CHLORINE AND ALMOST LOVE
Chapter One: The Tryout
The first thing I noticed about Lakeview High's pool deck was the smell, sharp and clean and a little bit like starting over, and the second thing I noticed was the boy standing at the far end of it, watching me the way you watch a storm you're not sure is going to pass you by or flatten you completely.
I didn't know his name yet. I would, in about eleven minutes, and I would spend the rest of the summer wishing I didn't.
But that was later. First, there was the tryout.
"You've got this," I told my reflection in the locker room mirror, tugging the strap of my one decent swimsuit, the navy one I'd saved for exactly this, and tried to believe it. You have got this. You have been swimming since you were six years old. A pool is a pool, even three states away from the one you actually know.
I didn't fully believe it. Three weeks ago I'd been folding laundry in our old apartment, listening to my dad on the phone with someone from his old job, his voice doing that careful, controlled thing it did when he was trying not to let his voice crack in front of me. Two weeks ago we'd been driving a U-Haul into Lakeview with everything we owned crammed in the back, because Dad's new job, the one that actually paid, was here, and here meant a town I'd never seen and a school where I knew exactly nobody.
There had been a conversation, the night before we left, that I still hadn't quite let myself think about too hard. Dad sitting at our half packed kitchen table, running a hand over his face, saying, in the careful voice of someone trying not to make his own kid feel like a burden, that if I wanted to keep swimming at a competitive level, Lakeview's program had a real shot at getting me seen by college scouts, better than anything we could have afforded back home. He hadn't said the word scholarship out loud. He hadn't needed to. I'd seen the number on the tuition brochures he thought he'd hidden well enough in his desk drawer.
Swim team is the one thing that's still yours, I reminded myself, pushing through the locker room door. Don't let a new zip code take that too. Don't let it also be the thing that has to fix everything for Dad, either, even though some small, terrified part of you is already doing the math on exactly how much a scholarship would mean.
The pool deck was already crowded when I stepped out, thirty or so kids stretching and chattering in the too-bright morning light, and I felt the particular, hollow loneliness of being the only person in a room who didn't already have a place in it.
That was when I saw him.
He was standing near the diving blocks, arms crossed, wearing the kind of expression that made it very clear he had better things to do than watch tryouts, though something about the sharp, assessing way his eyes moved over the pool told me he was watching every single stroke anyway. Dark hair, damp already like he'd already swum his warmup laps before anyone else even arrived, the kind of build that came from actual discipline instead of luck. He had the specific, unbothered posture of someone who already knew exactly how good he was and had stopped needing anyone to tell him.
Great. Every new school has one of these. The boy who looks like he invented being annoying and attractive at the same time.
He caught me staring. I looked away first, heat crawling up my neck, and made a very serious, very solemn vow to never do that again.
"New girl," said a voice beside me, and I turned to find a woman with a silver whistle and a clipboard, Coach Whitfield, according to the badge clipped to her polo. "Veronica Parker?"
"That's me."
"Transfer records say you swam varsity freestyle at your old school. Regional qualifier, two years running." She said it like a question she already knew the answer to, studying me over the top of her clipboard. "We'll see what that looks like in my pool."
No pressure. None at all.
The tryout itself was mostly a blur of chlorine and adrenaline, four one hundred meter freestyle heats meant to sort the entire hopeful crowd into varsity, JV, and everyone else, and I swam my heat with the specific, focused fury of someone who had exactly one thing in her new life that still felt like her own and was not about to let it slip away because of nerves.
Somewhere around the fifty meter mark, lungs already burning, I caught a flash of the pool deck through my goggles, blurred and bright, and thought, absurdly, of every swim meet back home, every single one, my mom in the stands before she passed when I was ten, then just Dad after, always in the same spot, always the loudest voice yelling my name even when I couldn't actually hear it underwater. He wasn't here today. He was at his new job, the one we'd moved across three states for, and some small, stubborn part of me swam the second half of that race like it might make up the difference somehow.
I touched the wall first in my heat. Not by much, but first, and when I came up gasping, pulling off my goggles, the first thing I saw was Coach Whitfield's small, approving nod, and the second thing I saw was the boy from the diving blocks, still watching, his expression unreadable in a way that made my stomach do something complicated and unwelcome.
"Not bad," he said, when I hauled myself out of the pool a minute later, close enough that I hadn't realized he'd drifted over until he spoke. His voice was low, a little bored, the kind of voice that made every sentence sound like he was doing you a favor by using it. "For a transfer."
"Is that supposed to be a compliment?"
"It's supposed to be accurate." His eyes moved over me once, assessing, the same way they'd assessed the whole pool a few minutes earlier, and something about it made me feel very aware of exactly how out of place I probably looked, hair plastered flat, breathing too hard, standing in a group of kids who all clearly already knew each other. "You've got decent form. Sloppy turns."
Wow. Okay. Thank you so much for that deeply necessary feedback.
"I didn't ask for a critique."
"You didn't have to." He shrugged, already turning away, like the conversation had cost him more effort than it was worth. "Just saving Whitfield the trouble of telling you herself."
"Are you always this charming, or am I getting a special welcome package?"
That got the smallest flicker of something across his face, gone almost before I caught it, not quite a smile, more like the ghost of one that he'd decided wasn't worth fully committing to. "Archie Sterling," he said, like that was supposed to explain everything, and maybe, judging by the way three separate girls glanced over at the sound of his name, it did.
Oh. Of course. Of course he's the one everyone already knows.
"Veronica," I said, when he clearly wasn't going to ask.
"I know. Whitfield announced it to the whole deck like you were a special guest star." He said it flatly, but there was something underneath it I couldn't quite place, something that sounded almost like irritation, though I couldn't imagine what I'd possibly done yet to earn it. "Regional qualifier two years running. Big shoes for a small pool."
"Is that a problem for you?"
"It's not my problem at all," Archie said, and there was an edge under the words now, sharper than before. "I'm just saying, everybody's going to expect a show. Might want to work on those turns before they get one."
He walked off before I could come up with anything even close to a decent comeback, and I stood there dripping on the pool deck, torn between the urge to yell something scathing at his retreating back and the far more inconvenient urge to watch him walk away, which, no. Absolutely not. That was not a thing that was allowed to happen on day one.
He's rude. Arrogant. Annoyingly, infuriatingly good at swimming, probably. None of that is a good reason for my stomach to be doing whatever it's currently doing.
I texted Lucy the second I had a free hand, standing under the shade of the bleachers while the rest of tryouts wrapped up around me.
survived tryout #1. also met the single most obnoxious boy in the entire state of this state. calling it now.
Her reply came back almost instantly, because Lucy has never once in the history of our friendship taken more than ninety seconds to answer a text.
obnoxious how? obnoxious cute or just obnoxious obnoxious
there is no such thing as obnoxious cute, Lucy
there is ALWAYS such a thing as obnoxious cute. send a description immediately
I did not send a description. I was still typing a deeply unflattering one when Coach Whitfield's whistle cut through the noise of the pool deck, calling everyone in for results, and I shoved my phone into my bag and jogged over, heart doing something nervous and fast that had nothing to do, I told myself firmly, with the boy currently standing four people to my left with his arms crossed and his expression carefully blank.
"Varsity roster," Coach Whitfield announced, reading off a short list of names, and my own name landed somewhere in the middle of it, and for one whole, warm second I let myself feel something like relief, like maybe this new life had room in it after all for the one thing that had always been mine.
That relief lasted exactly as long as it took Coach Whitfield to clear her throat and add one more piece of news.
"One more thing," she said, glancing down at her clipboard, then up, her gaze settling, with what felt like the worst possible timing in the history of timing, directly between me and Archie. "We've got a college scout coming to observe practices this summer, which means I'm restructuring training pairs to focus on relay strategy and leadership development. Sterling, you've been asking me for a training partner who can actually push you since spring. Parker, you need someone who knows this program inside and out if you're going to catch up on our relay rotations in time for the season."
No. No, no, absolutely not, whatever she's about to say, I already know I'm not going to like it.
"So," Coach Whitfield said, closing her clipboard with a small, satisfied snap, entirely unaware of, or entirely unbothered by, the twin looks of horror that had just crossed both our faces, "starting today, you two are training partners. Sterling, you'll be responsible for Parker's technical development. I expect results by regionals."
I turned to look at Archie, half hoping he'd say something to get us both out of this, and found him already looking back at me with an expression that made it very clear he was thinking exactly the same thing I was, except his version of it looked less like dread and considerably more like he'd just been handed a problem he fully intended to make sure I regretted becoming.
Great, I thought, gathering my towel with hands that were not quite steady, watching him stalk off toward the locker room without another word. Welcome to Lakeview, Veronica. New town, new house, new school, and a training partner who already looks like he'd rather be swimming laps around a shark.
I texted Lucy again before I'd even made it to the parking lot, thumbs moving faster than I could really think straight.
update: obnoxious boy is also now my assigned training partner for the entire summer. coach's orders. I did not consent to this arrangement.
OBNOXIOUS CUTE OR OBNOXIOUS OBNOXIOUS. I NEED TO KNOW NOW
I stood there a long moment in the parking lot, watching Archie Sterling's car pull away without so much as a glance in my direction, and realized, with a sinking, entirely inconvenient certainty, that I did not actually have a good answer to that question anymore.