Sometimes, when practice is done and all the other girls have cleared the pool, showered and gone home for the day, she finds her swimming laps. They don't really talk to each other because they're both too busy using the pool. She wears a Rosewood Sharks swimsuit instead of the one she used to wear for competitions. The one with all the logos of companies that sponsored her. Back when she could still win competitions through the shoulder and elbow problems that she started to persistently battle through her college years. She never made it to the Olympics because of that. It killed her to know that every year, even if she did great, there would always be some event to prevent her from advancing onto wearing the red, white and blue. She didn't make the national team time and time again. She would get close but then she would throw out her shoulder again and it couldn't quite heal in time to qualify for the USA Olympic Team Trials. So she sat out the games, year after year until it finally became too much heartache to keep on dreaming of being on Team USA in the Summer Olympics when she didn't know if she would also have to sit out the Grand Prix Series and then the following competitions after that.
The stupid sports psychologist that was assigned to her team tried to sell her on some bullshit that it was all in her head, that she kept choking because she was afraid that success wasn't going to be all it was cracked up to be. She thought it was stupid because her dad never raised her to be afraid of success. Her mentors and coaches always taught her to love to win. She wasn't this new generation of athletes that were taught to be reserved and hold back on how much they loved winning. She loves winning. But maybe that's the problem; she only loves winning when other swimmers love the other aspects of the sport. They like being fit, they love being at their personal best and all she could think about was how winning was everything. It wasn't some way to assess your abilities like other swimmers believed or some by-product of all the hard work she put in at the gym. It wasn't some reward. It was the necessity. It was what her father had made the sport all about since the day she realized she could swim… and not just swim like the other kids who floated in the water or dove in from the side of the pool. She would take off and swim lap after lap after lap until her first coach spotted her and started telling her dad how he could turn her into an Olympian. He didn't. No one did. And so she's back in Rosewood to try to take a break from swimming because even though she's good, she's not great. And even though she can win, she can't win enough to get to where she wanted to be.
And that's why she's here; swimming laps in a pool she left behind years ago with a girl that reminds her so much of herself that it hurts more than her shoulder ever did. With her dreams on hold while she's concentrating on healing, on not competing so she can heal by next year. Her dad wanted her close to home so he could control her again. So he could keep her every moment scheduled. She could have stayed in the city, coached all the girls with the same dreams as hers but she chose to go back to her hometown instead. She just couldn't face not being good enough for Team USA but getting someone else who was, there. It was selfish but it was also the truth. She also didn't know what she would do with herself when every minute of her life wasn't being carefully monitored. She had never lived without her father's schedule. Even her coaches followed his suggestions because it had gotten her as far as making it to the Trials. It got her back in the water faster and the routine made her feel normal. She'd never gone to prom, hadn't been caught shoplifting, she'd never know anything other than schedules and her father's constant shouting at her to do better. So she took the easy way out, where she wouldn't have to think, she wouldn't have to feel disappointment or rage… she would just have to adhere to the schedule.
So she was easily offered the head coaching position at Rosewood High. The other teachers were constantly in awe of her and treated her like she was larger than life. The administration would constantly barrage her with photo op events and even most of the girls she coached put her on a pedestal. It got old really fast but she was under contract and she had to heal. So she grinned and bore it all. The only time she actually felt relief was when she could use the pool again, after all the other girls left and it was just the Fields girl and her. So they swam laps, side by side and when they were done using the pool, after the finished showering she gave the junior a nod or would wave goodbye to her as she walked to her car at night. It wasn't until halfway through the semester that they actually talked. It wasn't much of a conversation. She merely gave the other girl a few pointers about her technique because she still hadn't been able to fully incorporate what she had suggested a few months ago and they couldn't afford to lose nationals. Emily stared at her, blushed and thanked her before heading to her car.
The next time they talked, they were alone again and Emily asked her what it felt like to compete. She shrugged at her and told her the truth, that it was pretty much the same as competing in high school, except the pressure got bigger because the stakes were bigger. But the water was the same, the other swimmers were the same, you were the same. Emily had frowned at that and asked her how everything could feel the same when the pool felt different each time she dove in. That made her heart stop because for Paige everything was the same, the only thing that changed was the name of the competition or the hotel she stayed at but it was always just a blur of sameness and here was this kid, this girl, telling her that she felt that the pool always felt different. She turned over and looked at Emily and finally noticed how pretty she was, not that she was just number one on their roster or that she was anchor or how she had failed to do this thing or that on tape, but actually noticed her. It made her blush and look away because that wasn't something she was supposed to notice.
After that though, all she could seem to do is take note of the swimmer. How she would be laughing in the halls with her friends but suddenly stop when she saw her walking by. Or how she would eat lunch with her three friends instead of the swim team, like the rest of the jocks tended to do. Just little things like that, she began to take notice. When summer was around the corner and her shoulder started feeling better, she thought she would be back in the pool, swimming and competing, but then her dad suffered a mild stroke and she decided to stay because her mom couldn't take care of him all on her own and Nick McCullers was too proud to let them hire a nurse. So it fell on her to help him around the house until he regained full mobility. She thought she would be stuck inside the house all summer as she had been the rest of the school year but then her luck changed when Mr. Fields knocked on the door. He wanted to pay her to swim along with Emily. Not really train her but just to give her some company while she was in the pool during the summer. They could program it around Nick's schedule so it didn't interfere with his care but he really wanted someone who loved swimming as much as his daughter does to hang out with her and maybe take care of her so she doesn't overexert herself like she had done a couple of summers ago. Paige agreed in part because it felt like another chunk of normality, of schedules that forced her to be in the pool for hours on end and in another because she liked spending time with Emily. Whether it was reviewing her tapes and seeing how they could improve her technique or just swimming laps in the pool without even acknowledging each other, there was something about Emily that drew her in, so she agreed to spend the summer with her in the pool and Mr. Fields shook her hand gratefully, telling her that now she had to come to dinner in order to meet his wife because she wouldn't believe him if he told her that the Paige McCullers was going to be working with his little girl all summer.
The dinner would have been uneventful if it weren't for one thing. It could have been her imagination. After all, she had drunk two glasses of wine when she usually stops at one. So her memory could have been a little unreliable but she swears that Emily's hand brushed up on her thigh while Mrs. Fields was clearing up the table. It could have been an accident… after all it didn't happen again, so she pushes it out of her mind until it happens again, after they've been swimming together for a week, Emily's hand brushes up against her thigh and when she looks up into her eyes, she apologizes but she doesn't look sorry. Especially because she leaves her hand there until Paige coughs uncomfortably and physically removes it from her thigh. And Paige has never had this happen to her because all her coaches were male and she never had to deal with this until now. She doesn't know if it's the proximity or a little bit of hero worship or what but she lets Emily rest her hand on her thigh for a couple of seconds all summer. Maybe it's because she likes it too but once school starts again and they have to navigate the whole dynamic back in the real world she's torn. She wants it to go further. She wants Emily to keep getting bolder and bolder. For her hand to rest on her thigh just a little bit longer. To go a little bit higher and higher until something else happens. Something she's wanted all summer but she hasn't let it happen because she's supposed to be an adult and she knows that these things never end well for either party. So one late night practice she tells Emily to please stop because she's not allowed to touch her this way. They stare at each other and Emily says that she's sorry even though she's really not at all.
Author's note: The original prompt called for 'Emily is the head coach of the swimming team and Paige is the team captain.' Although it didn't capture that, I still wanted to keep that coach/student dynamic.