“Hey,” he says. “Good to see you again. How’s it going?”
“Um, good.” I hurry through the door.
When he’s out of earshot, Jessa whispers, “Do you know him?”
“No.” Technically, it’s not even a lie.
Jessa and Amber aren’t going to let me get away that easily. They follow me into the locker room, waiting impatiently while I strip off my warm-up clothes to the suit underneath and then rummage around in my swim bag for my new Swedish goggles.
“You’re sure you don’t know him? It seemed like he knew you,” Jessa insists. “Come on! Tell us tell us tell us. He’s so cute. I heard he used to swim for the Bruins. How did you meet him?”
“Leave her alone,” Amber says, snapping her towel at Jessa.
I want to hug her. Jessa won’t give up when she thinks you’re holding out on her, but Amber respects things like privacy and other people’s wishes. You know, as any decent human being would.
“Know who?” asks Casey as she pulls another suit over the one she’s already wearing. Most of us wear more than one swimsuit to practice; the second suit is usually an old baggy one that’s lost all its elasticity from too much chlorine. It creates extra drag, which helps you go faster in actual races when you’ve got on only one thin layer of tight Lycra.
Swimmers will do just about anything to get an edge in competition, myself included. The only thing I refuse to do is grow out my leg hair for the ritual shave before big meets. When I was twelve, Sarah Weller teased me about how dark my body hair was—in front of everyone—and I’ve been self-conscious about it ever since.
“That redhead guy, the one who was holding the door for everyone,” Jessa tells her.
“Oh, yeah, he is cute,” Casey says. “Harry something. I heard him introducing himself to Avik and Nash in the mezzanine.”
“Harry Something,” Jessa murmurs. “Hmm. Hot name, too.”
“I’ve always wanted to be Mrs. Something.” Casey giggles. “You know him, Susannah?”
“She doesn’t,” Amber says so I don’t have to, bless her, then changes the subject. “What do you guys think about Beth?”
“What’s there to think?” Jessa asks with a shrug. “We don’t know anything about her.”
“A female head coach,” Casey says. “We’ve never had one of those before. Why are all swim coaches old white dudes?”
“The patriarchy,” Amber says in disgust.
“Sing it,” I say, high-fiving her. I love Amber. We both joined GAC when we were seven, and instantly gravitated toward each other; because she’s Black and I’m Latina, we shared the feeling of being outsiders in a sport where almost no one looked like us. One of my favorite things about Amber is that she says things out loud that I feel all the time but can’t put into words.
“She’s an assistant head coach,” Jessa says dismissively. “She’s not replacing Dave.”
But there’s got to be a reason Dave brought on a female assistant. He never has before. Female coaches are common enough at the developmental levels, but they’re infuriatingly rare in elite swimming, and if the misogyny of the sport had a mascot it would be Dave.
Under any other circumstances, I’d be thrilled to have a female coach, but I’m worried that Dave’s hiring of Beth has something to do with what happened at the invitational. What if he tries to foist me and every other swimmer he’s gotten bored with on her?
I make myself a promise: I’m never, ever swimming for anyone except Dave. GAC is one of the best swim clubs in the country, and he is the reason. I might not like it, but he’s an Olympian. He makes Olympians. And I’m not going to settle for second best. My career is too important to risk it.
* * *
The Lions Natatorium is no ordinary pool. It’s the nicest and most professional high school natatorium in the state. The pool is eight lanes and fifty meters long, with movable bulkheads that allow it to be reconfigured for all three types of races—short-course yards, short-course meters and long-course meters—plus a fourteen-foot diving well, three diving boards and a hot tub on the north end. The mezzanine can hold one thousand people, and on the south end there’s a viewing area behind an enormous picture window that can accommodate five hundred more; during the school day, students study and eat lunch there. I’ve seen facilities at NCAA Division I schools that were far inferior.
For almost a decade, this place has been my home, but since my slowdown it feels like a prison. I still love the water—I don’t think that will ever leave me—but the pool where I rose through the ranks, where I put in the daily work that propelled me to the top of a world championship podium, is not a place I want to be anymore.
Of all the disappointments my body’s changes brought into my life, losing that feeling of safety and peace my pool used to give me is one of the worst. And yet, tonight after practice, when everyone’s gone home, I stay late to work on my start.
I didn’t think Dave would let me. He can’t leave me here alone, and I figure he’s not going to skip dinner with his family to stay with me of all people. But when I ask, he nods and calls to Beth, who’s helping a younger swimmer wrap an ice pack on her shoulder. My chest tightens with hope. Does he forgive me for the false start? That doesn’t sound like Dave, but he can be kind when he feels like it.
“Ramos wants an extra hour in the pool tonight,” Dave tells her. “You free to supervise and lock up when she’s done?”
“Sure,” Beth says. She smiles at me. “Do you need help with something, because I could—”
“No, I’m fine, there’s just something I want to work on by myself,” I say.
This isn’t a normal request, but she rolls with it. “I’ll be in the office if you need me,” she says.
* * *
The coaches’ office has windows that look out onto the deck, so I’m sure Beth’s watching me, but I pretend she’s not there. It’s a relief to have the place to myself. Without all the noise and chaos of sixty swimmers practicing, the pool is like glass. The soft slap of water hitting the gutters relaxes me.
“Take your mark,” I whisper, tightening my grip on the block.
I do probably thirty starts, and each time my body unfolds neatly in flight, assembling itself into a streamlined arrow before plunging into the water. This is stupid. My disqualification had nothing to do with the power or technique of my start. It was fear—of being late off the block and losing our lead, of freezing up and not jumping at all—that did it.