I couldn’t show up at the gym for dryland that afternoon. Practices right after the Olympics were less intense. We had a three-hour practice every morning, and on Tuesdays and Thursdays, we had an hour of dryland in the afternoon. But I’d reached my threshold. I locked myself in my room, slept until two, a half hour before we were scheduled to leave. There was so much dread inside me that without thinking a second longer about it, I decided to fake a migraine. I had no idea what else to do. I hated lying, and skipping practice was something I never did, not even when I got my usual January cold. But I needed an afternoon off. I was desperate.
David, I’m taking the afternoon off. I’ve had a migraine all day, and it’s even worse now.
He responded. Was it the lactate set? LOL.
I don’t know what it is. but I need to rest.
Can’t you take some Excedrin? Work off the pain?
I’ve been working through the pain. It’s probably because I haven’t had enough rest. I’ll see you tomorrow.
He could be mad at me all he wanted. I was allowed to skip a practice given the fact I never did. Last time I skipped was my freshman year of college when I got strep throat. Last time I did it voluntarily? Never. Guess there was a first time for everything. I deserved an afternoon of rest if the thought of getting back in the pool made me want to cry. David didn’t respond, but I really didn’t care. I threw the covers over my head and finished crying out the guilt I had for lying and skipping until it put me back to sleep.
In swimming, we weren’t driven by financial factors unless we joined the very few swimmers with enough sponsorships to give us a livable paycheck. My performances at the world champs and Pan Pacs, in addition to Tokyo, made me one of those lucky swimmers with a handful of sponsorships under my belt. But even then, with eyes on us every four years, most of our biggest accomplishments went unnoticed by the world outside of our families and team. The thing that fueled us was internal motivation. We swam for ourselves. And if we lost our motivation, what did we have left?
I skipped the next morning. My excuse was that my migraine lasted all night, caused me to puke, and that I needed to go to the doctor. Obviously, that wasn’t true. Instead, I slept until the excitement of FaceTiming with Kennedy woke me up. The best part of my day.
I didn’t want to talk about swimming. I was up for any other conversation. Our FaceTimes were an escape from my life and a reminder of the one amazing thing I had to look forward to. I wasn’t counting down to the world champs in December. I was counting the days till the world champs were over, and I got to go home for Christmas with her.
Apparently, my ability to suppress emotions was impaired because she knew the second we started talking that something was wrong.
“Babe, what’s going on?” she asked with a fold in her eyebrows.
Usually, she greeted me with a weird thing she saw on the subway. But not this time. Even though I’d slept until two in the afternoon, I was still exhausted and down. Her voice was so nurturing and sympathetic, all I wanted to do was bury my face in her chest and cuddle her. Her embrace would be exactly what I needed to feel better, and right now, a break from the pressure in my head would be appreciated, no matter how short it was.
“Nothing’s wrong,” I said and feigned a smile. “Just tired. How are you?”
She tilted her head to the side and pursed her lips. “I don’t believe you. What’s wrong?”
I laughed nervously. I really hated talking about my feelings, especially when our time was limited. “Why do you think something is wrong?”
“Because I see it on your face. Your smile is not as big, and you look tired. You don’t have that usual spunk.”
“Swimming hours a day takes away all the spunk.”
“You had spunk when we had dinner two years ago. You had spunk right before the Olympics.”
“That’s because I was about to go to the Olympics, and the girl of my dreams reentered my life.”
She threw a hand on her chest. “Oh, what a line. Charmingly cheesy but it’s not gonna fool me. What’s wrong?”
Damn. I really thought that would distract her. “You’re supposed to tell me what weird thing you saw on the subway. Stop breaking the rules.”
“Stop diverting.”
I groaned. “I’m just tired and stressed, Ken. That’s all.”
“Stressed about what?”
“I don’t want to talk about it.”
She straightened and leaned closer to the camera. “Well, too bad. You need to.”
“I skipped practice yesterday and today. I faked a migraine.”
“Oh wow. When was the last time you played hooky?”
“Never.”
I could see the severity set in on her features. They became much softer, more sympathetic. “Why did you skip?”
“Because I need a break. I’m not excited to get into the pool. I dread it, like, really dread it.”
Closing my eyes, I pinched my temples with my thumb and middle finger at a sudden pang. I could feel the reality sinking swiftly in my gut. Swimming didn’t make me happy anymore. I was twenty-three years old. I was supposed to be full of life and dreams, and for whatever reason, I felt like I had no life. How could I be so ungrateful? I came back from the Olympics with five gold medals, the most decorated swimmer of the competition, and I found myself spiraling into a dark hole of depression, and I had no idea why.
It was like the Olympics sucked up all my serotonin, like a stimulant. When it was over, I was left with the comedown, the hangover, the depression from the depletion.
Maybe a much-needed break would provide me with clarity as to what the fuck was happening to me.
“Then take a break, Quinn. Everyone deserves a break. It’s not an unreasonable ask.”
I rubbed another round of tension out of my forehead. “I don’t want to disappoint anyone.”
“I don’t think that’s disappointing anyone. You need to think about yourself sometimes. Your mental health is the most important thing. Everything else is inferior.”
I grunted and fell back on my bed, allowing my head to plop into my soft pillow. “I miss you. I wish you were here right now.”
“I miss you too. A lot. Our week went by too fast.”
“Hell yeah, it did. It was, like, the only week I’ve had since Tokyo that I didn’t feel stressed out.”
“I think you really need to consider taking a break. Weigh the pros and cons. Have you told anyone else about it?”
I scoffed. “Yeah, right. Everyone would flip out. Ugh, I really don’t want to talk about this anymore. I just want to talk to you. It’s the only thing I’ve been looking forward to all day.”
“We only have two months to go,” Kennedy said, as if it was a good thing. She wiggled her eyebrows, a playful smirk on her lips, trying to get me to laugh. But after thinking about those three meets I had to go to and all that practicing, two months my time was not the equivalent to two months her time. She seemed to forget that by the next time we saw each other, she would have to finish her documentary, present her thesis, and pass her classes. But school didn’t seem to paint the stress on her face as much as my worries did.
“That’s so far away,” Ken,” I whined.