Secret Lucidity(2)

“Your boyfriend can’t save you from my interrogations, sweetheart.”

“Then tell me what will, because my junior year just ended, and you’re kinda putting a damper on my mood.”

“Coach Hale!” echoes from down the hall from a couple guys on the swim team who are pumping their fists in celebration as they clear out of the school.

“I don’t seem to be dampening their mood,” he defends with a boastful smile.

“You’re not their dad.”

“Don’t worry, sir. She’ll be with me, and I promise nothing will get out of hand,” Kroy interjects.

“She’s my princess—”

“O-M-G. You are so embarrassing!” I exclaim, tossing my head back in loving annoyance as I start to back step away. “I’ll call you later, Kroy.”

“Where are you off to?”

“The pool,” I tell him before looking to my dad. “Come get me when you’re ready to go.”

“The new coach was here earlier, but I think he might have already left and locked up.” As he says this, he reaches into his pocket and pulls out the keys. “Here.”

“Thanks, Dad.”

Keys aren’t needed when I find the doors unlocked. I look up to the small office that overlooks the pool and spot a guy who must be the new assistant coach.

He sees me and steps out to the top of the stairs. “Can I help you with something?”

“I’m going to get in a quick swim.”

“I’ll be locking up in a bit.”

“Coach Hale is my dad,” I tell him. “I rode with him today. Figured I’d get in some laps while I wait for him to finish up in his classroom.”

He leans his elbows on the railing. “So, you’re Cam?”

I nod.

I can’t help but to stare. He’s years younger than my dad and has perfectly styled, thick brown hair. His T-shirt and gym shorts wrap nicely around his tanned, athletic-cut body.

“Holler if you need anything. I’m just finishing up some paperwork before I head out.”

He walks back into the office as I make my way into the girl’s locker room.

While I change into my drag suit, the murmurings of a few girls catch my attention. Apparently, the new coach has fulfilled the embodiment of their schoolgirl fantasy come true. There’s no denying his good looks and physique, but the guy’s gotta be in his thirties.

My dad has had the same assistant for the past six years, but Coach Barlow’s wife just had a baby, and they decided to move to St. Louis to be closer to her family. I really liked Coach Barlow. He and my dad led us to more wins than I can count, including my holding the school’s record for the fifty-yard sprint.

Swimming has always been my thing, and something my dad and I have always been able to share. He spent his high school years in the water and went on to swim for the University of Oklahoma on partial scholarship.

I’m a daddy’s girl through and through. We’ve always held a special bond, which is different from the relationship I have with my mom. I guess every child has that something special with one of their parents. Not that my mother and I don’t get along. We absolutely do. But with my father, there’s this indefinable connection.

I just don’t look at him; I look up to him.

I’m a sprinter just like he was. I not only hold the school’s record time for my division, but also the state’s as well.

Call it an obsession.

Everyone else does.

But I don’t care

Team sports have never appealed to me. It’s knowing that I am the one who holds all the power to win or lose without having to rely on anyone else to carry any of the weight. No one can let me down but me, and when victory comes my way, which it often does, I know it’s mine and only mine. In the water, I’m at battle with myself. Even though girls swim on either side of me, eager to take what I strive to claim as my own, I’m alone. Nothing exists in the water but my will to beat my last best.

Time outside the water no longer exists when I dive in. I glide above the black stripe beneath me that guides me through my laps. The burn in my shoulders spirals through my muscles and down my arms, warming me into euphoria. This is my high—my drug of choice.

No one can take this rush away from me.

I ride it out until the fire in my lungs becomes too much for me to tolerate, and I break through the water’s barrier to find Coach Andrews on deck above me.

“Good times for an afternoon swim.”

He offers me his hand and helps me out of the pool. Taking the towel I left on the deck, I dry off.

He watches me closely as he takes a seat on a block. “I thought your father was exaggerating the truth when he was bragging about you. Clearly, I was wrong.”

I wrap the towel around myself. “You’re Coach Andrews?”

“I am,” he remarks with a nod. “After everything your father has told me about you this past week, I feel like we could be old family friends.”

“Oh, God,” I moan with the onslaught of mortification. Lord only knows what my dad told this man.

“Don’t worry. He didn’t say anything that would embarrass you too much.” He chuckles under his breath, and the smile creases the skin at the corners of his eyes, making something inside me flutter.