Next up, a father and son dressed as cows play pop songs on cow bells. Gabriel whispers in my ear, “Suddenly dancing underwater feels normal.” I smile at him, or I try to, but whatever they sprayed on my face has left it rock hard and I wince and hold my cheek while he stifles a laugh. I haven’t been this close to him since we were in Pete’s Mini and I wonder if he’s thought about that since. I totally haven’t. Nu-uh.
The act finishes and the father and son disappear off the other side of the stage. Now a huge tank is being lowered down in six pieces. The moment the first piece touches the floor an army of people surge forward with tools to fix it all together. I watch them drag a hose onto the stage and start filling up the tank while they walk around checking all the joins and edges.
Soon the tank is in place, filled, and the show music booms into life. I hear the indistinct sound of a voiceover man announcing the start of the show, then, from the way he holds the last word for a long time, I can tell he’s announced the next act.
Hang on, what? Is it us now…? They said we’d be fifteen minutes, maybe I’ve lost track of time? Aargh!
I throw off my towel and stumble forward. I have a terrifying moment of being blinded from the stage lights and then someone pushes me firmly aside.
Debs is holding me back by the shoulder while her team sashay past, their faces lighting up with practised plastic smiles the second they hit the stage. Cammie, Nicole, Amanda and Melia – all in matching pink swimming costumes.
For the first time all day I feel a real desperate desire not to do this, to just go home, put two chairs back to back, drape my duvet over them and eat cheese on toast under there.
I don’t even catch Debs’ eye, I just walk away back to my team, where Roman and Pete are standing there with grins on their faces. What are they so happy about? They’d better not still be excited about how “hot” Debs’ team is. They lean towards me and take an ear each.
“You know her team already got through the try-outs weeks ago?” they tell me in stereo.
I nod.
Roman whispers gleefully, “Well, we heard her kicking off, yelling at some poor guy backstage because now there are two swimming teams and only one can go through today.”
He raises his eyebrows at me. Us! The thought that anyone might think me and my team could be equal with Debs’… I’m astonished.
Debs looks back at me and I can’t stop myself, I give her my broadest smile. Which, thanks to the face spray, isn’t very big, but she gets the idea and looks royally hacked off as she turns back to watch the stage.
We hear whooping and cheering from the audience.
“It sounds like they’re doing well,” says Pete nervously. Well, duh. He and Roman step forward to watch, but I grab them both by the elbows and shake my head.
“You swim no one’s race but your own,” I tell them firmly. They hesitate but I know I’m right, I give them a Listen to Coach look and they do.
Because I am so wise and a massive hypocrite, I risk a peek when they’re not looking. Debs’ team are doing proper synchronized swimming. It looks good, really pro, perfectly in unison. Maybe I’m biased, but I think it’s a bit boring.
Our routine is more exciting: in some places it’s too exciting. Possibly downright dangerous? Hm. Let’s just hope the substitute doesn’t ruin it all. I suddenly feel sick, and either my throat has got very small or the air here is too big.
Their routine comes to a triumphant end. I hear loud applause and then it quietens down, but I can’t hear the judges’ feedback, just the rumble of voices. I push my ear to the curtain to try and make out words, but I’m almost knocked off my feet by the team striding confidently backstage and waving over their shoulders at the audience.
Their jubilant mood doesn’t last as Debs looms out of the darkness like a shark.
“What was that dive, Melia?”
Ugh, I think to myself, I do not miss that.
I look back and catch Hannah’s eye; she’s clearly thinking the same thing. Debs doesn’t even notice her one-time star swimmer standing in the shadows because she’s too busy bullying her team all the way back to their dressing room. Like she used to do to me, back when she cared.
“OK,” breathes Pete, interrupting my happy thoughts. “Showtime.”
We snap our goggles into place. Gabriel holds out his arm and we give him our towels. I realize I’m still wearing the whistle, and after a moment’s hesitation I take it off and place it around his neck.
“Good luck, Goldfish,” he says and kisses me on the cheek (but sort of near the mouth). I think that might technically count as my first kiss.
That is one impressively hot blush I have here. You could cook an egg on my head. Come on, Team, focus! (And yes, I’ve decided to start calling myself Team.)
The stagehands finish mopping up the water, the music starts again and I hear the booming tones of the voiceover.
“Bwuuuur bwurrr BWWUUUURRRRR!” he shouts.
That’s us, we’re BWWUUUURRRR!
Roman strides out first, I follow, then Pete behind me. I feel calm all of a sudden. There’s no point being scared, it is just going to happen now.
All my swimming training asserts itself and I start regulating my breathing.
You’d think it would feel weird being nearly naked in front of so many people, but it doesn’t. I ping my swimsuit straps for luck, once right, twice left.
We climb the stairs up to the tank and my knees shake with every step. My body feels unresponsive, as if I’ve borrowed it off someone for an hour. How do you work this thing? Where are the gears?
The three of us line up along the edge of the pool. I look down, then up, panicked – it’s just a pool like last time. The sides are filled in! Please tell me this isn’t going to happen to us again…
But then several guys appear from the side of the stage and in one dramatic move pull away the plastic boards surrounding the pool. There’s a whoomph! and lights shine through the water, dappling the faces of the judges and the audience with blue glimmerings. The lights move slowly, drifting past the tank – it’s like they’re recreating the aquarium video. Hope they don’t add an eel.
For the first time I catch a glimpse of the judges. I recognize them from the TV: there’s two men, two women and they’re all staring fixedly at us with slight frowns on their faces. What’s this? they’re thinking.
THIS is Lou Brown and the Aquarium Boys.
35
The music swells and fills the auditorium. We’ve spent weeks swimming to music from Lav’s crappy little speaker dock, but this is like a fireball hurling out from the stage. I can feel the bass vibrating in my ribs!
We raise our hands above our heads. There’s a hushed silence as we wait for our cue. I can’t begin to think about how many people are staring at us from the silent darkness behind the stage lights, so I fix my eyes on the water and visualize my dive.
Which is perfect. I feel the boys hit the water cleanly either side of me and we corkscrew to the bottom, where everything is silent and calm.
We somersault backwards in unison and I speed up as the others slow down. I watch the boys carefully out of the corner of my eyes, then I rise up and they dive beneath me, push off from the bottom, hold a foot and a calf each and raise me into the air. I break the surface of the water and almost fall because I’m deafened by the roaring sound in the studio. Everyone is cheering!
The boys throw me up into the air and I somersault, knees tucked hard to my chest. I catch a quick glimpse of the judges’ table before I dive down to the bottom and I’m back into the routine.
We swim around each other in a circle then Pete peels off to lie on the floor of the pool followed by me, then Roman. It sounds unspectacular but it takes such control. You have to let all of the air out of your body and we each exhale at a precise moment so that bubbles rush up from Pete, then me, then Roman. We slap our feet and upper arms on the bottom of the pool, push up hard and kick with mermaid legs to reach the surfa
ce. By now we have no air left in our lungs and it takes a super-human effort.
I always thought this would be the bit that drowned Gabe. I’d watch him do this with my heart in my throat, poised to grab him and pull him out of the pool, but he always struggled through. It makes my head spin and my ears ring – that’s why we put it at the end.
We lie on our backs on the surface of the pool like starfish with our arms and legs interlocking. We need this bit to get our breath back for the final push, so as the music builds we’re panting and waiting for our cue. This is the moment where the bass swells, we thrust our arms above our heads and we dive backwards underwater.
The routine ends with the three of us motionless.
Arms crossed over our chests.
Underwater.
Heads down.
Boom.
It gave me shivers watching the boys do that, through misted-up goggles in our school swimming pool with verruca plasters drifting past – it must look incredible now.
We surface and splash towards each other for a painfully hard group hug, which is a lot of slippery naked skin on skin.
We break apart prit-ty quick.
Gabe falls up the metal stairs to hug Roman, who pulls him into the water and we’re all hugging each other again. And then sinking, because that’s how water works, and hugging and sinking again because we’re too excited to think straight. I can’t believe we’ve actually done it! I don’t even care what the judges thought!
Well … I do a bit. So we swim to the edge of the pool, panting and pulling off our goggles. The judges are laughing and applauding and the comedian is even wiping at his eyes.
“Well,” says the mean one, spreading his hands wide as if he has no words, which makes the audience burst into roars and cheers again. It’s deafening, actually painful to hear, but we’re wincing and laughing.
“What even is that?” laughs the pop star judge, and I shrug modestly, like: just some new shizzle. We look at each other – we’ve never really put a name to it, and I reckon if I said the words “synchronized” and “swimming” in front of everyone Pete might push me out of the tank.
My hand slips off the edge of the pool and I put it back on again. But it slips off again and so does Gabe’s. We glance at our hands, then at each other, but the judges are still talking so we try to focus on them. There’s a ripple in the water, a strange Jurassic Park-style vibration that Roman and Pete don’t seem to feel but Gabe and I do.
The surface of the water looks strange, and other people are beginning to notice it too. A couple of the stagehands walk briskly towards us and the audience falls silent, confused.
Whenever I remember this bit later, it’s always in slow motion; maybe it was so unexpected that that’s the only speed at which I could process it.
One side of this massive tank detaches and falls backwards, off the stage.
I watch it fall with a dreamy indifference and I’m vaguely aware of shouting. Someone grabs at my arms but they can’t hang on to me. My legs are cold and everything feels suddenly hazy.
The four of us lurch downwards as the rest of the pool collapses and the water races towards the judges. Nothing feels like slow motion any more. Gabe and I clutch each other as the water throws us towards the judges’ table and my head is submerged. Burning water shoots up my nose. I need to cough, I wrench my head upwards but there’s just more water. Where is up? I can hear my heartbeat pounding in my ears, then people screaming, then heartbeat again, as my head is ducked in and out of water.
There’s a sharp pain in my lower back as I hit something – the table, a camera, a person…? Gabriel’s hand slips from mine; I grab fruitlessly at nothing but can’t find him again and for the second time that month I lose consciousness.
36
I wake up to the rustle of crisp sheets and a strangely familiar pressure on my chest. You only get tucked in this hard at hospital.
It’s a sign of an “interesting” life when you wake up in hospital so regularly that you can guess where you are with your eyes closed.
When I open them, Mum and Lav are sitting by the bed and Dad’s in a chair in the corner – just like our last visit. But no one’s crying this time.
They look delighted to see I’m awake and grin at me – the mood is definitely less serious. A nurse comes in to adjust my drip and check my charts. I think I recognize her from last time.
Ugh, except this time it feels like I’m wearing a polo neck made of cement. I’m in a neck brace and it’s giving me an unfortunate double chin. I prop my jaw on the side, hoping that helps.
Lav gets to the point with characteristic gentleness.
“Now you’re not dead, do you want the good news or the bad news?”
My throat hurts, so I hold up one finger, choosing option one.
“You nearly killed the judges of BHT.”
I raise my eyebrows high.
“Well,” she shrugs, “they’re annoying; I think it’s a fine achievement.”
“The boys are OK,” says Dad. “You got the worst of it.”
I roll my eyes. Of course I did.
“Now get some rest,” says Mum, putting a cool hand on my forehead. I turn my head to one side, trying to get comfortable, basking in the glow of our amazing performance. All that hard work, the nerves and the disasters, it was all worth it! We’re TV stars.
I smile to myself, closing my eyes. I don’t think I’ve ever been this happy. I’m a winner again – the Goldfish returns from the dead!
I have the unmistakable feeling I’m being watched. I open my eyes and Mum, Dad and Lav are all gathered tightly around my bed, looking down at me. Dad brushes my hair back from my face. Aaah, love my family.
I close my eyes again.
I open them again. Family still clustered around my bed.
OK, gang. It’s been emotional, but give a girl some space. How am I meant to have a nap while you’re all gazing at me like I’ve just been born? Although I suppose I should get used to this; famous people have to put up with it all the time.
Imagine how everyone at school is going to act around me now? Cammie’s gonna be gutted! Maybe Melia will finally get the guts to talk to me? Can’t promise I’ll be too keen. After all, I’ve got friends now: proper friends.
Mum interrupts the little victory parade in my head.
“Lou, you were wonderful out there. It was a beautiful routine, wasn’t it?” She turns to Dad and Lav.
“Amazing.” Lav nods. “You’re a choreographer!”
“Weirdest thing I’ve ever seen,” admits Dad. “Don’t know what goes on in that head of yours.”
“We’re all so proud of you.” Mum smooths my hair behind my ear. “But you didn’t get through to the next round.”
I blink at her.
I think I must’ve gone temporarily insane. Because, and you’ll laugh when I tell you, it’s so ridiculous, but it sounded like she just said—
“You didn’t go through. Debs’ team did,” adds Lav, clearly going for the “rip the plaster off quickly” approach.
“What?” I croak. My jaw slips off the side of the neck brace.
“Darling,” says Mum, “they couldn’t use the footage.”
“They think the damage to the stage, crew and audience might run to six figures,” Dad chips in.
“They might have to delay the next series because so many of the crew and judges are injured.” Lav brings up the rear of the Bad News conga.
“I see. Anything else?”
“I got a parking ticket,” Dad says. “Which I’m appealing, because the sign said…” He subsides at a look from Lav. “Nothing else, that’s all.”
“Try and get some sleep,” says Mum, and they all tiptoe out of the room to leave me “in peace”. AKA to stew in my rage.
I spend the next few days in hospital having X-rays to check I haven’t chipped my spine or anything fun like that. But thankfully I’m not the unluckiest person in the world, I’ve just got bruises.
“Did they give you that?” I ask, delighted.
“Not exactly…”
I turn the sign over and see large chips of paint on the back where he wrestled it off the door.
I examine the sign extremely carefully, suddenly a bit shy. Gabe sits on my bed, but my bedsheets are tucked in so tightly that him doing that pulls me towards him until I’m lying on my side. We’re very close now, and when I look up his face is right next to mine. And all I can think is: Beau Michaels tongue worms, Beau Michaels tongue worms.
Lav! She’s psychologically scarred me before I’ve had a chance to do any kissing of my own! But I’m only cross for a second because Gabe moves his face closer to mine and suddenly I am doing kissing of my own. Gabe’s lips are soft and there is no darting tongue action at all. I feel smug. I’m clearly having better kissing than Lav was. I smell the sweet hair product from the aquarium and realize that was Gabe, not Roman.
We’re holding hands while we kiss but as he moves closer we break away, laughing. I don’t know if you’ve ever tried to hug someone with a large cardboard sign between you, but it’s difficult, risky work. We break apart, ruefully rubbing our chins where the sign poked us.
“When you get out of hospital, would you like to do something?” he asks.
“Do? Like a new swimming team?” I suggest. Just in case he doesn’t mean a date; I don’t want to embarrass myself.
“No, like a date!” he exclaims, rolling his eyes.
He did mean do something like a date!
“Cool, sure, whatev,” I shrug. “I’m pretty chill about it, but if I have time, you know…”
Gabe gets up and props the sign on my windowsill where I can see it. “Go to sleep, you’re very annoying,” he says and kisses me on the cheek.
He leaves, but I don’t go to sleep, I just lie there looking at my sign.
Girl Out of Water Page 17