Photo Finish

"You don't wanna' fail do you?"

The apprentice who was also called a Bug Boy asked the jockey. The jockey was about to mount his racehorse. The other jockeys were lining up. Their colorful jackets and caps appeared.

The thin jockey, looked down at the apprentice, and said,

"Nah, failure is not an option! I've gotta' win this one!"

The apprentice smiled. A few minutes went by and a gunshot split the murmuring of the crowd. The race was on! The jockeys flew onto the track with arms that appeared as if they were geese, trying to take off in flight. Dirt flew up wildly. The heartbeats of the horses and jockeys drummed with a breakneck, frenzied pace.

The crowd cheered with a fresh passion. All their bets felt alive. The adrenaline rush in their bodies roared powerfully.

"Come-on Charlie! Come-on Charlie!"

The apprentice gripped the handrailing and craned his neck to see the horse he had put all his bets on.

One of the other jockey's flew off his horse but his horse continued to race on. A man in the stands hollered in defeat, as it was the very horse he'd bet several thousand dollars on winning. The man was red in the face and looked as if he were about to have a heart attack himself.

The horses sweat glistened in the sunshine. The racers narrowed out into two thin lines. Their helmets bobbed rapidly.

Charlie always waited right before the last second to rush into first place. Today's race was going to be no different. Charlie burst forth to the lead right in the last couple seconds and won yet another race! The crowd bellowed with rapturous noise and applause. They started chanting the horse's name.

"Charlie! Charlie! Charlie! Wins again!"

The apprentice smiled proudly. He ran over to the winning horse. A large golden trophy was brought out to the winning jockey and his horse. A flash of a camera went off and it spooked Charlie. He baulked and went up on his hind legs out of fear. The jockey tried to calm him down but before he could, the horses front hooves clamped down on his spine. His body pressed into the sand as if he were a crushed bug. Writhing in pain, he attempted to roll away. Something in his back had cracked. He felt a splitting pain jet through his entire body. Medics rushed to help assess him. The apprentice calmed the horse down and led him away from the crowd of people. The jockey had passed out.

The next thing the jockey knew, he woke up in a hospital bed. His pregnant wife looked at him with deep concern.

"You're lucky to be alive right now..."

She paused and tried to muffle a sob.

"Please, be done. You need to be done."

He nodded and paused.

"Done with what?"

"Being a racer... a jockey! Clearly, it's dangerous... You could've died! Your spine is crushed the doctor says. And to think... I might have been an early widow... trying to raise this child of ours on my own! You have to be done."

He was stunned into silence.

Could that truly have been his last race? His mind flashed back hours earlier before the race had started. In the flashback, he remembered the question that his apprentice had asked him.

"You don't wanna' fail do you?"

He slowly whispered the question to himself, but it had suddenly taken on a different meaning. Winning races, with an amazing racehorse, felt good. It had been his life, what made him feel most alive. He shifted his gaze to his round, pregnant wife, who was due any day. The rhythm of his thoughts felt as the cantering of horse hooves. He surely didn't want to fail at being a good father.