12. Return to Deck
Return to Deck
Maren walks into the school, her backpack slung over one shoulder, wearing shorts, her favorite Adidas slides, and a well-worn Everton Otters Age Group T-shirt.
She reaches into her pocket and pulls out her key ring.
One day, she really needs to figure out what half of these keys open.
When she took the job as assistant coach for the age-group program two years ago, Coach Hensley tossed her the ring and said, “You’ll figure it out, kid. ”
He wasn’t wrong. There was a lot of trial and error that first year, but now she has marked the ones she uses with Sharpies: black for main doors, green for the locker rooms, and pink for the equipment room beside the white board.
Summer swim season is her favorite. The team is smaller and more focused.
These kids don’t just try swimming on for a season; they live for it.
Best of all, they don’t have to share the pool with the high school team.
From three to seven every afternoon, this place belongs to her.
Technically, Coach Hensley still holds the title, but he has been phoning it in since announcing his retirement at the end of last season.
Maren doesn’t mind. The work feels natural now, even comforting.
She walks out of the office and flips on the overhead lights.
The pool does not glow the way it used to when she swam here.
The sunlight that once turned the water gold now filters weakly through the UV covers the school installed a few years back.
The air is cooler, but she misses the old light.
The way it caught the spray midair like glitter hanging in motion.
Crossing the deck, she pulls out the pace clocks so both ends of the pool can see them.
Friday practices always follow the same plan: warm-ups, then tight interval drills first, then free time once everyone is worn out.
Coach Hensley taught her early that if you tire them out before giving them freedom, the chaos is easier to manage.
The locker room doors start to slam, and laughter bounces around the walls. Maren leans against the railing in front of the bleachers, clipboard in hand, reviewing her notes one last time.
Then she hears the door open, the heavy squeak of the hinges, and a soft rush of air from the hallway. She doesn’t look up. Parents wander in and out all the time. Some stay and watch. Her mom always did it when she was young.
The bleachers creak—slow, steady steps climbing upward.
The door opens again, and a burst of cool air rolls through, carrying something faint but unmistakable. The scent of cucumber melon.
Maren’s memory stutters. It couldn’t be.
Her watch buzzes, saving her from the thought. She blows three short bursts on her whistle and turns toward the locker room doors just as the kids burst out, dripping with laughter and energy. She calls out the warm-up sets, hands out kickboards, and a familiar routine fills the air.
The door opens again. The scent returns sharper now. Maren glances toward the bleachers.
Of course it’s her.
Reese Callahan sits near the top row, elbows on her knees, watching the pool. Watching her.
Maren looks down at her clipboard. If she doesn’t make eye contact, then she won’t have to think about it, at least not right now. The paper feels soft from use under her fingers, edges curling slightly from humidity.
When she looks up, one of her new swimmers is struggling with backstroke turns. The girl clips the wall and winces. Maren walks to the edge, the wet tile squeaks beneath her slides, and crouches beside the lane.
“Hey, Sam, did I just see you bump your head when you came in?”
Sam looks up, drops of water running down her goggles, and rubs the top of her cap. She nods slowly.
Maren reaches out, palm gentle, pressing through the slick latex to check for a bump. Nothing. Relief spreads through her chest like a warm wave. The smell of chlorine slings to her skin, sharp and clean.
“Do you want to work on this, Sam?”
The little girl nods again, lips quivering with determination.
“All right, when you’re swimming backstroke, what’s your stroke count?” The girl looks up at Maren blankly. “How many strokes does it take you to get from the flags to the wall?”
Sam shrugs, voice small. “I don’t know, Coach Maren.”
“Well, we’ll fix that right now.” Maren smiles, voice bright with encouragement. “Go out halfway and start your backstroke in. When you pass under the flags, start counting. I’ll be here at the gutter, and when you’re close, I’ll yell ‘wall’, so you know when to stretch.”
Sam pushes away, feet slapping against the wall, ripples breaking across the surface. She glides to the halfway mark, turns, and begins her stroke in. The rhythmic splash of her hands and the slap of the water fill the space between whistles.
As she crosses under the flags, Maren calls out, “One, two, three, four, five, six – WALL!”
Sam stretches, fingertips grazing the gutter, the sound of her touch echoing softly off the tile. She pops up, water dripping from her cap. “Coach! Coach! I didn’t hit my head!”
“No, sweetie, you didn’t. And now you know that when you hit six strokes, you either stretch for the wall or flip for your turn. Let’s do it again to make sure.”
Sam kicks back out, her feet flicking trails of foam. The splash from the pool faintly smells of sunscreen and chemicals. As she passes under the flags, Maren counts again, louder over the hum of the filters. “One, two, three, four, five, six – WALL!”
The girl touches perfectly this time and bursts into a grin.
“Okay, Sam, I think we’ve got it. This time I’m not going to count out loud. Just come in and hit your finish.”
Sam nods, pushes off again, and swims out to the middle.
She looks back once, nervous but steady, then rolls onto her back.
Her strokes are smooth, water sliding off her shoulders in silver sheets.
She slips under the flags, lips moving as she counts.
At six, she stretches, fingertips finding the wall clean.
Maren drops to one knee beside the gutter and raises her hand. “I think we got it, kid. What do you think?”
Sam’s wet hand slaps hers, sending droplets across Maren’s face and shirt. The shock of the cold makes her laugh. She grabs a deck towel from the bleachers and wipes her face. Thankful that it is a clean one and not already damp and musty-smelling.
“What do we say about the last five yards, Sam?”
“It’s where the race is won, Coach Maren!” The girl sings, voice echoing through the humid air.
Maren smiles, heart light and full. When she looks up, her eyes catch Reese’s. Reese has moved down a step on the bleachers. Afternoon light filters through the tinted windows, bruising across her face. She’s leaning forward, elbows on her knees, gaze locked on the pool.
Maren turns away, picks up a stray kickboard, and tosses it toward the equipment room. The splash echoes like punctuation. She can’t get pulled into this, not now.
Her watch buzzes against her wrist. Almost time for free time.
Maren keeps herself busy on deck for a few more minutes as the last of the kids finish their final set. She calls out reminders about the meet next Tuesday and the invitational sign-ups for next weekend. When she finishes, she steps back and brings the whistle to her lips.
The sharp blast cuts through the air, so clean it makes the hair on her arms stand up. From the soles of her feet to the crown of her head, she fills her lungs and yells, “FREE TIME!”
The word echoes across the pool. The kids shout it back, voices tumbling over one another in an avalanche of noise.
Some of the older ones start planning a game of sharks and minnows.
A few of the younger kids practice handstands against the lane lines, and one of them just floats on her back, eyes closed, carried by the noise and the current.
Maren takes a slow breath in. One, two, three, four. She holds it for two counts, then exhales through her nose. She can’t help but notice the air tastes like chlorine and summer heat, and she can feel the whistle hanging heavily against her chest.
It’s now or never, she thinks to herself.
She starts across the deck. Each step lands louder than the one before, slides slapping against the wet tile. The laughter and splashing have now faded into the background for her. The closer she gets to the bleachers, the thicker the air feels, like walking into another time.
Maren sets her clipboard on the bench, her keys resting on top, and sits beside Reese. The cold metal of the bleachers seeps into her legs, a rush of chill that cuts straight through the warmth of the air.
Reese reaches over and picks up the keys sitting between them. The metal clinks softly in her hands. “You still color-code everything?” She asks.
Maren glances over, a faint smirk tugging at her mouth. “Didn’t realize you remembered.”
“Well, that one’s hard to forget. You color-coded my refrigerator when you visited, remember?” Reese laughs, quiet and genuine.
Maren lets herself laugh too, just once. It sounds strange in her own ears, like it came from someone she used to be.
The pool is alive with noise. A few of the older boys are seeing who can stay under the water the longest. One of them is counting loudly while the one who is being timed goes underwater.
But every time he goes under, his friends go under too and make faces at him, trying to make him laugh.
Shrieks of joy and splashes bounce off the tiled walls.
The silence between Maren and Reese is different. Not comfortable, not uncomfortable. Just suspended, like the space between sets when the water is still.
Reese breaks it first. “So, how are things?”
Maren’s eyes stay on the pool. “Busy. Coach Hensley’s finally retiring, so that high school position opened up. I’ve got an interview next week that I still need to schedule.”
Reese smiles. “You’ll be good at it.”
Maren shrugs, her throat tight. “We’ll see.”
A splash lands near the first row of the bleachers, mist catching on her legs. She wipes her hands on her shorts, more to steady herself than to dry them.
For a moment, neither of them move. Maren becomes hyper aware of everything around them, the feel of the bleachers underneath them, the sound of someone smacking a kickboard against the water, the smell of sunscreen hanging in the air.
Maren is unsure where to go from here. Does she lie and say everything is great?
Does she tell the truth and share that she is feeling totally lost with Coach Hensley leaving?
She hasn’t decided yet. When she hears the unmistakable call of her name, glancing around the pool, she sees a group of swimmers who are chanting her name. The chorus of voices hits her like sunlight, bright and saving herself from this conversation.
“Catch up later?” She says as she is already heading down the bleachers.
Reese nods, still smiling, and that small knowing look is enough to make Maren’s chest ache in a way she doesn’t have a name for.
She takes off down the deck, kicking off her slides, pulling her shirt over her head as she moves.
The fabric sticks to her skin before she can peel it free, revealing the swimsuit she’s worn under her clothes all along.
Her shorts come off next, tossed onto the bench, and then she is running straight for the water.
The dive slices clean through the surface, a rush of cold and silence swallowing her whole. For one long second, there is nothing but her muffled heartbeat and the hum of the filters. The cool shock slides over her shoulders and down her spine until it burns away everything heavy.
When she breaks the surface, the kids cheer. She joins them, splashing and laughing until her sides ache. She ducks beneath the lane lines and reappears on the other side of the group, the echoes of their laughter chasing her across the lanes.
Everything fades to the background. She forgets about the interviews, the distance, the smell of cucumber and melon still lingering in the air. Her only thoughts are to enjoy the Free Time herself.
On the bleachers, Reese watches with an expression that is somewhere between awe and nostalgia. Maren feels it even without looking, that shared pulse of memory neither of them has a name for.
When practice ends and the kids begin to climb out, Maren stays in the water a little longer.
The room settles into the soft buzz of the lights and dripping water.
She tilts her head back, floating eyes on the ceiling where the covered skylights dull the last of the afternoon sun.
It is quieter now, just the gentle lap of the water against the gutter.
She tips her head back and thinks. No matter where she goes next, this will always be the place that taught her how to stay afloat.