And there’s something about the way this butterfly stroke feels when done right. It requires a kind of physical congruence that almost works on its own. What’s really cool is, for the last meet of the season I’m going to have supporters who 1) I really want to impress and 2) will actually show up. See, once Leah started working with me, she recommended Swimming to Antarctica as a book club read.
It wasn’t an easy sell.
“The woman who wrote this book is tough,” Leah said when she introduced it. “This is some seriously grueling shit. Forget Diana Nyad, this Lynne Cox chick swam the Bering Strait. She actually swam over a mile in Antarctica. In a Speedo!”
“And why, pray tell,” Oscar said, “would we read a book with seriously grueling shit?”
“Because we’re going full female aqua,” Leah said, “to celebrate Annie on the front end of her swimming career, me in the middle, and Lynne Cox when she was at her apex, got it?” She withdrew a full-sized Swiss Army knife from her purse, pulled out the corkscrew, narrowed her eyes, and said, “And because I know your ride.”
I said, “Uh, Leah, I’m with Lynne Cox. This is my swimming apex, believe me.”
Seth’s arm flew up. “Ms. Sharon, do we or do we not have a rule about weapons?”
“Actually, Seth,” Sharon said, “that’s not exactly a weapon. . . .” She looked sideways at Leah. “Right, Leah?”
Leah smiled. “I was using it as punctuation.”
Seth said, “So Oscar doesn’t really have to worry about you setting free the stuffing in his upholstery? Or creating an unsightly scratch the length of his car?”
Leah held up the knife. “Maybe you can help me out, Seth. I want him to worry about those things, but I’m not going to act on either. What should I do?”
Seth’s head shook no like a small tightly wound bobblehead. “You’ve blown it by stating your intent.” He took a deep breath and almost established eye contact with her. “I was led to believe you were one of our more intelligent members.”
“Even geniuses slip up.”
“True,” Seth said, “but you have to admit, showing your hand that way was a pretty basic slipup. Crass, even.”
Leah nodded. “I think I can save this,” she said. “Oscar has been known, on semi-frequent occasion, to ingest substances that alter his perception. What do you think would happen if I wait a week or so and recommend the book as if for the first time, in hopes he doesn’t even remember it happened?”
Seth frowned, glanced at Oscar, who smiled and shrugged. “I suppose there’s a possibility. We’ve certainly heard him repeat himself often enough. However, I’d be surprised if your chances are fifty-fifty.”
“In which case, I just won’t mess up his car,” Leah said. “In fact we can avoid all of this, and all other threats, by giving me a big yes vote on this book.”
It was unanimous. We’re reading Swimming to Antarctica.
Flash forward two weeks to the last meet of the season; I’m on the deck with the rest of my teammates who I probably wouldn’t recognize on the street, out of their Speedos, but I’m moving around encouraging everyone because my book club friends have read the book and filled the bleachers, and are chanting our name—the Anchors—while Coach Rick goes over who’ll be swimming which events and calling out personal bests from memory. He says, “Remember, it’s good to take down the competition, but it’s even better to beat your old self.”
Whispers into my ear, “Is that your entourage?”
I look over my shoulder at Janine. “Kind of. My book club.”
“Who’s the woman with them?”
“That would be Sharon the Liberrian; she’s our unchallenged leader.
“This is the biggest crowd you guys have had all summer.”
“And we will not disappoint,” I say, nodding toward my anonymous teammates.
“Um-hmm,” she says. “Well, it should be interesting.” She starts to walk away.
I say, “Hey, Janine?”
“Yeah?”
“Thanks.”
“For what?”
“For kicking my butt this summer,” I say. “For keeping me swimming this god-awful butterfly until I got it.”
She gives me the look that says we both know why.
“Listen,” I say. “I was a bitch for messing with you.”
She smiles. “Go be ruthless.”
I live a compartmentalized life; that’s what Mr. Novotny used to call it. He said it was a life skill, made necessary by the differences in my worlds. If I acted around my bio family the way I act with my friends, or vice versa, I’d have a lot of ’splainin’ to do, as they say, but it works because there’s so little chance of my worlds colliding.
Today my worlds collide.
The book club is in the bleachers chanting the names of as many of my teammates as they could collect, when something happens that never happens. Nearly the entire Boots clan troops across the park and onto the bleachers: Nancy, Rance—the Boo Radley of the Inland Northwest—the lovely Sheila trailed by Yvonne and Frankie.
I don’t see firsthand what happens next because I’m hyperventilating on the blocks when it starts and in the water for the blastoff.
As I learn later, Sheila, who must be high, is convinced these people are actually here to taunt me, that no one could be here to root for the kind of swimmer I am, and they’re calling us “Anchors” which has to be a rip, and what a bunch of nerds anyway. She relays that shiny nugget to Nancy, who walks up to Seth of all people and says, “Who you all here makin’ fun of?” Seth only partially hears her because of the chanting and assumes she just wants the name of their champion. He says, “That would be the girl in the maroon racing suit,” and Nancy says, “They’re all in maroon racing suits, you idiot,” and Seth points again and says, “Her name’s Annie, and it’s impolite to call me that. Judging from appearances, it’s likely a more apt description of you.”
Nancy asks Seth how he’d like
