Infinite Blue Read online

  She smiled again. “No, it wouldn’t have.”

  They kissed. Clayton sensed the coiled tension within

  Ash and pressed against her. He loved that she still got nervous before a race she couldn’t lose.

  “I’ve got something for you,” he said, pulling away

  and digging in his pocket. After a few seconds he extracted a small box.

  She arched an eyebrow. “Um, aren’t you supposed to

  get down on one knee?”

  “Not right before a race.”

  14

  I N F I N I T E B L U E

  She laughed, her fingers fumbling as she flipped the

  lid open. The ring was a plain silver band etched with a Celtic design. She ran a finger over its surface.

  “It’s beautiful. What’s the little figure?”

  “It’s a water lover. From Scottish mythology.”

  “Water lover?”

  “Yeah. They’re nocturnal creatures who live under-

  water and are completely translucent. The story goes

  that water lovers are usually mistaken for ghosts, so

  people are afraid of them. But it’s actually the water

  lovers who are more scared of humans. The thing they

  fear most is being caught and exposed to the sunlight

  and air. When that happens a water lover instantly

  melts. She falls through your fingers and forms a puddle on the floor.”

  “Since when do you know anything about Scottish

  mythology?”

  “Since the shop assistant told me.”

  Ash took the ring from the box and slipped it over

  her right ring finger. It was much too large, and she

  wiggled it.

  “Oh crap,” said Clayton. “I’m sorry.”

  She laughed and transferred it to her thumb. “I love

  it. I’m going to wear it for this race.”

  “Isn’t that a no-no?”

  15

  D A R R E N G R O T H & S I M O N G R O T H

  “I don’t care.” She turned her hand over, admiring

  the glint of the ring off the soft light of the chapel’s electric candles. “Don’t let me fall through your fingers, hey?”

  Clayton kissed her hand. “I won’t.”

  “I love you, Clay.”

  “I love you too, Ash.”

  They held each other again. In the nearby stand, the

  holy water shimmered in its shallow marble bowl.

  16

  Two

  Clayton sat in the stands alone.

  But not by himself. The stadium brimmed with faces

  all too familiar, characters all too easy to parody. Fathers wearing monogrammed polo shirts and thumbing

  stopwatches. Painted mothers with peroxide hair. Little

  brothers and sisters waving signs and pom-poms and

  ice-cream sandwiches that leaked over their hands.

  Among them Clayton was a foreigner. A dark smudge on

  their fluorescent sports logos. That was how he liked it.

  He enjoyed the atmosphere and the crowd, but he didn’t

  cheer. And the people who banged on the seats—they

  were hilarious.

  Tablet and stylus in hand, he drew the chaos around

  him, distilling it into pixels, panels, speech bubbles. He’d finished an outline for a new character—a dancing cock-roach with a pom-pom on the end of each antenna—when

  17

  D A R R E N G R O T H & S I M O N G R O T H

  he felt the weight of being watched. He looked up. The

  woman in the next seat was giving him the once-over.

  His mind’s eye immediately caricatured her.

  Look at the smoker’s upper lip, a wrinkled duck bill.

  Too much mascara makes her eyes sink back into her

  skull.

  Let’s call her Shaz.

  The disdain in the woman’s gaze was barely masked.

  He twirled his stylus and offered a wry smile. Shaz

  nodded. She began to chew, though there didn’t seem

  to be anything in her mouth.

  “Morning,” said Clayton.

  “You takin’ splits there, love?”

  “I’m sorry?”

  “You takin’ splits? I’d like to see ’em at the end if

  you are.”

  Splits were lap times, or maybe lap ratings, some-

  thing like that. Without Ash in his life, he might have

  suggested the woman take her strange fetish next door to the gymnastics arena.

  “No, I’m drawing.”

  “Oh, are you, like, an event artist? You know, pictures

  of the pool and the kids!” The woman clapped her hands.

  “I’d love a picture of my Sally. She’s competing in the

  race coming up—the eight-hundred. Got a chance

  at a medal, she has. Not gold. No. Bronze, I reckon.

  18

  I N F I N I T E B L U E

  Maybe silver if she does a major pb. Yeah, we could

  get on the dais for sure. The eight-hundred—it’s Sal’s

  best one.”

  Ash’s best too, thought Clayton. She’d won the

  two-hundred and four-hundred events by wide margins,

  but the eight-hundred-meter was her pet. “She’s the

  prototypical specimen for the eight,” Coach Dwyer liked

  to say. “I only wish they had longer distances for the girls.”

  Clayton couldn’t speak to the truth of the “prototypical specimen” claim, but he knew Ash was something special.

  Long bones bound by carved muscles and leather tendons.

  Hands like ceiling-fan blades. And, of course, those shoulders, wide as a tank. Anatomically she was built to scythe the water like so many of her competitors. What set

  Ash apart, though, was her grace. She was an artist, at

  one with her medium. Sometimes, Clayton swore, you

  couldn’t tell where she stopped and the water started.

  Vanishing act aside, it didn’t prevent the pain Ash

  endured. The eight hurts like hell, she confided to Clayton once. The best way to do it is flat out. Right from the starter’s pistol, you sprint. She said it without the slightest hint of dread. In fact, her tone was not far short of

  bring it on. Clayton suspected it was because she could disappear for eight-plus minutes.

  “The eight-hundred?” a second voice chimed in from

  the seats behind. “You’ve seen Ash Drummond, right?”

  19

  D A R R E N G R O T H & S I M O N G R O T H

  Clayton took stock of the eavesdropper—another

  pair of lash-blast eyes atop a long nose that hooked at the end. Kaz. He searched for a smirk, an arched eyebrow, anything to indicate that this person knew exactly who

  Clayton was and why he was there. Nothing. Just open

  inquiry and mascara. He glanced down at his screen,

  wondering if maybe he had accidentally shown one of

  his “Ash sketches,” the absent-minded doodles he made

  on the side between his proper cartoons. The tablet

  was asleep.

  Shaz recrossed her legs and gave a small shake of her

  head. “That girl is something, I tell ya. The next big thing.

  Got Olympic gold in her future and everything that goes

  along with it.”

  “Yeah, I reckon,” said Kaz, nodding thoughtfully.

  “Don’t get me wrong, I love my Sal. Love her and

  her sisters with all my heart. She makes me so proud

  every time she races. Great little swimmer, she is.

  And the national team…it’s not impossible. One day,

  maybe. But, as good as she is, Sal is never going to give Ash Drummond a run for her money. No. That girl is

  untouchable.”
r />   A wave of noise broke over the grandstand. The

  contest below was nearing its finish. Two boys—one

  in a blue cap, the other in a white cap—had separ-

  ated from the field and were flailing for the final touch.

  20

  I N F I N I T E B L U E

  The water bulged with the strain of their lithe frames,

  their desperation for a fingernail’s advantage in the dying meters. The lunge came, and they sprang out of the wash

  that followed them to the wall. The crowd commotion

  dipped for a second, breath held for the result. The electronic scoreboard showed nothing, delaying, teasing.

  Then, with a click of some unseen magician’s fingers,

  the result flashed up. A pocket of supporters in the

  eastern stand jumped out of their seats and shouted.

  The white-cap boy raised and waggled a single finger in

  a cocky “number one” gesture. The blue-cap kid slumped

  over the lane rope. Tiny waves enveloped him and lapped

  gently against his crimson cheeks.

  “I’ve seen the ones who can’t cope with success,”

  said Kaz. She spoke louder to be heard over her own

  raucous applause. “It’s always the same. They get a bit

  of the spotlight, and they can’t handle it. Sponsorship

  deals come along. The media comes calling. They start

  thinking they’re a bit too special. Fame is a lot more

  fun than following a black line for hours on end. They

  go to parties, get in the social scene. And not once do

  they look behind them. They don’t see what it did for

  the previous ‘star.’ They think they can be different.”

  Kaz adjusted her charm bracelet and nodded. “That

  Ash Drummond though? Yeah, something is different about that kid.”

  21

  D A R R E N G R O T H & S I M O N G R O T H

  “She certainly comes across as a lovely young girl.”

  Shaz put her hands in her lap and turned back over

  her shoulder. “Really seems to have her head screwed

  on. Of course, you can never really know what goes on

  behind the scenes, right?”

  Clayton stifled a laugh and pressed the power button

  on his tablet. He stared at the rough sketch on screen, the dozen lines that would soon find form. An offer to draw

  the Shaz’s Sal was out of the question, but he wanted to offer her some small gift of goodwill.

  “I hope your daughter has a good swim today,” he

  said. “Maybe she’ll get the silver.”

  Shaz smiled and pulled her shoulders back. “Oh,

  thank you, darl! Thanks very much!”

  Contestants for the eight-hundred were filing out

  of the marshaling area. None of them—not even Ash

  Drummond—recognized the shimmering breath of

  Fate accompanying their entrance. For everyone present,

  this was just another event on the program.

  22

  Three

  Ash sat in the plastic chair behind lane four, head crammed inside a maroon latex cap, body squeezed into black Lycra.

  The blood in her temples thumped along with the music

  blaring from the bud in her left ear. Her feet bounced

  and danced. Somewhere amid the pounding drums and

  soaring guitars a grounded thought pushed through.

  Feel the water, Ash.

  It was the one thought that underscored Coach

  Dwyer’s final instructions (“Don’t go out too hard…Clean turns…Stay in the middle of your lane…Don’t let anyone surf off you…”) and her mother’s self-help sound bites (“You are the best…You cannot be denied…You were made for this journey…This is your moment to own…”).

  She turned off the music, removed the bud from

  her ear. She leaned forward in her chair and scrunched

  her eyes, trusting the sparks and blooms and fountains

  23

  D A R R E N G R O T H & S I M O N G R O T H

  of white behind her eyelids to center her. They didn’t.

  The sound of a wolf whistle— wanker—in the crowd

  jolted her focus. The smell of fries and ketchup ended

  it completely. She opened her eyes and cricked her neck, side to side. Her feet continued to hop and bop.

  A contrasting sight sat at Ash’s right elbow. The

  competitor in lane five was in her zone, and it wasn’t a friendly place. Her body was hunched, her face severe

  and frozen. The fluorescent-orange goggles belied a

  dangerous gaze. Her jaw was locked in a clench, the

  muscles in her cheeks like knuckles. She was a simmering cauldron. A building tsunami. Ash leaned over and

  tapped the side of her chair.

  “Hey, Tiff, what sits at the bottom of the sea and

  shakes?” She waited, allowing the silence between them

  to hang. “A nervous wreck.” She tapped the chair a second time. “Have a good one.”

  “Piss off,” replied Tiff, lifting her chin.

  Ash laughed. “You’re always so wound up, Tiffany!

  Chill.” She considered recommending a psychologist,

  then thought better of it. “You got to enjoy it out here.

  Lose yourself in the water.”

  “I’ll enjoy it,” said Tiff, “when I lose you in the water.”

  Ash nodded—fair enough—and leaned back.

  Tiff Beeksma had been chasing her for three years and

  had never got within shouting distance. But was that a

  24

  I N F I N I T E B L U E

  guarantee of dominance today? The question was barely

  complete before Blythe’s voice crashed her thoughts:

  There are no Cinderellas in this world.

  Ash noted her rival’s new look—a neck-to-ankle

  swimsuit that resembled sharkskin and claimed to bite

  big chunks out of personal bests. Tiff ’s glass slipper

  perhaps? Hopefully not. The last thing she wanted was

  Coach sitting her down, running a hand across his comb-

  over and insisting Ash also wear a glorified garbage bag.

  The thought of it made her skin prickle.

  The pa trumpeted her name. She followed the response

  protocol Blythe had designed for these moments—

  stand up, nod, wave to all sections. Confident but not

  cocky. Assured but not arrogant. She sat back down and

  looked over to the front section of the eastern stand

  where her parents were positioned. Blythe lifted a fist

  and mouthed the words winning time. Her father, Len, settled his full-body nervous tic long enough to bring his hands together in prayer. Ash turned her attention to the western stand and after a few seconds spotted Clayton

  hunched over his screen.

  “Aw, come on, Clay,” she said. “You could at least

  pretend.”

  She smirked and touched the new ring on her thumb.

  Clayton wasn’t into pdas and shunned the waving and

  the screaming and the—God forbid—blowing kisses that

  25

  D A R R E N G R O T H & S I M O N G R O T H

  the showboating boyfriends specialized in. She liked to

  give him a hard time about it— How about a big smooch, huh? —but in truth she appreciated it. Blythe called him ComiCon, without affection. What Blythe and others

  failed to see—what Ash saw and marveled at—was that

  although he seemed oblivious, Clayton could recount,

  often with alarming clarity, Ash’s every stroke. He understood her swims in a way that no one else did. He felt it—

  the luminous water, the burning
pain, the worry about

  every imperfect kick and the correction that inevitably

  followed. He was there in the lane with her. And though

  she would never say it out loud, the last thing she wanted to do was disappoint him.

  Her heart boomed, and she felt the shudders of his.

  Together, they could have been mistaken for the contin-

  ental shrugs of the seafloor.

  Ash walked to the pool edge, knelt down and scooped

  the water. She splashed her shoulders and chest. Thighs

  and calves. The spaces between her toes. She brought

  her goggles down to the bridge of her nose and slapped

  the sides of her swim cap with the butts of her hands.

  Responding to the marshal’s requests, she mounted the

  block. The starter commanded the field to “take your

  mark” and Ash obliged. Her feet assumed the position:

  the left gripped the block’s front edge like a bear’s claw, the right remained planted toward the back of the platform.

  26

  I N F I N I T E B L U E

  She pulled back and crouched, chin on her chest, body

  locked and loaded. Her skin was sprayed with goose

  bumps. The buzzy peal of the starter’s signal rang

  out, and Ash catapulted into the air. The split second

  between weightlessness and the water’s first slap always triggered a succession of unbidden images. On this day,

  Ash saw three.

  1. Herself at ten years old, standing in front of the

  ancient Leverton pool, gold medal for the fifty free

  around her neck.

  2. Clayton walking her through his creative process,

  his hands gliding over the screen as he turned pixels

  into characters and stories.

  3. Herself in the break off Cora Heads, bodysurfing

  with a pod of dolphins.

  Then she was in the water’s embrace. Timeless instinct

  and modern muscle memory took over. Her body became

  a seamless tide as exertion transformed into beauty.

  The girl who would come to be known as Wake began

  easing away from her rivals.

  One thought pulsed in her mind:

  I’m home.

  27

  Four

  Clayton sat in the stands and drew.

  Usually, when the starter siren blared, he would

  snap his eyes up from the screen and zero in on Ash’s

  lane, leaning forward, hands nervously occupied. On

  this day, for reasons he couldn’t fathom, Clayton did not look up. Instead he opened a fresh canvas and ran the