Silas
This beef with Sloane has gone on long enough. We’ve both been more than stubborn since our argument, but it appears her will is holding out longer than mine. Fine, then. I’ll be the bigger person and make the first move toward reconciliation. I miss talking to her. I miss her sarcastic remarks and throaty laughter. If she needs an apology, I can make that sacrifice of pride. Because whatever she says in fits of anger, our friendship is ultimately more important than whatever rhetorical point either of us tried to make.
And honestly, without Amy in the picture constantly questioning our friendship, it’ll be much easier to get back to normal.
Wednesday afternoon before swim practice, I toss my bag down on the bench in the locker room and pull out my phone.
Me: You win. I humbly apologize and throw myself at your mercy.
Me: Forgive me.
Me: Let’s meet up and talk?
Sloane doesn’t reply right away. Probably driving home from school. But I know we’ll be able to put this behind us once we have a real conversation.
With only a few minutes before Coach wants us warming up in the pool, I throw my phone back in my bag and get changed. Unfortunately, there’s nothing I can do about locker assignments. RJ struts in with Lawson to the locker two down from mine.
It’s become nearly intolerable sharing oxygen with him. The way RJ’s practically claimed ownership over Sloane and the entirety of her social life makes me goddamn homicidal. Lately my best tack is simply avoiding eye contact so I don’t get sucked into another self-righteous lecture about boundaries and loyalty from a guy who’s been lying about who and what he is since the moment he got here. In a few short months, he’s managed to turn everyone but Lawson against me. The fact that Sloane and Fenn can’t see how he’s manipulated them is beyond frustrating.
As I’m fitting my cap on, I can’t help noticing RJ with his phone out. His thumbs tap across the screen seconds before my own phone buzzes on top of my bag.
Sloane: I’m not ready. I don’t know if I’ll ever be.
“Did you do this?” I growl at RJ.
He has the nerve to stare at me blankly. “Huh?”
“Don’t fuck with me. Sloane. Just now.”
He glances at Lawson for clarification, but my best friend merely shrugs. Swim goggles dangling from one hand, RJ gives me an irritated look. “Dude, I have no idea what you’re babbling about.”
“Then show me your phone.”
He snorts. “Fuck off.”
“If you did nothing wrong, then there’s nothing to hide,” I shoot back. “I saw you texting Sloane right before she refused to meet up with me. You told her to. Just admit it.”
RJ stares at me. “I can’t tell Sloane shit. And if you understood her at all, you’d get that.”
Disbelief slams into me like a freight train. “Don’t act like you know her better than I do, all right? I was in her life way before you got here.”
“Come on, girls,” Lawson mockingly interjects. “You’re both pretty. Let’s take it down a notch.”
RJ and I are all but toe-to-toe on either side of the bench. Part of me wishes he’d throw a punch, so I could finally get him kicked off this team. Maybe kicked out of Sandover altogether.
“And it must burn you up,” RJ tells me. Goading.
“What’s that?”
“Finally knowing that all this time it wasn’t Duke or her dad that kept Sloane from being with you. She’s just not into you.”
My hands tingle with the urge to break his face. “You’d like to think that, wouldn’t you?”
“Okay then.” Lawson once again attempts to defuse the situation. “Why don’t we table this discussion for never?”
“And now,” RJ continues, flashing a cheerless smile, “she doesn’t rate you at all. How does it feel to be demoted from the friend zone?”
I shove him. Two hands to the chest. He comes back at me just as quickly, about to jump the bench, fists clenched, before Lawson throws himself between us and holds him back.
“Come on, man,” RJ taunts. “You’ve been begging for this fight. I’m right here, asshole.”
“Nice temper. You argue with Sloane like that too?”
“Watch your fucking mouth.”
RJ makes a fool of himself having to be dragged away by Lawson in front of the entire team. I figured that’d be the end of it, but no such luck. RJ’s need to be the chest-slamming gorilla in the room doesn’t stop when we get in the pool.
After an initial warm-up, Coach Gibson blows his whistle and has us line up behind the starting platforms.
“Mason, Clark, RJ, Silas. On the blocks.”
RJ intentionally puts himself in the lane next to mine. He proceeds to do that annoying compulsive habit where he slaps his thighs like he thinks he’s Michael Fucking Phelps.
“Hey, remind me,” he says over his shoulder, getting into a starting position. “What’s Silas’s record in the 400 free?”
“Uh…” Lawson eyes me cautiously. “Like a minute thirty-three?”
“Hey, Coach,” RJ calls. He slides his goggles down over his eyes. “Get out your stopwatch.”
“This isn’t a race, Shaw,” Coach barks back. “I want to see form. I want to see follow-through. Clean lines, smart breathing.”
“You’re dreaming,” I tell RJ, staring straight ahead at the flat water and seeing only the lane ahead of me. “That record’s getting me into Stanford.”
“Then you better hope they’re desperate for alternates.”
When Coach’s whistle blows, we’re both off the blocks like our feet are on fire. I hit the water in a straight line. Every muscle is pulled into focus on a clean entrance and getting as much distance as possible powering through my dolphin kicks.
RJ is right beside me. Almost stroke for stroke when we breach the surface. We hit the wall for the first turn dead even and well ahead of the outside lanes.
The problem, though, with swimming a dead heat with the lane beside you is all the chop they churn up. White water is the enemy of speed. Ideally, you want to be the lone leader with nothing but clean water ahead of you. RJ apparently doesn’t know this and thinks he can draft an advantage by hugging our lane line. I try squeezing every ounce of speed I can out of my kicks, grabbing the water with both hands and propelling my body as far as I can. Still, I can’t seem to find an inch of distance between us.
After the second turn, I come up to a face full of water. I know he’s intentionally splashing into my lane. Timing my breaths. Dirty fuck. But if he wants to cheat, he’ll have to try a hell of a lot harder than that.
Turnabout is fair play, so I start hugging the lane line as well. I make a point of smacking it with my hand or kicking it with a foot to force a wobble that veers into his lane and obstructs his strokes. In a competition, this would obviously be illegal. Here, all’s fair in love and war, right?
But I must get under his skin, because on the third turn he takes an extra dolphin kick past the resurface marker. A blatantly desperate move that proves he can’t beat me in a fair fight. So I show him there’s no honor among thieves. When I see him approaching the surface, I throw a leg out that connects square against his jaw. The result gives me almost a full hand of distance advantage. Then it’s a dead sprint to the finish.
I can already feel the wall against my fingertips as I push with everything I have left. I don’t even take breaths. I just keep my face in the water and kick as hard as I can.
Until I feel a sudden shove against my shoulder.
It’s enough to throw me off my stroke, and I watch RJ’s hands slam into the wall before mine.
“That was bullshit.” Ripping my goggles and cap off, I jump over the lane line.
He gets right in my face, cheeks flushed and eyes blazing. “Don’t start shit you can’t finish.”
Coach’s whistle screams through the building. “Everyone out of the water. Now!”
We all haul ourselves out and stand behind the blocks. I notice Lawson watching me with a frown and resist the urge to give him the finger. Since when does Lawson disapprove of shit like this? He lives and breathes chaos.
“You two,” Coach booms, pointing at RJ and me. “Push-ups. Go.”
“Are you serious?” I charge over to Coach, incredulous. How is it not obvious RJ is the problem? “He was messing with me the whole time. I was defending myself.”
“Yeah, I suppose I managed to kick myself in the face, right?” RJ throws himself in front of me like he’s ready for another round.
“Learn to stay in your own lane.”
Coach’s whistle again screeches us to silence.
“Both of you shut the hell up,” he barks. “I’m sick of your bickering.”
“Coach, come on.” I can’t believe he’s letting RJ off the hook on this.
“I don’t know what’s gotten into you two lately but keep it out of my pool.” Then he shakes his head at me. “I expected better from you, Silas. Push-ups. Get on it.”
“This is bullshit,” I snap.
Fuck push-ups, and fuck RJ. I’m not taking the heat for a fight he started.
Coach shouts after me, but I ignore him as I head into the locker room.