P AC-12 SWIMMING AND DIVING ARE SEPARATE EVENTS, ONE after the other. Lukas and I are out of town at nonoverlapping intervals: while he’s flying back from Seattle, I’m waiting for one of the assistant coaches to drive me to the airport, trying to decide what polish to pack in case I get time to do my nails.
However.
“I think the guys’ plane just landed,” Pen announces while we’re waiting at SFO, sitting up in a burst of excitement. “The gate’s five minutes from here—shall we go say hi?”
“Yes!” Bella says, followed by Bree’s blasé, “Sure.”
In a plot twist rom-com writers can only aspire to achieve, Bree and Dale broke up over a yet-to-be-revealed conflict, while Bella and Devin are still dating. Once again: so many questions, and absolutely zero way of asking them in a tactful way.
Pen’s eyes meet mine in one of the many I guess we cannot speculate about this now, but boy, will we be discussing later looks that we exchange on a daily basis. “Let’s go.”
“Should we bring our bag?” Bree asks.
“Good question.” Pen turns to me. “Do you mind keeping an eye out?”
I shake my head, pretending it doesn’t make my stomach feel like it’s full of metamorphic rocks. When the girls return, I don’t ask who they met, or how it went.
It feels a little like the first meet of my career.
Weird, when I’ve recently returned from a world championship, but my mindset has evolved more in the last few weeks than in the previous three years. New, more intentional choices. No perfect-or-nothing mentality. My brain, finally able to go quiet.
When I started out the academic year, my dream was to qualify for the NCAA tournament. I’ll have done good if I manage, I told myself. And poorly if I don’t.
I’m not sure I still believe that. In fact, I’m certain that I don’t need to qualify for anything to consider this year a success. “The real NCAA qualification spot was the mental health we gained along the way.”
“What did you say, Vandy?”
“Oh, nothing.” I finish warming up my quads and smile at Pen. “Ready?”
We place first in the ten-meter synchro event.
“This is the best day of my fucking life,” Pen whispers after we step on the podium. It’s not hard to hear her, even over the applause. She cries. I cry. We take a million selfies. Tear up some more. Sandwich Coach Sima in a giant hug. Celebrate with the twins, who got bronze on the three-meter synchro. FaceTime Victoria and tell her that it’s all due to her training. Have ice cream. Pass a shop that says TEMPORARY HENNA TATTOOS and . . .
“No,” I say.
“We have to.”
“No.”
“Yes, Vandy.”
“No.”
“It’s a sign. It’s destiny. God and our ancestors and Emily Dickinson want this from us.”
“We can’t.”
“Not only we can, we must.”
We settle for two divers entering the water side by side, and the words DIVING BESTIES underneath, on my right and Pen’s left shoulder. The employee, a teenage boy who’d rather be playing Fortnite, looks at us like we’re the least cool people he’s ever encountered. He’s not wrong.
It’s not until later that night, when we’re brushing our teeth next to each other, that I notice something weird.
“Pen?”
“Yeah?”
“How do you spell bestie?”
“B-E-S-T . . . Oh, shit.”
The following day, Pen wins the platform gold, and I take the bronze. We do all our pool deck interviews together, our new DIVING BEASTIES tattoos on full display. I am so happy, I need to take a minute alone in the bathroom to relearn how to breathe and iron my cheeks out of this unsustainable, too-wide smile.
The following week, at the Zone E meet, we both qualify for the NCAA.