"Seriously, that's what you think it is?" Willow asks Martina and leans against the large oak tree. We've been sitting outside together debating what the prize is going to be, and they've been arguing back and forth for the past five minutes.
"I don't know, it was just a guess," she replies. "What do you think the prize is?"
"I can't guess; that's why I was asking you," she answers. I groan.
"It doesn't matter that much, guys," I tell them. "We'll find out later today anyway." They glance at me, and Willow raises a brow.
"Wait, do you know what it is?" she questions, folding her arms across her chest. I shake my head quickly. "You're acting like you do."
"No, I seriously don't," I answer them both firmly. "I'm just as clueless as you two, but I'd like to conserve my energy for whatever this team challenge is."
"Whitney's right," Martina says, nodding in agreement. "Wait, don't we have to go to Room 100 right now?" She looks up from her phone. Willow glances at Martina's screen and nods, getting up from her spot on the grass.
"Well let's go then," I say, brushing off my athletic shorts and adjusting the top of my tight black shirt. We walk in a line to the Central Huilding, seeing a few other girls hanging by the doorways, laughing over something. We walk into the room together, the last ones inside.
"It feels like just yesterday we were standing here getting yelled at by Bob," I mumble to Martina as Bob enters through the back door followed by Cindy with her usual large smile that makes me want to punch someone. Martina starts laughing but stops when Bob glares at her. Finally, all fifteen of us are standing in a uniform line as Bob and Cindy walk to the center of the room.
"Congratulations to all of you, first of all," Bob says, his hands folded behind his back. His tone is anything but congratulatory, typical of him. "You all definitely are not the uncoordinated sloths you were nearly five weeks ago."
We all look between each other and then back at Bob.
"Anyway, as you all know you have both trained individually with your trainers and in the team challenges," he states, and the large screen lights up. "We have aggregated your scores from both on a scale of one to ten with our points system, so we are here to show the standings."
"But, we need to tell you something first," Cindy says, taking over for Bob. "Only five of you girls will compete in our final challenge today."
"You all have worked hard, but we had to narrow it down the competition to rightfully give our reward." Bob turns around to look at the screen. "But first we will show you the standings after week one." The names appear on the board, the top being Joanna. She dominated the leaderboard for a while, but by the look on her face I can tell she knows the numbers have changed.
"And here are the current standings. The names in green will go on, the names in red will participate in something different."
I feel a twinge of nervousness but wonder if Axel's words to me after the last team challenge are reassurance I am moving on. Sure enough I look up, and my name is in the number one spot, along with Cynthia and then Willow. After comes Joanna and lastly, Martina.
"To all of you who have made it, congratulations," Bob says, looking over at the five of us. "To the rest of you, you all did well and should be proud of your hard work. You may follow Cindy now." The other ten girls leave, grumbling to each other, while the five of us remain standing there, awkwardly glancing from left to right.
"Alright, before we go outside, I'm going to explain a bit about the prize," Bob says. "It's the same for anyone who wins the top spot. I'll be announcing it at the end of the challenge and the winner will receive all the details they need later on."
We nod our heads, proceeding to follow him through the door and out to the road where we ran the first day. Over there are five trainers standing on the side conversing. One of them is Axel. He glances at me, and I give him a wary look, as the dinner he has planned is more on my mind than this challenge.
Bob turns to them and speaks in a commanding tone. "Trainers, explain how this will work."
Axel steps forward and glances at the five of us, and Martina nudges me in the rib cage so hard I feel like I'm about to throw up my lunch. "Your final challenge is very simple," Axel explains, folding his hands behind his back. "It's a two-mile run. I know all five of you know how to run by now, very well, may I add. But there are two rules you must follow or else you will be disqualified. One, you must not stop or walk or take any sort of break during the run. And two, you must stay on course. You can't veer off or take a shortcut because you feel like it or else your run will be disqualified. Whoever crosses the finish line first will win first place."
"Take a moment to warm up and then we'll begin," Axel says, his eyes now focused on me. My cheeks grow hotter the longer he stares, and I hate that even when I'm kind of mad at him, he still has that effect on me. I lean downwards and touch my hands to the floor, feeling the burning stretch in my hamstrings. Martina does the same and our faces are level.
"Your face is turning that unattractive shade of tomato again," Martina remarks, and I get up, rolling my eyes.
"I'm aware, okay?" I say bashfully, but she just smiles and shakes her head. We continue to stretch for a few more minutes.
"Alright, the race begins here!" Bob booms, eliciting our attention to him pointing at the marker on the ground. "You're just running in a straight line to the marker at the end and back, so if you can't figure out how to do that, I wonder how you're still valuable to society. Now get into your positions."
Cynthia has an over-confident look on her face as she gets into the right stance next to me. I don't acknowledge her and instead focus on calming down. I am unusually nervous.
"Five, four, three, two...one!"
The last word is all I need to take off, staring straight ahead as my legs take me down the road. Axel knew how to do everything right. He trained me exactly for whatever challenge there was every week, only it took me until this day to realize it. And right now as I'm running, all I can hear is his voice in my head urging me to keep going.
Fuck him; I can do it myself.
My sneakers pound against the road and my ponytail whips against my back, fueling my desire to my steps defter and time faster. Minutes whir by, and I'm still going strong. I look over to see that I'm ahead of all of the girls, with only a few feet separating me from Cynthia and a couple more from Joanna. I forget about them, focusing on maintaining my stamina in this race, the only thing that will keep me going.
I exhale quickly, ignoring my aching calves and pick up my pace until I'm level with her. She looks over at me with a nasty glare and speeds ahead once more.
For the next quarter of the mile we go back and forth; one minute she's feet ahead, and the next I've passed her before she picks up her pace again. The other girls behind us are beginning to catch up.
The finish line becomes more and more imminent, and that's when I realize just how close I am to winning this. I quicken my pace, but before I can get anywhere Cynthia surpasses me one more time with incredible speed.
I begin to quicken my pace again, but something is kicked my way, flying to my feet. Before I can even comprehend what that was, I stumble over it and fall to the ground. My hands take most of my fall, and I grimace in pain.
I realize I had tripped over a dry, dead tree branch that had been kicked towards me by no accident. I look up and see Cynthia crossing the finish line, raising her hands up in the air in victory.
She cheated and boy, does she look happy to have done so.
I glance down at the palms of my hands again and find they're stained from the asphalt, the right one bloody. The other girls cross the finish line shortly after me and make their way over next to Cynthia, who's being hailed a victor. I stand several feet away from them, wondering if anyone noticed what just happened. The trainers glance over at us, and Axel's eyes widen when he sees me, immediately coming over and pulling me to the side.
"Whitney, what happened?" he asks, taking my hands and seeing the scratches and black marks on them.
"And Cynthia takes the first place spot!" one of the female trainers announces from where the girls have gathered. Cynthia smiles so wide, her narrow eyes staring me down. But the other trainers mumbling to each other must have caught on that something is fishy.
"It was her," I tell him, anger fueling inside of me, and he wraps an arm around my lower back. I don't care that I'm supposed to be mad at him, because I'm far angrier at that little cheater. "She did this to win!"
Before he can even say anything in return though, someone speaks up.
"Wait!" Willow shouts above all of us, stepping in front of Cynthia and Bob. Every eye turns to her as she catches her breath and then speaks again.
"Cynthia didn't win rightfully. She cheated." Willow looks over at me. "None of you saw her kick a tree branch behind her so Whitney could trip over it?"
They look at me, and I know they can see the slight tears welling up in my eyes.
"Is what she says true?" Bob asks Cynthia, who is now trembling. She says nothing in response, her eyes trained on her dirty sneakers.
I want to lunge forward at her, but Axel holds me back by my shoulder. He grumbles something I can't even decipher and lets go of me, walking straight in front of Cynthia, his height overpowering her.
"Did you or did you not break the rules and cheat so you could win?" he spits at her, his tone razor sharp. "Stop playing mute and answer the damn question."
Everyone is stunned to silence by him, including me.
"I saw it too," Joanna speaks up amidst the quiet. She hasn't said a word all this time.
"And she's cheated before!" Martina blurts out afterwards. "During the obstacle course in the woods she ran ahead of us before the clock began and got away with it."
Now everyone has their eyes on Cynthia who finally speaks up, her voice hardly above a whisper and her cheeks fiery hot.
"Yes."
"You are officially renounced your title," Bob says to her curtly, and she steps backwards in embarrassment. He turns to me. "Whitney, congratulations on now being this year's winner."
Martina, Willow and Joanna envelope me in a hug, and I feel like I will start crying if they don't let go of me. I thank them, brushing away my blurry eyes and smile at Bob, who for once has a look of approval on his face.
When everyone has calmed down, Bob stands next to me. "Whitney, it is my pleasure to tell you that you've won the opportunity and privilege to come back next year as a trainer at Bob Campbell's Intense Boot Camp. We'll be honored to have you on our staff and can discuss all the details later." Applause erupts from everyone, even though I can hardly comprehend what he told me.
"A-are you serious?" I ask, holding my face in my aching hands. It's unfathomable that he'd even consider I could be up to par with the people that work here, given where I started. He nods and pats my shoulder reassuringly.
"You've earned it."
I go back to celebrate with Martina and Willow, who wrap me into another hug. Over their shoulders I find Axel, appearing as though he wants to tell me something but maybe deciding it'd be better to wait until tonight.
Tonight can't come fast enough.