Playing the 'Son' Card (5 page)

Less than five minutes later Jack
knocked on my office door. “Can you spare a moment for your old
Uncle?” he asked in a playful voice.

I jumped up, and rushed at him.
“Uncle Jack! It’s great to see you.”

He returned the hug I gave
him.

“Ah, I’ve got a bit of a problem
here.” He was trying to act serious.

“What is it, Uncle Jack?”

He had a wide smile on his face now.
“I’m supposed to pick up this boy named Troy, but all I can find is
a man who goes by Mr. Evanson. Do you know where I can find
Troy?”

I laughed. “Oh, Uncle
Jack!”

“Well, look at you, Troy. You look
like you’ve grown six inches since I saw you last, and you’re
dressed like some businessman or something. You are most definitely
not a kid anymore.”

I liked what he said about being
more grown up, and I recalled what the man in the men’s store had
said about ‘the clothes making the man.’

“Well, I have grown a bit, but it’s
not six inches. I saw you at Christmas, and I know I haven’t grown
six inches since then.”

“Well, then, maybe not six, but you
sure look a whole lot older all of a sudden, Mr.
Evanson.”

I smiled again, and he suggested
that we get my stuff and get going. Two minutes later, I had left a
‘goodbye’ message with Melanie, and we were in his truck on the way
home.

As we drove the short distance to
their place, I expressed a little concern about the current status
of my own diving skills, and my worry that I might be out of
place.

Jack satisfied my worry by telling
me that he knew I hadn’t been diving since my Dad had died, and
that I was likely very rusty. He assuaged my worry by telling me
that Trevor and Jesse had not been at it very long at all, and were
pretty much beginners.

I felt a little better after that,
and appreciated his efforts to try and get me back at the diving in
an easy way.

Back at their house, I was given a
warm welcome by Sally, who also commented on my grown up
appearance. Trevor and Jesse did a real double take when they saw
me. The last time I’d seen them, I was not all that much taller
than Trevor, and still very much a kid myself. Now I looked like a
slightly short adult with my good clothes on, and I am sure they
were really surprised.

Still they were happy to see me, and
quite excited that I was going to go to their diving class and
participate with them.

“It’s going to be so cool to have
our big cousin with us,” Jesse said, as we all sat down to
supper.

We had to eat quickly and then get
going. The comment about being a cousin didn’t surprise me. We’d
used that term as long as I’d been calling his parents Aunt and
Uncle.

“Yeah,” agreed Trevor. “I’m really
glad you’re here and spending the long weekend with us,
Troy.”

“Well thanks, guys,” I said. “I’m
looking forward to it.”

I really was, too. My times with
this family had been the one bright light in my life since my Dad
died, and I really enjoyed the time with them.

After my father died, I had always
been a little bit jealous of them. After all, they still had a
father, and they always seemed to be happy and have a lot going for
them. They were nice looking boys, too. I always thought they were
better looking than me. I’d always been a little tall and wiry
where they seemed to have more proportional bodies.

Still, the whole family had always
been nice to me, especially after my father died and we started
visiting them much more frequently.

Troy and Jesse always seem to look
up to me, and treat me well, and that was a big change from the way
my peers treated me back home. When I was with this family, I was
someone, and I appreciated everything about that.

It wasn’t until the boys ran
upstairs to get their stuff that I remembered that I didn’t even
have a bathing suit with me, so I mentioned that to Jack with a
worried look on my face.

“Don’t worry,” he replied. “I’ll
just go upstairs and get Trevor to throw a couple of extra suits in
his pack, and I’ll have Jesse put an extra towel in
his.”

“Okay, thanks.” I was a little
worried about how Trevor’s suits might fit me, but I was quite
skinny and his measurements were not all that different than
mine.

We got to the pool about 45 minutes
before the boys’ diving lesson. Jack had just dropped us off,
telling us that he’d pick us up later.

“Why are we here so early?” I asked
Trevor, as we entered the building.

“We want you to meet our coach,”
answered Jesse in an excited voice.

“Our coach is also the pool
manager,” added Trevor. “He’s usually in his office until about ten
minutes before our class. That way you can meet him before the
class.”

Now I really felt like I was going
to be on display. I hoped that I could explain to their coach that
I had not been diving for a few years.

Their coach was a really nice man
named Jonathan. He was sitting at his desk doing some work when
Trevor knocked on his open door.

“Trevor,” he exclaimed. “Hello. And
you must be Troy.” Jonathan had risen and walked over to shake my
hand. “I’m Jonathan Fast. Welcome to our pool.”

“Thank you,” I acknowledged. “I, ah,
really appreciate your letting me attend tonight, but, uh... I have
to tell you that I’m not that good.” I wanted to say more, about
how I had not been diving since my Dad had died, but I couldn’t say
the words.

Jonathan was ahead of me on this,
though. It turned out that Trevor had already told him all of that
background. “Listen, Troy, don’t worry a bit. I gather that you
have not been diving in some time, and you are rusty.”

I nodded at those comments, quite
happy not to have to say anything.

“That’s not a problem,” he went on.
“For tonight, I want you to just start slow. Go back to the basics,
and just work your way back to where you want to be, however far
along that is. It is your comfort that’s important
here.”

I was so relieved to hear his words.
“Thank you very much, Coach,” I replied. “I really appreciate your
understanding. That really helps.”

He gave me a wide, genuine smile.
“I’m just very happy that you came tonight, Troy, and I know it
means a lot to your cousins here.”

“Yeah,” agreed Trevor.

“So, boys, you have just over half
an hour. You three may go in and use that far lane for some length
swimming before our diving class. Just make sure you don’t overdo
it. I don’t want you overtired before the diving class. Your
swimming should be just a light warm up, okay?”

I nodded as Trevor replied, “Got it,
Coach.”

“Thanks,” added Jesse as we turned
to leave the office.

The boys were quite excited as we
headed to the change room. Trevor explained that Jonathan rarely
let any of his divers swim beforehand and that it was probably my
presence that had made the difference.

In the change room, I got my clothes
off, and Trevor handed me a suit. It was, of course, the racing
style that divers wear. I pulled it on, and it did fit kind of
snug, but when I looked over at him, his was fitting him just as
tight. I looked over at Jesse, and his fit him just the
same.

The last time I’d worn a suit like
that, I’d been with my Dad. The thought almost made me lose it, but
I managed to keep calm.

I put on a brave face. “Okay,
cousins. Are we ready?”

We walked out to the pool. I was
about to face the last of the demons remaining from my father’s
death.

CHAPTER

7

Once out on the pool deck, we headed
to the spot that Coach Fast had designated. I looked to see if
there was a lifeguard around or anything, and there was one
standing at the far end of the pool. He saw me looking at him, and
smiled a greeting, indicating with a small gesture of his hand that
we should use the vacant lane that we’d seen from Jonathan’s
office.

I nodded my head in understanding,
and then turned to Trevor. We were standing at the shallow end of
the lane, and the water looked pretty inviting.

“So, you said that this is unusual
for you to be able to swim beforehand. What kind of swimming do you
two usually do?”

As Jesse looked on, Trevor gave me a
bit of a sly smile. “Well, actually, Troy, this is the first time
for us. We’ve never done this before. We’ve only ever done length
swimming in lessons.”

I took in his earnest efforts to be
truthful with me. “Okay, then,” I said. “I guess we’ll just try and
do a bit and see what happens.”

I thought about getting them to show
me what kind of swimming they could do at present, and then go from
there. They were probably as good as I was, given that they were
now aged eleven and nine, and I had pretty much stopped swimming
three years ago when I was nine.

“Okay, then, do you guys know all
your strokes?”

Trevor answered for them. “Well, we
know front and back stroke, and a bit of legs only, but we’re just
learning breast stroke.”

“Oh,” I responded. I’d known how to
do all my strokes when I was much younger than they were. “Okay,
then, here’s what we’ll do.”

I went on to explain that I’d show
them some strokes and then have them try them, and I’d help them
out a bit with corrections. I got in the water, and started off. I
did my first length of each stroke slow, and then normal speed.
Then I got out, and had them do it.

I remembered my father doing this
for me, from time to time, so I thought I’d do it with
them.

As I started out my first length, I
initially struggled to remember exactly how I should be doing it.
Three years without practicing was a long time, especially for a
kid. I was really conscious of the fact that I was demonstrating,
and so I was trying to do the stroke as perfectly as I could. It
helped that I was doing it very slowly at first.

After five minutes, we moved on to
the next stroke, and so on. I reminded them about what the Coach
had said about not getting tired, and that this was a warm up only.
I made sure that they didn’t work too hard, but that they had a
good chance to work on some of the corrections that I gave
them.

As the time went on, I got over my
initial jitters and emotional block, and kind of got into what I
was doing. I remembered that I liked swimming, and wanted to do
more.

I added some really slow fining and
sculling lengths, just to keep them moving but to keep the energy
output low. Finally, after about half an hour, I called a stop, and
we got out and went to warm up for a few minutes before going to
wait with the rest of the diving class about five minutes before
the start time.

There were five other boys and two
girls in the class with Trevor and Jesse, all pretty much about the
same size. I discovered as I talked to them before and during the
class that they ranged in age from seven to 14, but I was just a
little taller than the oldest, a boy. I could see that they were
sizing me up, and I wondered how I’d be able to perform.

It was a pretty large group, much
larger than I’d ever been part of for diving, but Jonathan handled
them all really well. He had the use of two low one-meter boards,
and a three-meter board. Apparently, the whole group was always
together for the first hour, and then the three or four best and
advanced divers stayed for an extra half hour at the
end.

When Jonathan arrived where we were
waiting for him, he introduced me as a ‘guest pupil’ and said that
I’d come along with my cousins because I used to do a lot of diving
when I was younger. He also mentioned that I was a middle school
8th grader from Spokane, and that gave me an assumed age of
thirteen and made me the second oldest in the group.

Jonathan was really good about not
putting any pressure on me. He had us all start the lesson with a
review of our basic takeoffs and approaches. Only after we’d all
done two or three of those did he move on to the basic front and
back dives. I didn’t know if he was doing this for me, or if he did
this every lesson, but I really appreciated it.

I was able to remember those
almost-lost skills, and slowly work up to the more advanced ones
that I’d been able to perform just prior to my father’s
death.

After we all did our best 3-step
approach to a front dive in the layout position and a standing back
dive also in the layout position, he allowed us to put a tuck and
then a pike in our simple dive.

After that, he allowed us to
progress to forward somersaults, which all but two of the group
could do. Then five of the group went on to do back somersaults,
and I tried it after Trevor and Jesse.

I was a little nervous as I got up
on the board after Jesse went. For the first time in over three
years, I was about to attempt a back somersault. I recalled the
Coach’s words from five minutes before. ‘Do your best back takeoff,
and then just think about your feet going over your head into the
water.’