Sink or Swim (15 page)

The cheerleading squad carries Amy Armstrong back to the girls' locker room on their shoulders, maintaining their perfect formation, while singing all three verses of our beloved school song, “Stevenson, Sweet Stevenson,” in four-part harmony.

I keep checking out the crowd to see if Larry Wykoff has shown up yet, but there isn't a class clown in sight. Even Rachel Klempner is conspicuously absent. I look around and spot Mr. Arkady sitting in the second row to one side, looking especially undead in the harsh gymnasium overhead lighting. He holds up a skinny thumb and smiles.

Doc Craverly sits to his right, looking at his watch and tapping his foot, while Principal Muchnick sits on the other side, nervously running his hands through his heavily pomaded hair.

An official wearing a crisp white-and-black striped uniform comes out and blows his whistle. Everyone quiets down immediately. “Places, please, for the two-hundred-meter butterfly stroke,” he calls into his megaphone. “All lanes are clearly marked. Make sure you stay well within them.”

I watch from the sidelines as swimmers from each team arrange themselves along the far end of the pool.

“On your marks. Get set. Go!” The official shoots his starting pistol and the swimmers catapult from the edge of the pool and into the water. They remain submerged way longer than you would have ever thought was humanly possible. I am already having sympathetic anxiety symptoms just watching them when suddenly they surface, hurtling forward like steroidal porpoises. A cheer goes up as the first swimmer finishes his ten laps. And then another one, and another. The pool goes quiet as everyone listens to the announcer with rapt attention.

“In third place, with a time of nine minutes and eleven seconds, let's hear it for Dirk Schlissel!” Banditos and One-Upsters scream their popular heads off. “In second place, with a terrific time of nine minutes and eight seconds, a big hand for Craig Dieterly.” More sustained cheering and applause as Amy Armstrong careens out of the girls' locker room doing a spontaneous series of flips and cartwheels across the entire length of the pool and lands in a split right in front of the announcer.

“And in first place, with the near record-breaking time of nine minutes and three seconds, give it up, please, for the Catfish's own swimming sensation, Nelson Lutz.”

The Sardine side of the room goes dead quiet as the Catfish pull out all the stops for their first blue ribbon of the night. The marching band plays a fanfare while Catfish cheerleaders do a dazzlingly complicated synchronized drill that makes Amy Armstrong and her team look like a bunch of preschoolers attending their first Mommy and Me class.

I guess Coach was thinking I would rise to the occasion when he made me team mascot. But the more the meet drags on, the more unhappy and anxious I get. My cheers are so uninspiring Coach Grubman suggests I concentrate instead on bringing towels to my fellow team members when I see their lips turning blue. The rest of the night is a blur of arms and legs and starter pistols and cheering.

With only a few races remaining, Coach Grubman hurries over to me. He whispers urgently in my earflap. “Mort Wykoff just called. He says Larry will be fine . . .”

“That's great, Coach!” I am so relieved I could cry.

“I'm not finished, Drinkwater. He says Larry will be fine as soon as he has his appendix removed. They're admitting him to the hospital as we speak. You're in the race after this one.”

What I'm thinking is:
Noooooooooooooo!!! This can't be happening. I want to go HOOOOOOOME!!!

What I say is: “I don't think I can do it, Coach. I'm not ready. Sign me up for a different meet. This one's a little too soon.”

“You'll be okay, Drinkwater,” Coach Grubman says. “Dig down deep and you'll find that inner athlete lurking inside you just waiting to come out. Believe me, it's in there somewhere. You just haven't found it yet.”

I sure haven't. And I can't see how I'm going to find it in the next few minutes, either.

A cheer erupts from the bleachers. This race is over. I'm next. My heart beats wildly. My breath comes in quick shallow bursts. I'm light-headed and a little dizzy.

“And the winners are . . .”

I am losing sensation in my lower limbs. Coach Grubman holds my claw and leads me in the direction of the pool. “Don't pass out on me now, Drinkwater,” he says. “Sardines trail by fifteen points. Let's go. Get into your starting position, Drinkwater. Now.”

I feel faint. And nauseous.

“You're in lane six,” Coach tells me.

I wander over to the edge of the pool in a daze and immediately forget where Coach told me to go, so I just stand in front of the first lane I see. Big mistake.

“You're in my space, Snake Eyes,” Craig Dieterly barks. “Move over.” He pushes me roughly out of the way. “I don't care what you do in your own lane, but stay away from mine. Understand?”

I nod weakly.

“Listen: don't screw up. We have a lot riding on this race. The Schlissels and I can pull this whole thing off if you stay out of our way. So don't try anything funny.”

“Okay . . . sure . . . no problem. I'm so cool with that, I'm cold.”

What do I do now? With five hundred pairs of eyes watching, I can't exactly walk across the pool.

So many people have given me so many helpful hints about swimming, but in my hour of need, I can't seem to remember any of them. Surely there must be one useful gem buried in Mr. Miyagi's eight trillion pieces of unwanted advice. But if there is, I can't think of it now. All I can think of is drowning.

FULL SPEED AHEAD

I LOOK OUT
at the water, moments before my first-ever swimming race, and suddenly plan B pops into my fevered brain. It's pretty radical. But I think it might work. Its main and only purpose will be to keep me from dying.

Here's is the plan: I am not going into the water. Period. The end. When the starting pistol goes off, I will grab my side, fall to the ground, and pretend to be having an appendicitis attack. By the time I get back from the hospital, the meet will be long over and I can go home alive.

It's a brilliant plan. Only (A) Aunt Harriet's weak heart will probably explode if she sees me having an appendicitis attack. And (B) this is exactly what is happening to Larry Wykoff right now, and that's why the plan occurred to me in the first place.

Right. Okay. So much for plan B.

“On your marks,” the announcer begins. I stand, trembling, in front of lane six, praying for the race not to begin. I'm looking down at my flippers to make sure no part of me is protruding anywhere near Craig Dieterly's stupid space when I spot the dark piece of paper on the tiles, about a foot away from me. That's funny. Why would there be a piece of paper on the pool deck?

“Get set . . .”

Maybe if I hold my breath long enough, I can make myself faint. It's worth a try.

Wait a minute. I think that paper just moved. I must be mistaken. Paper doesn't move.

But bugs do. Terrifying water beetles that leap up at you with their giant, disgusting, gelatinous wings fluttering in your face do.

“Go!”

When the starter pistol goes off, the startled bug by the side of the pool flutters its bat-like wings, shoots into the air like a speeding bullet, and crashes right into what passes for my face.

I shriek with terror. “ARGHHHHHHHHH!!!” And hurl myself into the water to get away from it. It never even occurs to me that I don't know how to swim.

The simple horrific fact of having an insect the size of a grapefruit attached to my face is currently occupying all the space in my brain devoted to “fear.” There is simply no room left for anything else in there. I could probably give an impromptu address to Congress right now and fight an army of crazed mummies without even breaking a sweat, if I weren't swimming for my life in a pool in Carbondale, Illinois.

My thick, muscular legs propel me through the water like twin motorboats. My short, stumpy arms pound the surface like well-oiled pistons. I can think of nothing but fleeing from the enormous bug that clings to my snout until I finally shake it loose and its flies away to terrify some other swimmer.

I nearly crash into the wall in the shallow end, turn myself around, push off, head back into the deep end, push off the wall, start swimming back into the shallow end . . .

Hold on a minute. DID I SAY SWIMMING???

For a moment the realization that I am effortlessly speeding through the pool without a water wing in sight is so unnerving that I panic and start to sink. And that's when it happens: my gill slits begin to pulsate. The pulsating turns into a steady vibrating sensation. It feels like an army of cats purring softly inside my body.

My natural instincts are kicking in, just like Mr. Arkady said they would. I somehow know exactly what to do. I open my mouth and gulp in mouthfuls of water as fast as I can. Only instead of swallowing, I redirect it out through the slits in the sides of my neck, using muscles I never even dreamed I had. Row after row of gill tissue spring into action and suck the life-giving energy out of the H
₂
O and sends it coursing through my veins.

“A fish doesn't have to go to school to be a fish. It just knows.” Coach Grubman, you were right! I lift my head up out of the water to thank him and hear my name being joyously shouted from every corner of the room. “Go, Charlie, go! Go, Charlie, go!” It's so thrilling that I complete my next four laps even quicker than my first four, barely aware of the other nine swimmers struggling in vain to keep up with me.

A roar goes up from the bleachers and I realize I have completed my four hundred meters well ahead of the rest of the pack. I relax at the end of the pool, not even out of breath, and wait for my competition to complete their laps.

Craig Dieterly arrives first, gasping and wheezing, and immediately notices me waving to my fans. “What are you doing here, Broccoli Breath?” he pants. “You must have cheated. You can't be the winner. You don't even know how to swim.”

“I do now,” I say cheerfully.

While Craig Dieterly fumes, a Catfish swims to the finish, and the announcer yells into his bullhorn. “The race is officially over, folks. That was Mike Norsic in third place at six minutes flat. Craig Dieterly takes a speedy second with five minutes and forty-five seconds. And Charlie Drinkwater takes the blue ribbon with an astonishing world-record-breaking time of, will you listen to this folks,
five minutes and three seconds!
The Sardines win the meet in an amazing upset, narrowly beating the Carbondale Catfish by three points. Let's give it up for our new Central Illinois Champions, the Stevenson Middle School Sardines!”

Several hundred Sardine fans stand on their benches and scream their hearts out as Amy Armstrong and her squad dance in from the sidelines. A happy Coach Grubman runs out and yells in my earflap, “What did I tell you, Drinkwater! I knew you could do it! From the first day I saw you. I knew it!” He notices Craig Dieterly glowering, gives him a swift “Nice job,” and runs off to speak to the rest of the team. Sardine and Catfish fans stream into the pool area to get a closer look at me.

My relatives and friends climb down from the bleachers and fight their way through the crowd to congratulate me. “I was so excited I could hardly breathe, Charlie!” my mom calls.

“Me too, Mom!” I shout back.

“I'm so proud of you, son!” My dad beams. “Can you imagine? A world record? Harvard on an athletic scholarship, here we come!” He gives me a thumbs-up sign. And pretty soon every single person in that gym has their thumbs up—except Craig Dieterly, of course.

As Dave and a bunch of other upper-classmen attempt to hoist me up onto their shoulders, Principal Muchnick runs up to me ecstatically. “Congratulations! You did it! You won us the championship! Quiet, please, everyone!”

A hush falls over the crowd. Principal Muchnick continues, in a voice trembling with emotion, “In recognition of your astonishing achievement today I present you, Charles Drinkwater, with this humble token of our gratitude and admiration.” He places a huge blue ribbon in my claws. “May you wear it in good health.”

The crowd whistles and stamps and cheers. My mom rushes up to me with tears streaming down her face, pins the ribbon to my Sardine costume, and snaps a picture. I will never forget this moment as long as I live. I pinch myself to make sure I'm not dreaming.

“Hold on a minute,” an angry voice shouts. “Has everybody lost their minds?”

The crowd grows quiet again. A tall, unhappy-looking gray-haired woman with enormous arms marches forward. “Since when do we give criminals blue ribbons and a pat on the back and forgive them their crimes because they win us state championships?” It's Mrs. Dieterly, of course. “Is that the lesson we want to teach our students, Principal Muchnick? I don't think so.”

My mom looks like she could smack Craig's mom in the face. Principal Muchnick looks confused. A chorus of “Who is this woman?” echoes throughout the room.

Then another voice rings out. “Excuse me, everyone.” Stanley emerges from behind the bleachers. If you've never heard five hundred people gasp in unison, you should try it sometime. I'm here to tell you it's a pretty satisfying sound.

My enormous jaw drops even lower than Uncle Marvin's.

“May I have your attention, please?” he goes on. “I'd like to say a few words.”

The crowd parts as he walks slowly forward.

“I'm Stanley O'Connor, everybody. I'm the other mutant dinosaur in the room. Hi, Mom. Hi, Dad.” He waves to his parents. I watch carefully to make sure Aunt Harriet doesn't have a heart attack. She seems okay. She and Uncle Marvin rush up to their son and embrace him silently. Stanley hugs them back with all his might.

At last he breaks away. “I can't just walk away and let my cousin take the blame for everything I've done. I thought I could, but I can't. I know how much guts it took for you to dive into that pool and swim that race tonight, Charlie. You overcame your greatest fear. And if you can do it . . . then so can I. I hope.”

Actually, it didn't take
that
much guts to get me into the pool. All it took was one extremely large palmetto bug. But what Stanley doesn't know won't hurt him.

The crowd whispers excitedly until Principal Muchnick calls for silence. “Quiet, everyone. I want to hear this.” Stanley fidgets on his two large flippers, looks out at the crowd, takes a deep breath, and begins. “I broke into Dieterly's Delectable Denizens of the Deep and took their salmon. I stole my father's bag of used shoes, and the bread from the school cafeteria, and the dessert from Beautiful Bites. Yes, I was hungry. But what I did was wrong. I want you to know I acted on my own. My cousin Charlie had nothing to with any of this.” Stanley pauses to take a deep breath. “I cannot tell you how good it feels to get this off my chest.”

And I cannot tell you how relieved I am to be off the hook at last. You are looking at one happy fish.

Stanley comes over and looks me right in the eye. “You were kind to me when I needed you, Charlie. And I deserted you when
you
needed
me
. I'm really sorry, and I hope you accept my apology.”

“Thank you, Stanley,” I say quietly. “I do.” It feels great when people apologize to you for what they've done, and nobody even has to make them.

Then Rachel Klempner pipes up. “Attention, please! I bring you a message from the most wonderful guy in the world, Larry Wykoff!”

Everybody turns to see who the strangely enthusiastic girl is.

“He told me to tell you how proud he is of each and every one of you here tonight. And he asked that we Sardines give a great big cheer to all you Catfish who swam so hard, and were such good sports. Hip hip HOORAY!!!

“Larry and I wanted to say something especially to you, Charlie. Because we admire and respect you so very much.”

Rachel Klempner and Larry Wykoff respect me about as much as Moe and Curly respect Larry. Maybe a little less.

“Larry heard about your amazing record tonight, Charlie Drinkwater, and he specifically wanted me to tell you he's not at all surprised at how well you did. We both have the utmost respect for you. You have come so far in such a short time. You're our hero and you always will be.” Rachel Klempner has actually moved herself to tears during this last part.

I would bet you three billion dollars that Larry Wykoff didn't tell her to say anything. She just made it all up. She doesn't mean a word of it. She never does. As the crowd breaks up the loudspeaker clicks on:

“Please exit in an orderly fashion. No running in the parking lot. And please, drive safely. The life you save may be your own.”

At least that's an announcement you can trust.

Stanley joins us in the corridor and we make our way to the parking lot. Mr. Arkady catches up to us just as we reach my mom's truck. “Vell done, Charlie.”

“Thanks,” I reply.

“I vuss impressed vitt your performance as vell, Stanley. You told the truth, the whole truth, and nuttink but.”

“I haven't had a lot of practice at that sort of thing.” Stanley and I hoist ourselves into the back of the truck.

“I trust you vill heff many more opportunities for tellink the truth,” my science teacher says.

“I'm really glad you made Stanley come to the swimming meet, Mr. Arkady. It meant a lot to me. How'd you do it?”

“Vell, Charlie, last night venn I came to see you, I noticed garbage scattered everywhere behind your garage. And several sets of flipper-prints. Eet deedn't take a genius to know you vurr feeding Stanley. So after I left you, I vaited in the shadows for heem to come and see you. And venn
he
left I had a leetle visit uff my own vitt your cousin in your backyard. I deedn't
make
him come to the meet, Charlie. I merely
suggested
he come in case he changed his mind about confessink.”