Making Waves by Susannah McFarlane

‘On your marks. Get set. Go!’ shouted the sports teacher.

    Emma Jacks dived into the pool and began to swim as fast as she possibly could. Taking a breath only every third stroke, Emma moved her arms quickly and strongly and kicked her legs as hard as she could. As she turned her head from side to side, she glanced at the other swimmers to checkwhere she was in the race. Emma could tell from the swimsuits they wore who the other swimmers were. Hannah, one of her best friends, wore a navy blue swimsuit and was just a little bit behind on her left. Nema, definitely not one of her best friends, was just in front on her right wearing a bright pink swimsuit with silver stars.
    Emma kept swimming, kicking even though she thought her legs were going to fall off. She was catching up to Nema and, while she wouldn’t have enough time to beat her, she would be close. As they came up to the end of the pool, Emma stretched out her arm and slapped it only a split-second after Nema.
    â€˜A great race girls, that was a really close finish,’ cried Ms Tenga, one of the teachers and race timekeeper.
    Emma was relieved and pleased with her race. Holding onto the lane rope, she looked around to see how everyone else had gone. Nema had come first, she had come second and, yes, Hannah was third and Isi, another really good friend, was fourth. Her other good friend, Elle, was just finishing, struggling with slow, heavy strokes, in last place. Elle put her head up and took a huge gasp as she touched the end of the pool.
    â€˜Way to go, Ellesabelle!’ cried Isi.
    â€˜Thanks, Is,’ said Elle smiling in an exhausted kind of way, ‘but even you couldn’t get excited about me coming last.’
    â€˜But you finished this time,’ Isi pointed out.
    â€˜That’s true,’ said Elle climbing out of the pool. ‘Go me.’
    Smiling, Emma climbed out of the water after her friend. She knew Elle wouldn’t be upset about coming last in the race: swimming just wasn’t Elle’s thing. Running, however, was a different matter. Elle normally picked up all the blue ribbons at the athletics carnival. She ran fast, she jumped high and long. Elle was just better on land. But Emma, Hannah and Isi all loved the water and they were strong swimmers. They were hoping their times would be good enough to get them into the relay team at the upcoming carnival. How much fun would it be torace together?
    â€˜Well, it seems we have our relay team for the carnival,’ said Ms Tenga, looking up from her clipboard. ‘Isi, Hannah, Emma and, with the fastest time, Nema. Good job, girls. Now quickly, off to the change rooms please.’
    â€˜Thanks, Ms Tenga,’ said Nema, ‘but I actually think I was pretty slow that time. I am sure I can be a lot faster.’
    â€˜Aaaargh!’ groaned Hannah burying her head in her towel as the girls headed to the change rooms. ‘That is so, so, so...’ Hannah seemed lost for words.
    â€˜So Nema?’ suggested Emma.
    â€˜Exactly,’ said Hannah. ‘I know she is a good swimmer but she thinks she is so much better than everyone else. And how does she manage to flick her hair even when it’s wet?’
    Nema was a good swimmer, a really good swimmer. She trained hard and she swam for a squad outside of school. Everyone knew that because Nema would bring her huge squad swim bag to school, even on days when there wasn’t swimming, and show people her name sewn in big letters across the bag. It was pretty cool, as were all the different coloured swimsuits Nema had. Everyone had to admit that Nema was a great swimmer but did she have to boast about it all the time?
    It seemed she did.
    Now that the trials were over, everyone rushed to get changed and then filed onto the bus to return to school. Emma sat next to Hannah, and Isi and Elle sat across the aisle from them. Nema sat behind them, by herself because her swim bag took up most of the