I Live In My Scuba Gear Chapter One “You won gold in the back stroke, breast stroke, freestyle and the butterfly,” Belinda Lyle asked, “but you didn’t compete in the four by one hundred relay. Why not? That could’ve given you a fifth gold.” “Just because.” Scott Wagner answered offhandedly. He was more interested in toweling off after a recreational session that had included all of his four swimming disciplines. “Some of your teammates have expressed displeasure at your refusal swim with them.” Belinda trailed along as he walked towards the showers. “They feel that with your speed in anchor, they would’ve placed first instead of sixth.” “They should’ve just swum faster.” The Olympic star went into the locker room. “May we talk afterwards?” Her request bounced off his back unanswered and she watched him disappear into the men’s change room. The last thing she saw was the sentence ‘I live in my scuba gear’, tattooed across his shoulders. “I should’ve mentioned that his time in the four by one hundred distance I just saw might’ve been gold if he had performed the relay alone.” She muttered aloud after consulting her stopwatch. The reporter strolled around to the pool lobby entrance to the men’s change room door. She jotted down the three sentences the sport star has uttered and then she looked at them. “I can’t use these in a story.” She flipped to a fresh page in her notebook and jotted down his tattooed sentence. ‘I live in my scuba gear.’ Her eyes lost focus on the page as she mentally reviewed the reasons that brought her here. Scott Wagner was a swimming sensation. He had suddenly appeared at an Olympic qualifying swim meet and had vastly outstripped his competition to win a berth. At the world games, he had left all the other swimmers in his wake on the way to gold in each event he had entered. Sports reporters from around the globe clambered to speak with him but he shrugged them all off. “Getting him to talk with me would give my reporting career the boost that I need.” She crossed her knees and adjusted the material of her knee length plaid skirt. That with a white shirt and her auburn hair arranged in pigtails gave her the appearance of a schoolgirl doing a homework assignment. Other female sports journalists had tried almost every variety of looks to try to entice an interview with this elusive star. “You’re still here?” Scott emerged suddenly and saw her touching up her makeup. “Of course I am.” Belinda tucked away her compact. “I want to speak with you.” “For the record no doubt. But now is not a very good time because I’m hungry.” “I’ll buy you dinner,” she blurted, “and we can chat informally.” The Olympic swimming sensation stopped and scrutinized her. He wasn’t drawn to her teen costume but it did lend an air of desperation, as if she would do anything. “Can you keep your notebook in your bag while we eat?” “Certainly!” Belinda almost swallowed her bubblegum. She would just make sure that she could find a sly moment to switch on her digital voice recorder. —X—O—X— “This is nice.” Belinda glanced around the upscale restaurant set on a seaside quay. Internally she cringed at a thought of how much the bill would amount to. So far she had not gotten anything from him. In the taxi, he had been quiet as a Greek statue—as well as his classic physique being as sexually appealing as one too.” “I like the sea.” His gaze was on the sun setting into the aquatic horizon. The yellow orb was already half submerged and with the golden reflection pointing directly at them, it looked like a comet from the earth streaking back into space. “I wish I could be underwater at the exact place where the sun is splashing down.” “That would be rather warm for my tastes.” Her cheeks reddened as if flash burnt by the reflected ray because it suddenly seemed to Belinda that her perspective was off center. Normally the spear of sunlight on the water should’ve aimed directly at her eyes but this one was slightly off and it was pointing towards the Olympic star. “I suppose so.” Scott smiled for the first time since their meeting. “You like scuba diving?” She found his smile enigmatic and yearned to find out what was behind his standoffish nature. “Your life in scuba gear tattoo was a clue.” “Scuba gives me the gills that I can’t find otherwise.” “Then your tattoo means—.” Belinda had to break off her sentence because a waiter had hustled over with menus. She silently growled at the man’s efficiency at such an inopportune moment when she seemed to have found a juicy topic to explore. “What would you like to drink?” The waiter asked. “Just water for me.” Scott said. “I’ll take a glass of red wine.” Belinda had briefly considered having only the same as him but since she had a tough job ahead in cracking his nut, she felt that a small bracer was needed. “Actually,” Scott handed his liquor menu back to the waiter, “red wine sounds good.” “Let’s make it a shared carafe then.” Belinda smirked. A little social lubricant might oil up his tongue. She regretted not ordering tequila shooters instead. “You only feel your life is complete when you’re in the water?” She tried to bring the talk back to the interrupted topic. “So you’re living in your scuba gear.” “I guess so.” Scott’s words were noncommittal and a slightly perplexed face showed that his thoughts had traveled away from the sunset discussion. “When did you first aspire to be a competitive swimmer?” She tried another tack. “Well,” he paused while taking a tiny sip of wine, “I never aspired to that.” “As a child,” Belinda took a gulp of her drink, “did you spend much time swimming?” “Actually,” he seemed to be thinking of a good response, “yes.” ‘Damn you to Hell!’ Belinda internally cursed him and was tempted to up and slap him as well. Wagner was cruelly teasing her with his hesitations, only to squash her attempts with nonexpanded answers. “Did your father coach you?” “No.” Belinda took another big swallow of wine and then topped her glass back up. With her spending ten words to elicit only one from him, this wasn’t turning out to be much of an interview. After a few more questions that gained only an affirmative or a negative, she stopped trying. She sat in silence, trying to think of a way to breach his walls and finished her second glass of wine while waiting for the main course. “Excuse me,” the waiter had returned unexpectedly empty handed, “but some of the kitchen staff were wondering if they could get your autograph.” “Send them out.” Scott offered and the waiter scurried off. “I’ll use the washroom while you’re busy.” The young woman rose from her seat. “Please comb out your pigtails so it looks like I’m dining with an adult. I don’t want the scandal rags saying that I’m going out with underage girls.” —X—O—X— Belinda Lyle found her way to the ladies room through moisture welling up in her liquid brown eyes. When there, she examined her face and watched a big tear trace a black mascara trail down her left cheek. “Why did I think I could pry open his mental oyster shell when nobody else could?” She asked her reflection but it didn’t reply. She didn’t see her image as the raving beauty that some of the other girl reporters were but she felt she had a pleasant look. She took a tissue and daubed at the dark smear on her frecklestrewn cheek. Belinda then pulled out the elastic bands from her hair and combed her midback length hair. ‘I look frumpy now.’ She thought. Without the pigtails, her schoolgirl look had lost its charm and her one shirttail was untucked. “This misadventure has just cost me money that I don’t have.” She recalled the taxi fare being larger than she expected and the bill for the meal would be another pricey hit with nothing to show for it. She could imagine her successful accountant brother saying ‘it can be written off as a legitimate business expense.’ “Against what?” She retorted to the fleeting thought. “I need a work related income to deduct it from.” Belinda wanted to fix her face but realized that she had left her handbag at the table. She made do by cleaning the mascara smear and sponging up the tear’s remains. The aspiring columnist modified her clothing’s impression from ‘schoolgirl’ to ‘tart’ by tying her shirttails to display her midriff and tugging the skirt down to ride low on her hips. She practiced her bravest smile before leaving the mirror and returning to the disappointing ordeal. —X—O—X— The people surrounding him looked at her oddly: then they skittered away. “I’m not sure if that’s better,” Scott smiled again when commenting on her adjusted look, “or worse for my reputation.” “Are you planning,” Belinda didn’t know him well enough to accurately read his face, so she equated his expression to smugness, “to repeat your amazing performance at the next Olympics?” Internally, she vowed to somehow shove that condescending look right back down his throat: Belinda Lyle would do whatever it took to wrest what she wanted from him. “No.” “Why are you so reticent with the media?” She had noted that the dishwashers and cooks had been beaming, indicating that the swimming star had been genial. “Because I only tell the truth, and that’s not what the sports writers want to hear. It’s also not what they seem to believe their insipid readers are interested in either.” “And you haven’t memorized your handbook of ‘win one for the Gipper’ platitudes.” The verbal exchange had happened so unexpectedly that Belinda didn’t realize that this was actually something she could use, until it was finished. But then, she was stuck for a way to prolong the full sentence conversation. “Nor will I.” Scott effectively terminated the verbal thread. The meal arrived and the talk was confined to bland remarks on the food’s flavor and requests to ‘pass the salt’. Belinda finished several more glasses of wine. She finished the whole beaker by herself because the swimmer hadn’t touched his glass after that one first sip. “If you’re not going to drink that,” the girl reporter indicated his glass with a glance, “may I have it?” This nearly valueless meal was costing her plenty and she resolved to at least get a glow from it. She was already feeling somewhat tipsy. Scott Wagner wiped the corners of his mouth while she drank his wine. Then he set his napkin on his plate and watched her savor the final drops. “Will we,” he set his both elbows on the table and leaned towards her, “have sex?” “Why—?” Stunned by the query, Belinda couldn’t quickly compose an appropriately indignant reply, so the lonely word was left hanging as a blunt question. “Because that will be the price of the insightful interview you’re so anxious for.” Belinda Lyle’s head spun with the effects of the alcohol and from a conflicting swirl of her thoughts and emotions. The swimmer’s expressionless eyes were those of Satan as he waited for her to sign away her immortal soul. The inner demon of her ambition and the angel of her conscience scratched, bit and eye gouged one another. The internal fight’s nonimpartial referee seemed to be her body—that suddenly gave a favorable gush of hormones in response to her admiration of his physique. Then in the midst of her turmoil, the host presented the check on a silver platter and she fumbled out her credit card. “Yes.” After a very long pause the girl scrawled her blood ink onto Lucifer’s contract. The sales slip arrived and she signed it without noticing the amount. Scott took her by the elbow and guided her wordlessly outside to catch a cab. —X—O—X— “Have you propositioned any of the other female media?” Belinda whispered when they were nestled together in the taxi’s back seat. “You already know the answer to that one.” He intoned. “And from here forward, all I expect to hear from you are intelligent and purposeful questions.” “Agreed.” Belinda thought for a spell. ‘Yes, it would’ve quickly become public news if this were his normal pickup routine.’ “I do have a question that other journalists have continually asked without receiving a satisfactory reply from you. Why didn’t you compete in the fourbyone hundred relay event?” “I’m not a team player.” Scott spoke softly with his lips next to her ear, to keep the driver from overhearing. The warm breath of his words fluttered her shimmering hair slightly and he felt her quiver from the pleasurable vibrations on the nape her neck. “Water polo is a team sport and that’s why I don’t play it, even though I swim well enough to excel at that game.” “You were accepted onto a nation’s Olympic team,” she stretched the word out, “and that gave you an obligation that you didn’t meet.” “I won a berth on an Olympic squad on the basis of my having swum qualifying heats faster than anyone else the nation could field and I then proved my merit by taking first place in every event that I entered. Had I considered swimming a team sport, I wouldn’t have tried out, for the same reason that I don’t go out for water polo.” “What’s wrong with team sports?” The taxi driver asked over his shoulder. “If one enjoys playing in or watching a team sport, then nothing is wrong with them. But I prefer individual sports where my own performance is all I need to rely on. The relay event bastardizes the solo pursuit of competitive swimming to create a mockery of a team endeavor. The end product is a farce that returns false results.” “Four swimmers each race one quarter of the total distance and the combined time is measured against the other teams.” She said. “How could that be a false result?” “Your mind’s speculation suggested to you that the a relay is not entirely valid but instead of listening to your own reasoned evaluation, you allow a politically correct view to take prominence in your altered opinion. So you are defending an untruth that your inner psyche knows is complete and utter bullshit.” “Competitive mindreading isn’t an Olympic event yet.” Belinda scoffed. “So forget about trying to win gold in it.” “For no other reason than my own enjoyment, I individually swam the equivalent of a 4X100 relay in the pool today.” Scott reminded. “When I finished that, I displayed no signs of having employed my maximum exertion. To all casual observers, I was just engaging in a recreational swim. But you weren’t just that passive witness.” “Your aurareading nonsense is the only bullshit here and it’s fast getting old.” “The absurd suggestion of my employing paranormal means to hit so closely to the true mark was your suggestion, not mine. Like our chauffeur, I’m not deaf. Through the open change room door, I heard you musing whether my time was sufficiently fast to have won Olympic gold by competing as a oneswimmer team. And you were correct. I have done the same distance as the four by 100 relay all by myself—and closely challenged the Olympic winning times.” “You hear me say that but you’ve obviously misinterpreted my reason for saying so. You erased the previous records in each of your four events by a wide margin but to do the relay alone, you’d need to swim four tenths of a kilometer in the four strokes at Olympic pace PLUS make up the time that three of those swimmers save in their power starts. I didn’t actually think you could do it: I was just searching for a pickupline to get an interview with you.” “And in that event, you’ve won your gold.” Belinda Lyle sucked on her lips to keep from responding. She felt far worse than a whore. Prostitution wasn’t an Olympic event because a bed shouldn’t be a spectator venue. But each publically read column she now produced would be a result of her having taken his shaft in barter for his words, and people could view it as so too. “Okay.” Scott noted her tight mouth and smiled. “Whether you believe I could do it is moot. News editors aren’t going to purchase an article outlining a reporter’s view. What I suppose to be true comprises the marketable story, regardless of whether my belief is intrinsically sound or not.” “I do concur with that assessment.” “Then let’s finish this line of discussion for a Pulitzer caliber capstone on Belinda Lyle’s first piece on the previously evasive, but recently acquired, Scott Wagner.” “Let’s do.” Belinda made a deliberate show of taking out her notepad and pencil. “While Scott Wagner has an unshakable faith in his ability to competitively swim the 4X100 relay all by himself,” he spoke as if reading her prose, “then he can staunchly assert that three lesser teammates would’ve only served to slow down his finish. He can further envision how his excellent individual performance would be harnessed to elevate inferior swimmers to gold medal stature they were incapable of attaining on their own personal merits. To support his position, Scott Wagner has delivered a statement. ‘My wouldbe teammates may carp about how they might’ve taken first if I had joined them but without me, they only placed sixth. In baseball, a pitcher is not able to throw a ball, and then run down and catch it too. He needs a teammate and even if the catcher is not as talented as the pitcher, together they are a battery. A relay in any athletic discipline is not a team event. It is just a number of athletes lumped unnaturally together, who really should be prevailing or failing according to their own personal abilities – and drive.’ Period, and end of story.” “The decision on where to place the punctuation is mine alone.” “Granted.” “And do you realize how conceited that article makes you sound?” In the confines of her mind, Belinda became conscious of a demarcation line she had just stepped over. It was too late for her to change her mind. She had just accepted his first payment in currency they had agreed was cash and her body now owed him sexual gratification. “So be it.” Scott shrugged. “In any adventure requiring a choice between looking good or being loyal to my perception of truth, I will always opt for the latter.” “Then in our team,” Belinda found herself saying, “my part is pitching the questions and your job is to bat back the answers, with as much spin and relish as you care to put on them. I’ll either field them and play them back to you, or allow them to float from the ballpark—at my discretion.”
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