What? Andy thought. He’s never gone that fast! I’ve never gone that fast!
The Eel walked up to Andy. “What the heck?”
“Shut up!” Andy said.
It was time for Heat 2 — and Andy was in lane 5. In a daze, he walked to the blocks. He kept replaying Mark Li’s performance in his head. Mark’s strokes were perfect. His turns were sharp. As Andy got ready to climb up onto the block, Coach Ocampo grabbed his shoulder.
“Andy, don’t let Mark Li’s swim get in your head. Nothing is won today. It’s all won tomorrow. Your job is to swim a top-eight time right now, to get into tomorrow’s final. Don’t get out of your rhythm.”
Andy looked up to the stands. His parents were still sitting far enough up to see the whole pool. But Enalyn was hanging over the rail that separated the bleachers from the pool deck. “Andy! Nail the entry! Turns out 56 isn’t your number. But you can do this!”
Andy got up on the block. For the first time in a long time, the angle that let the swimmer lean over the pool felt strange. In the set position, with arms down and shoulders hunched, Andy felt like it would be easy to fall forward.
The starter — in a robotic voice that sounded like the evil robot from the Galaxy Queen cartoon — told the swimmers to get on their marks.
Andy waited.
Andy felt gravity pulling at him into the pool.
I can’t get DQed, he thought. If he entered the water, he’d be disqualified. I can’t have come all this way to lose on a false start and get Dairy Queened.
Then, the beep. And everything slowed down. Andy felt himself fall into the pool, nice and shallow. He surfaced clean, well into his strokes. His kicks were true. One. Two. Three. Breathe.
Through his goggles, Andy saw the black bar on the pool’s bottom that guided him in his lane. When the bar ended, he had to get ready to turn. He could tell by the lack of turbulence in his field of vision that he was in the lead.
He tucked his legs in tight and rotated in the water. He breathed out through his nose. He felt his feet brace against the wall as he pushed off hard to swim back the way he’d come. His internal clock was telling him that this was the fastest he’d ever gone.
One. Two. Three.
Again.
The black line in the pool was coming to an end. Andy was nearing the finish. Two, three more powerful strokes. A pair of thrusting kicks. He stretched, fingertips touching the wall.
He’d won the heat!
And then he looked up at the clock.
55.45.
It was his best time ever. But it was a half-second slower than what Mark Li had posted in his heat.
Andy heard Enalyn screaming. “You see! Look at that! Better than 56!”
But, at the moment, Andy felt like the slowest racer in the world. He wondered if this was how Zach felt.
***
Andy had put on his warm-up suit and was sitting in the stands. He’d just finished swimming the anchor leg for COBRA’s relay team. He had made up half a lap on the field, but he couldn’t make up the deficit. COBRA was a small team, and the other swimmers simply couldn’t keep pace with the other teams. COBRA didn’t qualify for the next day’s final.
Now Andy had just one event to focus on, the 100-metre freestyle final.
Coach Ocampo sat down next to him.
“You seem awfully worried,” said the coach.
“Shouldn’t I be?” said Andy. “Mark Li has been at least a half-second slower than me at every meet this year. And now he posts a crazy time.”
“A crazy time in the preliminary heats,” Coach Ocampo said. “Really, all he did was swim a fast qualifying time.”
“And?”
“And, if you spend the rest of the day worried about Mark Li, you won’t be going as fast as you can tomorrow. Worry about what you can do. Go to the warm-up pool. Work on some entries. Work on your rhythm. Worry about going as fast as you can. Mark Li is going to do whatever he’s going to do. You can’t control that. What you have to focus on is getting faster, saving your best for the final and then executing.”
“He’s right, you know,” said Enalyn, sitting down on the other side of Andy. “Just pretend you’re swimming in that lane at Earnscliffe. That you’re by yourself. Just you and the clock.”
“Yeah, I guess you’re right.”
“Now, let’s get your mind off tomorrow’s final,” said Enalyn with a smile. “Miriam Said’s heat is coming up.”
The dare! Andy thought. He’d become so distracted by Mark Li’s time that he’d almost forgotten about the dare.
Enalyn took Andy by the hand. She led him to a couple of seats that offered a decent view of the pool through the crowd of people gathered to watch the first heat of the women’s 100-metre breaststroke. Miriam Said’s orange cap was like a beacon. She waited for all the competitors to take their marks before finally discarding her long robe and getting onto the blocks in lane 4.
The gun sounded, and she was in the water. Her head popped up and she took a mighty breath. She brought her hands together as if she were praying, then drove them apart, with each movement thrusting herself forward.
By the wall, Miriam Said was already body-lengths ahead of the field. When she turned, she had the pool to herself in front of her. The other seven swimmers were still going in the other direction.
By the time the rest of the field had finished their turns, Miriam Said was ahead by a third of the pool. She smoothly coasted to the finish.
Andy knew it was time to dash out of his chair, run across the deck and give Miriam Said a kiss. His brain told him to get up, but his body remained rooted to the chair.
“Did you see that?” Enalyn cried. “She’s so good!”
Enalyn clapped and clapped and clapped. She didn’t notice two swimmers walking right up to where she and Andy sat and looking Andy in the eye.
It was the pair of swimmers from Leslieville.
“What the hell?” said the first one.
“Tomorrow. After the final. I promise,” Andy said.
“Okay. But that’s your last chance,” said the second swimmer. They shot Enalyn admiring glances as they walked away.
Enalyn turned to Andy. “What the hell was that? Who are those guys?”
“It’s nothing,” said Andy. “They’re just some guys who were bugging me earlier today. Really, it’s nothing at all.”
12
Making It
Andy’s arms were covered in red patches.
After the first day of racing was over, he hadn’t joined his parents at the Super 8 where Coach Ocampo had booked rooms for the team and some of the parents. Instead, Andy got into the warm-up pool, then got out. He plunged off the blocks. He did it again. And again. When his entry was perfect, there was no sting on the skin of his arms. But, when he missed his angle, even by a bit, there was a smacking sensation when he hit the water. And with every bad entry, the stings added up. By the second day of the meet, as the clock ticked down to the 100-metre final, Andy’s arms looked like they had broken out into a rash.
The starter announced that it was time for the boys to get up on the blocks. Mark Li was in lane 3. Andy was in lane 4.
“Four is a very unlucky number in Chinese,” Mark told Andy, who stood on the block next to him. “I just wanted to point that out.”
Andy closed his eyes. Entry has to be perfect. One. Two. Three. Breathe. “Nice of you to finally talk to me, Mark,” he said. “Or do you want to find your phone so you can tweet that? We can race without you.”
He opened his eyes. He looked through his grey, frosted goggles toward the lane in front of him. He could see the packed stands in the reflection of the still water.
“I saved my best for this meet,” Andy heard Li say.
Andy didn’t take his eyes off the lane. “I saved my best for this meet, too,” he
said.
They were interrupted by the robotic voice of the race official. “Gentlemen, take your marks.”
Andy took a deep breath. He had to time it perfectly. As soon as he heard the beep, he needed to move. His entry had to be smooth. He couldn’t afford even a fraction of a second’s hesitation on the blocks.
Then, a splash. Someone was in the water!
False start! thought Andy. The swimmer in lane 7 had plunged into the water before the beep sounded.
Dairy Queened! The race was done for the swimmer in lane 7.
The swimmers were told to reset.
Andy imagined he was a tiger shark, gliding through the water, chasing his prey.
The boys were once again told to take their marks.
Once again, Andy looked into the water ahead of him. It was still rippling slightly from the false start a minute before.
Focus on the beep, Andy thought.
And then it came. Andy reacted. He hit the water. His entry was clean, leaving only a tiny little splash behind.
Andy pushed forward under the water, reaching ahead to maximize his distance. He broke the surface and his right arm rotated into a stroke. Then the left. Each hand glided through the water. Each thumb pointed down, acting like a fin when a hand hit the water. His kicking was in rhythm. And he pushed hard, but not so hard that he came out of his cadence. He made sure to keep his strokes true and concentrated on completing the cycles faster.
He got to the wall. His internal clock was telling him that he was going even faster than he’d swum the day before. Faster than he’d ever gone.
It was time for the turn. As Andy got close to the end of the lane, he took a breath and dove down into the water, somersaulting and twisting at the same time. He pushed off the wall. His feet felt like they had springs in them. And then he was off, back to the start.
One. Two. Three. Breathe.
Andy kept thinking about his rhythm, making sure all his limbs were working in concert with each other. Each kick of his legs helped maximize his speed. Each stroke was true.
The finishing pad was ten metres away. Nine. Eight. Seven. Six. Five. Four. Three . . .
Andy stretched forward, trying to tap his fingers on the pad as quickly as he could.
Contact.
Andy sprung out of the water, ripping off his goggles in one mighty swipe. He noticed Mark Li was looking up at the clock. Which one had made it to the wall first?
There was a wait of a few seconds, then the times flashed.
Mark Li had gone even faster than he had in the preliminary heat. His time was 54.89.
But Andy’s time was 54.78. By a tenth of a second, Andy had won!
Andy thrust his arms into the air. He got out of the pool, put on the towel Coach Ocampo held out for him, then jumped into the air.
“Whoa, don’t break those ankles!” came a voice from behind Andy.
It was Travis Holloway. Andy spun and shook the coach’s hand.
“I heard you were okay at surfing on a flutterboard,” said Holloway. “Now I see why they call you Tiger Shark.”
“Sir, I m-m-mean, it’s an honour . . .” Andy stuttered.
“Honour? Well, son, you’re going to be seeing a lot of me. I’m going to watch you race at nationals. Ready for the trip to Edmonton?”
Andy could feel his face being stretched by his wide smile. His dad was in the stands, arms in the air. His mom’s tears had smudged her mascara. And Enalyn blew him a kiss.
Enalyn blew him a kiss? Wait! thought Andy. Did Enalyn really just do that?
@TigerShark
@MarkLi Mark, you swam a great time. It just wasn’t quite as fast as ME.
@TigerShark
@MarkLi Oh Mark, Mark, you there? What, you aren’t on Twitter?
@TigerShark
@MarkLi Are you kidding me? Did you really block me?
Twitter
The user @MarkLi does not exist.
Andy put down his phone and looked at Enalyn, who sat in the stands next to him.
“I think Mark Li just deleted his Twitter account,” he said.
“Oh, so sad,” laughed Enalyn. “Are you going to miss your Twitter friend?”
“Very funny.”
Since he had his phone in hand, Andy checked his Twitter stats. He had sent out a tweet link to the YouTube video Swim Ontario had posted of the 100-metre final. It had been shared only twice. He then surfed to the YouTube video of him surfing across Earnscliffe Pool. It had more than five million hits.
Andy’s father walked to where Andy and Enalyn were sitting, a soft drink in his hand. He sat down next to Andy.
Andy showed him the screen. “Look at this, Dad. I set the fastest time in Ontario, and a couple of people watched that. I surfed, and, well, a lot of people watched that.”
“Oh, András, you will understand this one day,” his father said. “If you do something excellent, some people will notice. But if you do something silly, everybody notices.”
“And, Andy, you only set that time a couple of hours ago,” Enalyn said. “Give it time.”
“But when the flutterboard video went out, it was shared hundreds of times within hours,” said Andy.
Enalyn shrugged.
“András, some people watched you surf across the pool. Sure, pretty cool. But what did that give you?”
“I got a lot of followers on Twitter.”
“And what does that mean?”
“It means, more people check to see what I have to say or post when I update my Twitter account.”
“Okay, Andy, I will pretend that you just spoke English there. So, does this mean you have many new friends?”
“No, just thousands of new followers.”
“Followers? And you lead them . . . where?”
Andy laughed. “No, Dad. I don’t lead them anywhere. They just check in to see what I do.”
“Sounds like communism,” his father said. “It’s best if other people don’t know what you do.”
“Why?”
“Because if people know what you do all the time, you’re not free. You can’t be your own person. This Twitter sounds like Big Brother watching you.”
“It’s just other people.”
“Oh, so the mob watches you. So much better.”
His dad took a long draw from his pop, making a long sucking, gurgling sound. He finished it off with a loud “ahhhh.”
“Well, when are you going to leave, you two?” his father asked. “Your mother and I are about to drive back to Brampton. You could come back with us. You have no more races left, right? We can go celebrate at home.”
“No, Dad, I think I’ll take the van back with Coach Ocampo,” said Andy. “I’d still like to see a few more races. And it looks bad if a provincial champ leaves the event when there’s other swimmers still left to race.”
Especially Miriam Said, Andy thought.
“Okay, okay, I’m going to go track down your mom,” his dad said. Before he turned to leave, Andy’s father put his hand on his son’s shoulder. “I’m proud of you. You were flying in that pool. All those hours, working with your coach, they paid off. And you could also go change. You’re still lounging around in your swim suit!”
13 The Dare
Andy and Enalyn watched race after race.
“Miriam’s race is coming up next,” she said.
“How come you don’t go up and talk to her?” Andy asked. “I mean, she’s been in the building for the last couple of days.”
“Oh, come on,” she said. “She tweeted me once and I was, like, floored. I don’t need to go up to her and bother her. I’m just a spectator here.”
“Well, I’m going to go down and watch the race from the deck,” Andy said, and got up.
“What? You’re leaving?” Enalyn coughed. “
We’ve got a great view from these seats. We can see the whole pool.”
“Um, I need to say hi to someone on the deck,” Andy said.
“Now?”
“Um, yeah.”
“Well, Andy, I’m going to stay here. Sometimes you act so weird. Are you sure you’re not a superhero with a secret identity or something? That would explain you getting up and leaving right before the race.”
Andy shrugged. He walked down off the stands and onto the deck. In the competition pool, Miriam Said was getting on the lane-5 block for her signature event, the 100-metre breaststroke.
The beep sounded, Said plunged into the pool. She surfaced well ahead of the pack. With each stroke, her orange swim cap would submerge, then rise back up. She made a whistling sound when she exhaled. The race wasn’t even close. She got to the halfway mark well ahead of the field. She shot through the water. On the deck, dozens of people were holding up their phones, taking videos of the race.
Miriam Said hit the finishing pad. People on deck whooped and cheered. She waved to them as the other racers finally got to the end. Andy pushed through the bodies so he could get closer to the far end of the pool. With a provincial medal around his neck, no one questioned him.
This was his chance. Miriam Said had just gotten out of the pool.
Andy knew what he had to do. Rookie has to finish the initiation, right? he thought to himself as he dashed forward. The sound of his flip-flops smacked off the deck like dozens of slaps.
No one tried to stop him. He stood in front of Miriam Said. The words came out of his mouth like someone else was saying them. It felt like he was out of his body, watching another person take over his speech and actions.
“What a great race!” he said. “And you, really, are like, wow. I just wanted to say that.”
“Um, thanks?” Miriam Said raised an eyebrow.
“I’m Andy. I’ll see you at nationals.”
I’ve done it, Andy thought. I talked to her.
And then, Andy hugged Miriam Said. He whispered “congratulations” in her ear, and then delivered a small peck to her cheek. His towel had slipped off his shoulders, and for a second, he could feel her wet skin against his. As he turned and walked away, he knew that the people on the deck were staring at him. He saw that some had their phones pointed directly at him. But he didn’t care.
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