‘Let’s go,’ I declared, face set like flint.
‘Lead the way,’ Nathan grinned.
I looked back down at my feet, doing their best not to let the team down but not quite ready to be leading this stage of the Programme just yet.
‘Could you lead the way?’ I asked. ‘I’ll follow.’
Nathan’s eyes did that kind, crinkly thing again and he gently tugged me forwards a couple of steps. ‘Let’s do it together. That way I can catch you if you pass out.’
‘Good plan.’
And it was. I shuffled along, gripping my anchor, keeping my breaths as shallow as possible as we made it up the stairs to the viewing area, which overlooked the pool below. I lowered myself into a plastic chair and finally unclenched my hand from around Nathan’s.
‘You can open your eyes now,’ he said.
I did. His were still crinkling away. ‘You look inappropriately pleased to be witnessing someone suffering a panic attack.’
‘That would be inappropriate. But I’m witnessing someone overcoming a panic attack, and seeing that has made my day.’
Oof – it seemed my poor, frazzled heart had just about enough energy left to do a weak flop in response.
‘Do you want a coffee or anything?’
‘I’ve water in my bag.’
‘Right, I’d better get down there.’
‘Thank you,’ I called, as he reached the stairwell, managing to squeeze the words through the giant blob of tears balled up in my throat.
He spun around and paused there for a moment. ‘Well done.’
Two little words, but he spoke them as if one of his squad had won the gold. Like he was proud of me. I tucked those words inside my heart and used the warm glow to power me around to look down onto the vision of my past a few metres below.
My past. My son’s future. He was even more astonishing than I’d imagined. I wondered if me being there helped. Scrap that. Iknewhow much it helped. The number of times he glanced up at the viewing area told me that. Mesmerised, I barely blinked the whole time, so desperate was I to not miss a second of it.
Different swimsuits and shorts, a lot less bellowing and bullying from the coach, but not much else had changed. It was all so familiar, yet it felt as though a lifetime of avoidance and denial, secrets and cover-ups, had built an impenetrable wall between my present world and this one. I watched, and wept, and let the adrenaline gallop through my system, but, most important of all, I stayed.
It was incredible. Me, here at last. Watching my boy. I pushed aside the weight of regret, and shame and anger and hurt, and grasped hold of what consolation I could at the certainty that this was a new day, I was here now, and I would be here from now on. I had made it.
Twenty minutes before the end of the training session, a man wearing a dark brown baseball cap pushed through a door below and hurried over to one of the poolside benches where a few of the parents were watching their kids below me. He sat down, one arm placed on each knee, head twisting from side to side until he spotted Joey, powering along the far lane.
He didn’t look like a scout. Scouts wore tracksuits and trainers, not jeans, thick sweaters and heavy boots. And the agents who didn’t go for sportswear dressed in suits.
Who was this man?
I clattered down the stairs in a mix of anger and terror, wheeling along the corridor to the door leading to the pool. As my brain finally caught up with my agitated body, it produced this thought:What are you going to do when you open the door, Amy? Accuse him of stalking in front of everyone? What if he knows who you are? What if the one time you turn up at Joey’s training you cause a scene and embarrass him?
Jerking to a stop, I crashed into the door, sending it flying open as I stood there behind it. Every pair of eyes belonging to everybody on the bench swivelled to look at me. In the split second before the door swung shut again, my own eyes locked onto two of them. Which was precisely enough time to realise who they did in fact belong to.
‘Sean Mansfield,’ I exclaimed. ‘I should have known.’
I stood there, my nose an inch from the closed door, my whole being in suspended animation. Before I slipped completely into an insensible stupor, the door creaked open and Nathan appeared.
‘Are you okay?’
‘Probably not.’
‘Were you trying to brave it poolside? If you wait ten minutes, I’ll give you a hand.’
