A Life To Waste Read Free Page A

a little bit
selfish or self centred, but he didn’t think so. What is so wrong
with wanting his boy to look at him and say “when I grow up Dad, I
want to be just like you.” Dave used to say that when he was
younger, he didn’t say that anymore. Now all he wanted to do was
please the coach. All day every day it seemed to be the only thing
he would talk about. “Phil said I’m coming on really well” or “Phil
said if I can just push a little harder then....”
    “Phil said this, meh Phil said
that neh” Dave’s dad said to himself in a childish little tone. He
didn’t mean to be jealous, but he couldn’t help it. After all, you
can’t control your feelings, and jealousy is one of the
strongest.
     
    Dave went to training every
Tuesday and Thursday without fail, he never missed one session, he
always wanted to please Phil. Every day he would push himself more
and more, train harder than the day before. Phil could see the
amount of effort he was putting in and accordingly gave him the
constant praise that he had earned for these efforts. Phil pushed
him to his boundaries and sometimes beyond them in training, when
it came to competitions he tried to pick out the ones he thought
would have tougher opponents. Be more of a challenge for Dave. Dave
still won all the races, but again there were quite a few close
shaves.
     
    By the time Dave turned 15 he
was rumoured across the country to be the next big thing. He was
going to make Team GB without any problems, so everyone said. He
was still undefeated in all his races, which Phil told him, was a
first as far as he had heard. Dave and Phil were more than just
runner and coach now, after the amount of time they spent together
training over the past couple of years, every Tuesday and Thursday,
plus additional one on one sessions Phil did especially for Dave.
They were practically best friends now. Phil really was Dave’s
hero, after every race his first thought would be “Phil will be
proud of me for that run”. Dave wasn’t far off being Phil’s hero
either, Phil had never seen a boy with such dedication and
ambition. He had made him into his own little project, his own
little prodigy. He was sure that Dave was going to be the first
person he would ever train to compete at the Olympics.
     
    Dave’s dad grew tired of hearing
about Phil all the time, Dave seemed to notice this, but he never
said anything to him. His Dad never tired of hearing how well Dave
was racing though. His face still gleamed with pride when he
watched him cross the finish line, or when he would come home and
tell them “first again”. He really couldn’t be any more proud. Plus
Dave was doing well in school, he wasn’t the smartest kid in his
classes, but he certainly wasn’t by any means dumb or falling
behind. His teachers said he was guaranteed to get at least B’s,
but most likely get a few A’s as well. He really was the perfect
son.
     
    While driving home one day from
a competition, Phil and Dave were chatting away. Their usual talk
about “this is what you did well today, but we need to improve
this” and “keep this up and there is no stopping us.” Then they
were discussing maybe going to grab to get something to eat, it was
already past six, Dave had told his mum he would most likely grab
some dinner on the way home with Phil. His mum said that it was
fine, it was quite a common thing for them to do that, sort of a
post race bonding feed or something weird like that.
     
    Phil was looking in his rear
view mirror “I’m sure I saw something a second ago that looked like
a cafe” he said “I haven’t seen an exit yet though? Maybe I missed
it” He turned round to look out of the back window itself, to get a
better view than from the mirror.
     
    “LOOKOUT!” Dave yelled, Phil
quickly turned round to see what was coming, but it was too late.
The drivers side of the bonnet caught the tail end of a lorry
driving in the middle lane. The car spun out of control. His