Deep End(83)

LUKAS: In that scenario, nighttime pool usage is the least of our problems.

SCARLETT: Yeah, good point.

SCARLETT: Heading for the airport to return to California. Gotta go!

LUKAS: Be good. And slow down with the murders.

I wonder when he’ll fly back from Europe, and where he’ll go after. Swimming and diving, men and women, sometimes are the same team in name only. There are schools in which the female team is stronger; others where diving is little more than an afterthought. When it comes to meets, we rarely travel together. The men’s swimming schedule is probably somewhere on Stanford’s website, but if Lukas wanted me to know where he is, he’d tell me.

Not that I have time to think wistfully of him. Traveling has a domino effect that never fails to shrink my heart: classes, labs, tests to make up for, which means that every meet is sandwiched by days stacked back-to-back. Moving as a team requires more social battery than I could ever scrounge up, even if the Gravelines power plant were to relocate inside my chest. Last but not least, I always, always get the cruds.

“Have you considered purchasing a new immune system?” Maryam asks when she catches me sniffling in the kitchen.

“Too expensive,” I mutter, pouring hot water into the Pipsqueak travel mug Barb got me for my birthday.

“I think Aldi sells ’em at a discount. Even a used one would be better than what you’re working with. ”

I give her the finger and step outside. It’s windy and foggy, and the prospect of practice in preparation for the next away meet, in less than eight goddamn days, turns my will to live into a raisin.

I must not be the only one. When I get to Avery, Pen and the twins seem delighted by the sight that greets us.

“How did they even . . .” Bella looks at the dozens of seagulls that have taken residence in the diving well. “You know what? Doesn’t matter. Coach, what’s going on?”

Coach Sima ambles toward us. “They’re sanitizing everything, but apparently there are so many droppings, only a monster would force you to dive in these conditions.”

I tilt my head. “Did you ask if you could force us to dive in these conditions?”

“Yes, and you know what I was told. No practice today.”

“Oh, no,” Pen deadpans.

Coach Sima glares. “Strength training’s still on, smarty-pants.”

We glance up at the platform, which appears to have become the vacation home of a family of seagulls. A quiverfull one.

“The heroes we need,” I say.

Pen nods. “But not the heroes we deserve.”

Pilates indoors feels like a decadent step up from freezing my ass in the air. I’m jackknifing my way into oblivion when I overhear Pen chatting with Monroe, one of the swimmers.

“Where the hell is Lukas?” he asks. “I thought he’d be back by now. I owe him ten dollars.”

Pen laughs. Clearly, the rest of the team still doesn’t know that they broke up. “He got back a few days ago, but immediately left for Seattle. Med school interview.”

“No shit?”

“He should be back tomorrow.”

I force myself not to wonder why she knows, and I don’t.

It’s because they’re still friends. Best friends. Or because Pen didn’t chicken out of texting him every night for the past two weeks, typing and deleting and retyping until she fell asleep. The problem is, his list covered stuff like orgies and pony play, but offered no insight on whether I should contact Lukas if I simply miss him. I don’t want to overstep and ruin our arrangement. And Lukas . . . I have no clue what he wants. All I know is that he hasn’t been texting, either.

“Jesus,” Monroe says. “And then he’s heading straight back out to UCLA for the quadrangular meet?”

“I think so, yeah.”

“Ballsy. Can’t believe he’s applying for med school during an Olympic year.”

“Kinda pointless, honestly. Even if he gets accepted, he’s going to defer. He might as well have waited, but hey. He loves to torture himself.”

He does, doesn’t he? And yet later, in the locker room, I find myself asking her, “Is he really going to defer?”

“What?”

“Lukas, I mean.” He never mentioned it to me. Then again, when would he? In between bouts of helping my therapist fix my post-traumatic issues? Or while defiling poor Dr. Smith’s pristine cancer research lab?

What about while you two were getting busy on top of me? The bench in front of my locker asks. It’s been calling me a slut for two weeks.

You know what you did.

I turn away.

First you disgrace me, then you ignore me.

Jesus.

“Yeah,” Pen says. “He physically can’t go to med school and still pursue swimming at the elite level.”

She’s right. I’m not sure why it never occurred to me. Maybe it’s because my intention has always been to quit diving after senior year, but . . . he’s a much more successful athlete.

“Don’t you miss Lukas?” Bree asks Pen. “He’s been gone for a while. I’m still trying to figure out how to deal with Dale spending Thanksgiving in Iowa.”

“I’m used to it. We were long-distance for so long. And we text.” Pen shrugs, then grins at me. “What about you, Vandy? Do you miss Lukas?”