Christos Tsiolkas - Barracuda

Waves of exhilaration flood through me. I beat Costello, I flog him. The boy is about to say something to me, to accept my victory, but I cut him off and raise my arms, my biceps flexed, my fists clenched triumphantly. I make a sound, somewhere between a grunt and a bray, and I repeat it. So he knows I have beaten him. Costello slips back under the water, he says nothing at all.

I will learn how to breathe again.

As I am about to climb into the minibus with the others to head to school, Coach taps me on the shoulder, pulls me away from the squad. I can see the others looking back at us as they board.

Coach waits until all the boys are on, then he gives the driver a thumbs-up. ‘Come on, Danny,’ he says. ‘You come with me.’

All the way out from the city we don’t speak. It isn’t until he turns his car onto the freeway that forms the spine through the south-eastern suburbs that he turns to me. ‘Danny, do you trust me?’

I have to trust you, no one else will take a chance on me now. But I don’t say that. I just nod obediently.

‘Good. You have to trust me, son. You have to trust me if you want to be a swimmer again.’

Two thoughts rebound against one another: that he has called me son ; and that he knows I am not the strongest, not the fastest, not the best. I have to learn I can’t reconcile the two notions, they confuse me and render me silent.

I pull my bag onto my lap, search for my water bottle and drink from it hungrily. ‘I think I did good back there,’ I say meekly, not looking across at him, looking at the steady flow of cars in front of and around us. ‘It felt good to beat Costello.’

Coach makes an ugly derisive sound. He is gripping the wheel so hard his knuckles are white. ‘Costello is fourteen, he’s nearly three years younger than you, he has some talent, but he’s no champion.’ His left hand slips off the wheel and his forefinger drums hard at my chest. ‘Is that who you want to compare yourself to? Is that the best you expect from yourself?’

I can’t speak. I want his fingers to be a fist, I want him to punch me, bash me. Anything but his contemptuous words. They are no worse than the things I say to myself since I came back from Japan, in fact, they are much milder. He hasn’t called me a loser, he hasn’t called me a coward; he hasn’t uttered that one word that is the load on my back, he hasn’t called me a failure.

But he and I, we both know what I am.

‘Answer me, boy. What is it you want?’

I am too frightened to speak. I don’t dare say the words.

Coach again takes one hand off the wheel, and says, ‘I can train you, boy, I can build your muscles here,’ and as he spits the words he punches, hard, his own chest, ‘I can make you strong here ’, and he smacks the palm of his hand to his bicep, ‘I can work you so hard that every part of your body will be perfect. Here,’ he yells, and slams his fist into his chest again, ‘Here,’ punching his bicep, and ‘ Here ,’ he delivers a blow to his thigh. ‘But what I can’t do, Danny,’ and his finger is pointing at my head, ‘I can’t do anything about here .’

He indicates to veer off the freeway, we are nearly at school. I know that I have to say something, that he has taken me aside to give me an ultimatum, he is asking whether swimming is over for me. And I can’t believe it, my body is betraying me again, I can sense the shudders going through me, the tears about to flow from my eyes. I shut them tight, I inhale, I rein myself in. I can’t break that promise, that promise that I have made to myself: that I will never ever ever cry again.

I have to learn how to breathe again.

I open my eyes: the world in my vision is dry. I turn to Coach. ‘I want to be an Olympic swimmer.’

We are in the school car park. Coach turns off the car and looks at me.

And I look at him. I don’t see the drooping jowls, the fat face, the bulldog neck. I see large and dark and limpid eyes, a sheen of moisture there in the blackness.

‘You are at a crossroads, son, but I have faith you can be a great swimmer. Do you have that faith?’

All I can think of is that he has called me son again. He is about to say something else. But he swallows the words.

I have to stop myself saying, Tell me, tell me what to do, what to think. Tell me. I have to trust you.

It comes to me, it is a story my father used to tell me when I was a child in my flannelette pyjamas. Sometimes he would read to me but more often than not he enjoyed telling me stories. Of how a young Presley was taken up to Memphis or how a son of slaves called Lead Belly grew up in a whorehouse and discovered his genius for singing in prison chain gangs.

‘Music’s the best education, Danny,’ I remember him saying. ‘A true education, not like the manufactured crap on the radio these days.’

And he told me about Robert Johnson at the crossroads. That night he showed me the sleeve of a record, Johnson smoking a cigarette, clutching the neck of a guitar. He didn’t look old enough to be called a man.

Robert Johnson met the Devil at the crossroads, my father told me, and he wanted to play the blues so bad that he made a deal with the Devil. He sold his soul. That was how much the music meant to him, that was what it cost him to play.

The water rushes past me, a flock of yellow-tailed cockatoos fling from the trees and their squawks fill the day.

You are at a crossroads, son .

I didn’t get raised with God so I am not acquainted with the Devil. But looking out across the river, I am sure that I have felt them both in the water. Poseidon was the god of the ocean and Poseidon carried a trident. I remember that.

Mum didn’t want me to learn about God, she said God is just goodness. And evil? I never asked her about evil.

How much do I want it?

I look around me; the bush is empty, there isn’t anyone else around. So I whisper, ‘I’ll sell my soul.’

The river, the birds, they are the only ones who hear me.

And I don’t know God and I don’t know the Devil. What would He want in return? What would be a sacrifice?

The thought rushes through me; and now I feel the cold, now there is only cold.

I’d give up my father. I’d give up my mother.

I see it, I see it clearly, a truck crashing off a highway.

I will give up my father and I will give up my mother.

And I’d give up Luke, I’d give up Martin.

And it feels right, it is right. Martin remains young and handsome and beautiful for eternity.

I will give up my mates.

And Demet?

I will give up my best friend.

And the cold is my blood and my blood is ice.

Now I understand evil. The shaft that is light between us, from her heart to my heart. I will break that light. That’s how much I want it .

And Regan?

That shy little girl, hiding behind her long sandy hair, waiting patiently for my training to finish, who can’t bear my father yelling at me, who can’t bear anyone hurting me. Who adores me.

I will give up my sister.

And Theo?

Who is there in the morning and who is there in the evening, trusting me, believing in me. What would anything mean without Theo? I can’t give up Theo.

What is it you want?

I have been holding in my breath and now I exhale.

The birds have stopped their song. Even the river is silent.

I will give up Theo.

The trilling returns, the rush of the water.

I get to my feet, but a thought is pounding, it is current and wave, it is coursing through me: is it worth it? All I am is shame. But there isn’t a God and there isn’t a Devil because in the pool that afternoon my legs are leaden, my arms are dead weights, my lungs gasp for air; I swallow water. Coach doesn’t have to say a word, I don’t have to look at him. I know the disappointment that will be there in his eyes.