Chapter 02 · 5 min 18 sec
Who Wins If I Win
The hollowness of achievement when it costs us the people we love.
Lyrics· 438 words
Who wins if I win I spent half my life chasing horizons Running toward names on distant doors Trading comfort for another promise
Always believing there was something more I crossed cities, I crossed oceans I crossed years I can't reclaim Always staring at the mountain
Never asking who helped me climb the same Now the road is getting quieter And the nights are getting long So I find myself returning
To a question all along Who wins if I win Is it the man in the mirror Or the hands that pulled me up
Whenever the road got steeper Who wins if I win The hearts that carried mine The souls that paid in silence
So I could chase this life Tell me When the dust settles in Who wins if I win
My father taught me courage My mother taught me grace Friends became my shelter Whenever I lost my place
The woman standing beside me Carried more than I could see While I was building distant futures She was building me
Every lesson, every failure Every scar beneath my skin Feels a little less like mine now When I think of where they've been
Who wins if I win The dream was never mine alone Every mile I traveled Was paid by those back home
Who wins if I win The voices through the years The ones who stood beside me Through every doubt and fear
Tell me When the dust settles in Who wins if I win Maybe nobody wins alone
Maybe nobody ever did Every victory is stitched together From a thousand invisible gifts A teacher, a friend, a sacrifice
A door held open at the perfect time A hand on your shoulder when you almost gave up A voice saying One more try
The world will know my name But they won't know the story Of all the quiet heroes Standing behind the glory
And if I leave this world With anything worth giving Let it be this truth That no one climbs alone
Who wins if I win My children and their future The people who believed Before there was proof
The ones who never asked For credit or applause The ones who gave their love Without keeping score
Who wins if I win The answer's finally clear Every person who walked beside me Brought me here
And when the final chapter closes And the lights grow dim I'll know Nobody wins alone
Nobody ever did So if I stand upon a mountain Looking back at where I've been The greatest view was never mine
It belonged to all of them
*A story about what winning costs*
For eleven months, Marco trained for the Regional Athletics Championship.
He ran before school, in the rain, on days when his legs ached and his breath came in ragged gasps. He said no to birthday parties and film nights and lazy Sunday afternoons. He had a plan, and the plan was: win.
His best friend, Dani, came to every practice for the first few months. She'd sit on the wall and time him with her phone and shout things like "you're getting faster, I can see it!" But gradually she came less, and then not at all. Marco told himself he'd catch up with her after the race. After.
The day of the championship, his family drove two hours to watch. He ran the best race of his life. He crossed the finish line first, and the sound of the crowd hit him like a wave.
They gave him a gold trophy. He held it up for the photo.
On the drive home, he texted Dani. *I won.*
She replied after a long time. *I know. Congratulations.*
That was all.
At home, Marco put the trophy on his shelf. He stood back and looked at it. It was real, and heavy, and exactly what he had worked for.
But his room felt very quiet.
He called Dani.
"I missed your birthday," he said. "And the film night. And about nine thousand other things."
"Eleven," she said.
"I'm sorry," he said. "I thought winning was the thing that mattered most."
There was a pause.
"You ran really fast," Dani said. "But you've always been fast. That was never the most interesting thing about you."
Marco looked at the trophy again. It still looked the same. Gold and heavy and real.
But he understood something now that he hadn't understood before: a trophy can tell you what you achieved. It can't tell you what it cost. Only you know that — and only you get to decide if it was worth it.
"Can I come over tomorrow?" he asked.
"Yeah," she said. "Bring the trophy. I want to see how heavy it is."
He laughed, and it was the first real thing he'd felt all day.
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*Before you chase something, it's worth asking: who wins if I win?*
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