Whale Talk

CHAPTER 13

The monthly Athletic Council meeting is set for lunchtime of the Monday we return from the conference meet. I get a note from Simet between first and second periods to see him in his room before he goes in. “These guys must have stayed up late,” he says “They’re pushing hard to revote on our letter requirements. I told ’em I was bringing you with me.”

“Bet they loved that.”

“Everything’s relative. I threatened to bring the whole team. I think Andy Mott makes everyone nervous.”

“Mott is my personal hero.”

“Benson is bringing some representatives from the football team, and I guess Roundtree is bringing a couple of hoopsters. There is some common feeling that I misrepresented the truth.” He laughs.

“What do you want me to say?”

“I just want you there to have us represented. You may not have to say anything. Play it by ear, but whatever you do, don’t lose your temper and don’t get into it with Barbour. It could be a tight vote, and you don’t want to piss anyone off.”

I run into Carly coming out of Simet’s room and bring her up to speed. “This is too cool,” she says. “Janet Lindstrom is the girls’ sports rep to the council, and she’s gone. I’m first alternate. I don’t know how Janet would vote, but I’m in your pocket, if you play your cards right.” She kisses me on the cheek. God, I love her. She is so perfect for me, requires so little.

Simet and I walk into the council a few minutes late because of a last-minute strategy meeting, and the room falls silent, making me wonder if Benson and Roundtree had a last-minute strategy meeting of their own.

Benson is chairperson for the year, and as he opens the meeting, I realize if parliamentary rules are in play he can vote only in case of a tie, so between that and the addition of Carly, we may have been handed a two-vote swing. He dispatches with old business in about fifteen seconds, then calls for new.

Mike Barbour raises his hand. “I move to call for a review on the letter requirements for the swim team.”

Before anyone can respond, Carly says, “Call for discussion.”

There is agreement.

Barbour says, “The letter requirements were misrepresented to the council, I believe.”

That’s way more articulate than Barbour is. Somebody has been coaching him to imitate a human.

Simet knows how to play this game. “Misrepresented? You’re saying I deceived you?” He turns to Barbour. “That’s the gentleman’s way of saying ‘You callin’ me a liar?’”

That throws Barbour for a second. Even he isn’t in the business of calling a teacher a liar. “No, well, what I mean is, I don’t think the rest of us knew whether the requirements were hard enough to earn a letter.”

“So you basically made your decision without sufficient knowledge.” It isn’t a question.

“I think what Mike is trying to say,” Benson says, “is that we believed you were setting a standard for yourselves that would meet criteria that would set your team in an equal position with other sports teams.”

Simet and Benson lock eyes. Simet says, “I haven’t been a member of this council very long, but in almost every formal meeting I’ve attended elsewhere, the chairperson’s job is to run the meeting and let the other members debate, to avoid an appearance of bias.”

That pisses Benson off, and the jacked muscle in his jaw tells us so, but he’s cool and hands the gavel to Roundtree. I don’t think Benson knows how any formal meeting is run. He’s used to saying what he wants when he wants. It doesn’t matter which of them is chair, it still takes a vote away from the bad guys unless we’re in a tie.

Carly says, “I wasn’t here the day of the original vote, but it seems to me that if the council made a decision and the swimmers swam their entire season with that goal in mind, it would be unfair to change it now.”

Go, Carly!

Barbour says, “We didn’t know every kid on that team was gonna get a jacket.”

“Neither did I,” Simet says.

“But I think that may be the point,” Benson says. “It’s a brand-new sport here at Cutter, and every athlete lettered. What other sport in the school’s history has lettered every athlete in the program?”

“Actually,” Simet says, “the chess club lettered all its athletes in 1989 and again in ’93.” Now how in hell would Simet know that?

“The chess club!” Barbour blurts out. “That ain’t no athletic team.”

“It was then,” Simet says. “Before ’95 it was considered a sports team, and the members earned letters. In those two years, every athlete lettered. No one said a word.”

“Correction,” Roundtree says. “Someone did say a word, which is why the chess club is no longer considered an athletic team. Chess is a game, not a sport.”

“I won’t get into that argument with you, Coach. Don’t know whether I’d argue for or against chess as a sport. My point is, when it was considered one, everyone lettered. In context, there is precedent for all the athletes on a team lettering.” The council is quiet, probably digesting Simet’s words, but he raises his hands in mock surrender. “Hey, I don’t even think it’s a big deal, or has anything to do with the point of this issue. It’s just a fact.”

“Okay,” Roundtree says. “Then let’s focus on the issue. The item under discussion is whether the council had enough information when we took our last vote to make an intelligent judgment regarding the letter requirements of the swim team. Mr. Barbour thinks not, and it appears Coach Benson agrees. Is there more discussion, or should we vote to reconsider?”

My hand goes up. “Wait. How many other coaches had to bring their letter requirements before this council? I haven’t been here before, but you guys didn’t discuss basketball or volleyball or wrestling or any other winter sport, did you?”

Benson says, “The letter requirements for those sports have been set for a long time. Most often it’s a question of rubber stamping, because the requirements are reasonable.”

“So there are bylaws that say the council has the right to pass judgment on a coach or a team? Like, you could show me where all this is written down?”

Benson is really tightening up now. “It is understood at this school, Mr. Jones, that the Athletic Council oversees all athletic matters. This unquestionably falls under our jurisdiction.”

“But it’s not written down,” I say

“It doesn’t have to be written down.”

“But it isn’t.”

“I’ve said all that needs to be said,” Benson says, “and I’m asking that this be brought to a vote.”

“Actually,” Simet says, “I think it does have to be written down somewhere, Coach. I can’t imagine that the purpose and criteria for this council isn’t recorded somewhere. Is it possible to postpone this long enough to look into that? I won’t order the letters yet, and we can hold off on making a decision until we see exactly how this is all laid out. That’s fair, isn’t it?”

Benson thinks it isn’t and says so, but when put to a vote, waiting seems reasonable to a simple quorum. Thank God for women’s sports and for Carly Hudson.

“I just wanted to regroup,” Simet says back in his room. “That would have been too close to call. It will take them a while to dig up the paperwork, if there is any, and set up another meeting. We might have been able to pull the votes, but I didn’t want to take a chance if we can do it without. If we can work up a little compassion for Chris and play down Mott’s two-gun salute to the student body, we could have a shot.”

Carly tells me afterward we should have gone ahead and called for a vote. She’s afraid Janet Lindstrom might vote with Benson. It’s a chance we’ll have to take.

Workouts are a kick. We have put the supine surgical-tubing station (which Dan Hole began to call muscle masturbation-thereby placing him forever in Mott’s good graces) into mothballs, and now the guys simply line up in an endless forty-by-infinite-yard relay, where they go after me forty yards at a time, and I build up incredible yardage. In the second week we’ll taper me again, with medium-speed yards coupled with quality sprints, until I supposedly peak at some cardiomuscular apex that will allow me to lay waste to the swimmers on the coast, none of whom have I yet seen up close and personal.

To stay with me, each of my guys starts from a dive, which adds a little twist to my workout one out of four times when Simon hits the water hard enough to surf me into the next lane. When this is all over, I may try an open-water swim. I say one out of four times because Chris Coughlin works out on the other side of me, swimming as hard as he can, then waiting for me to lap him before coming after me again. He really does have some potential down the road, and Simet is keeping him in shape to see if he can get on an age-group team as soon as the state meet is over.

The music from the boom box is so loud Simet has to cup his hands and holler directly into my ear to correct the tiniest imperfections in my stroke, but it adds to the overall ambience and is not to be squelched. Somewhere near the end of the season, Jackie Craig became captivated by the music of John Philip Sousa, so now “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer” is sandwiched between “Stars and Stripes Forever” and “Semper Fidelis.” Jackie didn’t say a word; simply handed Simet the Sousa CDs when Simet called for new music as he did at the beginning of each week.

For the past two weeks we’ve been getting a lot of telephone hang-ups at home, which I assume is Rich Marshall slamming down the receiver every time he calls and Alicia doesn’t answer. She does answer the phone as regularly as anyone else in the house, so sooner or later he’ll get her.

“Gotta happen sometime,” Dad told her. “Might as well see if you have the power to refuse him while you have some support.” Mom thinks we should try to catch him and add a few extra weekends in the slammer for breaking the no-contact order, but Dad says we should simulate real life as much as possible, and there will be a time in the very near future when Alicia has to figure out whether or not she’s going to be able to put the kids’ best interests ahead of her own. Heidi is doing much better, which means she’s meaner than a Doberman to her younger brothers, who have enjoyed Rich Marshall’s umbrella protection plan from the day of their birth. A new pecking order is being established, and nothing in me wants to stop it.

The hangups prompt my mother to order Caller ID, and between that and Last-Call Callback we discover most of the calls are coming from the pay phone at the 7-Eleven about eight blocks away. One of Rich’s logging truck drivers must have quit, so Rich is driving until he can hire another, and the convenience store is directly on his route.

Rich is also making his presence felt in more subtle ways. One day there is a Marshall Logging plastic travel coffee cup on the sidewalk across the street from the house. Another day a double-bitted ax is stuck in a tree in our backyard, a blue hard hat left in the vacant lot behind our place. We know it’s him but have no proof. There are several hundred of the coffee cups strewn around town, remnants of a campaign ploy Rich used last year in a failed run for a city council position.

“He’s watching us,” Alicia says just after Dad pulls the ax from the tree trunk. “He’s letting me know he’s around.”

Dad puts the ax in the garage, then stands in front of Alicia, placing his hands on her shoulders. “Tell me you haven’t been communicating with him, Alicia.”

“I haven’t. Honest, Mr. Jones. Not once. Since I’ve been here, not once.”

“I’m going to trust that,” he says. “What do you think he’ll do?”

She looks away, a flash of desperation passing over her face. “Something bad,” she says. “Rich obeys the rules up to a point, then he doesn’t care. When he thinks somebody is taking something that’s his…See, he doesn’t really care about the kids. I’ve always known that. It’s when he thinks he’s losing me.” She nods toward me. “He thinks I’m…you know, because of Willis…When it gets bad, I don’t know what would stop him.”

Dad’s face goes hard. “I’ll stop him.”

I’d put my money on Dad.

Late that night the phone rings, followed by an extra loud hang-up. Ten minutes later it rings again. Ten minutes later, again. All from 7-Eleven. Dad tells Alicia to answer it, then he and I hop in my car for a quick run to the store, where we discover Rich’s pickup idling next to a row of three pay phones. We pull up on the far side of the building so we can watch him catty-cornered through the store windows. His pickup door opens, and he takes the few wobbly steps to the phone. It’s obvious he doesn’t know this state has an open-container law.

Like a cat, Dad is out of the car and at the door of the phone booth, his knee wedged against it to keep Rich trapped. He whacks the glass hard with his hand, and Rich turns with a start. “What the fuck?”

“Nobody’s home,” Dad yells through the door.

“Who the-Get the hell away from the door.”

Dad opens it partway, blocking Rich from coming out. “Marshall, I’m standing here talking with you at midnight at a phone number that I can match up with my Caller ID, which means you’ve broken a no-contact order. It’s hard to tell if you’re dumber than you are mean, or the other way around, but I’m going to give you the benefit of the doubt and go with dumb. Which means if no one at my house hears from you for thirty days at least, I won’t report this.”

“Get the fuck away from me,” Rich says. “Lemme outta here.”

“Soon as you repeat back to me what I said,” Dad says.

“GET THE FUCK AWAY FROM THE DOOR!” Rich screams, but Dad forces it closed.

“Repeat it,” Dad says.

“Man, if you don’t want your ass kicked-”

“I do want my ass kicked, Marshall. And I want you to be the one to try. Now, you’re drunk and you’re screwing up big time, and if I were you, I’d cut my losses and go home.” Dad backs away from the door.

Rich comes out, looks like he’s going after Dad, but he gets a better look and, even in his altered state, reconsiders, which to my way of thinking is a very smart move for a guy drunk on his ass.

Dad says, “Rich, I’m doing my best to be decent to you, but if you keep stalking, I could get pretty uncivil.”

“Foster parent can’t do that,” Rich says. “You got rules.”

“Yeah,” Dad says. “I’m telling you, when it comes to protecting folks, I make my own rules.”

“You got a lot of guts, messin’ with a guy’s family.”

“And I wouldn’t forget that,” Dad says. “I’ve got a lot of guts.”

Rich turns for his pickup. “For a baby killer,” he says. “A lot of guts for a baby killer.”

Dad shows no reaction.

“Better keep your hands off my wife, Sambo,” Rich says as he brushes past me. “You and your daddy better watch your backs.” He’s in his truck and gone.

“You gonna call the cops?” I ask on the way back.

“We’ve got the evidence,” Dad says. “I’ll wait and see what happens with the calls and the artifacts. When a guy gets past a certain point, legal action just pisses him off. We don’t want Rich thinking he has nothing to lose. That’s the worst place for a stalker. If he thinks he can win something by staying away, maybe he will.”

I repeat Rich’s parting words.

“And we will watch our backs, won’t we, son?”

I agree that we’ll watch our backs.

Under normal circumstances Simet and I would take a school car or his Humvee to State, but he wants the team in on this and so arranges to borrow his uncle’s Winnebago, a vehicle so wide it’s illegal in three states. Luckily one of them isn’t Washington.

Because I’m the only one swimming, and because our struggle with the Athletic Council has become public, the students lined up to see us off this time look like those being sent home for writing a threatening essay. No cheerleaders, no marching band, and-surprise!-no one from Wolverines Too, which was out en force when the football team boarded the bus for State.

The ride over is great. Icko manages the beast as if it is a super school bus, with Simet in the copilot’s seat and the rest of us lounging in captain’s chairs and sprawled out on the beds. Mott wants to get one of those transparent maps you put on your back window, skip the meet, and see how many states we can color in before anyone discovers we’ve told the school to kiss our ass.

“Better get a map of the world,” Simon says. “It’s a question of them caring.”

Mott smiles from his sprawled-out position on the bed. “Better make it a map of the solar system.” Which launches Dan Hole into some discourse on astrophysics, until Icko informs him he doesn’t consider the season over yet, and Dan could “build up a real set of pecs talking about that stuff.”

The meet is held at the University of Washington pool, a pretty impressive place if you’ve been swimming in backwater towns of eastern Washington and northern Idaho. The water is just as wet and the pool just as long, but there are seats for as many people as usually see a basketball game in Cutter. Teams from all over the state, male and female, dot the deck and fill the practice lanes, and hordes of fans yell encouragement from the bleachers.

My races are spread over two days. The hundred on the first, and the fifty and two hundred on the second. It’s intimidating even though my times are fastest in the state for the hundred and the fifty. The other contenders are surrounded by teammates, all in flashy warm-ups with state-of-the-art workout bags, as opposed to my gray sweats and canvas bag.

The team officials won’t let my guys onto the deck because they’re not participating, so they stake out a spot low enough in the bleachers where I can hear them cheer, while Simet and I throw our stuff in a corner next to the starting blocks.

I swim the hundred tonight, the fifty and two hundred tomorrow. The instant I hit the water for warm-ups, I know the sprints belong to me. Simet and my Far Side swimming team have brought me to exactly the point I need to be: that place where my strength and stamina and timing meet at a perfect vortex. I will get off the blocks like a shot, and I won’t miss a turn. And nobody can take me in between. There are few times in your life when you know, but for me this is one of them. I swim some easy laps, some middle speed, a few pickups, and come out of the water confident.

Tay-Roy calls me over to the bleachers before my prelim to the hundred, leans over the rail. “You know, if you win just two events, Cutter will place ahead of a whole bunch of teams. You could put us in the top ten by yourself.”

I do already know that. Simet has told me so many times there’s no way I could forget. A good showing exonerates him from skipping out on the wrestling job.

“And if you won three-”

“I won’t be winning the two hundred, Tay,” I tell him. “I’ll be lucky to place in the top six.”

“Even that,” he says.

Mott appears beside him. “Remember, this ain’t just for you,” he says. “If you’re up in the team standings, we’re up in the team standings. Don’t want to put too much pressure on you…” He laughs.

I blow my prelim field away, earning the fast lane for the finals. I’m nearly a full tenth of a second faster than the second-place time, and I do feel strong. I wish there were more drama, but I win the final by the same margin.

Before we head back to the Winnebago, Simet calls in my time to the TV stations in Spokane, so Cutter will get the news. He has fulfilled his promise, picked up valuable points for the all-sport title. Another first would put us close to the top, and then even a fourth place could put us ahead going into spring sports. With the kind of track team we should have, we might wrap it up.

There isn’t much more drama for the fifty than the hundred. I’m a couple of tenths off the state record after my prelim, and tie it in the final. Two firsts put us in eighth place in overall meet standings. The next relay knocks us out of the top ten because number nine and ten both have strong teams, so our ability to place in the top ten rests on whether or not I can hit my best two hundred.

I qualify fourth, first in my heat. Something is happening here that I recognize from times when it seemed like the universe was lining up athletically for me. My first hundred is within a half second of my best hundred time ever, and I finish easy, saving myself for the final. The two hundred has always been my toughest race, because when I’m supposed to turn it up on laps six and seven I either don’t turn it up far enough, or too far and then can’t bring it home. But I’m in a zone, feeling stronger with each lap. If I can hold this till the final, I could surprise some folks.

We go back to the parking lot between the prelims and the finals to hang out and let a little pressure off. Simet uses his cell phone to leave Benson and Morgan messages, telling them I have exceeded his wildest dreams; that a good finish in the two hundred is a real possibility, and maybe they should start cleaning out a place in the trophy case for the all-sport trophy. “Nothing wrong with greasing the skids,” he tells us as he snaps the phone shut. “Be nice until we don’t need them anymore.”

We get the call back from Benson within five minutes. Simet answers, listens, hands me the phone. “He was out shoveling the walk,” Simet says.

I say, “Hey, Coach, what’s up?”

“I hear you’re knockin’ ’em dead over there. We’re all real proud of you.”

I say thanks.

“Just the two hundred left?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Can you win it?”

“Maybe if a kid named Ray Roscoe drowns in warm-ups. He’s got Olympic trial times in the two and four hundred.”

“Where’s he from?”

“Wilson High. In Tacoma.”

Benson is quiet a moment. Then, “They’re no threat. Anyone there from Seattle Heights?”

“Two guys. Pretty good swimmers. I qualified a tenth of a second ahead of one and about a second behind the other.”

“That’s a problem.”

“I was just swimming to qualify,” I tell him. “I’m closer than that.”

“They took us in a couple wrestling matches we should have won at their state meet yesterday. I’ve made the calculations, and I believe if you take them both, we’ll go into spring in first place.”

“Make you a deal.”

He laughs. “Shoot.”

“I beat both Seattle Heights swimmers, you vote for our letter requirements.”

Silence. “I’ll see what I can do.”

“What you can do is raise your hand when the yes vote is called.” I glance at Simet, who’s shaking his head as if in warning.

Benson says, “T. J., you’re not threatening to throw the two hundred, are you?”

“Did I ever tell you who my favorite baseball player of all time is?”

He doesn’t answer.

“Shoeless Joe Jackson.”

“Let me speak with your coach.”

I hand the cell phone to Simet. Mott gives me thumbs up.

Chris Coughlin says, “They gots a baseball player with no shoes?”

“Shoeless Joe,” I say. “Sometimes he didn’t wear shoes.”

“And sometimes,” Dan Hole says, “he compromised his love of the game for his own personal, which is to say financial, gain.”

“Yes, he did,” I say.

Icko glances at Dan as if to say, “The season isn’t over yet, my pearly-mouthed friend,” and Dan smiles.

Simet listens into the cell phone, glances at me, then at the rest of the team. “Coach, that’ll never hold up. You waited until we were gone.” Pause. “Maybe that’s true, but there was no hurry.” He listens another moment, then says, “I’ll think about it, Coach, but I can’t promise.” Then, “Okay, I won’t promise.”

He waits, holds the phone away from his ear, grimacing at Benson’s tirade.

“Coach, that may or may not be a good coaching technique, but it doesn’t work with peers, okay?” Pause. “Well, maybe not in your eyes, but technically I am your peer. Listen, why don’t you let us take care of business here and you have your weekend. There have to be some good games on.” Pause. “Yeah, sure, we’ll keep you informed.”

He flips the phone shut, gazes into our faces. “Coach Benson told me not to tell you this until after the meet; I said I’d think about it.” He puts a finger to his temple and glances toward the heavens. “There. I’ve thought about it. They held an Athletic Council meeting Friday.”

“Lemme guess,” Tay-Roy says. “They voted on our letter requirements.”

Simet’s eyebrows arch. “That’s cowardly,” he says. “I was gone, and Janet Lindstrom voted with Benson and Roundtree.” He slams his fist into his hands. “I could have talked them into it. Damn it! Don’t worry, guys, this isn’t over.”

I am pissed. This is exactly the reason I’ve never turned out for anything; they always have to have it their way. They seem to listen, but in the end they make the rules and to hell with the people who have to follow them. They have no respect for what we did, no respect for what we created out of thin air.

We’re deflated. We are eight laps from the end of our season and have met every goal we set.

“This isn’t over, guys,” Coach says again. “They can’t set the letter requirements, they only have right of refusal. I’ll get us what I can.”

That doesn’t wipe the look of dejection off most of my teammates’ faces. Mott isn’t dejected at all. He’s pissed. I’m with him.

“I don’t know whether this helps,” Simet says, “but there’s one thing they can never take from us, and that’s this time. As a young man I coached swimmers on their way to the Olympic trials. I’ve coached championship teams at all levels, but I have never coached a team with the guts this team has. When I’m looking back on my coaching career, this is the team I’ll be proudest of.”

He means it-we know it, feel it-and it still feels like hell. For everyone here but me, and possibly Tay-Roy, this is the way it always is. Do your best and get the crumbs.

I grab my tank suit, and we start for the door, when the sounds of sobbing turn us around. Jackie Craig sits in the captain’s chair behind the driver’s seat, his body convulsing.

Chris Coughlin watches him with anxiety you can almost feel. Icko walks over and puts a hand on Jackie’s forearm. Mott says, “Hey, man, them fuckin’ jackets are ugly anyway.”

Jackie gasps for air, convulses again, shaking his head.

“Naw, really,” Mott says, “they are.”

“It’s not the jackets,” Jackie says, doubling his word count for the season. “It’s…”

We wait while he works to catch his breath.

“It’s…I don’t know what I’m going to do when this is over. I never belonged to…anything. I was never on a team, never chosen for…” He stops, breathes again. “When I got on this team, I couldn’t believe it. I kept wondering when you guys were going to find me out and make me leave. The reason I haven’t said anything all year was so you wouldn’t notice me. I didn’t want to bump anything, you know? It’s like when there’s a mean dog, you just stand there and hope he doesn’t see.” He closes his eyes and shakes his head from side to side. “What happens when this is over? God, what am I gonna do?”

Icko grips Jackie’s shoulder. “You’re gonna do whatever you have to do to keep this alive,” he says. “We ain’t a mean dog. Right now, you’re gonna get up and help T. J. swim this race. Then we’re gonna order some hella pizza, as you guys say, an’ have us a goddamn victory party.”

“Hell,” Mott says, “none of us could swim worth a shit. We’ll find somethin’ else we can’t do worth a shit an’ turn out for that in the spring. Wanna coach a rugby team, sir? Then, hell, come summer, maybe we’ll turn out for Little League.”

Because I qualified fourth in the two hundred, I don’t have an inside lane, but I kept myself out of fifth and sixth spots, so I’ll still be close enough to see the leaders.

Warm-up feels good, my stroke powerful. This is it. I’m planning the race as I swim, accelerating into my turns and coming out of them as if on a sling.

Ray Roscoe warms up two lanes over, and we’re gliding through the water stroke for stroke. For a brief second I wonder-if everything goes just right, could I take him?

The guys line up low on the bleachers, waving their towels in support. Apart from Tay-Roy, they look wounded, once again handed second-class citizenship. I hate Benson; I hate Barbour. Those assholes set us up-man, they have to have it all-and all of a sudden I have new resolve for this race.

The starter calls us to the blocks-“Swimmers, take your marks.” The starting gun pops and I am stretched out over the water, surging with the adrenaline my fury creates.