The Girl Who Dreamt of Dolphins (17 page)

Chapter Ten
:

It had been an ordinary Monday at school. Lucy had got up late
and had had to rush to get ready, before Dad shovelled her out of
the house, locking the door behind her, cup of coffee in one hand
and attaché case in the other, sending her off up the road to
school whilst he sunk behind the wheel of his car. Lucy had knocked
on Amy’s door just as it started to rain. She’d forgotten her coat
and so they waited, hoping the rain would stop. It didn’t. In the
end Amy’s mum lent Lucy an umbrella and they’d trailed into school,
huddling together under it, only just getting there before the bell
went for the start of the school day.

The morning passed in a dull blur and then the bell rang for
lunchtime. It was swimming practice day and while the other
children piled into the school dining room, Lucy crossed the road
to the swimming pool, trying not to get too wet as she did so,
before quickly changing into her swim suit. Because Dad was so
reluctant for her to do any serious swimming practice, Lucy had
become a little furtive with him about her swimming sessions. He
wasn’t terribly observant at the best of times and it was easy for
her to make sure he didn’t notice the swimsuit and towel, goggles
and swim cap that she stuck into her school bag. She rinsed out and
dried her swimsuit herself at home and Dad didn’t seem to notice
the extra towels she dropped into the laundry basket. He just
dumped everything into the washing machine and occasionally
complained that Lucy ran through towels far too quickly. He knew
that the whole class had swimming once a week, but had no idea that
Lucy did more swimming two or three lunchtimes as well. Lucy was
happy enough to keep things that way.

Miss Baldwin was waiting for her at the pools edge.

‘
Right Lucy, we’re going to practice your diving and turns at
the end of the pool. Let’s see what we can do to slice some
valuable seconds off your time doing lengths.’

‘
Sound’s good’ said Lucy brightly. They spent the next twenty
minutes practicing diving, with Lucy trying to dive into the water
more cleanly and efficiently than before.

‘
With a good dive’ said Miss Baldwin, ‘you hardly leave a
ripple. Lucy didn’t seem to be able to do it quite as Miss Baldwin
wanted.

‘
It’s good’ she reassured Lucy the eleventh time they tried
‘but I know you can do it just a little bit better.’ Miss Baldwin
didn’t always have the time to focus on Lucy’s technique, but when
she did it was a bit like being under the un-blinking eye of a
perfectionist. Whatever Lucy did was never quite right. She’d
improved a lot though since Miss Baldwin had been teaching her, but
her teacher was never satisfied with that either.

‘
You’ve got raw, natural talent’ she’d told Lucy more than
once, ‘but that’s not good enough on its own. Unless you work at
your technique, you’re never going to get anywhere.’ Lucy knew that
Miss Baldwin wanted her to compete at the County level, or higher.
She also knew that she couldn’t, not without a major show-down with
Dad and she just couldn’t face that right now. But Miss Baldwin had
a row of shining cups and medals in a glass cabinet in the main
entrance to the school and she wanted to add to her
collection.

After practicing diving, Miss Baldwin had Lucy doing widths,
flipping in the water at each end and pushing off again with as
much force and speed as she could muster. Another twenty minutes
later and Lucy was beginning to grow tired.

‘
Ok Lucy’ said Miss Baldwin, releasing her at last, ‘I want you
to do some front crawl now and think carefully about the rhythm of
your strokes and the timing of your breathing as you swim.’ Miss
Baldwin turned her attention on Jerry Smith and Lucy had time to do
a few more lengths on her own before changing quickly, grabbing a
sandwich and then going to afternoon classes.

She was just coming out of the changing room when Miss Baldwin
called out to her to wait a moment.

‘
Lucy, have you spoken to your Dad yet?’ she asked.

‘
Err, no’ replied Lucy awkwardly.

‘
Then speak to him tonight’ Miss Baldwin told Lucy. ‘There’s a
competition coming up after half term and I want you in it. Of
course it’s going to mean more focused training, but if you’re
ready to put time into training before school for a few weeks, I
think you might do really well. What do you say?’ Lucy
frowned.

‘
I don’t know’ she said uncertainly. ‘Dad’s not going to agree
to me doing training before school.’

‘
What about if I speak to him?’ replied Miss Baldwin, ‘I’m sure
we can sort something out well enough.’

‘
No! No I don’t think that’s a good idea!’ exclaimed Lucy. It
was all very well doing extra swimming in the lunch breaks, but not
if Miss Baldwin then put her in these impossible situations. ‘I’ll
tell you what Dad says.’

‘
I’m really keen on you winning some silverware for the school
you know Lucy. I know you can do it.’ At that moment the bell rang.
Lessons would start again in five minutes.

‘
I’ve got to go’ said Lucy, relieved. She turned and ran up the
corridor. She might just get to the canteen and get a sandwich
before they closed the hatch.

Dad picked Lucy up from the after-school club as normal. He
didn’t look happy.

‘
I’ve got a bone to pick with you young lady’ he announced as
Lucy climbed into the car.

‘
What is it?’ Lucy answered.

‘
I had a call today from school.’ Lucy was
mystified.

‘
Really? I wasn’t sick or anything today Dad and I didn’t get
into trouble either.’

‘
I had a call from your Miss Baldwin’ he continued, with a
disapproving pause.

‘
Oh, I see’ said Lucy, beginning to realise what the matter
was.

She says you’ve been doing swimming practice, two, no, three
times a week at lunchtimes and I knew nothing about it! What’s
going on?’

‘
Well, you know’, replied Lucy hesitantly, ‘I’ve just been
doing my swimming practice.’

‘
No, what you’ve been doing is secretly sneaking off to do
swimming behind my back, hiding your swimming things and carrying
on like you don’t need to ask my permission!’

‘
It’s only swimming’ Lucy replied defensively, but that just
made Dad angrier than before.

‘
And now I hear your sports teacher wants you to do training
before school as well and wants you to gallivant off and do
competitions and goodness knows what else’ he continued, his voice
rising. ‘And she wants me to ferry you around to do this
nonsense.’

‘
Well, Miss Baldwin says I’m good, that I’ve got potential, but
I just need some more focused training.’

‘
And you know I don’t approve of all this, that I don’t approve
of it at all.’ They drew up at home. They clambered out of the car
and Dad slammed the door.

‘
What about your school work, what about spending times with
your friends, what about just being a normal school girl?’ he asked
as they walked up to the front door.

‘
There’s nothing weird about swimming’ Lucy replied. ‘Everyone
goes swimming!’

‘
Yes of course, everyone goes for a splash in the local
swimming pool occasionally. But not everyone gives up their life,
their education and everything else to plough up and down doing
pointless lengths.’ The house was cold as they walked into the dark
hall.

‘
Most parents would be proud that their children can do
something well.’

‘
And I am proud of you Lucy, I’m proud of you for your work at
school, I’m proud of you for how you’ve coped with everything in
the last year, I’m proud of you for just being you. But you’ve got
enough to worry about, I’ve got enough to worry about, without all
this swimming nonsense.

‘
I like swimming!’ exclaimed Lucy, worried that she knew what
Dad was going to say next.

‘
So I told Miss Baldwin that you certainly weren’t doing extra
swimming and you weren’t going to do any lunchtime swimming anymore
either.

‘
What?’ said Lucy with rising alarm in her voice.

‘
And do you know what she said?’ Dad’s voice was rising again.
‘She said that she didn’t understand why as she had a letter of
authorisation from me. A letter of authorisation?’

Lucy shifted uncomfortably. She knew she was in trouble
now.

‘
It must have been from a long time ago’ she
replied.

‘
No, your Miss Baldwin says she gets one every term. She says
the last one she got was from January.’ Lucy blushed
guiltily.

‘
You’ve been forging my signature Lucy, for that and goodness
knows what else!’

‘
Oh please Dad. It’s not fair!’

‘
You’ve been lying to me Lucy. Lying to me! That’s not the
daughter I know.’

‘
Well you know, I thought….’ Lucy trailed off, reluctant to go
on.

‘
You faked my signature because you knew I’d say
no!’

‘
It’s not fair! Just because Mum ….’ she cried out, anguish in
her voice.

‘
It’s nothing to do with Mum’ replied Dad angrily. ‘I’m worried
about you, your well-being, your future, your life!’

Lucy just couldn’t take it anymore. She ran upstairs, bitter
tears in the corner of her eyes and slammed her bedroom door closed
behind her. She threw herself face-down on her bed, sobs convulsing
her body. She loved swimming, she loved being in the water. It felt
so natural, as though she belonged there. What’s the point of
hanging around in the playground every lunch time when she could be
in the swimming pool, with only her thoughts to keep her company
and the echoing noise of the pool muffled under water. She had
plenty of time to hang out with her friends and there’s no way her
teachers thought she was losing out in class because she spent too
much time swimming. She was doing well at school, she knew she was.
The thought of not being able to swim left her feeling empty
inside, in a way that she didn’t quite understand. She felt as
though a hook was caught in her heart. She felt trapped and
suddenly desperately alone.

Dad called up for her to come down for dinner, but Lucy
refused and just stayed up there, defiant and angry. Eventually she
heard him come upstairs. He knocked on her door but she wouldn’t
answer. He thought better than to come in; just as well because
Lucy thought that she might throw something at him. Instead he left
her dinner on a tray outside her door. She didn’t care though. She
wasn’t hungry and wasn’t going to come out for it. Presently, she
heard the television downstairs.

She crept out of her room, stepping carefully over the dinner
tray in front of her door and across to the spare bedroom, where
Dad had his home office. She switched the light on and pushed the
door closed, so that Dad could not hear what she was doing from
downstairs. His mobile phone was up here and Lucy picked it up
quietly. She looked in Dad’s phone book and quickly found Bethany’s
number. She tapped in the numbers and then laboriously started a
text message. She wasn’t very good at texting and it took her
longer than she’d have liked. Eventually it was finished and she
pressed ‘Send.’

‘
It’s me, Lucy’ the text message read. ‘I really want to get
away from Dad and come and see you. Can I?’

Second’s later the mobile phone started to vibrate and Lucy
knew it would start ringing in a just moment. She seized the
handset and pressed the green button to receive the call before it
might ring and Dad would hear it.

‘
Hey Kiddo’ came Bethany’s familiar voice through the receiver.
‘What’s up?’

‘
Hi Bethany’ whispered Lucy. She paused awkwardly and Bethany
didn’t say anything either. ‘I want to come and see you. Its half
term on Friday and I want to see you.’

‘
I’d love to see you too Kiddo, you know that, but what does
your Dad say?’ Lucy paused again.

‘
You know what he’d say.’ It was Bethany’s turn to be quiet for
a moment.

‘
So what’s up between you and your Dad?’ asked Bethany. Lucy
crumpled and started to cry down the phone.

‘
I just can’t stay here any longer, I feel so alone. I….’ She
just couldn’t speak, her throat hurt with emotion. Her eyes stung
with tears. She curled up on the office chair and hugged the mobile
to her face. ‘I need to see you.’