Deep End

AMSTERDAM IS BEAUTIFUL. THE FOOD IS GOOD. DUTCH PEOPLE are nice, even when we don’t speak a word of their language and are so immersed in talking, we wander off and get lost. At the end of the day, in the clunky rise of the hotel’s elevator, I cannot remember what we discussed. Everything. Nothing. Both. All I know is that Lukas took my hand sometime after lunch, and hours later I’m still holding his index finger. That he got a phone call from his team, asking if he wanted to join them, and told them he was busy. What’s the last time I spent a day like this, turning completely off? Not worrying about events, classes, whether Pipsqueak is holding a grudge over me being gone?

“I need your help tonight,” he tells me. His fingers play with mine, relaxed, like I’m an extension of his body.

I give him my flirtiest Is that what we call it nowadays? smile.

“I really do need—”

The elevator stops. A giant suitcase appears, followed by a tall, dark-haired man who instantly hugs Lukas. “Hey, mate!”

Lukas laughs. “Only you would show up the day before prelims.”

I may not follow swimming, but I do follow Lukas, and I recognize this guy. Callum Vardy. Australian. Big butterfly sprinter. He and Lukas seem more than circumstantial friends.

“Your family’s here?” Callum asks.

“Nah. They’ll be at the Olympics. I quote: ‘Can’t come see all your little races.’”

“Christ, they sound like mine. And you . . .” He turns to me. His eyes are, frankly, ridiculous. So green, they might be responsible for the deforestation of eastern Madagascar.

“I’m not Pen Ross,” I hurry to say.

“I know, love.” He seems entertained. “Pen and I go way back.” His eyes flick to Lukas’s, and then to where his hand is once again holding mine. “We know each other . . . well.”

He and Pen had sex—that’s what he means. I’m sure of it. I glance at Lukas for any tells of jealousy or irritation. Find only amusement.

“So . . . ?” Callum asks. His eyes travel from me to Lukas, asking a question I cannot interpret. Lukas immediately shakes his head.

“No.”

“You sure?”

“Very.”

“What can I do to convince you?”

He smiles. “Absolutely nothing.”

“Too bad.” The elevator pings and the doors open. “Well, this is me. Let’s get a drink after the finals, since you two are no fun.”

He disappears into the hallway, and I spend the rest of the ride trying to formulate an appropriate question, but I have nothing when Lukas hands me a can of shaving gel and a razor. “Can you do my back?”

“I’d forgotten you guys do that!”

“Only before big competitions.” The absence of body hair and dead skin cells can apparently snip a few hundredths of a second off a race.

“Who shaves you, usually?”

“Gösta does my back and neck, and I do his.” I give him a blank look. “Gustafsson? He’s in our medley team.”

“Is there a specific way I should do it?”

“As long as you don’t saw off my arm, you can’t be worse than him. Or me.”

“How can you be bad at shaving?”

“I’m okay doing my face. But the rest . . . there’s so much fucking hair, Scarlett.”

“Aww. Poor, innocent, seven-feet-tall baby.”

“I’m not seven—”

“Hyperbole. Get in the shower, Bigfoot,” I order.

He raises a surprised eyebrow, but I don’t back down. “Seriously, I’ll make you as smooth as a nineteenth-century brothel’s satin sheets.”

“Graphic.”

“The king will make me a knight of the Swedish empire.”

“Like I said—”

“But you gotta shower first. Open up those pores.”

He inches closer, looming, and pulls me in the shower with him.

Twenty minutes and some fooling around later, I straddle him while he’s face down on a towel on the floor, and start the long process of de-yetifing him. It’s fascinating, having him at my mercy, unusually passive and relaxed. Taking care of him for once. “Your thighs are currently smoother than the Danish electoral process. Gösta could never.”

“You’re killing it with the rhetorical figures.”

“With the shaving, too.” I work in silence, thinking, churning. Then: “Did they date?”

“Who?”

“Callum and Pen.”

He laughs. “They didn’t.”

“Turn around, I need to do the front of your legs—thanks. So they . . . had a thing?”

“Sex, yeah.”

“Oh.” When, though? The timeline doesn’t add up. “Were you guys ever in an open relationship?”

“Nope.”

“Then when did she—” I drop the razor. “Did the three of you . . . ?”

“Yup.”

“Oh . . . wow.”

Lukas props up to his elbows, clearly finding my shock diverting. “For someone who’d be A-OK with me tying her up and keeping her in a closet for an undetermined length of time, you’re easily scandalized.”

“You’re right. Why am I being a prude?” I massage my temple. “I’m just surprised.”

“Why?”

“In the list, you said that . . . you weren’t that interested in threesomes.”

He sits up in a flurry of golden skin and abs. “I’m not.”

“Pen is?”

He nods. “It was a couple of years ago. When we saw each other a handful of times a year it was hard to tell, but once we were living in the same city, we realized that our sex life wasn’t great. We tried stuff.”

“With Callum?”

“Among others.”

Others. “How many?” His eyes lift to the ceiling in concentration—like he’s counting. “That many, huh?”

He shrugs.

“I have a lot of questions about the logistics.”

“I see.”

“All of them inappropriate. None of them my business.”

He smiles. “Let’s hear them.”

“How did you choose . . . ?”

“It was mostly Pen who . . .”

“Spearheaded the project?”

He snorts. “She’d find someone. Ask me if I agreed. Come to me when the plans were made. Some guy who was in her class. Tracy—he used to be on the team? Backstroke? Callum. Others.”

“Always guys?”

He shakes his head. “It was pretty even.”

“Did you . . . ?”

He nods.

“And?”

“It was fun. Good, even. Though I’m not as attracted to men as I am to women.”

“Tragically straight?”

A soft laugh. “Or thereabouts.”

I pull up my legs and prop my chin on my knees. How did I never hear about it? Then again, who would tell me? “I might need a list of the Stanford people involved, or I’ll be wondering every time I talk to someone. The twins. Billy the maintenance guy. Coach Sima. Dr. Smith.”

He bites the inside of his cheek. “None of them, Scarlett.”

I sigh. “You know, I wish I was more like the two of you.”

“In what way?”

“You’re just . . . rational. Never jealous. I don’t think I could . . . share.”

“It’s not that simple at all, Scarlett.”

I shrug, forcing myself to move on from something that could get very sad, very fast. “Break’s over. Before the pores close, we—”

His fingers close around my wrist. “I asked for you.”

“What?”

For a few moments, his jaw works. “Every single person Pen and I had sex with was her choice, and I was okay with it. But when you joined the team, I asked her if she could approach you.”

“I . . .” My cheeks glow, on fire. “Why?” But I remember something I haven’t thought of in months: Pen’s words at Coach Sima’s barbecue. I know you think she’s hot. You said so.

“You were beautiful, but that wasn’t . . . You seemed so quiet and reserved. We have this saying in Swedish, ‘In the calmest of waters . . . ’ I couldn’t stop thinking that you were hiding something. That there was a secret in there, something everyone else was missing. And . . .” A silent laugh. “I was right. It was there. Same as mine.” He looks at the slowly setting sun. “So I asked Pen about you. It was the first time I did anything like that.”

“And?” I’m surprised my vocal cords still work.

“You had a boyfriend, and that was it. But she didn’t forget. She knew I found you attractive, would tease me about it, in her way. That’s what she does with people she loves.”

I feel a little numb. “Is that why she threw me at you at Coach Sima’s house?”

“Maybe. Or maybe she was just drunk.”

I nod, realizing that I really don’t want to talk about this any longer. “We should finish the shaving. Okay?” I force a smile. “Let me make you smoother than a saxophone solo.”

Lukas mutters something that sounds like “This needs to stop, Scarlett,” but before lying back, he pulls me down and kisses me.

I kiss him back, and it’s unlike any other time.