Chapter One
This was my eleventh time being drug tested in the last year. That meant eleven times a stranger watched me pee into a cup.
The first time, I was sixteen, right before my first world champs in Barcelona. I was a shy pee-er, so I sat for what seemed like twenty minutes waiting for the minimum of ninety milliliters. Even though I was a minor and the Doping Control Officer stood on the other side of the bathroom stall, she was still there, getting paid to hear me pee. What an exciting job.
Now that I was an adult, the DCO had the pleasure of no barriers blocking her view.
By now, I was a pro. Technically, a professional swimmer and also a pro at drug tests. It came with the job, especially right before the Olympics. We all had to do it, but that didn’t make it any less awkward. Nothing would ever normalize a stranger staring intently at my groin to make sure I didn’t tamper with the pee.
I’d had to select my “vessel,” which was just a creepy yet sophisticated way of saying “pee cup,” and inspected said pee cup to make sure it was clean and no one had tampered with it. The DCO had instructed me to wash my hands with only water. Then she followed me into the bathroom and instructed me to pull my shirt halfway up my torso and my track shorts down to mid-thigh so she had a clear view. No matter how many times Officer Shelley fixed her gaze on me, I still couldn’t look her in the eye. I held the cup halfway into the toilet and stared at one of the tiles on the floor. It was chipped and kind of looked like the state of Iowa. It only took about a minute to get myself to ninety milliliters under all that pressure. Then I had to secure the lid and follow Shelley into the back room where she would process the sample.
“Thanks, Quinn,” Shelley said with a friendly smile. “Good luck at the games.”
“If I pass my test,” I joked, but it was clear that didn’t sit well with her. Her smile faded, and she blinked. I thought it was funny because besides alcohol, I’d never smoked a cigarette, done weed, or popped any pill that wasn’t an over the counter pain or allergy med. After all the drug tests at this very facility since I moved to Berkeley, Shelley should have known I was nothing but clean. “It was just a joke.”
“Mm-hmm, stick to swimming. You’re better at it. Gatorade isn’t paying you to be a comedian.” She held her firm scowl until she broke, offered me a wink, and just like that, we were cool again.
“See you in the fall,” I said and waved.
Next stop: afternoon practice at Berkeley. Team USA had just come back from the Olympic trials in Omaha. Tapering had started, which meant practices were getting shorter and easier. It was also an interesting time because swimmers were a really awkward subspecies. For example, I wore three old suits that were barely still intact—see-through and holey—and purple tights. The only time I wore tights in my life. We wore extra layers to practice during tapering to increase drag, so by the time we shed the extra weight at the Olympics, we zoomed through the water. But it was also fun wearing ripped tights and very old suits to the point where they looked like we’d run them through a shredder. We walked out of the locker room to the pool deck as if we were on the runway and praised each other for whoever won the ugliest swimsuit competition.
But the weirdest, most awkward thing we did was not shave. Now that part I hated. It was a good thing my intense schedule made it almost impossible to form relationships outside of the pool because even if I had an ounce of free time to date, the lack of shaving would do a good job repelling all the women.
“Guys, the Tinder guy just asked me out on a date,” Lillian said as we stepped through our house after practice. She showed his picture to me and Talia on her phone. He was in a tight, navy blue fireman T-shirt with baggy, sallow-colored fireman pants. Behind him was a firetruck, and I rolled my eyes at how corny the picture was. I could only offer her a shrug, then went to the fridge to enjoy my late afternoon meal while Talia took the phone to view the guy better.
This had been our lives since we’d rented the three-bedroom house a year before. Lillian and I had been teammates our freshman year at Berkeley, before she went pro at the start of our sophomore year, right after Rio. Once you went pro, you weren’t allowed to swim for your college team anymore. We befriended Talia despite the fact that she went to our rival school, Stanford. All three of us were on the national team and went to Rio together. But unlike me, who got gold in the 4x200 free relay and took fourth in the 400-meter free, Lillian and Talia medaled in their individual events.
Living with my two best friends was great. They were like my sisters. The only thing that annoyed me was that they were too straight and talked about boys too much.
“Tinder Fireman?” Talia said with her tone rising in intrigue. She studied the phone. “Damn, he is gorgeous.”
At least the guy had muscles. If my beautiful straight friends were going to date men, they had better date guys who were worthy of their sculpted Olympic bodies. But their fawning made me shiver in disgust as I ate a large spoonful of yogurt, hoping this round of straight talk wouldn’t last too long.
“I mean, we’ve been texting nonstop for three weeks now, so it’s about time,” Lillian said. “He wants to go out tonight.”
Talia grunted out of pure jealousy. There were a handful of rules during tapering. Because it was meant to preserve energy for our races, we couldn’t even walk to the grocery store a few blocks down the street. And if we couldn’t exert the bare minimum amount of energy to go shopping, sex was “strongly discouraged.” The Olympics was like our Lent, except we gave up much more—like shaving, drinking, sex, going to the grocery store, or on a simple walk, every single unhealthy food imaginable, and only eating for fuel.
“God, I’m so jealous,” Talia whined while plopping on the couch. “But good for you getting Tinder Fireman to finally ask you out.”
Lillian let out an evil laugh. “Yeah, right as I feel jealous that you two are going to Tokyo and I’m not, I’m reminded that I can drink and have sex.”
Lillian would have had to sacrifice those too if she hadn’t torn her ACL a year and a half ago while hiking in Yosemite. She fell five feet on an extreme trail and ruined her pursuit of the Tokyo Games. She was a breaststroker for the medley relay in Rio, American record holder in the 100 and 200-meter, and Olympic gold and silver medalist respectively. Breaststroke heavily relied on legs and knees, which meant that once her injury was confirmed, Tokyo was ruled out. She was depressed for a year while Talia and I had to reluctantly go to practice and she had to go her separate way to physical therapy. But in the last few months, when training and meal plans became stricter, a smirk found its way to her lips again while we envied her freedom.
“Okay, it’s official,” Lillian said after typing on her phone. “I have a date tonight.”
Talia banged her head against the couch. “Gah. I want to have a date tonight. Not even a date. Just a rendezvous.”
“Oh, shut it,” Lillian said. “You’re about to go to a buffet in a week. I don’t even want to hear it.”
“Ask him if he has any hot friends,” Talia said, then glanced at me minding my business with my yogurt. “Both men and women. Help your two best friends out.”
“Nah, I’m good,” I said, spooning another helping.