Flash Point

Maya's legs burned as she rounded the track, her sneakers slapping the rubber in a rhythm that matched her frantically racing heart. This was it—the regional qualifiers, and she was currently in fourth place. Again.

"You got this, Maya!" yelled her best friend Chloe from the bleachers, but the other girls' taunts echoed louder.

"Watch out, here comes Slow-poke Maya!"

She'd been stuck in the middle of the pack all season. Then came the vitamins—the little orange pills her teammate Jordan swore by. "They're totally natural, just energy boosters," he'd said. For two weeks, she'd popped them before every practice, hoping for that breakthrough moment.

Now, thunder rumbled overhead as the sky darkened ominously. The announcer's voice crackled: "Runners, we have a weather delay—"

A jagged bolt of **lightning** cracked across the sky, and suddenly the crowd gasped. Not at the storm—but at Maya, who'd found herself still **running**, legs pumping faster than they ever had, hair streaming behind her like a dark flag.

She didn't stop. Couldn't stop. Something had clicked—maybe the terror of being last, maybe the storm's electricity, maybe finally realizing she'd been relying on orange pills instead of her own fire.

She crossed the finish line first, collapsing onto the grass as rain began to fall, her chest heaving, her face breaking into a grin that matched Chloe's screaming from the sidelines.

"WHAT did you take?" Jordan demanded afterward, eyeing her suspiciously.

Maya pulled the bottle from her bag and dumped the remaining pills into the trash. "Nothing," she said, and meant it. "Just realized I already had what I needed."

Later that night, she texted Chloe: "Think I'll stick to actual **vitamin** C supplements from now on. The orange stuff? Overrated."

Her phone buzzed back: "LOL you literally left everyone in the dust. Storm OR no storm, that was ICONIC behavior."

Maya laughed, already anticipating practice tomorrow. Lightning storm or not, she was done running from herself.