4. The Team Trip
The Team Trip
They pile out of the school vans in a tangle of towels, swim bags, and laughter that feels a little too loud for the hush of early spring.
The shore of Lake Michigan is a wide gray plate, the water bending light, so it looks like a sheet of steel one minute and a thousand silver scales the next.
The air is cool but kind enough. It carries the smell of wet stone, crushed grass, sunscreen that no one will remember to reapply, and a faint bite of fish that makes Maren’s nose twitch.
Coach Hensley claps twice. The sound skitters over the pebbles.
“Gear in the pavilion. Towels and bags on the picnic tables. You know the drill. No one in the water until you are signed off with your swim partner.” He studies the clouds like he can read the rules inside of them.
“Weather is our friend for now. But we never know how long that will last.” They were lucky they would be able to even get near the water today; it was one of the first nice days of the season.
The water is definitely going to feel like ice, though.
Maren stands with her duffel at her feet as she traces the shoreline with her head.
Darker patches show deeper water. A set of orange buoys bob in a gentle line that marks the swim area.
The farthest buoy has floated a little outside of the main ring, a fat cylinder shape that tilts and rights itself in the waves.
Her fingers itch. She wants to get in, to feel the cold sheath around her and pull the world into manageable lengths.
Reese whistles, low and soft, like the lake might answer her.
She wears a threadbare camp hoodie, sleeves shoved up to her elbows, and the hood strings knotted into a tidy bow.
Her sandy brown hair is in a messy bun that looks like it should topple right off her head.
She drags a long stride across the sand, her footprints leaving dark ovals behind her.
“This lake is moodier than I am,” she says, not to anyone in particular.
Then she looks at Maren and grins. “Hey, Mini-Coach.”
The words land like a fingertip poking a bruise, but at least it is better than ‘Co-Captain.’ Reese had been calling her that all week.
Captain was a name that felt clean in Maren’s mouth.
Then Coach added the Co part to it. Before she could even get used to that, the turn happened.
The turn where she nailed her ankle on the gutter.
She has not been back in the water since that morning, and today will be pushing it if she is honest with herself.
But she cannot stand watching the water move without her any longer.
She has been trying to pretend that all this change does not make her skin crawl, and she has been failing miserably.
“Not a coach,” Maren says, inching down for the clipboard in her bag. “Not yet.”
Reese leans in as if the air near Maren is warmer. “You look very coach-like with that roster clipboard. Which, for the record, should count as weight training.” Reaching out, Reese taps the clipboard in the bag gently.
“Pretty sure my wrists are strong enough.” It comes out flatter than she wants. She tries to smile. It feels like stretching a tight band. “Are you going to keep that hoodie on all day?”
“Absolutely not. I would like to survive this day, no more drag than the required swimsuit.” Reese tilts her face toward the lake. The wind lifts baby hairs along her hairline and shows the soft freckles there. “That cold water is going to hurt like an insult today.”
“I like insults,” Maren says.
“Good, because I have a few prepared.” Reese bumps her shoulder. “Kidding.” Her mouth tilts. “Mostly.”
They move toward the pavilion with the others.
The structure is wooden and smells like charcoal from a thousand past cookouts.
Someone already stashed a pile of split logs by the fire ring.
The younger swimmers clatter around like loose marbles, chasing each other with the single-minded energy of people who do not fear the way Maren does.
She checks the checklist tacked to a post. Buddy assignments, the workout, reminders to not go anywhere without their buddy.
Coach Hensley starts to call names off the buddy list. The wind fingers the pages and flips two at once. Maren fixes them back into order.
Her hands know this kind of work. Straighten. Stack. Line up. She moves to line up the snacks and water bottles. The motion calms the static in her head.
Reese returns from the van with a mesh bag of fins slung over her shoulder. The green plastic flashes like fish in a net. “I rescued these so they would not wander off. Fins are notoriously independent, I’ve heard.”
“You are very noble,” Maren says. She slides a bottle over to even the spacing. “Put them with the towels. It will reduce chaos.”
“Spoken like a person who has never met our team.” Reese sets the fins down and watches Maren work. “You, okay?”
The question hangs between them. Not the casual kind.
Not the fake kind. Maren’s brain stutters.
The air is damp and cool and tastes like iron.
She could nod. She could redirect. She could talk about the schedule or the s’mores Coach plans for later.
The word okay sits in her throat like a pill she is not ready to swallow.
“I will be,” she says instead.
Reese nods, quick and sincere, like she understands the space between will and be. “Same,” she says softly. “Same.”
Coach claps loudly again and gestures them into a semicircle on the sand.
“Dynamic stretch. Ankles up to the hips, then shoulders. No heroes. If you are hurt, you tell me before the lake tells you.” His eyes flick back to Maren’s ankle in a knowing glance.
He does not call her out, just holds the look for a beat.
She rolls her ankle slowly, tests the tug, and nods.
The sun winks from behind a line of clouds, and everything brightens.
“Buddy up. Ten-minute jog around the parking lot, then we hit the water. We are not going out farther than the buoy line until I say.” He raises his voice as two freshmen test the water with their toes and shriek. “That means you, Jules and Nicole. Save your drama for the drama club.”
They sign in on the sheet. Reese writes both of their names and adds a tiny flourish to the R, like a ripple curling back on itself.
They shrug out of warm layers. The wind skims goose bumps up Maren’s arms. The lake is not shy.
It calls in a low voice, a steady hush that pulls at something steady inside her.
They start their jog around the lot, starting at the bathhouse and working toward the large dune and back around.
The jog lasts for about two minutes before they are just walking silently next to each other.
Gravel crunches, breaths settle, shoulders drop.
As they finish their second lap, the whistle is sharp in the wind.
Maren looks over at Reese. “Race you to the water.” She takes off before Reese can respond, tearing down the beach as she pulls her hair into a ponytail with the rubber band she always keeps on her wrist. Reese thinks about protesting about reminding Maren that she is hurt, but she knows that it is a losing battle.
This girl needs water. Reese shakes her head and chases her.
Maren is silently standing at the water’s edge when Reese comes up next to her.
She does not notice that Reese has arrived.
For a moment, it is just her and the waves rolling up and tickling her toes.
The stones on the shore here are always smooth and almost polite, ready to lure you into thinking that the lake cannot hurt you.
Maren steps in. The cold slices up her feet and ankles and wraps her like a careful bandage.
It hurts in a way that wakes her up. Her lungs expand.
Her shoulders loosen. She is here. She is held.
Reese hisses through her teeth. “This is payback for everything wrong I have done.”
“You might be here for a while then,” Maren says.
“Ouch. Cruel. True.” Reese shuffles forward. The lake takes her calves and then her knees. “Okay, okay, it’s not that bad.”
Maren knows the spots where the ground drops. She knows the rhythm of missing stones underfoot. She tells Reese where to step. Reese listens, which surprises Maren because Reese has the look of a person who would ignore instructions on principle. They wade out until the water folds at their hips.
“Acclimated,” Reese says. Goose bumps like sand grain constellations across her skin. “Let us do something extremely unwise.”
“No,” Maren says, but the word is not heavy.
Reese points her chin toward the far orange buoy, the one sitting a breath outside of the main ring. “Race you to that.”
Maren looks. The buoy bobs like it has a thought and it is trying to finish it.
Beyond, the lake is a soft undulation of pewter and white.
A gull rides the air and slants away. Maren’s heart ticks faster.
She could reach it easily; she has done this 100 times before.
She would count eight strokes, sight, eight strokes, and sight.
She would run her breathing on a steady count of three.
She would keep lateral control tight and feel the pressure of the water stack along her forearm. Her body wants the logic of it all.
“You do not have to race me,” Reese says. The sentence is casual. The eyes are not. They shimmer with something that is not laughter.
“I want to,” Maren says. She wants to, like she really wants to.
Reese cracks her neck left, then right. The movement is practiced, like she is trying to shake loose a memory. “All right, rules. First touch to the buoy wins. No dunking. No sabotage. Pride is the only prize.”
“I don’t want pride,” Maren says. “I want water.”
“Then take it.” Reese grins, bright for real now. “Ready?”