Deep End

AS I ONCE EXPLAINED TO BARB, DUAL MEETS ARE OFFICIAL and regulated by the NCAA, but “not, like, too much.”

“What you just said makes absolutely no sense,” she pointed out, and she was right.

The most important swimming and diving competitions are clustered in the spring. That’s when our regional conference, the Pac-12, happens, when the NCAA trials and finals happen, and, in a year like this one, when we fight it out to see who’ll get to go to the Olympic Games. Preseason meets are much smaller in size, and it’s understood that no athlete is expected to be in tip-top shape yet. Records or personal bests are unlikely, they are not televised, and the atmosphere more convivial. If we win, good. If we lose: See you in March.

“No synchro for you on this meet. You’re just not good enough yet,” Coach tells Pen and me on Friday night, sounding ready to combat our counterarguments.

Pen and I, though, both slump in relief. “You’re right,” she says. “No need for public humiliation.”

I nod. “We should definitely spare the Texans our shame.”

“Someone could even TiVo us and post us somewhere.”

I scrunch my nose, Pen faux shudders, and we leave a perplexed Coach Sima behind.

Basically, this meet is no big deal. It might even be a small deal—if not for two reasons.

One: this is my first time competing since my injury, and the thought has been making every cell in my body want to puke since I woke up.

Two is, of course: The. Inward. Issue.

“It’s normal to be nervous,” Pen says, holding my eyes in the mirror as I part my hair to French braid it.

I half exhale a laugh. “Is it that obvious?”

“Just to me.” She smiles. “Because I know you.”

She does. Maybe our relationship started as circumstantial, but lately we’ve been together so often, it’d be hard not to describe what we have as friendship—even for someone like me, who strives to avoid overestimating her emotional significance in other people’s lives. “I just need to get through the first dive, I think. Then I’ll calm down.”

She lays her head on my shoulder. “I’ll be there, Vandy. If you need anything.”

We march out of the locker room with the women’s swimming team, and there’s so many of them, all so powerfully upbeat, it’s hard not to be infected with their enthusiasm. Last night, in preparation for UT’s arrival, someone put up a bunch of MEET THE ATHLETE posters. They’re plastered on the hallway leading out to the exhibition pool, and I pass by a few familiar faces. Kyle, Niko, Rachel, Cherry, Hasan. Lukas.

He’s the only unsmiling swimmer, and boy, is it fitting.

I stare at his picture, unsurprised by the stomach squeeze that hits me, an odd mix of wistfulness, anger, sadness—and irritation at myself.

In the last few days, he tried to call me. Twice. Then texted me. Once.

“I forgot that Lukas is trying two hundred freestyle, too,” Bree says, tapping at his poster.

Pen nods. “Sweden’s head coach told him that they don’t have anyone fast at it on the Olympic team.”

“Is he just, you know.” Bella shrugs. “Against anyone else medaling?”

“Oh, shit.” Pen winces. “I forgot that two hundred freestyle is Devin’s and Dale’s main, too! But don’t worry—it’s not going to be one of Lukas’s NCAA events.”

“Oh, yeah.” Bree snorts. “’Cause otherwise Devin and Dale were totally gonna win that race.”

“Hey!”

“I’m just trying to be realistic about who we’re dating, Bella.” Bree sighs. “See, the difference between me and you? That’s how you know that clear-sightedness is not genetic.”

“Then basic human decency must not be, either.”

“Excuse me?”

“They’re so scary when they argue,” I whisper at Pen, hurrying outside ahead of them.

“They grew up together and are basically the same person. They know how to strike the chakra that’ll hurt the most.”

“You make an excellent argument for lifelong solitude.”

One of UT’s most recent recruits is Sunny, a girl I trained with back in St. Louis. “I can’t believe I’m in my first college competition!” she tells me on the deck, hugging me once and then again. “And you’re in it, too! You’ve always been goals for me.”

You sure about that? I don’t let myself say. I smile, pretending to be excited and not full of worms crawling over my internal organs, and go sit next to Pen to begin the time-consuming process of putting on wrist guards and taping my joints. In the pool across the diving well, the swimmers are warming up. Lukas is there, speaking with his coach and Rachel as he stretches, and I recall his text.

LUKAS: I owe you an apology.

“Pen?”

“Yup.”

“Can I ask you something about Lukas?”

“You mean, my ex whom you’re currently doing? Sure.”

Not currently. “The other day I met his brother, and—”

“What brother?” Her eyes widen.

“Jan.”

“Wait—which one is Jan?”

“The next youngest.”

“With kids? The lawyer?”

“Those would be Oskar and Leif, the two oldest.”

“Right, right.” She shrugs. “What about Luk?”

“You know how he . . . tries to prove to himself he’s above wanting things?”

She gives me a baffled look, like I just announced that I’m moving to a farm in Vermont to tend to pygmy goats. “Lukas Blomqvist? Are you sure—holy shit.” Pen slaps my forearm, staring somewhere into the stands.

“What happened?”

“He’s here.”

I squint into the distance, looking for a non-otherwise-specified he. “Who?”

“Theo. Teacher. The teacher I’m hot for!”

I gape. “Is he here to see you?”

“I—maybe?”

“Did you invite him?”

“No! No? I mentioned in passing that I had a meet and now he’s over there . . .”

Pen sinks her obviously delighted smile into her knees, and I bite my lower lip to avoid laughing.

My first competing dive after my (forced) hiatus is a thing of beauty, and the judges agree. I get eight point fives and a nine, and for a moment—a beautiful, brilliant, blooming moment—I allow myself to cradle the hope that I might be back.

“That was the most elegant reverse two-and-a-half-somersault tuck I’ve ever seen,” one of the UT coaches tells me while I stare up at the scoreboard from under the shower. Austin tried to recruit me, and she and I met when I visited their campus.

“Thank you,” I say, feeling—wow. I might actually be proud of myself. What a concept.

“Hope to see many more from you.”

Pen goes after me, but her entry is not the cleanest. Sunny’s good, but her degree of difficulty is low, which reflects on the score. The twins don’t compete from the platform, which means that with the UT divers, there’s seven of us overall.

The second round—forward three and a half—goes even better, as do my twist, my armstand, and my backward dives. By the time the fifth round is done, I’m second on the board, trailing Pen by just two points, but am fifteen ahead of Hailey, a UT sophomore.

“And this is where I get fucked,” I mutter, trying to keep my shoulder warmed up.

“No. Nope.” Pen steps in front of me. “This is diving, Vandy. Negative thinking is how you get fucked.”

I take a deep breath. Force myself to nod. “You’re right.”

“I’m always right. And listen.” She takes both my hands. “Taking a break from trying inward dives was a great strategy. You’re gonna go up and get that inward pike done, because you are amazing. And if you don’t, I’m going to . . . I don’t know, beat you up? So you better.”

I laugh. Accept her hug. When the referee gestures at me to start climbing the tower, I do that, lingering halfway, waiting for the two girls before me to complete their dives. When I hear the second splash, I dry whatever droplets are left on my skin, throw down my shammy, and walk toward the end of the platform.

It always feels momentous, stepping toward that edge—throwing one’s body off a cliff can never be a light decision—but today the ten meters between me and the water are absolutely life-changing.

I visualize. Not the dive, this time, but the way I’ll feel after I manage an inward pike. Waking up tomorrow morning and leaving what plagued me in the past few months firmly behind. Going to practice without being defined by the one thing I cannot do—once again among peers, instead of an intruder. Returning to St. Louis for the holidays and not having to skulk around in the hope I won’t meet any of my former teammates—or, even worse, Coach Kumar.

Feeling whole again.

I visualize all the good things that will come from me flying through these ten meters in the right way, and none of what will happen if I don’t. Because Pen is right, and a defeatist mentality has no place in diving.

My eyes slide to Coach Sima, Pen, Victoria, the twins, all rooting for me. A few thousand miles away, so are Barb and Pipsqueak. On the far end of the pool, leaning one arm against the wall, a towering, cap-tousled figure in sunglasses stares up at me.

“One minute,” the referee yells.

A time warning, but it’s okay. I’m fucking ready to bury the last two years of my life.

I turn around.

Close my eyes.

Bend my knees. Lift my arms up. Press my back into the shape I learned as a kid.

Take a single deep breath, and go.

Divers are in the air for less than a second, but sometimes the process of twisting our muscles and angling our body is so arduous, it seems to stretch for years. Today, that’s not the case. My waist bends easily into a pike that’s as much second nature as photosynthesis is for plants. And the rest . . . it just works. I’m not sure how, or why, but it does. I’m in the water sooner than I can worry about failing, and before I reemerge, I take a moment.

Squeeze my eyes shut.

Savor the relief.

Then I burst out, barely holding back a grin, wipe the water from my eyes, and—

I don’t even need to see the scoreboard. Pen’s frown tells me everything I need to know.

I may have done a pike. And maybe it was a good one. But I did not manage an inward dive.