Trifecta-Week Eighty-Six – Crack

It is Monday and that is when our friends with Trifecta announce the first of their two weekly word prompts. The answer, as always is the third definition from the Merriam Webster Online Dictionary and is intended to stretch our writing minds as we should have a situation unfamiliar to us as far as the usage of the ordinarily common word.

We turn now to our weekly one-word prompt.  This week we are asking for a 33- to 333-word response using the word:

CRACK

1a : a loud roll or peal  

b : a sudden sharp noise 

2: a sharp witty remark : quip

3a : a narrow break : fissure     

 b : a narrow opening —used figuratively in phrases like fall through the cracks to describe one that has been improperly or inadvertently ignored or left out 

4a : a weakness or flaw caused by decay, age, or deficiency :unsoundness   b : a broken tone of the voice   c : crackpot

5: moment, instant –

See more at: http://www.trifectawritingchallenge.com/#sthash.wYuENWIf.dpuf

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The smell of the fresh cut grass was a kind of aphrodysiac to him. He almost hated to spoil the freshly prepared plot, but spoil it he would. This was his chance to show everyone what he was made of. The process was set up wrong in his mind. You had to be from a certain school to get the top agent’s attention.

All he did was set every rushing record as he carried the pigskin through every miniscule crack his offensive lineman managed to eek out against much larger foes. Once he got into the clear he was just like a thoroughbred unleashed. No one could catch him, not any one he faced so far.

His last hope was on draft night. 214 spots, surely he could fill one of them. He would settle for being Mr. Irrelevant, the last taken by an NFL team. If he could just get a chance. Was it possible he could slip through the crack? Could he be left waiting like a bride at the altar?  Yes, he could and yes, he was.

But none of that mattered at this moment. Lowly Cleveland invited him to camp and now he trotted out on the field to face the Raiders defense in the first preseason game. He would show them. Prove them all wrong. He took a deep breath as he settled into his three point stance. The quarterback’s cadence evoked his adrenalin surge as he heard the key utterance that launched him toward the ball.

He exploded forward, seeing a gigantic opening, not the crack he was used to having to navigate. He shifted gears, feeling the sprinter kick in as he squirted through the line. He could see the end zone and felt so alive. But then he felt a bone jarring smash from his left. Thirty minutes later a grim face delivered the news. He had a crack in his leg above and below his knee. He was done for the year. 

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