of his big hugs she had loved so much as a teen. One of those hugs that just make you feel safe no matter what was going on in your life.
Tears started to spill out of both their eyes as they remained there, frozen for a couple of minutes.
"Come in." The emotions running through him were lacing his voice. They locked eyes as Pierre sat down on a sofa and Sara remained standing in the small hallway.
"How do you do it?" Pierre frowned.
"Do what?"
"Let me in like this. Hug me. Please, just scream, curse, make me out for a hypocrite because I am!" Sara threw her arms around. "Just don't be like this. Don't forgive me this easily. I know I wouldn't have. It took me doing the same thing to forgive Juliette so please don't make it easy for me! I don't deserve it!" Pierre stood back up and walked back to Sara.
She closed her eyes. Now she was getting it. He had been doing his best to keep all of his anger in and she just gave him a way to unleash it all.
But the last thing she expected was for him to cup her cheeks and force her to look at him, especially because when she opened her eyes, he was smiling softly at her.
"Oh I'm mad alright, but it is outweighed a hundred times by the joy of you finally talking to me again."
"I'm sorry," Sara whispered. "I am sorry for it all and I understand if you never want anything to do with me again I just needed to tell you I am sorry for it all."
"Don't hate yourself for it." Sara huffed. "I know you do, so don't go all Sara on me." Her shoulders slumped down even further. "We have a long way to go, but I know having you as a best friend again will all be worth it. If you want that too." Sara started to smile through her tears.
"Why do you think I am here? I didn't believe it was possible, but even then I was hoping for this miracle." She sniffed. "Do you think Juliette will be even slightly as graceful as you about this all?" Pierre shrugged.
"I'm not going to be standing in between that. You will have to find that out all on your own. I'm just happy you are willing to."
"Not as happy as Anthoine would have been."
"I don't know. My two favourite girls finally getting back together to being the power-duo they were as teens? I'm pretty sure my happiness would beat Anthoine's." Sara chuckled.
"Then I am pretty sure that if Juliette is willing to forgive me, we are going to be inseparable because we won't just have Anthoine as glue, but you as well."