Chapter 10
jude
For two days, Bishop and Hollis don’t make me regret telling them.
I wait for Hollis to forget himself and reach too fast, or for Bishop to pull me aside with questions he has no right asking yet.
Instead, Hollis waves from lane four on Wednesday when I walk onto the deck, like he isn’t sure he’s allowed to be glad I showed up.
I stare at him for too long before lifting two fingers back, and he smiles so hard he slips off the wall and comes up coughing. Bishop thumps him between the shoulders with one hand and doesn’t look at me when I hide behind the clipboard.
By Thursday, I manage to say a quiet hello first. It’s mostly aimed at the floor, but Hollis hears it from halfway across the pool.
His head snaps up, water dripping from his goggles, and Bishop’s hand lands on the back of his neck before he can climb out like greeting me requires full-body commitment.
“Hi, Jude,” Hollis throws back, his whole body leaning into Bishop’s grip.
I nod, tell Nelson to stop abusing the fins, and spend the rest of practice pretending lane four hasn’t become the easiest place on deck to look.
Friday is where I lose some part of my sanity, letting my biology take control when I don’t even know what it’s doing.
Practice runs late, Marsh is annoyed about meet schedules, and the freshmen keep putting wet towels in the dry bin.
Hollis climbs out after cooldown with his towel hanging from one hand, T-shirt sticking to his chest because he puts it on without drying first. Bishop stands beside him with one hand low on his back.
Neither of them calls me over, which is somehow the thing that gets me moving.
I set the clipboard down, cross the wet tile, and stop in front of Hollis before I can talk myself out of it.
Hollis goes still immediately. His hands open at his sides, his chest rising under the damp shirt, his eyes fixed on my face like he’s checking for permission he doesn’t know how to ask for. “Don’t be weird,” I mutter, then step into his space and press my ear to his chest.
His heartbeat jumps under my cheek, one hard thud and then another, and for a second he forgets to breathe. When the purr starts, it comes out rough, vibrating through his ribs into my face. My eyes close before I can stop them.
Bishop’s fingers touch my hair, light enough that I can ignore it.
He strokes once, then waits. When I stay there, his hand returns, while Hollis' purr rolls harder under my cheek.
“There you are,” Bishop murmurs. I keep my ear over Hollis' heart and let them pretend I’m only staying because moving would make it awkward.
The locker room door swings open before I can figure out how long I’m allowed to have this. Nelson steps out with a towel around his neck, sees me tucked against Hollis, and grins. “Damn, Morrison. Can’t wait to see you back in the water if this is the new pre-practice ritual.”
Hollis' purr cuts out under my face. Bishop’s fingers stop in my hair. Nelson’s grin disappears the second Bishop looks at him, and he mutters something about forgetting his water bottle before vanishing back through the door.
The silence he leaves behind feels worse than the comment. I lift my head from Hollis’ chest and step back slowly, watching them both.
“What did he mean?” I ask. “Back in the water?”
Bishop lets out a heavy sigh. “After you told us what happened, we petitioned for your athletic status to be evaluated. Apparently, that’s all Marsh needed, a few students to go to the board alongside your otherwise perfect history of attendance, meets, and wins.
The approval came through this morning.”
“You applied to put me back on the team without asking me?” My voice comes out sharp enough that Hollis flinches, but he keeps his hands at his sides.
Bishop shakes his head, trying to make himself smaller. “Jude, we didn’t put you anywhere. The option has just been opened, but it’s completely your choice. Fuck, this was supposed to stay private until we were able to speak with you.”
Hollis looks like he might be sick. “We didn’t want to trap you,” he says, quieter than I expect. “Bishop said you might tell us no. He said we still had to make sure the door existed.”
I look away from him because that’s harder to be mad at. Marsh is in his office with the blinds half-open, head bent over paperwork like he hasn’t been listening to every word. I wonder if this is what he’s been doing for the last two days while I thought everyone was being normal around me.
I never even fought for my status on the team. I just took the punishment. The only reason I’m still here is because of Coach Marsh and my secret love for the one thing that was stolen from me.
“The conditions are ugly,” Bishop says. “Monitored practice. Blocker verification. Review before the competition. Athletics still wrote it like your body is the risk. I’m not going to pretend they didn’t.”
My throat tightens. If he tried to make it sound generous, I’d leave. If he acted like ugly paperwork is the same as justice, I’d leave faster. Instead, the truth makes it easier to swallow. “Then why would you do it?” I ask.
“Because you love the water,” Bishop offers without a hint of hesitation.
I hate that he saw that. I hate that standing on this deck has felt like visiting something I buried without ever getting to say goodbye. Hollis makes a small sound, and presses his palm flat against his own thigh like he has to hold himself there.
“I can’t get in,” I say, looking at the water instead of either of them. “I can yell at Nelson. I can organize the equipment. I can stand on the deck and pretend it’s close enough, but I can’t get in.”
Bishop comes a little closer, only enough that I don’t have to turn my head so far to see him.
“Then we start with the part that went wrong before you ever touched the water. The blocker gets checked before you go near the pool. Seal, label, expiration, texture. You choose who handles it. You choose who touches you. If you say stop, everything stops.”
I rub my thumb over the inside of my wrist, where the blocker still sits from this morning. Most days, I only run it across my scent glands but on others, on days where there had been a meet, I had slathered it everywhere. “That sounds humiliating.”
“It is,” Bishop says, the bluntness pulling my eyes back to him. “The paperwork is. The reason for it is. But the ritual can belong to you.”
Hollis' voice comes softer this time. “I can get in first. I won’t touch you. I’ll just be there, in the next lane, so you don’t surface alone.”
I stare at him for too long. He holds it, barely. His face is open and miserable, hope fighting terror because he knows this is too important to fumble. Bishop’s hand slides up his back once, grounding him without looking away from me.
“Before dawn,” I say finally. “No team. No Nelson. No one making comments. Marsh stays in his office unless I call him.”
Bishop nods. “Before dawn.”
“And this is about the water,” I say.
Bishop’s answer is quiet. “Then it’s about the water.”
The next morning, the swim building feels colder than it should.
The halls are dim, and the locker room lights buzz overhead while Bishop sets the blocker on a clean towel by the sinks.
Hollis sits on the bench a few feet away, elbows on his knees, hoodie inside out, hair a mess.
He looks like he barely slept, and when I sit down across from Bishop, his purr starts before anyone says a word.
Some part of me wants to curl back up in his lap like I did the other night but that would defeat the purpose of staying focused.
So, I start my ritual first by checking the tube of blocker.
Seal intact. Label right. Expiration fine.
Texture right when I squeeze a little onto my finger.
My hands shake, so I check it again. Bishop waits until I hand it over, then repeats the same checks where I can see them.
He shows me the tube, caps it, uncaps it, and waits for my nod.
“You can do it,” I tell him.
Hollis’ purr deepens from the bench as Bishop moves in front of me, close enough to touch but angled so I can still see Hollis if I want to.
“Throat first?” he asks, and when I nod, he waits for me to tip my chin up before his fingers touch my skin.
I flinch at how cold the blocker is and Bishop stops immediately, hand suspended near my neck, eyes on my face.
I take one breath, then nod again, and he starts over with slow passes across my throat.
The wrists are easier. I offer them one at a time, watching Bishop’s face instead of his hands.
Behind my ears is worse. My shoulders lock before he even gets there, and Hollis shifts on the bench like the movement hurts him.
Bishop glances at him once, then back to me.
“Left side first,” he says. “Then right. Then you cap the tube.”
He does exactly what he says, no extra touching, no surprises. When he’s finished, he places the tube in my palm. I cap it myself, the click sounding too loud in the empty locker room.
Then Bishop hands me the verification form, a new start to the world of swimming.
Hollis stands only after I hand back the form, hands shoved into his hoodie pocket like that’s the only way he trusts himself.
We pass Marsh’s office on the way to the deck, the coach looking up through the glass and gives one short nod.
I walk toward lane three without meaning to and stop hard enough that my toes curl against the tile. Lane three. Of course my body finds it before my brain can stop it. For a second, the whole place tilts, and I’m back at the wall with the noise changing around me.
Hollis drops his hoodie on the bench and gets into the next lane before I can decide whether I’m leaving. He surfaces at the wall, arms folded on the gutter, water running down his face. “I’m here,” he whispers. No promise that nothing bad can happen, no plea for me to be brave.
Bishop sets the clipboard on the timing chair and moves into my line of sight. “Ladder, sit entry, dive, or we leave. All of them count.”
I let out a small laugh as Hollis’ mouth twitches, and the purr starts again, faint through the gutter and the tile.
I pull off my shirt before I can think too long, then climb onto the block.
My legs shake the second my feet settle.
The water stretches out in front of me, my chest tightening around the memory of the crowd, the hands, the empty pocket in my bag.
It takes me several deep breaths as I try to tell myself that this isn’t then... and then, I just dive.
The water closes over me, and everything goes quiet. My body remembers before fear catches up. My stroke is rusty and too tight, but it’s mine. The lane is mine. The water is mine.
I touch the wall hard and grab the gutter with both hands. Hollis is beside me, grinning so wide it should be illegal this early in the morning. “Your streamline is still better than mine,” he says. “I’m taking that personally.”
A laugh breaks out of me before I can stop it. It sounds wrecked, and I press my forehead to the tile while Bishop crouches near the wall, close enough to be there and far enough to let me breathe. I missed this. I missed the water so badly it feels like grief.