Chapter 9 - Nightfall

School had finally ended and now it was time for the swimming tryouts. On the bright side, it was only gonna be me trying out, on the bad side... IT WAS ONLY GOING TO BE ME TRYING OUT! Everyone's gonna watch me! 'What if they laugh at me? What if I ram my face into a wall by accident?' Yeah, it was time for mental freak-outs. 'Adelina, you really need to calm down. All you have to do is swim right? If you keep your eyes open, you won't run into a wall.' That little voice had to pop in. 'Oh shush!' I fixed my hair up into a quick bun and grabbed my goggles before walking out into the pool area. What I saw nearly took my breath away.

"Woah..." I said in admiration. There were so many swimmers perfecting their strokes and dives, the coaches were giving their advice and helping the swimmers, and the pool was absolutely huge! 'You have to swim in that? Yeah, good luck.' I rolled my eyes at the voice's snarky remark. "It's pretty overwhelming isn't it?" I turned my head and was met with those all too familiar ocean blue eyes. Lucas smiles softly at me and how he looked was... 'Awoo!' He looked like he had just gotten out of the pool, his hair was a wet and pushed back out of his face. His body was exposed and dripping with water. 'Adelina! Focus!' For once I was glad the voice had yelled at me.

I shook my head a bit and replied, "I have no idea if I can do this.." I rubbed my arm and looked back at the many swimmers who were bound to judge me in a few minutes. "Hey," Lucas gently tilted my chin so I was looking at him again, "You'll do great baby. I know you will" Lucas was always quick to make me feel better, this time I couldn't help but smile at him.

"Thanks Lucas." He nods then takes a step back. "Alright, so here's how tryouts work for the swim team: You'll be timed as you swim the front crawl stroke for 100 meters. You have to beat the base time of one minute." Lucas had crossed his arms and scanned me for a reaction.

'Is he joking?' The voice had asked me. 'No no no, he looks plenty serious.' Here comes another freak-out in...

3...

2...

1...

"One minute for 100 meters??" I had bursted out to Lucas. He looked taken aback. "L-l-lucas.. I-I c-can't do t-this.. T-there's no w-way I c-can beat t-t-the b-base time!" I held my hands together to stop them from shaking. "W-what if I mess u-up the dive? What i-if I don't g-get air? What if I time my strokes wrong? What if I run into a wall??" I looked at Lucas on the verge of tears.

"Run into a wall?" He sighed and shook his head. "You're putting too much thought into this." Lucas carefully grabs me by my waist and pulls me into a hug. I close my eyes and hug Lucas back. 'I feel safe here.' I smiled to myself. "Do you feel better?" Lucas looked down at me and gently moved some loose strands out of my face. "Yeah, I feel a bit better. I think I'm ready to start."

I smiled at Lucas as he took my hand and led me over to the coaches. One of them had blown their whistle, and every swimmer had stopped what they were doing and formed a circle around us. 'Watch this secretly be a cult or something.' Now was really not the time for the voice to be popping in! One of the coaches stepped up to me, he had his arms crossed over his chest and looked at me with judgement. I've seen this coach before at Lucas' swim meets, he's always yelling at the swimmers. I think he's the head coach.

"Show us what you got, Jacobs." The coach nods his head towards a lane. I look over at the water, then at two swimmers who are setting up the clock to time me. With a deep breath, I turn to Lucas and take off my bracelet. "Can you watch this for me?" I grab Lucas' hand and place my bracelet into his palm. He closed his hand around it and smiled softly at me. "I won't let it go." With that, I turn and walk over to the lane, putting on my goggles and stepping up to the starting block. I waited for some kind of signal to get ready to swim. "Take your mark." The second coach held up her whistle to her lips. I bent down and grabbed the edge of the block with my shaking hands. For what felt like hours, the second coach finally blew her whistle and at the sound I dove into the water.

The cold shock from the water made me feel the adrenaline rush instantly. I moved my legs into a dolphin kick until I broke the surface of the water. Once I did, I started pumping my arms and legs into over time to swim the front crawl. My heart was racing and my mind was out of focus, my breaths came in shallow. I had almost no air, but that didn't stop me from swimming faster. I had reached the other wall and copied the flip turn so many swimmers have done before. I pushed my body to go faster, my lungs feeling like they're about to burst. I saw the wall I had started on and pushed myself to go faster. As soon as I touched the wall, I picked my head up out of the water and taken several deep breaths. As I stood in the water relishing the feeling of being able to breathe again, I see the swimmers looking at me with astonished expressions.

"Adelina." Lucas had the exact same expression everyone else did as he pointed at the timer. My eyes followed the direction his finger was pointing and my eyes landed on the bright numbers: 43.27. I had swam 100 meters in 43 seconds. Lucas' time for the same thing I did was 32 seconds, I had finished 11 seconds behind him. Which means, I qualify for the team. I slowly climbed out of the water and wearily stood in front of everyone as they stared at me in dead silence.

"She did it!" Someone has shouted, and with that the whole team had erupted with praises and congratulations. "Babes! You're on the team!" Lucas was beaming, so was I. We hugged each other tightly as the coaches walked over to us. The team had quieted down and watched the head coach as he smiled at me.

"Very impressive swimming, Jacobs." The second coach walked back to him and handed him a jacket, which he then handed to me. I looked at the black and white jacket and traced my fingers over the gold lining while admiring the school's logo that glimmered on the jacket: the side profile of a lion roaring. "Adelina Jacobs, welcome to the Lion Hills High School swim team." The head coach had announced, and soon everyone had swarmed me and started asking me questions to get to know me. 'This is team bonding? It's a bit hectic.' The voice in my head stated, but I didn't mind the fact that my new teammates wanted to get to know me. The coaches had dismissed the team for the rest of the day, so everyone went back to the locker rooms to go home.

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"Adelina!" I turned around and saw Lucas running towards me. I jogged over to meet with him as he stood in front of me. "Did you forget something?" I looked at him confused as Lucas grabbed my wrist and put my bracelet back on me. I looked at my wrist and smiled as I saw my shiny pendants.

"My lucky charm! I can't believe I almost forgot about it, " I looked at Lucas and hugged him, "Thank you for keeping it safe." Lucas hugged me back and I was met with his familiar and comforting warmth, "I told you I wouldn't let it go." A car pulled up beside us and we both look at it. "My mom's here." I let go of Lucas and pick up my bag. "Thanks for helping me today." I smiled softly at him then gave him a quick kiss before getting into the passenger's seat of my mom's car. Lucas smiled and waved at us as we began the drive home.

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It's been hours since my tryouts ended, and my muscles were so worn out and aching in pain. My parents were about as happy as I was when I told them that I had made the swim team. After a few hours of doing homework, I was finally ready for bed. I walked over to my bed and crawled underneath my covers, nuzzling into my pillow, excited to get some sleep. As I closed my eyes however, my mind kept racing with thoughts I couldn't grasp and something felt wrong. I sat up and hid my face in the palms of my hands.

"No use.." The ONE TIME I wanted to go to sleep early and I just didn't. Typical teenage problems. Then, I heard something hit my window. Alerted, I looked over at my window and saw the silhouette of a person. "Babes." The shadow figure waved at me. I rolled my eyes and got out of my bed to let Lucas in. "Dude, what are you doing? You're sneaking in through my window now?" I opened my window and took a step back to let Lucas into my room. As soon as he climbed in, he held my waist and kissed me deeply. Without any hesitation, I kissed him back just as deeply. We moved to my bed and continued to kiss. Everything around me was fading again, and this time I didn't stop it.

It was nightfall when he came.