“You’re one of the best swimmers on that team,” Mom says.
“Not anymore,” I say.
“Who’s better than you?”
“Sarah. Casey. Lauren. Jessa.”
“You’re at their same level,” Mom argues. “And you don’t compete in the same events.”
“Doesn’t matter. They’re going to Nationals and I’m not.”
“There’s still time to qualify,” Mom reminds me. “And you could’ve gone to Juniors if you wanted. We would’ve found a way to swing it.”
“What’s the point? I can’t make the team.” I stroke Lulu’s head. “It wasn’t worth the expense.”
Because I’ve competed in an individual Olympic event at World Championships, even though it was two years ago, I’m not eligible for the US Junior Nationals team. One of the many ways in which that stupid gold medal has ruined my life.
Not that I want to be on the Junior Nationals team. It’s Nationals or nothing. But I don’t have the times right now to qualify for the meet, let alone be one of the top six in an event to make the roster.
Dad yanks the battered GAC handbook out of a cabinet and waves it triumphantly.
“I’m calling Dave right now,” he says. “Where’s my phone?”
“Charger in the living room, I think,” says Mom. Traitor.
“Dad, please don’t,” I beg. “It’s over now; it doesn’t matter anymore.”
What I don’t tell them, because it’ll only make them angrier, is that if Dad goes off on Dave, Dave will take it out on me. If I’m lucky, I’ll just get Punishment—extra laps at the beginning and end of every practice until he figures I’ve learned my lesson.
But he’ll probably find a better way to penalize me, something more psychological and insidious. He’s been known to freeze out swimmers he’s not happy with, neglect them in practice and ignore them in competition. Just one look from him has the power to make me wither inside. My life goal is to make it to the Olympics; my daily goal is to stay on Dave’s good side.
“What kind of parent would I be if I let a grown man yell at my daughter in front of hundreds of people and said nothing?” Dad asks.
“A swim parent,” my older sister says, appearing in the doorway with a dog-eared copy of The Glass Menagerie in her hand. Nina wasn’t at the pool today because she had play practice, and anyway, she doesn’t come to my meets anymore.
“Most of the kids on that team, their parents would be the ones yelling,” Nina says. “If you rush to Susannah’s defense, she’ll look weak.”
Mom and Dad stare at Nina, appalled, but they know she’s not wrong. We’ve all seen the way certain people—my friend Jessa, for example—get treated by their winning-obsessed parents. As if they have more riding on their son or daughter’s performance in the pool than their kid does. That kind of unreasonable preoccupation has never made sense to Mom and Dad.
“That’s ridiculous,” Dad says. “Susannah’s not weak, she’s sixteen. He can’t beat her up because she made a mistake. She’s not his employee. We pay him to train her, and that team’s not cheap.”
“Hector,” Mom says in warning. She squeezes my hand. “It’s not about the money.”
Dad sighs. “Of course it’s not. I didn’t mean it like that.”
“We want to do what’s right for you, Susannah. Can you let us do that, please?”
“No,” I say. Nina chuckles, and Dad shoots her a you’re not helping look.
“Overruled,” Mom says.
Dad disappears into the living room to find his phone. I want to scream, but I know how that would go over. I rest my forehead on the table. Nina gives me a condescending pat on the shoulder. Mom swats her away and rubs my back. Lulu curls up at my feet and rests her chin on my toes.
“It’s going to be okay,” Mom says. “Dad’s only trying to help. We love you, mija. All we want is for you to be happy.”
“I would be happy if you and Dad would back off and let me make my own decisions.”
“You make a lot of your own decisions,” Mom says. “Maybe too many.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“It means that you’re our child and we get a say in what goes on in your life,” Mom says. “And don’t you dare speak to me like that—I’m your mother. You were raised better. Both of you.”
“What did I do?” Nina asks.
“You inserted yourself in something that wasn’t your business,” Mom tells her. “Now go to your room, please. Susannah and I need to talk.”
“I’m not in the mood to talk,” I say.
“It sounds like you’re in the mood to be grounded,” Mom says. “Is that what you want?”
I roll my eyes. “Ground me, I don’t care. I’m going to take a shower.”
“Dinner in half an hour,” Mom says firmly as I trudge up the stairs.
I toss my swim bag on my bedroom floor and kick it into the closet. We get a break between the GAC Invitational and the start of school, so I won’t be needing my equipment for two weeks. Shutting it all away, if only for a little while, feels more satisfying than I expected.
As I close the closet door, I catch a glimpse of myself in the full-length mirror I put away when I started to hate the sight of my reflection. When I won gold in Budapest, I was slim and hydrodynamic. I slipped through the water like a minnow, a flash of quicksilver between the lane lines.
Then I got older and everything changed. I grew everywhere, shooting up to five-eleven, widening at the hips and shoulders, filling out in the chest—the genes that made my mother’s beautiful curves and gave my dad his height finally expressing themselves.
You’d think I’d be grateful for the increased wingspan and the size-ten feet and the boobs Nina would kill for, but I didn’t know how to handle my big new body in the water. It won’t move like it did before. It’s slow and cumbersome and useless. I thought once I got used to it, I’d get back to where I was, but it’s been over a year and that hasn’t happened. I’m starting to give up hope that it ever will.
A high-pitched mew draws my attention to the two gray cats sitting in the window. Frick and Frack are brothers, a pair of Russian blues that we rescued when a family in the neighborhood moved abroad. They’re the gentlest cats we’ve ever owned, so docile you can pet their teeth, and they don’t mind being held, which is good because I could use a cat hug right now.