Page 43 of The Last Five Yards

The casing looks fine on the outside. But the screen is fogged from the inside, moisture trapped like a thin cloud. Tiny droplets glint under the edges of the keyboard. The smell of chlorine clings to every inch.

She counts to three and presses the power button.

Nothing.

She tries again. Longer this time. Ten seconds. Twenty.

She breathes in one, two, three, four, and then just holds it, scared to let it out.

Silence. Not even a flicker from the screen. No light. No fan. No reassuring hum.

Just the faint, dead click of a circuit that did not survive the soak.

Maren swallows hard. Her chest tightens. It feels stupid to cry over an object, especially after everything else, but this is not just a laptop. It is years of plans. The spreadsheets. The practice cycles. The college recruiting trackers. The attendance logs. The detailed, color-coded road map she built for the future seasons.

It is the illusion that if she planned hard enough, she could avoid being blindsided.

“You had one job,” she whispers.

She is not sure if she is talking to the laptop or to herself.

Her reflection stares back at her in the dark screen. Hair pulled into a messy bun. Dark circles under her eyes. Skin is still a little pink from the weekend sun. She looks younger this way, somehow, and more tired.

Her fingers trace the edge of the warped case, feeling where it’s was tacky to the touch. Her backpack smells like a hotel hot tub that was not maintained properly.

The sound of that huge splash still echoes in her head. Not a thud or crash, but the sudden roar of water hitting the deck and the awful realization as it seeped straight into the motherboard.

Her stomach twists. She presses the heel of her hand against her ribs, trying to steady herself.

She had been ten the first time she learned what chlorine could do. A suit faded in weeks. A towel bleached in days. Skin that felt tight if she did not rinse it right away. Her mother used to joke that chlorine could dissolve problems if you let it.

Maybe she believed that too much.

Maybe she thought the water would fix the parts of her she did not know how to handle. The fear. The pressure. The way she clenched around every detail like it was the only thing holding her together.

Control has always been her answer to fear.

And now her most controlled object is gone.

She sinks onto the bench, elbows on her knees, staring at the laptop like it might suddenly forgive her and work.

It does not.

She closes the lid. The click feels final and hollow.

She remembers buying it with her mom right after graduation, standing under the harsh lights of the electronics store. Her mom making a fuss about the extended warranty, Maren insisting she did not need one. They left with a receipt long enough to be a bookmark.

She had promised herself this laptop would carry her forward. Through her college classes. Through coaching. Through whatever came next.

Instead, it carried her right back here. To this pool. This locker room. This strange in-between moment when everything feels like it is ending and beginning at the same time.

She rests her elbows on her knees again, rubbing her palms together. They still smell faintly of the cheap lotion from the vending machine near the showers. She used to hate that smell. Now it just reminds her of every winter morning she showed up before the sun, half awake, half determined.

She wonders how many times she has sat in this exact spot over the years. How many times she wished for quiet.

Now the quiet feels like failure.

She closes her eyes and counts her heartbeat. It does not help.