The Winning Stroke Read Free Page B

around in a
     stinky old swimming pool.
    “Forty-eight, forty-nine, fifty! Done!”
    He'd finished the last exercise. The pool was still empty. None of the members of the swim team had arrived for their practice
     yet. He was all alone in this big space, surrounded by the tiled walls, the wooden seats, the sunken lights, and the cool,
     green water. All he had left was his swimming laps.
    As he swam up and down the pool in his usual lazy crawl, his arm muscles started to loosen up. His leg still hurt a bit, but
     it wasn't as bad as Monday. By the time he'd done four laps, he was feeling much better. And he was no longer alone. Several
     others were parting the waves in different lanes.
    As Jerry pulled himself out of the water, he wondered if these swimmers felt like part of a team. Sure, they had uniforms
     and a great coach, but it wasn't the same thing as running out on the field with eight other guys at the start of the game.
     And warm-ups in baseball meant throwing the ball around with your teammates, not plowing through the water in your own lane.
     You won a game because your team worked like a well-oiled machine, each player doing his part. In swimming, the team members
     competed against one another!
    Still, as Jerry toweled off, he could feel a kind of team spirit float over the water.
    Yeah, but it's weird, Jerry thought. Why would anyone choose this sport over baseball or another team sport?
    That got him thinking about baseball tryouts. They'd be starting any day now. He might not be able to join the team right
     away. But even Doc Gold had said he should be able to play later in the season. Maybe he could pinch-hit or fill in if someone
     got sick.
    Jerry tried to push the image of himself sitting onthe bench as far from his mind as possible. It was too painful to imagine waiting in vain for someone on the team to drop
     out.
    “Hey, you're becoming a regular swimming fan!” The voice at his elbow startled him out of his gloomy thoughts.
    “Well, I can't really play baseball yet,” he said. “It helps pass time.”
    “You ought to think about swimming,” said Tanya. “I saw you doing your laps. You're not all that bad.”
    “Laps? Oh, you mean my therapy.”
    “Whatever you call it, I've seen worse,” she said.
    “Yeah, well, I'll stick to my exercises,” he said. “That's what's going to get my leg back in shape so I can play baseball.”
    But that Friday, after he had whipped through his routine exercises, he found himself looking forward to swimming his laps.
    Coach Fulton came by and watched him do the first two runs back and forth. “Let's put a little more zip into it,” he called.
     “Get that blood circulating!”
    Jerry tried to swim harder, but he didn't manage to go any faster.
    When he climbed out of the pool, the coach wasgone. He knew that there was another half hour before practice because he had checked the schedule outside the coach's office.
     As usual, a few early birds had arrived and started their warm-up on the other side of the pool. Tanya was one of them. She
     left a group of girls and came over to talk to him.
    “Not bad,” she said. “Until the coach yelled at you and you choked.”
    Despite the coolness of the water, Jerry's face burned.
    “I didn't choke,” he protested.
    “Yes, you did,” she said matter-of-factly. “You tried too hard and you got sloppy. I do it all the time. Everyone does. But
     I'm getting better.”
    “I can see,” he said.
    “You know what would really help me?”
    “What?” he asked.
    “If someone would swim with me when I do my extra practice,” she said. “I hate doing it alone. It feels strange being all
     by myself in the pool — not like competition. What do you think? Would you mind helping me out?”
    “Me? Swim with you?”
    “I'm not asking you to jump blindfolded off thehigh diving board,” she said. She took off her bathing cap and shook out her short blonde hair. “I'll just come by at the
     end of your