PART 1
It was the eleventh hour, and I was that still. I had never been that still for a very long time. It felt as though, in under an hour, I had seen my own piece shatter like glass. It felt as though someone had nailed me to the spot where I was seated. No, I was not moving—not even a single strand of my hair.
At this moment, I was not sweating, but from the inside, it felt as though thirty times the heat of a volcano five hundred kilometers away was burning within me—from my intestines to my lungs, then out to my mouth. And when I exhaled, the thick, hot smoke from my nostrils could tell exactly what internal battle was going on.
I felt like screaming, but who on earth would even hear me? It was pointless to scream. But sometimes what you try to avoid is what happens. For just a moment, I felt like screaming while I was burning inside, while on the outside my whole skin was covered in goosebumps.
I kept my cool by not screaming, but what had happened now? How could I keep my cool? As a man, sometimes failure does not come from action—it comes from within.
