Sink or Swim (5 page)

“Yeah,” Dave agrees. “Seventh grade is the pits.”

“Amen.” I turn off my light.

We both grow quiet. I think about how much I hope they catch the mysterious robber.

Then that horrible sound starts in again. Only this time it's closer. Much closer.

A shiver travels up my body from the tip of my flippers to the top of my pointy head. Balthazar rolls over onto his back and asks for his stomach to be scratched. “What do you think that sound is, Dave?”

“I dunno,” he answers. “Maybe a couple of bobcats fighting. Why, what do you think it is?”

“It sounds kind of like a werewolf to me.”

Dave chuckles. “You're kidding.”

“Not exactly.”

“Because there's no such thing as werewolves, okay?” Dave sits up in his bed and looks me right in the eye. “You know that, right?”

“I guess so.” I scratch Balthazar carefully on his soft round belly with one of my claws. He's almost asleep again. “You think maybe it's a banshee?”

“No, I do not think it's a banshee.” Dave seems pretty adamant. “There's no such thing as banshees, either. You know, for a genius, sometimes you're not very smart.”

“Tell me about it.”

“You've got to stop watching those scary movies. They're a bad influence on you. Seriously, Charlie. And there's no such thing as vampires. Or zombies. Or the Invisible Man. Or Mothra, for that matter.”

“Oh yeah? Well, what about Creatures? Are they imaginary, too?”

For once in his life, my brother can't think of a single thing to say. He just sighs deeply and pulls the covers over his head.

Pretty soon I can't tell who's snoring the loudest: Balthazar or Dave. And I am still awake. I stare up at the ceiling and try to keep my mind off tomorrow's swim practice. Which only makes me think about it more.

If there really was an alternate universe somewhere, I would move there immediately. Just as long as they don't have swimming teams there.

YOU CAN LEAD A CREATURE TO WATER, BUT YOU CAN'T MAKE HIM SWIM

“WHEN I BLOW
my whistle, everybody into the water!” Coach Grubman shouts. Last period just ended and swimming practice is about to start. I am doing my best off to ward off a panic attack. Wish me luck.

Coach Grubman is short and stocky and bald. A large silver whistle hangs from his neck. He looks like one of those people who goes around wrestling alligators on Animal Planet. He ought to feel right at home with me.

“One, two, three.
BRRRRRRING!!!
”

The sound echoes through the pool area, and the fifteen other members of the Stevenson Middle School swimming team leap into the deep end, laughing and screaming and waving their arms.

Not me. I say a silent prayer, hunker down by the gutter, and dip my scaly green legs slowly and carefully into the shallow end. I have hated going in the water ever since Craig Dieterly pushed my head in the sink and turned on the faucet during first-grade bathroom break. I nearly drowned.

“You there! What do you think you're doing?” Coach Grubman barks.

I was kind of hoping he wouldn't notice me. Not happening.

Coach holds a rubber band in his hands and fiddles with it as he talks. He stretches it. He winds it around his fingers. He balls it up in his fist. “What part of ‘everybody into the water' don't you understand, Drinkwater?” He snaps the rubber band like it is an exclamation point.

“Sorry, sir,” I reply. “I'm almost in. Just give me a minute here.” I teeter at the edge as I lower myself another few millimeters, wishing that Coach Grubman would stop staring at me. The acrid chlorine smell burns my eyes and makes my extremely sensitive nostrils itch. The entire team swims over and gathers around me in the shallow end to watch. The ridiculous brushed satin bathing suit my mother made billows up around my haunches like a giant green parachute.

“What are you wearing, Bigfoot?” Craig Dieterly yells. “You look like the Jolly Green Baby.”

“Yeah,” says Dirk or Dack Schlissel. “Where'd you get that stupid diaper?”

“Shut up, Schlissel,” I reply. “Haven't you ever seen a bathing suit before in your life?”

“Ooh, now it's mad,” Craig Dieterly taunts. “I'm so scared.” He splashes around and pretends to cry. Everyone thinks it's the funniest thing they have ever seen in their life. “I want my mommy!”

“Can it, Dieterly,” Coach Grubman grumbles. “And Drinkwater, you'd better get in the water this instant. I'm starting to lose my patience.”

I remain frozen with fear at the edge of the pool, trying to figure out if fear of going into the shallow end is one of those fear that keeps me safe? Or would that only be fear of going into the deep end?

Coach comes over and unceremoniously dumps me in the rest of the way. I stumble over my tail when it hits the bottom and my head nearly goes under. I inhale a snoutful of water. I cough. I splutter. I try not to panic. The clock on the blue-tiled wall says three o'clock. Only fifty minutes to go.

“Okay, girls,” Coach Grubman yells. “Everyone hold on to the edge and kick. It's warm-up time!” I quickly grab on to the side of the pool with my claws and start flapping my flippers.

I've always wondered why the most horrible thing gym teachers can think of to call you is a girl. I don't think girls are so bad. One of my best friends is a girl. My mom's a girl. Or at least she was. Marie Curie was a girl and she discovered radium.

I am just getting used to this kicking thing when Dirk and Dack Schlissel sneak up behind me and pull my bathing suit down. Craig Dieterly starts chanting, “Naked monster on the loose!” and the rest of team whistles and hoots. Grady Hollabird, the only sixth grader on the team, quietly hands me my suit back. I nod gratefully and slip it on as fast as I can.

Coach Grubman blows his whistle again. Everyone freezes as he walks over to the edge of the pool and yells at me, “You're a real troublemaker, you know that, Drinkwater? Five laps. Right now.”

“But . . . but . . .” I stammer. This is so unfair. “I didn't
do
anything.” Everybody else should be punished. Not me.

“No excuses, Drinkwater,” he hollers. “Hop to!”

I keep my head above the water as I inch farther and farther toward the deep end while moving my stumpy little arms around to give the impression that I am doing the breast stroke. Except for everyone making fun of me and feeling like the most uncoordinated idiot in the history of idiots, swimming practice isn't actually as horrible as I thought it would be. It's sort of bearably horrible.

But then Larry Wykoff, the class joker, starts in on me. “Better keep an eye on Drinkwater, Coach. He'll steal the water out of the pool if you're not careful.”

“Yeah!” Norm Swerling shouts. “He's one bad Kleptosaur.”

I concentrate on Gandhi. And passive resistance. And getting out of the pool in one piece. I continue my slow walk/swim across the pool.

“Drinkwater's cheating, Coach,” one of the Schlissel twins whines. “Don't let him get away with it.”

“He's not even putting his head under the water,” the other Schlissel adds.

Then Craig Dieterly joins in. “He's just walking around in the pool. Look at him, Coach.”

I can remain silent no longer. “Why don't you mind your own beeswax for a change, Dieterly!” I cry.

“Why don't you make me, Gumby?” Craig Dieterly splashes so much water in my face I start to choke. That old familiar suffocating feeling starts in and I have to fight an urge to flee from the pool and hide in the locker room.

“Hey, that's enough, Dieterly!” Coach Grubman shouts. “Go pick on someone your own size.”

“Are you kidding?” Craig Dieterly shouts back. “That stinky lizard's
twice
my size!”

“I am not a stinky lizard, I'm a mutant dinosaur, you idiot.”

“Can't you two bozos stop fighting for one second?” Coach Grubman sounds really annoyed.

“He started it, Coach,” Craig Dieterly complains.

“And I'm ending it.” Coach sticks out his arm and points dramatically. “Get to the other end of the pool, Dieterly. Now. There is one captain of this ship and you're talkin' to him.” Craig Dieterly reluctantly swims away. “As for you, Drinkwater, four more laps to go. I'm counting.”

“It's not fair, Coach Grubman,” I complain. “I didn't do anything. I swear.”

“I'd call stealing a boatload of Dad's salmon and thirty-two loaves of sourdough bread doing something,” Craig Dieterly says angrily. “Wouldn't you, Coach?”

“I didn't steal anything, Coach,” I protest. “In this country you are innocent until proven guilty.”

“One more peep out of either of you and I'll file a bad behavior report with Principal Muchnick so fast you won't know what hit you,” Coach Grubman threatens. “Get your head under the water. Now. Understand?”

“Yes, sir.” I stand quietly in the corner of the pool, staring down at the water.

“I don't care if we have to stay here until Christmas, Drinkwater. I am not letting anybody out of this pool until I see that pointy head of yours under the water, and that's final.”

I look up at the clock and watch the second hand inching its way around the dial. If I look really closely I can see the minute hand slowly tick off the minutes. I stare at the wall and count the number of chipped tiles and towel hooks. While the rest of the team swims laps, I try to get up the courage to get my snout one inch closer to the surface of the water. “Go ahead,” I tell myself. “You can do it. It's only H
₂
0. Seventy-three percent of the world is covered with the stuff. How bad can it be?”

It's not helping. Every time I try to lower my head it feels like a giant electromagnet is holding it in a viselike grip, and it won't budge.

Coach Grubman paces back and forth. His rubber band is moving around so fast in his hands it's practically a blur. Finally he comes over to me and kneels by the side of the pool.

“What's the matter, kid, didn't anybody ever teach you how to swim?” he whispers gruffly.

“They tried,” I reply. “It didn't work.”

“You'd think it wouldn't be all that difficult. I mean, what with you having flippers and a tail.” Coach puts on his glasses and looks me up and down. “What exactly are you, anyway?”

“I'm a mutant dinosaur, sir.” I stare at the surface of the water, hoping that somehow I will summon up the courage to put my head under it.

“Look, do me a favor.” Coach Grubman pulls at his rubber band so hard it looks like it's going to break. “I don't really feel like standing here all day waiting for you to put your damn snout under the water. Try harder, Drinkwater.”

“Absolutely. No problem. Here goes . . .” I concentrate with all my might, and tell myself about all the horrible terrible things that will happen to me if I don't listen to Coach Grubman. Then I notice his big silver Timex slip off his wrist and sink into the water like a stone.

Without thinking, I duck my head under the water, whip out my enormous tongue, and grab hold of the watch before it even touches the bottom of the pool. I am handing it back before I realize the seriousness of what I've just done. I'm lucky to be alive. I could easily have hit my head on the bottom of the pool, knocked myself unconscious, and drowned. As it is, I may have breathed water into my lungs and gotten a respiratory infection, which could lead to pneumonia and you
know
how dangerous that can be.

“You're full of surprises, aren't you, kid?” Coach Grubman looks impressed.

“Yes, sir. I hope your watch is okay.” I clear my throat and the taste of chlorine in my mouth makes me gag.

“The watch is perfectly fine.” He pats his wrist. “It's waterproof. And unbreakable. If it wasn't, I would never have dropped it in the water in the first place.” Coach gives me a wink and walks away.

It suddenly dawns on me. “You tricked me, didn't you!”

He turns back. “We coaches have to do whatever it takes to get you meatballs up and running. You call it a trick. I call it standard operating procedure.”

“Hmm. So what you're really saying is that the end justifies the means. An interesting point of view. I'm not sure I agree with you. But . . . it's a topic worth further exploration. Perhaps we could continue this discussion on dry land, if you catch my drift.”

Coach Grubman kneels down and speaks to me simply and quietly. “You talk too much, Drinkwater. Why don't you tell that mighty mouth of yours to shut up every once in a while and start trusting your darn instincts. A fish doesn't have to go to school to learn how to be a fish. It just knows. Now get out of here.” He tosses me a towel. I catch it in my claws and wipe the water from my eyes.

Coach puts his megaphone up to his mouth and shouts at the Sardines. “Everybody out of the pool!” Fifteen exhausted swimmers slowly emerge from the water, grab their towels, and shuffle to the locker room. “Remember: it's the Stevenson Sardines versus the Carbondale Catfish in only three more days. Eat right. Stay fit. See you at Thursday's practice!”

I clutch the edge of the pool with my claws and start dragging my massive torso out of the shallow end. Coach Grubman comes over, grabs me by the shoulders, and helps me to my feet. I mean flippers.

“So do you think you could just tell Principal Muchnick I'm a hopeless case and kick me off the team and save us all a lot of grief?”

“Not on your life. Something tells me there's a swimmer lurking somewhere deep inside of you, Drinkwater. I'm not done with you yet.” Coach Grubman snaps his rubber band, turns on his heels, and is gone before you can say “sometimes your day turns out to be just as awful as you thought it was going to be.”