Chapter 5: Volleyball

Kerry’s POV:

It was half time and I was the star guard sitting on the bench, wore out and frustrated as I saw the faces of team mates and coaches which showed their disappointment. I went into get some steam by the bench by the showers in the locker room and closed my eyes. My mind went back to a time where similarly I was making a mess of things. It was a blast from the past. It had happened back when was playing for my high school away from at The Holiday Volleyball Tournament and I feeling pretty full of myself. The big match against our school rival wasn’t going as planned. My shots just weren’t falling in after I jumped up and spiked the ball. The volleyball kept going out of bounds and causing side outs. I would get the dig, but failed to send the ball to my team mates before spiking it over the net. That meant our team was at a disadvantage because of poor sets which led to missed opportunities for points. My teammates seemed perturbed I was hogging the ball. I told myself was trying to get us to victory, but the truth was by not looking for the open player or developing passes to lead to easy volleys I was hurting the team.

Shots were bouncing off the rim and I even had two air balls. I wondered how this could be happening to me. I was the darling of the tournament and my picture was on the front page of our hometown newspaper. The more shots I missed the more perturbed I got. I started taking low probability shots which angered my coach and my team mates. However none more than my grand dad, the community sportswriter had planned to write a headline about us winning the big rival game and moving on in the tournament. However, we would have to have a much better second half.

I just couldn’t figure out why my accuracy tonight was off. All the towns people had driven three hours to support the team excited to have an outlet from the mundane jobs. As I looked over in the stands I could see the disappointment in their face and heard their groans as I missed an easy fast break lay-up I made all the time. The week had been filled with college scholarship talk and I was feeling invincible before the game started. Now, I was having trouble making one of two making spikes that stayed in the court and were near impossible to dig on the other side. And, then there were the poor or no passes. Many I knew better than to commit. I tell you I was becoming a frustrated volleyball case stomping my foot and yelling at my team mates instead of calmly running the plays. While I was not scoring points I was not gold bricking either. My sweat had permeated my white shorts and I knew that meant the audience could see my visible panty line from the stands.

The buzzer for half time rang and we ran off the hardwood court with excitement. I was told my grand dad wanted to see me out back in his trailer. I jogged out to the travel trailer in the parking lot and entered the deserted press trailer. There was no one there but my dad and he looked mad. He waved the newspaper with my picture on the cover and told me I had let my success go to my head. I nodded my agreement embarrassed about my performance and my temper tantrum on the court. He said I had shown poor leadership and sportsmanship and he was going to use the newspaper to settle me down.