Streamline

by Jennifer Lane

  This family togetherness had all come to a crashing halt six years ago. Shuddering as she sat with the Christmas ornaments, Mary remembered the betrayal she’d felt that night. She’d sprinted away from James, fleeing to her car through blinding tears and driving off like a madwoman. She’d screamed when the headlights suddenly shone over her hood. She slammed on her brakes, but it was too late.

  She recalled very little from the year following the accident. She’d been in a coma for days, and the rehabilitation for her shattered legs — the wheelchair, the leg braces, and canes, the permanent dis-ability from the Navy — had paled compared to the devastation of the family. They’d never been the same.

  Still holding the photograph, Mary struggled to stand, balancing precariously on her canes. Feeling a familiar throbbing pain in her legs, she reached to the end table for her bag and the bottle of Oxycontin inside. For some reason, she seemed to be running out more quickly than usual.

  7. High and Wet

  Finding himself alone in the locker room, Leo popped an Oxycontin and chased it down with some Gatorade.

  This stuff was awesome.

  At first he’d taken a pill for one specific purpose, but now he found all kinds of reasons he needed them. Butterflies fluttering in his stomach before a swim meet? Check. Sore muscles after a grueling practice? Check. Anticipating his father exploding with violence against him? Check. Needing to act respectfully toward his father despite being fil ed with rage? Check. Crushing sadness observing the shell of a woman his mother had become? Check.

  The only thing Leo didn’t like about the Oxy was stealing it from his mother. He was disgusted with himself every time he snuck into her bag or medicine cabinet. He was also terrorized by the thought his father might catch him in the act. And pretty soon his mother would figure out her pills were going missing, so Leo had to find another supply. He just had no clue about how to score drugs.

  Leo jumped a little as Eric waltzed into the locker room, dripping wet, to rummage through his locker. He retrieved his asthma inhaler and took a couple puffs. “Yo, Scotty. You comin’ out to warm-up or what? You’re late.”

  “Thanks for being my personal freaking wristwatch.”

  Eric took a step back. “You’ve become an ass, Leo. I’m starting to regret voting for you as team captain.” Huffing, he stomped out of the locker room, leaving Leo to stare after him.

  Had he been an ass? He’d been feeling a little irritable lately, but the Oxy always seemed to calm him down. Leo grabbed his goggles and headed out to the pool.

  The competition course was set up for twenty-five yards. Jumping into a crowded lane, Leo began his meet warm-up. Matt allowed the swimmers to choose their own warm-up, which Leo appreciated, and he followed the same routine for every meet: several easy lengths followed by stroke drills and sprints off the block. This time as he finished the last sprint, he tried not to notice how sluggish he felt.

  Hugging the gutter, he watched Audrey towel herself off and put on sweats before climbing the bleachers to say hello to her mother. It was obvious where his girlfriend had gotten her reddish-brown hair and rich brown eyes. Mother and daughter squeezed each other in an extended hug.

  When Mrs. Rose stifled a yawn, Leo remembered Audrey saying something about her mother coming home late last night from Alabama. Then Audrey laughed. Mrs. Rose probably just botched some swimming terms, Leo thought, a smile on his own face. Audrey’s mother was clueless about the sport, in contrast to her over-involved father.

  It was so beautiful to see his girl laugh. Her head tossed back, spilling auburn hair over her shoulders, and her lightly freckled face glowed with warmth. She hadn’t laughed much since her father’s conviction. And Leo certainly hadn’t been making her laugh like he once could.

  Leo hopped out of the pool as Audrey climbed back down the bleachers and huddled up the girls’ team for a cheer. He smirked as he dried off while watching their stupid cheer, complete with choreography. He snuck a look over at the Tallahassee Tritons gathered across the deck. Leo hoped they wouldn’t judge Pensacola based on the girls’ cheer.

  The guys wouldn’t be caught dead doing anything that involved dancing — their cheers focused solely on amping up. As soon as the girls were finished, fifteen male swimmers congregated around Leo on the deck. He dug deep to generate some excitement. No matter how he felt, it was expected of him as team captain.

  He yelled the first line in a raspy yet powerful voice, and the team chanted back, clapping to the beat: Leo: I went down by the river!

  Team: Oh yeah!

  Leo: Took a little walk

  Team: Oh yeah

  Leo: Met up with a tiger

  Team: Oh yeah

  Leo: And we had a little talk

  Team: Oh yeah…

  The clapping and energy came to a crescendo, and the team was a frenzy of testosterone by the end of the cheer.

  Buoyed by his teammates, Leo now felt like he might jump out of his skin. Why was it so hard to feel normal now? Shaking it off, he high-fived the closest teammate, but sobered when he saw his father standing in the bleachers, watching him sternly. Looking away, Leo trotted over to his swim bag and guzzled from his water bottle. He stood apart from the team and planned ahead for the 50 freestyle.

  He watched Audrey, Elaine, Susan, and Kelly gather for the 200

  medley relay. They were going after the school record, and Elaine looked particularly fierce as she lectured the two sophomores. When she finished, they lined up with five other teams, ready to start. Only the Tallahassee team offered any competition.

  Alex came to stand next to Leo. “Go, Laney!” he cheered. “Go, my little hag!”

  Elaine’s face turned red as she jumped in the water for her backstroke start. Leo snuck a look at his father, but he showed no sign of having heard the comment.

  In a flash the race began, and Elaine’s strong kick got Pensacola the lead as Audrey mounted the block for the breaststroke leg. She timed the relay exchange perfectly and dived into the water in a tight streamline. A quick underwater pullout and she popped up to the surface. Audrey’s long stroke was better suited for the 100 or 200 breaststroke, but she was able to extend the lead slightly for Susan on the butterfly.

  Susan maintained the lead, but the Tallahassee squad pulled closer on the anchor freestyle leg. Kelly somehow held them off and brought it all home. Elaine, Audrey, and Susan jumped up and down as they realized they’d beaten the school record by one tenth of a second. They practically dragged Kelly out of the pool for a group hug.

  Audrey and her teammates met briefly with Matt to review the race, then she bounded over to Leo. “Did you see that? We broke the school record!”

  Leo managed a non-genuine smile. “Way to go.” Audrey gave him a strange look, then turned and went to sit near Elaine and Alex.

  Leo looked down. Great, now he’d hurt Audrey’s feelings. He didn’t even want to be at this meet. If only he could go home and sleep…Or maybe another Oxy would help.

  When the 50 freestyle rolled around, Leo stood behind the blocks and tried to pump himself up. Usually he’d borrow a teammate’s headphones and nod to the pounding beat while stretching and jumping around, but he didn’t feel like going to the trouble today.

  He felt like he was moving in slow motion as he mounted the starting block, and the race was over before he knew it. Lifting his goggles, Leo’s eyes widened when he saw his time on the board: 22.0.

  He hadn’t swum that slowly in a meet since his freshman year. Even worse, two Tallahassee swimmers had beat him.

  Leo hung his head, pulled himself out of the pool, and zoomed straight to the locker room. He sat in silence for several minutes, trying to collect himself. What had gone wrong? He had no answers, but he felt a little calmer after a while, so he emerged and went to talk to Matt. As he crossed the deck, Leo noticed his father was gone.

  Wonderful. Apparently his swim sucked so bad his dad couldn’t take watching the meet any more.

  M
att studied him. “What’s up with you?” Leo felt a flash of panic zip through him. “What do you mean, sir?”

  “You’re dogging it at practice, then you stink up the pool with that fifty. I’ve never seen your turnover so slow, and my grandma could’ve gotten off the block faster than your start.”

  “I — I don’t know. I felt like I was in a fog or something.”

  “Well, go cool down, and get yourself ready for your hundred.”

  “Yes, sir.” Leo walked down to the part of the pool not used for the meet and tried to catch Audrey’s attention. She wouldn’t look at him.

  “Join the club,” he muttered as he slid into the cold water. I’m disappointed in me too.

  8. Cartwheels though the Puddles

  Winter in northern Florida was Denny Rose’s favorite season, and he drank in the warm sun as he walked the perimeter of the courtyard.

  At first the MPs had forced their listless inmate to walk during recreation time, but he’d now grown to enjoy the thirty-minute hustles. They seemed to lighten his mood.

  He’d been thinking about Audrey’s swim meet all day long, but his mind wandered as he walked. He recalled the summer Audrey had started swimming. Their neighbor’s daughter, Elaine, had been on the officer’s club swim team, and she’d convinced Audrey to give it a try.

  Denny grinned, remembering how little he and JoAnne had known about the sport at that first meet. Audrey’s saggy, bright blue swimsuit had been totally wrong for competition, but she’d still won all her events that evening.

  Denny had overheard another father talking to his daughter about the final relay of the evening. The girl had been completely confident their team would win. When her father had asked why, she’d answered , “Because Audrey’s on it.” Denny had swelled with pride and been hooked ever since. He’d kept track of the time and place of each of Audrey’s races for her entire career.

  That first meet, years ago, had been blanketed by angry storm clouds as it ended, and the skies poured down sheets of rain. Swimmers and their parents had raced through the parking lot, screaming with laughter and soaking wet. As Denny and JoAnne threw open their car doors to scramble inside, Denny cried, “Where’s Audrey?” JoAnne gasped. “I thought she was with you!” They frantically peered out the windshield and saw their daughter dancing toward them, wearing only her swimsuit and an enormous smile. Her hair cascaded over her shoulders as she threw her arms out wide, spinning in the teeming rain in front of her family’s car.

  Denny had stared in amazement at the carefree joy of his only child. She didn’t need a pool to enjoy the water. She didn’t need a pool to swim.

  Feeling the cool breeze in the courtyard, his smile faded. He’d never watch his daughter swim again. Denny saw the MP signal the end of yard time, and he joined the other prisoners forming a line to head to the showers.

  The majority of cons at the military prison were young enlisted men who’d earned short sentences for drunk and disorderly, insubordination, or theft. They kept their distance from the forty-three-year-old convicted murderer, but it didn’t matter. Denny knew he’d eventually be transferred to Leavenworth.

  As he scrubbed cheap shampoo into what remained of his buzzed hair, his stomach twisted. Audrey wouldn’t have much time to visit him once he moved to federal prison in Kansas, and JoAnne barely made it to see him as it was. He fought the urge to cry. The streaming shower could hide his tears, but once he started sobbing, he might never stop. Instead he bit the inside of his cheek and willed his emotions back under control.

  At the conclusion of the shower, the inmates folded their wash-cloths in neat squares and wiped down the shower room before dressing and standing at attention for inspection.

  Next was dinner: congealed macaroni and cheese and cold green beans. His stomach was in no condition for food anyway. After he disposed of his tray, an MP informed Denny he had a visitor.

  Denny exhaled with relief when he saw his wife standing on the other side of the glass. He barely got the phone up to his mouth before he blurted, “How’d Audrey swim?” JoAnne smiled. “Her medley relay set the school record. She swam beautifully.”

  He beamed. “What was her split? Did she get under thirty?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “How about the overall relay time? What’d they go?” JoAnne shrugged. “I’m not sure, honey. You know I don’t follow times like you do.”

  Denny sighed. “Listen to me go on about the meet — I haven’t even asked about you. How are you, Jo?”

  “I’m good. Glad to be back in town.” She paused.

  “What is it?”

  “I ran into Kate at the grocery store.” Denny stiffened. Kate was his ex-wife. They’d divorced twenty years ago.

  “She feels awful about her testimony at the court martial.”

  “She did nothing wrong. She just told the truth.” His hand clenched the prison phone. “I’m an alcoholic wife beater.”

  “You’re neither of those things.” JoAnne leaned forward, her brown eyes flaring. “You hit her once, then you got sober. You’ve been an excellent husband and father. You never drank again.”

  “Until the July fourth barbecue.”

  JoAnne shook her head. “Why, Denny? Why’d you take that first sip?”

  “I ask myself that every day. If I hadn’t been competing with Bill Walsh for that promotion, and if Commander Scott hadn’t offered…” He shook his head. “Nope. This is on me. Nobody got me here but me. And now my family’s paying for my mistakes.”

  “We’ll get by. I’m making good money in Alabama.”

  “How’s the job?”

  JoAnne smiled and launched into a story about one of her crazy patients. As they caught up on the last three weeks, the couple eased into their old banter and even laughed once or twice. Denny almost forgot he was in prison for a moment. Almost.

  9. An Eye for an Eye

  Mr. Crawford droned on about the judicial branch of the US government, the branch enforcing the laws of the land, while Leo brainstormed ways to break those laws. He sat, absentmindedly tapping a pencil on his desk as he tried to figure out how to hook himself up with some Oxycontin.

  It wasn’t as simple as asking his druggie classmates how to score.

  Being the son of one of the most powerful men at the nearby naval base put Leo in the spotlight, and it would be too risky to approach someone he didn’t trust. He knew a few of his teammates smoked pot on occasion, but Leo doubted they were into prescription drug abuse.

  No, he needed a method more clandestine. Something untrace-able. He wondered about online prescriptions from Mexico. His mind whirred, but the excitement evaporated when he realized he didn’t have a credit card or a secure mailing address.

  Then he remembered Jason’s friend Tony. He and Jase had gotten into all kinds of trouble in high school, and if anyone knew how to score drugs, it would be him. Leo had heard Tony worked down at the docks, and he sensed it was time for a visit.

  Leo had saved a little over a hundred dollars from the meager allowances his father doled out. Audrey sometimes complained about always walking on the beach for their dates. But the salty ocean air and pounding surf provided a romantic backdrop for their snuggles and kisses, and in the end she never seemed to mind that much.

  Although they’d come very close, they hadn’t had sex. Audrey wasn’t quite ready, and Leo respected her caution. He was a bit cautious himself. He dreaded an unplanned pregnancy. His father had told him if he ever got a girl pregnant, he’d perform the abortion himself. And Leo wasn’t entirely convinced he was joking. Most of the time they were both just exhausted from training, but when Leo was feeling friskier, he hoped she’d come around soon.

  As Mr. Crawford reviewed the term length and requirements for Supreme Court justices, Leo thought about the previous evening.

  He’d come home after the swim meet, eaten a quiet dinner with his mom, and retired to his room for some homework.

  A little while later his fath
er had come home. He barged into Leo’s bedroom and parked himself on the bed. Leo swiveled around in his desk chair.

  “So,” his father boomed. “What happened in that fifty free?”

  “I don’t know, Dad.”

  “How was your hundred?”

  Leo reluctantly met his eyes, which thankfully retained their cool gray hue.

  “Even worse. Forty-nine flat.”

  “Have you been staying up late, talking to Audrey?”

  “No, sir.”

  “Have you been doing more yardage in practice than normal?”

  “No, sir.”

  “Well, then, I’m back to my original question. What happened?” Leo chose the stock answer for this situation and delivered it staring straight ahead. “No excuse, sir.” His father peered at him. “Why are you sweating?” Surprised, Leo brushed his hand across his forehead. Why was he sweating? “Um, just nervous, I guess. I have a chemistry test tomorrow.”

  Narrowing his eyes, his father rose from the bed. “That coach better not over-train you. Maybe I’ll speak with him.” When the door closed behind him, Leo exhaled and reached into his pocket to touch his one remaining pill. He had to figure out something fast.

  Leo’s attention returned to the classroom when he realized Mr. Crawford and his classmates were staring at him expectantly.

  “Could you repeat the question, sir?”

  “Mr. Scott, I asked you how long Supreme Court justices serve.” Leo cleared his throat. “As long as they’d like to, sir? They can only be removed through impeachment and conviction, or if they resign.” Mr. Crawford paused, then nodded before continuing the lecture.

  Leo felt Audrey’s curious eyes on him, and he gave her a reassuring smile. Good thing this class was easy. When he’d been suspended for a week in September, all the missed assignments and tests could’ve killed his GPA. But Mr. Crawford and the rest of his teachers had allowed him to make up the work based on his reputation as an excellent student.