Page 31 of Racing Hearts

“I can’t keep having every practice be a fight like this and, apparently, the iron fist isn’t working,” he says, clearly ignoring my question. “You’re not one of my actual athletes. I can’t actually tell you what to do. So why don’t you tell me. What do you need to start taking all of this seriously?”

“What do you mean you can’t really tell me what to do,” I say.

“I have no actual power in our relationship,” Adrian clarifies. “I can talk loud. I can shout demands. But I can’t withhold anything from you, like a seat or race placement. I’m not going to make a recommendation about your future team selections. I can’t impose any consequences on you like a real coach would. I need you to decide to work with me, to take me seriously. So, why don’t you tell me what you need to start doing that?”

I swallow a gasp as I realize what he’s offering. “Give me control over the program.”

Adrian chuckles. “I’m the coach, Kath.”

“Okay, well you asked what I need to take you seriously, and that’s it. I want routine and structure and matrices. I want plan A’s, which never morph into plans B or C based on someone’s whim or—”

“Intuition?”

“Yeah, intuition.” I fold my arms, but I’m relieved to finally be given an opening to state my preferences. “I’ll design something structured and predictable. Your team can do it, too.”

Adrian’s eyes dance across my face even as he shakes his head. “I’m not doing that.”

I shrug. “Well, then, I’m not taking it seriously.”

Adrian watches me for so long I wonder if I’ve broken him. Hopefully, I have. This man could use some breaking.

Abruptly, he says, “Let’s compete for it.”

“What?”

“We compete. Like with the lemon bar. You win, I’ll let you design the program. I win, you have to start following my instructions without arguing about every decision or trying to find loopholes in every rule.”

The edge of excitement lifts my chest. For the first time in days, I have a real opportunity to determine my own fate. And a competition is exactly the way I want to resolve this.

“We can arm wrestle again,” I say, nearly breathless with excitement.

Adrian barks out a laugh. “No, Parker. The offer is only good for the erg.”

I can tell he thinks he’s got some kind of upper hand here, but adrenaline still rushes through my fingertips. Little does Adrian know, the erg is my forte. Using an erg is like rowing—pulling an oar through water—but there is no water and there is no oar. It’s just a machine with a handle, a sliding seat, and a display screen. No crosswinds, no waves, no confounding conditions. Just pulling.

“Yes,” I say, trying to hide the eagerness in my voice. “It’s a deal.”

Adrian’s mouth explodes with another grin. “Let’s race right now.”

Eleven

Adrian practically skips to the lockers. From one of the wooden cubbies, he extracts a gym bag like a handyman retrieving a well-loved toolbox.

“Meet you there?” he asks. “I’ll change.”

That enthusiastic grin has reinvigorated his face. This time, a certain deviousness simmers just under the surface. It reminds me of Sofi’s wolfish grin when she’s about to crush me at pinball. Wariness rises up in me, like my body has internalized a mistake before my mind has caught up.

I sling my own bag onto my shoulder and scale the rickety old wooden stairs toward the upper levels of the boathouse, forging toward the erg room.

I’m not a religious person, but if I were, this place would be my house of worship. Dust motes dance in the rectangles of light spilling from the massive bay windows. They illuminate the row of ergs like pews awaiting their parishioners. The room smells like sun-warmed wood and old varnish and I’m bathed in a prayer shawl of silence, entranced.

The first time I ever felt the sensation of rowing was on one of these machines. It was the summer before I started high school, Mom was between jobs, and no two days were the same. One night she’d wake me up at midnight because she was craving waffles, and the next she’d be canceling our plans to go back-to-school shopping so we could do a candle-making workshop at the YMCA.

On a whim, Mom signed me up for Discover Rowing Day. The coach, Darlene, led our awkward group of shuffling teens through the trophy room to tell us about the club’s long, decorated history, and let us each hold an oar. I was already awestruck by what she described: the discipline, the routine of early mornings, the consistency of long-distance sessions.

It was the erg that sold me, though. When we got upstairs, Darlene said we could all give them a try, so I sat on a seat and pulled at the handle, awkwardly lifting it over my bent knees. The flywheel came alive in a whir and the display screen lit up to monitor distance, stroke rate, and splits. My technique was all wrong, even inexperienced I could tell that, but as I watched the little screen, I started experimenting, moving my arms differently or pushing my legs harder. I loved the way the numbers jumped or stabilized in response to my movements, the smooth feeling of the handle in my fingers, and the droning, constant purr of air.

Standing over me, Darlene asked what I planned to do with the rest of my summer.