Breath Like Water

by Anna Jarzab

  Mom nods at my mug. “That’s not energy tea, is it? You need sleep. You’re very cranky.”

  I shake my head. “Chamomile.”

  “Good girl.” She takes a big sip. “Ah. I can feel the neurons firing already.”

  I laugh. “I don’t think I’ll need tea to get to sleep tonight.”

  “It was a long day.” Mom puts an arm around me. I let my head fall against her shoulder. “You have a lot of those, kiddo.”

  “I know it’s not easy on you guys, either,” I say. “Between practices and competitions and travel and equipment and membership fees and Boosters meetings—”

  “And the bake sales!” Mom says. “All those freaking bake sales.”

  “I know it’s not just me who’s giving everything up for this silly dream,” I say.

  “Oh, mija.” Mom hugs me, jostling the dozing cats, who glare at her resentfully. “It’s not silly. It’s a beautiful dream. And we’re not giving everything up. It’s our pleasure as your parents to be able to provide you with what you need. It’s all worth it, a million times over, as long as you’re happy.”

  “Thanks for not asking me if I’m happy right now.” If she did, I don’t know what I’d say.

  “I know sometimes it can be hard to tell. There are nights I sit down to my homework at the end of a miserable day and I think: Why am I doing this? Is this really what I want? But the next day, the sun rises, I go to work and I remember how much I want to be a lawyer—so much I was willing to return to school at my age and take weekend classes for the next eight years and go into debt that will take eight hundred more years to pay back.” Mom kisses the top of my head. “I know you think we can’t understand, but I imagine that’s kind of how you feel.”

  “Pretty much.” Except my debt isn’t just financial, and it’ll take my whole life to pay back. But there is one way I can start to make a dent in everything I owe them.

  I shift so that I can look at Mom. “You know it’s not just about the Olympics. If I can swim well enough over the next few years, I’ll get a scholarship. Swimming could pay for college.”

  After all the money my parents have spent on my swimming, I can’t bear the thought of them taking out loans to finance my education. I’m not their only child.

  “I wish you didn’t have to worry about that,” Mom says, but she doesn’t tell me not to worry.

  Mom gives my shoulder one last squeeze. It hurts a bit actually; I never warmed down my muscles after my last race, and I’m feeling sore.

  “Time for me to go back to work,” she says. “And you need to go to bed. Did you eat?”

  I nod.

  “Then get some sleep,” she says. “Tomorrow the sun will rise, and you need to be ready for it.”

  CHAPTER THREE

  314 days until US Olympic Team Trials

  DAVE BANGS HIS clipboard with the heel of his hand to get our attention.

  “Hey! Quiet down!” he shouts. “I have an announcement to make.”

  I’m sitting in the pool mezzanine, surrounded by my teammates. The mezzanine is a huge balcony with carpeted bleachers that are as wide as couches, and it stretches the entire length of the natatorium, but we’re all clumped together in our usual spot overlooking the diving well, which is as still as a millpond. It’s the first GAC meeting of the fall; school started today, and everyone is amped for the new season. We’re supposed to be stretching, but most people are gathered in small groups, chatting animatedly and pretty much ignoring Dave.

  Jessa and Amber are beside me, talking in low voices. I think they’re debating the relative attractiveness level of the handful of swimmers who just joined GAC, but I’m not really listening—unlike everyone else on the team, I’m watching Dave.

  It’s been two weeks since the invitational, since Dave dressed me down on the pool deck over my false start—two weeks since Dad called and yelled at him for berating me in front of the entire Chicagoland swimming community.

  Dad and I haven’t discussed it since—his vain attempt to protect me, I guess—and I didn’t hear anything from my coach over the break. The suspense is killing me. I half expected Dave to tell me not to return to GAC.

  That didn’t happen, but I’m afraid it still could. I keep trying to catch his eye, but every time it seems like I might, his gaze slides over me like I’m not even here.

  When people don’t pipe down, Dave grabs a bullhorn from the floor near his feet. There’s an unfamiliar white woman standing next to him. She’s tall and slender, with long mousy brown hair tied back into a severe ponytail and a pair of glasses in electric blue frames sitting on the bridge of her nose. They’re too big for her face, but somehow, they suit her.

  She stands with her hip resting against the glass railing and her back to the aqua expanse of the pool below. I barely have time to wonder who she is and why she’s here before Dave starts shouting into the bullhorn.

  “Everybody settle down and SHUT. UP!”

  I cover my ears—that bullhorn packs a wallop. It does the job, though. We all shut up.

  “Finally.” He sets the bullhorn on the ground and tucks his clipboard under his arm. “Okay, so first of all, welcome to the first GAC practice of the season.”

  A cheer goes up and someone lets out a sharp whistle. Dave smiles.

  “I hope you guys got some rest during the break, because today’s sets are going to crush you. But before we get to the good stuff, I’ve got an important announcement to make.”

  Dave points to the woman standing next to him. “This is Beth Ramsay. As most of you know, Mills accepted a job as head coach of the Beaumont Bruins—”

  People boo at the mention of our local rivals, but Mike Mills was a Dave clone, just ten years younger—a fratty-looking white bro who strutted around the pool deck in Vineyard Vines polos and Sperrys like he was God’s gift to swimming, barking orders and treating us like babies. Jessa thinks I’m being sensitive, but I swear he was especially dismissive of people who didn’t look like him—i.e., the team’s small handful of swimmers of color, and the girls. I’m not sorry to see him go.

  “—and Beth will be taking over his spot as assistant head coach,” Dave continues. “I expect you to treat her with respect and listen to everything she tells you. You monsters go easy on her. Got it?”

  He turns to her. “Beth, any last words?”

  She laughs. “Nothing special. I’m happy to be here, and excited to work with you guys. I hope you’ll enjoy working with me, too.”

  Dave nods and dismisses us with a wave of his hand. “Hit the deck, and don’t let me catch any of you slacking. Break’s over, time to get back to work. See you down there.”

  I try once more to catch Dave’s eye, but he turns to talk to Beth. I make my way up the bleachers behind Jessa and Amber, swept up in the flood of swimmers streaming through the door at the top of the mezzanine. A tall guy I don’t know waits patiently as people push past. Even though it’s his turn, he holds the door open for my friends and me.

  I don’t recognize him at first, but when I do I almost trip right out of my flip-flops. It’s the boy I ran into at the GAC Invitational. The one who asked if I was okay as I was fleeing the scene.

  My face gets hot. He’s the last person I ever wanted to see again, and now here he is, at my club. We’re teammates. The thought of having to swim every day with the stranger who witnessed one of the lowest moments of my year makes my stomach drop.

  “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 undern
eath 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.

  There are no do-overs. A hundred good starts now won’t erase the one that I flubbed.

  But I keep going, taking comfort in the rhythm of it, in the feeling of doing something well, until I happen to glance at the clock. It’s been an hour, which is as long as I can reasonably expect Beth to give me. I toss my goggles onto the deck and hoist myself out of the pool.

  “It’s probably none of my business, but I don’t think there’s anything wrong with your start.”

  The sound of another person’s voice takes me by surprise. My foot slips on the slick metal gutter and I almost topple into the water. I grab the block to catch myself.

  Harry Something is standing near the entrance to the men’s locker room, staring at me with those big, super-chromatic eyes, carelessly leaning against the wall like he’s holding it up instead of the other way around.

  A pang of jealousy hits me square in the chest. An athlete’s job is to understand his or her body and what it can do. It gives you a special kind of confidence, which Harry seems to have. I used to have it, too, but now my body is so foreign to me I’d need the Rosetta Stone to puzzle it out.

  “I know there’s nothing wrong my start,” I tell him. I wrench my swim cap off with a wince. It seems to take half my curls along with it. “You scared the crap out of me.”

  “Sorry about that.” He strolls toward me, shoulders thrown back, hands in the pockets of his jeans, all arrogance and ease. As he gets closer I realize he’s chomping on a Red Vine.

  “I thought I was the only one here,” I tell him. “Except Beth.”

  “That’s her in there?” He mimes wiping sweat from his brow. “I was afraid it was Dave.”

  I wrap a towel around my waist, feeling exposed and a little embarrassed, as if Harry’s caught me giving myself a pep talk in the mirror. Why is he suddenly always around at t
imes like these?

  “How long have you been watching me?” I ask.

  He crams the last of the Red Vine into his mouth and swallows hard. “Don’t say it like that! I wasn’t watching you, like in a creepy way. I saw you through the glass on the way to my car.”

  I glance over my shoulder at the windows that look into East Commons. It’s empty, all the tables and chairs put away for the night. I wonder if we’re the only people on campus.

  “Why are you still here?” I ask Harry.

  “I forgot a couple books in my locker and I need them tonight. Don’t teachers know they’re not supposed to give this much homework the first week? That was the unspoken rule at my old school.”

  “Not here.” I feel so awkward. I don’t know what to say, or what to do with my hands. Why couldn’t he have walked on by and left me alone?

  Harry sits down on a nearby bench and pats the spot next to him. I hesitate, then collapse beside him, feeling the full weight of my exhaustion. I sigh.

  “Yeah, same,” Harry says. “Dave wasn’t kidding. That practice was grueling.”

  “I feel like I’ve been fed through a meat grinder,” I tell him. He nods in sympathy.

  “Which reminds me—why are you still here?” he asks.

  I lift an eyebrow. “I know you saw that false start at the invitational.”

  He scrubs his fingers against his scalp. The bright fluorescent overhead lights pick up the gold in his hair. We’re sitting so close to each other that I’m practically dripping on him.

  “I saw,” he admits. “Dave completely overreacted. I almost decided not to join GAC because of it. I’m not about working my ass off for someone like that.”