The year is 2010 and I am standing at the edge of a frigid pool in my high school natatorium at 6:04am silently cursing underneath my breath.
A few months previous, I had told my mother I was cut from the swim-team tryouts and waited about an hour after school before calling my father to come pick me up. I ran my hair and swim suit underneath a bathroom sink faucet before coming home, happily distraught about being taken out of try-outs. In her vehemence, she called the coach to demand a reason why – only to be given a puzzled answer: “I’m afraid I don’t know who your son is.”
The truth was, the swim team was a walk-on. Try-outs were mere formalities, or rather, a cruel introduction to a sport that my high school was notoriously bad at. My mother – delusional and obsessed with the idea that a body like mine could gain some bulk after a few months on the swim team – furiously drove me to school the next morning, promising to lock me out of the house if I did not go to practice.
Flash forward to now, and Coach Z is standing at the edge of the pool, blowing his whistle. I am watching as the boys in my lane dive in and start their laps. Suddenly, I am next, and with teeth gritted I leap in reluctantly.
In retrospect, the icy water was not as frigid as the veteran members on my team had exaggerated. What was actually awful was getting up at 5:30 in the morning to jump into the chilly pool. As I swim, I become exasperated. My lane is the first lane in the pool, also known as the worst. In my lane there are two other men – Joey, a boy who desperately wanted to get into shape; and Kyle – a senior with Down syndrome.
I don’t mean to sound morally superior or unforgivably rude, but Kyle was notoriously devious. Since the moment I had come to the (second) first practice, he viewed me with contempt. It seemed to me that while none of the other boys knew that I had faked trying out on the team, Kyle possessed a clairvoyance swimming around in that electric brain of his, and thus, knew my dirty little secret, and detested me for it.
He did not need to detest me for me to feel as awful as I did – his lap times had that covered. For a boy with almost no physical coordination and a mental capacity of a kindergartener, Kyle was a really fast swimmer. Occasionally, as I gasped for air in between my strokes, I could see Coach Z standing above me, relishing in my torture.
Swim practice was both physically demanding and taxing. Practice was six days a week, with additional 6AM practices every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. The chlorine in the water bleached and fizzled my hair – and as a person who loved the dark, thick windswept look, a look I so painstakingly fought combs, scissors, and hair wax for, that was infuriating. My skin cracked easily, my eyes were always dry, and everywhere I walked I was greeted with soreness.
I enjoyed the company of some of the men on my team, but as a closeted and artsy type, I found it difficult to connect with most. My only other companion, Edgar, openly gay and openly pompous at his Free 100 time, also came to detest me.
“I like him outside of swimming,” I heard him say in the hallway. “But on the team he’s such a bitch.”
Ultimately my greatest enemy came in the form of a whale – Jerry, who weighed around 300lbs. and was two lanes above me. Despite his immense weight, Jerry had a killer butterfly stroke that demolished races. He was also a raging narcissist and an aggressive intellectual who competed with me in Speech and Debate, a sport I was proud to say I was very good at. Yet here, Jerry, trounced me. From rude jabs to overt accusations, I never felt safe around him.
As a novice to anything, my go-to strategy was to observe how something was done before trying it. In this case, I found that nearly impossible. One afternoon, Coach Z called us to practice our take-offs. Half-heartedly he chided: “Go when you hear the buzzer.”
It was a simple enough direction, but when the captain of our swim team – a gorgeous WASP Republican kid named Brendan – took off to early, everyone jumped the gun in sequence. Z made all of the swimmers get out of the water and try again. Kyle cursed under his breath as he climbed out of the pool. He flicked me the bird and then climbed up on the diving board once more. “Swimmers, take your mark!” Z bellowed.
Crash! This time Kyle dove in too early. Ricky, the assistant coach, tapped me on the shoulder and nudged me to get on the podium first. “Kyle’s slow, you know?” He smiled a toothy grin.
Obviously he was slow, the kid had down syndrome.
I reluctantly climbed the podium, unsure of what the protocol was. I refused to finish last place – as I had so many times. And this instance, we were doing freestyle stroke, which Jerry was notoriously awful at. I knew if I swam this I could beat him, and move myself out of the lane with Kyle. In my head, I thought: “The sequence goes: ‘Swimmers take your mark, buzz!’ and then take off.”
In actuality, the sequence went: “Swimmers, take your mark. GET SET. **BUZZ**”
As I pushed off from the podium, I could see from above Z take his stopwatch and furiously thrust it into the stands. I bobbed up at the surface of the water, to see him storm out angrily. I turned around and became painfully aware I was the only one in the pool. Kyle giggled a storm as Jerry and his tits shook their heads at me in contempt.
Needless to say, my relationship with Coach Z did not improve. Our disgust for each other was mutual. To me, he was complacent, chubby, and needed to get his haircut at somewhere else besides a Great Clips. To him, I was uninterested, unfazed, and really fucking gay. And he was right. I was. I took great joy in handing him several “I can’t make it to this competition” letters because of my conflict with Speech and Debate. I knew he could not forsake me either, for Jerry was opting out as well.
One evening, however, Z called me to his office and thrust the letter I had written to him about missing the upcoming meet. “It’s a competition,” I explained. “I can’t miss it.”
“Jerry told me this one was an invitational, so he was willing to miss it for our meet.” Z explained. “If you miss three meets, you are ineligible for a varsity letter.”
While one aspect of me was disheartened that I would not receive varsity status, a more rational voice emerged from this conversation: “I’m sorry coach,” I explained. “But I made a commitment to Speech and Debate before I even joined swimming. I want to honor both, but if this is compromise I have to make, then it’s what has to be done.”
He frowned a bit but nodded and sent me away. I was perplexed at his apathetic reaction, especially since at this point in the game I had poured in close to twenty hours a week of practice and was slowly improving my times in freestyle and backstroke. I stopped coming in last, and got moved up a heat (though not a lane, which was my ultimate goal). If anything, I was the most improved swimmer on the team, unlike poor Joey in my lane, who had not trimmed his times since the first day.
Secretly, I was irritated. I knew I would not return to the team next year – I told my parents I was miserable and unhappy and that the only reason I was partaking on the team was as punishment for my lie. They consented to this, and allowed me to quit after the season was finished. This was the condition of our agreements, and although I had no sudden vagary, I was dismayed that I would not get the varsity letter after all. I couldn’t even lie to myself – I did not want it for my college applications, or a jacket – which were hideous, I would never be caught dead in one – but merely I wanted it simply to say that I had accomplished it.
The next day, Z was no longer apathetic. He wrote on our itinerary “ANIMAL KICK” which was a dreaded 10x100 (swimmerese for ten laps of four lengths across the pool (40 laps)) kick stroke that swimmers dreaded. I found, however, clutching my kickboard, that it was relatively easy. I was keeping up with the fastest swimmers on the team and I finished only behind the top five. As I climbed out of the pool Jerry yelled at me: “Greg, are you sure you finished?”
Z looked right at me, eyes glaring. “You’re finished?” He spat. “He’s a junior, you’re a sophomore. I’m gonna believe him. Get in the fucking water of get the fuck out.”
“GET IN THE FUCKING WATER!” He screamed.
Everybody snapped their heads in my direction. Tears were streaming in my goggles, but I jumped back in and kicked ten extra laps. I finished with Kyle, dead last. I went into the locker room enraged, that evening. It was chillingly silent – not a single person spoke to me.
The next day in class Edgar and his friends chided me: “Stop pissing off Z.” they warned me. “Your attitude isn’t good for the team.”
It was wildly unfair of them to do. Nobody recognized any of my successes – how I cut my freestyle time by 40 seconds, or how I was promoted to the second level heat of two different medley strokes, or even how I fucking destroyed over half the team in the animal kick. I contemplated arranging a meeting with Z to hash this out, but it did not seem realistic, and he was always unavailable when I needed to speak with him.
The day came to shave our heads for the league meet, a tradition I refused to take part in, only to be met with venomous hostility from nearly everyone. I could not use Speech and Debate as an excuse either – for Jerry was already in the process of shaving. I sat angrily as Edgar snipped my hair off. Seeing the locks fall into the drain was heartbreaking, but I gritted my teeth and looked into the mirror anyway. Before me was a kid I did not recognize – an angry fifteen year old cancer patient.
Z walked in, head shaved (though he never had much hair anyway) and was shocked to see me. I knew right away that he did not expect me to partake. Yet there I was. We exchanged a cold glance, and he approached me. He nodded and then touched my scalp. “Looks like you got nicked with the razor a little.” He said coolly.
For the next few weeks, we tapered – which was nice break from the intensive work outs we normally endured. And then two nights before leagues, Z called us to the pool for our first major work out in a while: the animal kick. Round Two.
I got into the pool, indignant this time. I would not finish dead last. I would claim my rightful place among the top animal kickers on our team – justly. And I did. Not even James, with the fastest 50 Free time on our team, overtook me. I came in third place, and Z screamed gleefully as I came into the final length: “LET’S GO GREG, YOU’RE KEEPING UP WITH THE BIG DOGS!” He cried.
Today is our last 6am practice. The water is cold, but not so cold that I am unavailable. The only hair on my body are my eyebrows and pubes. As we finish our run, Z shakes our hands and reminds us of our Team Banquet that same evening. He grasps my fingers warmly, and for a moment I think we will hug. We do not, to my relief, but I am satisfied all the same.
At dinner, Z passes us folders. I don’t open mine because I already know what it contains – a photobook of the past year, a certificate of completion, and the varsity letter which I would not be receiving. As dinner comes to a close and the speeches are ending, I finally take a peek into the folder and see a dark blue knitted ‘B,’ tucked squarely into the pocket. Behind the ‘B,’ which is inscribed onto a shield, is a large baron knight. Everyone is filing out and I approach Z warily: “I thought I wasn’t supposed to get this?” I ask.
“I thought about it, and I decided that you really deserved it.” He said with a smile.
It might’ve been the first smile I had ever seen from him. It seemed disheartening now to tell him that I would not be returning next year. Somehow, it occurs to me that he already knew. As I walk out of the restaurant towards my mother’s car, I look at the knitted ‘B’ and nearly laugh. A lot of misery and pain and suffering were toiled to earn such a mundane piece of cloth. Yet, strangely, there was no regret of that year. It was a surprise that I was disappointed in myself not returning to the team, a disappointment that beckoned at me all evening.
That evening, I sleep naked under the covers. Not all my hair has grown back yet. Sleeping naked, hairless, under the sheets is heavenly – chilly like the plunge into icy waters, but warm like the pool which wraps you like a blanket from the freezing air. Pool water isn’t frigid, it’s only when you break the surface.
BREAK THE SURFACE
By: Greg Strasser
Published: 5/16/16
