My alarm clock wakes me the next morning and I groan with the effort of opening my eyes, and then wince at the light. It feels like someone is stabbing my temples with a knife, and my mouth is filled with cat hairballs. When I sit up, the room spins, and I’m so dizzy, I fall back on my pillow.

A moment later, I hear Beatrice muttering something, but I can’t focus. She hands me a cup of water and ibuprofen, and this time, I sit up as slowly as possible in order to toss back the pills and swallow the drink.

She helps me into standing. “Your alarm was going off for ten minutes. I came in here to shut it off,” she explains, her eyes sweeping over me. “Kick, I don’t think you can go to the meet like this. We have to leave for the pool in ten minutes.” She glances at her watch.

I just shake my head and go to the bathroom. I don’t trust my throat to work to form words. Even with a sip of water, it feels like a rusty pipe. As I sit on the toilet to pee, I notice how sensitive my vagina is, like I had sex, rough sex. Vague memories from last night come back to assault me and I finish peeing just in time to get off, turn around, and throw up in the bowl. I have a stomach of rocks when it comes to drinking. This is from something else entirely. Disgust.

Oh, God.

Bea asks if I’m okay from the other side of the door, and when I don’t answer right away, she peeks her head in. I wave her away. “I’m coming,” I croak out. “I’ll be ready in ten minutes.”

She watches me warily, probably wondering whether to try talk me out of it. I can’t be alone right now. I need the pool. I need to be near my teammates, my sister. I need distraction. She must find her answer from my look of desperation because she nods and turns away.

After brushing my teeth and doing a few rounds of mouthwash, I go through the motions of pulling on team sweatpants, a tee shirt, a hoodie. All my stuff for the meet is in my locker at the pool, so I don’t need to think too hard. I do realize I forgot a bra as I walk downstairs, but whatever.

Bea doesn’t say anything as we walk to her car. We usually walk to the pool, but I’m thankful she makes the unilateral decision not to exert the extra energy.

“Kick, you okay?” she asks when I immediately shut off the radio that blares with her turning of the ignition.

“Nope,” I answer simply. I mean, it’s obvious, right?

“I heard you come back. It was only a few hours ago.”

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to wake you.”

“That’s not why I brought it up. Although it did sound like you were crashing around. You fell going up the stairs. I got you into bed.” She speaks quietly, and I’m thankful for her even tone. There’s no condemnation there, just an explanation. My mind hasn’t played reels from that portion of the night, and by then I might have been blacked out.

All I can do is whisper, “Thank you.”

The rest of the morning is easily one of the worst of my life. I’m thankful to be in the water, at the pool, but I can barely get through the laps, let alone actually race or try to go hard. Just diving off the blocks and doing flip turns makes my head spin.

I deserve it, of course. I don’t deserve to be here, at the meet, swimming on the A relay of one of the best teams in the nation. There’s no way everyone doesn’t know I’m fucked up right now. I feel like I’m practically zig-zagging down the lanes. I wonder vaguely if I’ll get kicked off the team for showing up to a meet like this. I’ve been in less than ideal shape for many Saturday morning practices over the years, but this brings my lack of discipline to a new level. Maybe I should just do everyone a favor and quit already.

But sometimes it feels like all I really have holding me together is swimming. It’s the one thing that doesn’t make me a complete loser. A failure. A run of the mill party girl with nothing more to offer than a pretty face. I’d really be nothing if I quit.

Shay knows something is up, of course. After the meet, she wants to talk to me. But I can’t. I don’t know how to explain any of this. I’m not even entirely sure what happened. Well, maybe I am, but if I say it aloud it will be real, and if it’s real… I can’t handle it. My own stupidity got me here. Shay won’t tell me “I told you so,” but she should. Everyone should. I deserve this.