Deep End: A Bad Boy Sports Romance (17 page)

“You know this is the first time we’ve cuddled?” she says, practically whispering into my ear.

“I like it,” I say.

“You se
emed like such a tough guy, stayi
ng so calm, when the coach was in
your
face. I wouldn’t have
guessed
you were the cuddling type. After all, you ran out the last time.”

“You know good and well I had a race to get to,” I say.

“I know, I’m just kidding,” she says.

She seems sweet and innocent again, despite the intense sex we just had. It feels like I can’t really get a read on Allison. Sometimes she seems shy and bookish, and other times, she seems wild and free, ready for anything. I guess that’s how it is getting to know a person—slowly different parts of their personality start to
unveil
themselves to you, and in the moments before these
separate
parts cohere together in your mind, finally merging, it seems like you are getting to know multiple people at once.

“
So you really love me?” she says, in the
sweetest
voice
imaginable
. “I wasn’t sure if it was just something stupid we were saying, you know, in the locker room during the meet, but I want you to know I really meant it. And I
mean
it now.”

“Yes, I really meant it,” I say, and in
this instant I really know tha
t
it’s
true. I’ve never been
more sure
of anything in my life. I almost say this to her, but
for some reason the words don’t
come out. I do manage a, “I love you,” though.

“I love you, too,” she says.

“Can I ask you something?” I say, lightly running my fingers up and down her arm. I love the way her skin feels so smooth and silky. In
comparison
, my own body feels rough and hardened, purely
practical
. She, on the other hand, is a thing of beauty, as if nature worked incredibly hard just to make her in the most perfect way possible.

“Sure,” she says, smiling up at me, as if nothing I can say will bother her in the sli
ghtest. We’re completely surrounded
and enveloped in the after glow of sex, and the current-glow of
exchanging
our second round of “I love
you’s
.”

Anchor spends the night for the first time. I can’t
believe
we said we love each other. I pretended to be asleep, with my eyes closed, until he drifted off. Now I’m lying here awake. We hadn’t even turned the lights on when we came in the room the first time, so all I see is darkness, now that the night has fallen.

There’s still
a little
part of me that’s wondering what the hell I see in
t
his jock, and a part of me that wonders whether this is real. But I think it’s only natural to feel like this. After all, no one has
no
doubts at all. That’d be completely crazy.

Before Anchor drifted off to sleep, he told me all about what happened with Spellman when I was leaving the
locker room
.

“Aren’t you worried that the coach will really kick you off the team?” I asked him.

He just shrugged his sho
ulders. Somehow, it all doesn’t
seem
to
be bothe
ring him that much, but I can’t
understand how. If I were in the same situation, or even a situation half as bad, I’d be so stressed out I doubt I’d b
e functional at all. I wouldn’t
even be able to dress myself, let
alone
fall asleep in a new bed without a worry.

As I think about
myself
being in a similar situation, I feel that pride swelling back up inside me, that pride that he’s my man. This is my man here, lying next to me, his arm up on my side. He’s breathing gently, and now that my eyes have adjusted
to
the darkness, I ta
ke a good look at him, relishing
the opportunity to really take in his whole naked body without worrying about him watching me look at him.

All those doubts were crazy
. I can’t believe how lucky I am
to be with a guy like this. There’s just something special about him. He’s just got some kind of special charisma
about him, something that I’ve
always felt I lacked myself. But that’s the
beauty
of lovers—you can find in them what you were lacking yourself, and thus completing yourself, turning yourself into a complete, whole unit.

Eventually I fall asleep. I don’t notice when it happens, but I guess you never do. Falling asleep is like falling in
l
ove: one momen
t you’re awake, and the next you’re
asleep, and it’s impossible to ever know exactly take notice of the moment that it actually happens. Sure, there’s a point when you tell each other you’re in love, but when that actually happens is anyone’s guess.

The light is
pouring in through the shades. I wake up with my heart pounding.

Anchor seems like he’s just waking up too. Maybe we’re
synchronized
more than I’d thought, since I haven’t made any movements that would wake him up.

“You’re not worried about
people knowing we
’re together now?” I say. What
a dumb thing to say!

“Glad to see you too,” says Anchor, bending his head and giving me an incredibl
y swee
t kiss.

“Sorry,” I say. “I’m just nervous for you, is all.”

Anchor shrugs his shoulders. “Don’t worry about it,” he says. “Anyway, Spellman already told the coach that we were together, probably. There’s no doubt it’s the first thing he did when he regained consciousness.”

“But you still have to talk to the coach, right?”

“I guess so,” says Anchor,
looking like he really doesn’t
want to do it.

“I know it sucks,” I say. “But you’ve got to face it.”

“I’ll head over there right now,” he says.

“You think he’ll be there? It’s got to be like 6 in the morning right now.”

“
Morning
practice,” he says, getting out of bed, and starting to get dressed.
I’d forgotten that he came here
in just swim briefs
, soaking wet. He bends over to get his pants out of his duffel bag.

As he bends over, I can’t help but admiring his body again. He looks like
a statue that can move. I can’t
believe he’s mine. All mine.

“You’re looking at me like you want another round,” he says, giving me a wink.

“Maybe I do,” I say.

“Sorry, got to get to practice. I’m already late.”

I blow him a kiss as he walks out the door.

As the door closes, all my old worries about getting discovered suddenly seem so silly and trivial.

I lie back and
try to go to sleep, but my heart
it still pounding. Anchor may not be concerned about what’s going to happen
to
him, but I am. And for the first time, I realize I’m concerned for him, rather than for myself. I’m not thinking about
my future career with The Journal
, but for Anchor’s future careers in the
Olympics
and beyond. If he’s kicked off the team, what will happen to his chances? And
besides
, what did the Olympic scout think after seeing Anchor disobeying his coach so
blatantly
? What did he write in his report? Did he capture it all on his
video camera
?

I can’t
sleep, so I get
up and start doing some school
work.

But flipping through my math
textbook
gets boring really quickly, so I decide to do a different kind of work.

I open up a new email window on my computer, and start writing a new article. The last one I wrote when I was angry
with
Anchor for leaving me after sex. Looking back on it, maybe I overreacted. And when I think of what I wrote, I now think I certainly overacted. Why
d
id I have such a burning desire to destroy the swim team in printed words? What had they ever done to me, except not invite me to their parties? But…wait, they actually had invited me to one of their parties. That first night that I “met”
Anchor,
Dave had
actually
invited me to a party, hadn’t he? Or had he just invited me back to his r
oom? I can’t
remember now, a
nd it’s inconsequential
anyway.

This is a
completely
different type of article than the one I wrote before. Instead of being filled with the nastiest stuff I could think of, all the dirt that Anchor told me, this article is basically a glowing account of Anchor’s performance in the swim meet yesterday. I heavily praise the entire swim team, including the coach. Even Spellman. I make Spellman
out to be some kind of injure
d
hero, facing Anchor, a force so much greater than himself that he can’t
ever
defea
t him
. I make the swimming
team events
sound like a
Greek
epic poem.

Halfway through, I get a phone call. It’s Anchor.

I open my cell phone.

“Shouldn’t
you
still
be in morning practice,” I say. “Doesn’t it
last
like four hours or something?
”

“That’d be too long even for me,” says Anchor. His voice sounds weary and tired. “They kicked me off the team.”

“Oh, baby
,” I say, my voice becoming swee
t, without realizing it. “I’m so sorry. What happened?”

“Well, I’m technically still on the team. The assistant coach was able to reason with coa
ch a little bit. But I couldn’t
get through to him. Spellman, of course, told coach everything. He told them all about you. And I wasn’t
supposed
to get close
to you. I think I told you that before? Anyway, I’m on the bench the rest of the season.”

“Well, at least you’re still on the team. Doesn’t that mean you’ll still be
eligible
for the
Olympic
team.”

“
Technically
,
yeah
,” says Anchor. “But the thing is that they’re not going to be crazy about contracting someone who’s always causing trouble, and this is a pretty big mark against me. And to top it off, I won’t be able to race in any more meets. This is the end of my
college
swimming
career right here.”

“But you did so well in the l
ast meet. Did you end up breaking
a record?”

“Yeah,” says Anchor, seemingly too depressed to tell me exactly what record he’s broken. He really doesn’t sound like his normal buoyant, cocky self. I feel a pain inside of myself. We must already be synchronized in a way, our emotions having merged in a
s
ense. What affects Anchor affects me too. It’s a sobering realization, yet also a joyful one.

“
Didn’t you do well enough yesterday for the
Olympics
to really want you?” I’m trying to make him see the better side of this, trying to minimize the damage.

“They
usually
like to send scouts two or three times
, and now
there’s
no point in sending another
scout, since I won’t be racing.”

“So it’s all still
up in the air?” I say, trying to
make my voice sound hopeful, but my heart is sinking.
“Basically there’s no way to know one way or the other
whether you’ll be on the
team.”

“
Yeah, the only thing to do is wait and see.” My words don’t seem to have had the effect I’d hoped on him. I know the only thing he wants in life is to be on the Olympic team next year, and now there’s a really
good
chance that’s not going to happen.

“Want to meet up?” I say. “Maybe I can make you feel better.” I have in mind a nice cuddle session on my bed. At this point, the sheets have dried, and I can almost already feel the warmth of his body snuggled up against mine. And maybe sex, if it comes to that. That would comfort both of us, not just Anchor.

“I gue
s
s,” says Anchor
. “I haven’t eaten anything yet
. I usually eat with the team afte
r morning practice, but I don’t
feel like joining them today.”

“That’s
understandable
,” I say. “Why don’t we meet in the Jones
Cafeteria
?
I think it’s opening up right now. We can get some waffles.”