by Dean, Ali
“I’ve been thinking about taking you in this minivan since you put that visual in my head on the high dive.”
Despite how the rest of that night went, it seems some good came from the conversation we shared. I love that he’s been carrying that visual around for over a year.
“Well, what are you waiting for?”
“We’re in the parking lot of my elementary school. Now, my sister’s elementary school.”
“So?” I question, my lips brushing his. “Everyone’s watching football and eating turkey. Just try not to rock the van too hard. We don’t want to be obvious.”
* * *
We pull back up in front of Jack’s house not long after, each in our own vehicles. He pulls me in for another kiss before we walk through the front door. Heather will probably have her guesses as to what we’ve been up to, but I don’t really care at the moment. I’m too happy to be fazed in the least. Although as we step up onto the front porch, I remember the look of disgust in Jack’s eyes in this spot, and I stiffen.
Jack senses it and stops, turning to me, holding my hand. “What’s wrong?”
No longer wanting to hold anything back from him, I tell him the truth. “You looked so disgusted with me when you were talking about Nolan and that night. I mean, I get it,” I start to justify it but this time he puts a finger on my lips.
“Whatever you think you get, stop. I wasn’t disgusted with you when I thought you’d wanted to hook up with Nolan and hang out with him after he played at the Happy Hollow. If I looked that way, you read it wrong. If there’s anything that made me look that way, it was the way Nolan talked about you when he told me. And the way I treated you the first time we hooked up at your place. I treated you the way Nolan talked about you, and I hated myself for it. I still do.”
“Don’t hate yourself, Jack,” I say immediately, knowing how it feels to blame yourself for things you shouldn’t. “We had seriously hot chemistry and I didn’t want more. Or didn’t think I did. You were just trying to give me what I thought I wanted, okay? What matters is that we’re together now, and there’s nothing between us.”
“Hmm… there’s touring. I definitely need a break from that as soon as this one’s over.”
“It’s like you said in L.A. We’ll figure it out, okay?”
The front door opens and Gracie stands there, wearing a pink eight-year-old-sized apron with ruffles on the bottom over a lime green leotard. She waves a turkey baster at us. “Stop making out and start cooking!” she exclaims with a huff, hands on hips.
“How do you know what making out is?” Jack asks with suspicion.
She shrugs. “It’s what Mom told me to tell you.”
Jack and I exchange amused and slightly-guilty smiles. Guess Heather knows exactly what we’ve been up to after all.
“Come on, let’s have our first holiday together,” he says, pulling me forward by our grasped hands.
I’m still not certain what the future holds for my relationship with Jack, but I know that we both want the same thing, and that’s enough for me. It’s the same with my future after college. I don’t know what will happen, but at least I now know what I want. And even though it scares me to want something and not know if I’ll get it, I’m learning to embrace it. Figuring out that it’s okay to go for something and risk not getting it. It’s not necessarily failure if you don’t get it, because it’s better than not trying at all. Sometimes being brave is just going after what you want, and until now, I couldn’t even admit to myself what I wanted. Baby steps.
Chapter Thirty-One
Kick
As I warm up for the Winter Classic, the last meet before winter break, I feel lighter than I have in a long time. This is the only big invitational meet hosted at our home pool, and I love seeing our training grounds transformed into chaos. Teams from all over the western United States are here, crowding the pool deck. It’s one of the only times in the year the stands are overflowing, since we usually only host dual meets.
While we’re still mid-season, not yet rested or in shape to set our best times, this is an important meet. It’s the best chance to hit qualifying marks for the championship season. For some, the goal is to simply to qualify for conference, for others it’s Nationals. I’ve already qualified for the conference championship, but today I want to qualify for NCAA – the National Collegiate Athletic Association championship. I’ve qualified with the medley relay teams every year, just barely got in on the individual medley, or I.M., last year, and only qualified in the 100 breaststroke my freshman year. This year, I want to qualify in all three of my best individual events – 100 and 200 breast, and the 200 I.M.
In the past when I made it to NCAA, I hit the times at our conference meet, when I was tapered and rested, which meant I’d lost some of my fitness by the time NCAA came weeks later. Shay hits the NCAA qualifying times early in the season so that she knows it’s her final meet and she can hold off on tapering until after conference. That way, she can be rested without losing fitness, in peak racing condition, for NCAA. I want to be in that position this season. I want to have a shot at actually hitting the podium at NCAA, rather than just being happy I made it at all. I want to perform well enough that the panic attack at the first meet will be overlooked by potential agents.
It’s the first evening of a three-day meet and Shay and I hop out of the warm-up pool together to head over to the starting blocks. We’re in lanes 4 and 5 for the 200 I.M. She hit the top qualifying spot this morning, and I’m in the third spot. This is the only event when I occasionally, if rarely, beat Shay. Okay, so it’s happened three times over countless races, but whatever.
Shay reaches over for a fist bump as we position ourselves behind the blocks and watch the semi-final heat ahead of us finish their last lap.
I love racing next to Shay. I always feel like a team, like we’re somehow both stronger, when she takes the block beside me. I get strength from her strength, and I like to think it’s reciprocal. As the swimmers ahead of us pull their tired bodies out of the water, the announcer calls us forward.
The cheers are always louder when Shay and I race side by side like this. I can hear our teammates hooting from the other side of the pool, ready to get in our faces at the wall. Hitting the NCAA standard in this event is a long shot for me. I’ve got a better shot in the breaststroke events tomorrow and the next day. But that doesn’t mean I’m not going for it anyway.
“Swimmers, take your mark.”
My body is loose and ready to pounce as I let my fingertips drop to the edge of the starting block.
With the loud beep, I spring forward, arms tightly clasped over my ears, and glide under the water before moving my torso in a dolphin kick. I’m no Shay Spark, but I’m a solid butterflier, and I stay within a body length of the national champion and record holder in the lane beside me through the first stroke of the individual medley.
When we turn into backstroke, I echo the same underwater dolphin kick on my back before breaking the surface. I love racing this event, switching strokes every two laps, holding my own in fly and back before really showing my stuff in breaststroke. My body feels smooth and strong as I move into the flip turn with perfect timing. The summer training and focus on technique paid off, and I’ve shaved time simply by tightening up my starting dive, turns, and underwater streamline position.
Switching from back to breast, I hit the suicide turn just right and push off the wall with determination, ready to attack the breaststroke pull-out. By now, my lungs are starting to burn, and it’s tempting to break the surface earlier than ideal in order to take a breath, but I follow through with the movements that maximize my forward momentum. When I break the surface, I’ve nearly caught up to Shay.
Like me, Shay doesn’t really have a weak stroke, which is why we’re both good at the I.M. If we had to choose, our worst stroke would be freestyle, which is pretty unusual. The sound of cheering rushes in my ears each time my head bobs above the surface, and when I hit the wall to turn into t
he second lap of breast, Shay and I are neck and neck. There are shouts close to my face as our teammates bend over the edge of the pool. People go crazy watching us race against each other. It’s like no one can lose, since we’re on the same team, more than just the same college team. It’s easy to understand the appeal of dual sponsorship. Together, we’re just better.
I hold strong on the second pull-out, and focus on tight and fluid kicks through the last lap of breast stroke. When I turn into free, the last stroke, I’ve got a slight lead on my sister. No one else is even close.
The last two laps of free in the I.M. are no holds barred. Everything I’ve got left goes into motoring myself forward. Pulling, kicking, breathing to the side as little and as quickly as possible. It’s a frenzy of burning muscles, bubbles, and pain as I reach the wall and engage in a flip turn, pushing off with all my leg strength. Unlike with breaststroke, where my head comes up each stroke, it’s impossible to see where Shay is, though I sense her near as I throw everything I’ve got into the final few yards. I pound into the wall, knowing I’m happy with the race no matter what the clock says.
She’s right there with me, and we high-five one another, uncertain who won, before glancing at the clock. I’ve won by two one-hundredths of a second. We’ve both hit the NCAA qualifying mark, by quite a bit. Actually, we both broke Shay’s school record from NCAA’s last year, which means we’ve secured best times. I can’t remember the last time I hit a best time mid-season like this when I wasn’t tapered. Vaguely, I think about how whoever updates the record board must be getting pretty annoyed with the two of us.
Shay slides over the lane line to embrace me in a hug. “Okay, I promised myself I’d let it be your decision but please pretty please go pro with me. I can do it without you but it’s so much better with you at my side.”
“Yeah, Shay. I think the agents might even want me for swimming now too, don’t you think?” I half-kid her.
She pulls away to give me a shoulder slap.
Glancing at the stands, I find both our boyfriends standing beside our parents. Mom leans over to say something to Jack. She’s warming up to him, from what I can tell. I have mixed feelings about her liking my boyfriend. It’s weird. It goes against my normal. But shit’s changing, I guess.
“I’m not crazy about taking a career path Mom approves of,” I admit to Shay as we pull off our goggles. “I mean, I don’t want her to think it was her idea, or that I’m doing it for her.”
Shay just grins at me.
“You really don’t have to worry about that, Kick.”
But as I catch Mom’s eye and see this weird twinkle, goosebumps break out as I recognize what appears to be maternal pride. It feels… good. Mostly because I’m not doing any of this for her, I’m doing it for me. But shit, it’s nice to know that working hard, supporting Shay, really going for it in the pool, all of that, can make a mom with the most impossible standards beam with happiness.
Maybe I’m not such a fuck-up after all. Maybe I never was.
Chapter Thirty-Two
4 months later
It’s not exactly a movie premiere, but Coco didn’t mess around making us look like red carpet material. The band’s new P.A., a middle-aged no-nonsense woman named Peggy, arranged for a viewing of Kings of Sound’s newest music video, which features my dance moves.
I’m still floating on the high from last weekend. I shocked everyone, except for Shay, so she claims, when I won not only the 100-yard breaststroke, but 200-yard breaststroke too. I got second place only to Shay in the 200-yard I.M. For a girl who had never made it to the finals at NCAA and didn’t even qualify in any individual events last year, the results have the swimming world buzzing. Sure, I’d had a major breakthrough at summer nationals, but it had almost felt like a one-hit-wonder situation until NCAA. Now there can be no doubt in anyone’s mind, especially my own, that I’m the real deal.
Shay’s floating on her own high, completely in la-la land. When she took the top podium for the 200 I.M., gasps echoed throughout as Jett Decker came forward as the one to present her medal. But when she bent her head for him to slip the medal around her neck, he shook his head, got down on one knee, and slipped a ring on her finger instead. I cried.
Jett loves Shay so fierce and so loud, the public proposal made perfect sense for them. We all knew it was coming. Even Mom, who grumbled about how young they were, and how it happened too fast, took on a glowing happiness I rarely saw from her.
Jack arranged a limo to pick us up at the condo. He’s already at the theater with the band, doing media stuff, answering press questions and taking photos. After firing Nolan on Thanksgiving, Will, Townie and Jack decided they didn’t need a permanent piano player in the band. If it worked out and they found the right person, they’d take him or her on, but their dynamic with just the three of them was solid.
It came out that Addy had leaked the photos of Jack and me to the press back in September. I don’t know if she was trying to sabotage our relationship or just wanted to make a quick buck, but it sealed her fate, and her brother’s, with the band. Any hope they could come back in some capacity was squashed. They were toxic.
I didn’t mind that Jack and I went public anyway, especially now that I have confidence in us, in this, in his love for me. He’s seen all of me, from the locker room Kick, to the sobbing panic attack Kick, and he only seems to keep loving me harder. Since Christmas, we’ve been able to see each other a couple times a week. It’d be better if it was every day, but as far as I’m concerned, we have our whole lives ahead of us. Besides, we’re both chasing big dreams, and we support each other in that.
The world already knew the song Fireball was about me, and since I’d been posting my dance moves on my blog and Instagram account, the world also knew about my little side talent. So, I finally came around to being the star in one of the band’s videos. It isn’t for Fireball, that song isn’t suited for my hip hop-style moves. It’s for one of their faster, upbeat tunes that plays on the radio. It’s their only song that could almost be classified as pop, though the guys practically growled when I told them that.
“And that’s why we need you to be the dancer,” Townie had explained. “The studio keeps trying to get us to dance and that’s just crossing a line. Next thing, we’ll be called a boy band.”
So now I’m in a limo, toasting champagne with Coco, Jett, Shay, Beatrice and her boyfriend Daryl. As it turns out, Coco and Townie hooked up that night in L.A., after Jack pulled me into the hotel bedroom, leaving them alone in the suite’s living room. They connected again when the fall tour ended and have been seeing each other regularly since. He’s twelve years younger than her, but they’re really into each other.
When we pull up to the theater, Jett and Shay get out of the limo first. I follow behind them, blinking at the flashes going off around me as I seek out Jack. He’s standing by the door, wearing a black three-piece suit, but still looking comfortable with his usual high top skater sneakers. The shoes are new, not yet scuffed. I notice the tie is a deep blue, matching the color of my dress. Coco must have been involved in his wardrobe choice.
Jack’s face is hard and serious, like it often is when media is around, but his eyes are soft when I meet them, and he lets out a little sigh as he takes me in, like he’s finally able to relax now that I’m here.
I walk up to him and he places his hands on my hips, brushing his lips over mine. “Fireball, I don’t know how you expect me to get through the night’s events with you in that dress, by my side, while I watch you on the big screen dancing to my music.”
His words send tingles through me, and I have to agree, the night’s going to be excruciating. Jack places a hand on my bare back, and I see him glance there, his eyes widening at the low scoop and the way my entire back is exposed.
“Fuck,” he says on a groan before turning back around and moving us through the front doors.
The media isn’t allowed inside the theater, and the gathering is a small,
private one. They’ve already put out half a dozen music videos and never had a formal affair like this. I know Jack only arranged it for my benefit. Once we’re all seated inside the theater a few words are spoken by the producers before they shut off the lights.
I’ve already seen the video, of course, but seeing it on the big screen with friends and family, it’s more intimate than I expect. I don’t know if anyone else in the theater feels that way, but I sense Jack does by the way he pulls me close to him with one arm around my shoulder, the other reaching across my waist to hold my hand.
Our relationship is now intertwined in a unique way with this visual production; it’s an undeniable public display – even though Jack doesn’t make a physical appearance in the video, it’s his voice, his lyrics, and his band that I’m moving my body to. I spent some time learning new moves, polishing others, and working with a choreographer to make this video work. And it came together. Wow, it really flows. I’m fucking proud of myself. A year ago I don’t know if I would’ve gone through with it. I wouldn’t have felt I deserved it. I might have feared it was only a handout, a favor from a guy, and I didn’t have what it takes. Sure, I still have those feelings, but they aren’t holding me back, bringing me down. I’m no Beyoncé, but I’ve got mad dancing talent. I can see that on the screen. Jack saw it. The band saw it. Now the whole world will see it. I can own it.
I’m beaming as I stay at Jack’s side throughout the night, at the after party. It’s past midnight when my feet start to ache, and I wonder when it’s socially acceptable for us to peace out. Jack’s been touching me in little ways all night and I don’t want to wait any longer to be alone with him.
Jack must sense it too because he guides me out of the bar through a side door, until we’re in an alley. Giggling, I turn to Jack. “Are alleys going to be a thing for us?”